The Works of Lord Byron Volume IV Part 8

XVI.

For thee, my own sweet sister, in thy heart I know myself secure, as thou in mine; We were and are--I am, even as thou art--[am]

Beings who ne'er each other can resign; It is the same, together or apart, From Life's commencement to its slow decline We are entwined--let Death come slow or fast,[an]

The tie which bound the first endures the last!

[First published, _Letters and Journals,_ 1830, ii. 38-41.]

LINES ON HEARING THAT LADY BYRON WAS ILL.[91]

And thou wert sad--yet I was not with thee; And thou wert sick, and yet I was not near; Methought that Joy and Health alone could be Where I was _not_--and pain and sorrow here!

And is it thus?--it is as I foretold, And shall be more so; for the mind recoils Upon itself, and the wrecked heart lies cold, While Heaviness collects the shattered spoils.

It is not in the storm nor in the strife We feel benumbed, and wish to be no more, But in the after-silence on the sh.o.r.e, When all is lost, except a little life.

I am too well avenged!--but 'twas my right; Whate'er my sins might be, _thou_ wert not sent To be the Nemesis who should requite--[92]

Nor did Heaven choose so near an instrument.

Mercy is for the merciful!--if thou Hast been of such, 'twill be accorded now.

Thy nights are banished from the realms of sleep:--[93]

Yes! they may flatter thee, but thou shall feel A hollow agony which will not heal, For thou art pillowed on a curse too deep; Thou hast sown in my sorrow, and must reap The bitter harvest in a woe as real!

I have had many foes, but none like thee; For 'gainst the rest myself I could defend, And be avenged, or turn them into friend; But thou in safe implacability Hadst nought to dread--in thy own weakness shielded, And in my love, which hath but too much yielded, And spared, for thy sake, some I should not spare; And thus upon the world--trust in thy truth, And the wild fame of my ungoverned youth-- On things that were not, and on things that are-- Even upon such a basis hast thou built A monument, whose cement hath been guilt!

The moral Clytemnestra of thy lord,[94]

And hewed down, with an unsuspected sword, Fame, peace, and hope--and all the better life Which, but for this cold treason of thy heart, Might still have risen from out the grave of strife, And found a n.o.bler duty than to part.

But of thy virtues didst thou make a vice, Trafficking with them in a purpose cold, For present anger, and for future gold-- And buying others' grief at any price.[95]

And thus once entered into crooked ways, The early truth, which was thy proper praise,[96]

Did not still walk beside thee--but at times, And with a breast unknowing its own crimes, Deceit, averments incompatible, Equivocations, and the thoughts which dwell In Ja.n.u.s-spirits--the significant eye Which learns to lie with silence--the pretext[97]

Of prudence, with advantages annexed-- The acquiescence in all things which tend, No matter how, to the desired end-- All found a place in thy philosophy.

The means were worthy, and the end is won-- I would not do by thee as thou hast done!

_September, 1816._

[First published, _New Monthly Magazine_, August, 1832, vol. x.x.xv. pp.

142, 143.]

FOOTNOTES:

[35] {33}[Compare--

"Come, blessed barrier between day and day."

[36] [Compare--

"...the night's dismay Saddened and stunned the coming day."

_The Pains of Sleep_, lines 33, 34, by S. T. Coleridge, _Poetical Works_, 1893, p. 170.]

[37] {34}[Compare _Childe Harold_, Canto III. stanza vi. lines 1-4, note, _Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 219.]

[38] [Compare--

"With us acts are exempt from time, and we Can crowd eternity into an hour."

_Cain_, act i. sc. 1]

[i] {35}

----_she was his sight,_ _For never did he turn his glance until_ _Her own had led by gazing on an object._--[MS.]

[39] {35}[Compare--

"Thou art my life, my love, my heart, The very eyes of me."

_To Anthea, etc._, by Robert Herrick.]

[40] [Compare--

"...the river of your love, Must in the ocean of your affection To me, be swallowed up."

Ma.s.singer's _Unnatural Combat_, act iii. sc. 4.]

[41] [Compare--

"The hot blood ebbed and flowed again."

_Parisina_, line 226, _Poetical Works_, 1900, iii. 515.]

[42] ["Annesley Lordship is owned by Miss Chaworth, a minor heiress of the Chaworth family."--Throsby's _Thoroton's History of Nottinghamshire_, 1797, ii. 270.]

[43] ["Moore, commenting on this (_Life_, p. 28), tells us that the image of the lover's steed was suggested by the Nottingham race-ground ... nine miles off, and ... lying in a hollow, and totally hidden from view.... Mary Chaworth, in fact, was looking for her lover's steed along the road as it winds up the common from Hucknall."-"A Byronian Ramble,"

_Athenaeum_, No. 357, August 30, 1834.]

[44] {36}[Moore (_Life_, p. 28) regards "the antique oratory," as a poetical equivalent for Annesley Hall; but _vide ante_, the Introduction to _The Dream_, p. 31.]

[45] [Compare--

"Love by the object loved is soon discerned."

_Story of Rimini_, by Leigh Hunt, Canto III. ed. 1844, p. 22.

The line does not occur in the first edition, published early in 1816, or, presumably, in the MS. read by Byron in the preceding year. (See Letter to Murray, November 4, 1815.)]

[46] {37}[Byron once again revisited Annesley Hall in the autumn of 1808 (see his lines, "Well, thou art happy," and "To a Lady," etc., _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 277, 282, note 1); but it is possible that he avoided the "ma.s.sy gate" ("arched over and surmounted by a clock and cupola") of set purpose, and entered by another way. He would not lightly or gladly have taken a liberty with the actual prosaic facts in a matter which so nearly concerned his personal emotions (_vide ante_, the Introduction to _The Dream_, p. 31).]