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Ranolf and Amohia

Canto the Twenty-fifth

page 455

Canto the Twenty-fifth.

I.

Depart then, Ranolf! leave to Grief and Time
The task to cleave out, in some other clime
Less fraught with frenzied thoughts, their ends sublime!
Even Sorrow could not here its fruits mature—
Not here—nor now; for Change and Time, be sure,
Are needed to assist it in its Art
Of Soul-Tuition. This by theory too,
Though spurning now the power of both, he knew;
And felt his only course was to depart.
The land seemed loathsome to his laden heart;
Sick—sick he was; aweary of the skies:
The Mountains seemed to look him in the face—
Cold—calm and sullen, conscious of his woe;
Each shrub and tree that once had charmed him so,
Turned wormwood with the thoughts it bade him trace:
And every River rolled before his eyes,
A Mara-flood of bitterest memories.

When the first shock of Amo's death was o'er,
And he could rouse himself to act once more,
With but one lad his light effects to bear,
He started for some Northwest harbour, where
Vessels that haunt these latitudes repair.
page 456 A Ship he sought; but cared not whence it came,
Or whither bound: to him it was the same,
So that away, far distant, he were borne:
All lands seemed now of all attractions shorn!
Perhaps, as most deserted and forlorn.
The barren, dreary, ever-restless Sea,
Would to his desolate Soul most soothing be.

His road was nearly that which Amo chose,
In search self-ruinous of ruthless foes;
Nor that he sought with conscious aim the more
To take that path because 'twas her's before:
His unresigning anguish could not crave
To see, or seek for solace at her grave;
Herself—herself! the vain demand—nought less—
His greedy grief insatiable would press;
Not any maddening circumstance or scene
To rouse remembrances of what had been—
Too prompt already, manifold and keen!
Yet haply he was guided on the whole,
By that attraction of his secret soul;
A bias, though unconsciously, obeyed,
Towards even the shadow of that loved one's shade—
Towards any place her sweetest presence still
With haunting fondness sadly seemed to fill.

When near the coast, they told him of a Ship
Whose Master would ere long his anchor trip;
For three years' chase of his gigantic game,
Run down o'er boundless Ocean hunting-grounds,
With hardy boats'-crews for his well-trained hounds—
In that most venturous, gravest, grandest Sport
Which makes all others seem contracted—tame—
page 457 Had now his Ship with ample produce stored.
And so he was about to leave the Port—
Wood—water—fresh provisions all on board—
And cut his boisterous crew's rude revels short.

II.

Sad, weary, listless, and alone—
For nought companionship had cheered—
"Twas Ranolf's habit through the day
To take his solitary way,
Letting Te Manu choose his own.
Before him now the Port appeared:
There—with dim spire of masts and shrouds,
And yards across like streaky clouds,—
The Ship he sought at anchor lay.
Crowning a cliff that overslooped
The sea—whence trees o'erhanging drooped,
The village stood the Wanderer neared.
With rows of posts, unequal, high,—
That level crest against the sky
Was bristling; and within them grouped,
Thick thatch-roofs nestled peacefully.

Woeworn and weary, then he went
Thoughtfully up the steep ascent;
And passed the log, rough-hewn and laid
For bridge across the empty fosse;
And paused before the opening made
For entrance in the palisade.
He looked around; upon the spot
He saw no living being stirred:
Fast-closed was every silent cot;
The sun was shining, high and hot—
page 458 A lingering summer afternoon;
Faint insects hummed a drowsy tune
At times—no other sound was heard.

In doubt what course he should pursue,
On sad and gloomy thoughts intent,
With folded arms and head downbent,
Against an entrance-post he leant.
Not far below, there hung in view
That immemorial red-blue gleam
Of world-embracing Ocean-fame—
The flag that long shall float supreme,
Let all of English blood and name
Be to each other staunch and true!
Ah, with what sense of proud delight,
So long unseen, a short time back
That flag had flashed upon his sight!
But now it bade his memory track
The train of evils that had come
Out of that longing for his home.
Well might his heart so busied, feed
On bitter anguish; well might bleed
Remembering why he shunned to share
That home with her! He could not bear
Nor blink the truth, the cause, to-day—
Contemptible and coward care
Of what 'the World' might think or say-
That blatant—brainless—soul-less World!
Ah with what scorn he would have hurled
Such pitiful respect away,
Had one more chance been given to prove
How much he prized that priceless love!
page 459 O but one chance—giv'n then and there
The 'World' and all its slaves to dare!
With measureless defiance brave
Its worthless worst rebukes, and save
A heart, so simply grand, beside
Its poor conventions, paltry pride;
Refined frivolities—and cant,
The natural course, or worse, the want
Of real emotions, framed to hide!—
Aye! but too late that wisdom came;
The shame, too late, of that mean shame;
Remorse, and withering self-disdain,
Too late and impotent and vain!
There was nought left him hut to rave
With voiceless, useless, inward pain.
His trust in higher things was gone—
His 'Power Divine'—his 'God of good,'
What faith in Him could he retain!
It seemed to his despairing mood,
Faith could not, should not, live alone
When Hope and happiness had flown.

On such distressful thoughts intent,
Against that entrance-post he leant.
Forlorn alike to eye and ear
Seemed time and place and atmosphere!
With wearying, bright unchanging glow,
The calm, regardless sunbeams shone;
With wearying faintly-changeful flow
The insects' tune went murmuring on;
No sign of living thing beside;
Not even a dog's out-wearied howl;—
Yes—once his listless eye espied
page 460 Scarce noting it, a sleepy fowl
Ruffling its feathers in the dust;
Companionless—the moping bird,
Stalking and pecking leisurely
Beneath a cottage wall, went by;
No longer were its mutterings heard.
Yes—once a rat, in open day
Stole forth, and crossed at easy pace
The silent solitary place;
Stopped often, shewing no distrust
Nor any haste to slink away.
It too had vanished. Still fast-shut,
In sunshine stood each silent hut:
And dark, distinct, beside it lay
Its shadow still—no cloudlet slow
Passing, to make it come or go—
Unfading—seeming changeless too
As if it neither moved nor grew,
That lingering, loitering afternoon.
Then even the murmuring, dreamy tune,
That now would swell and now subside,
Awhile in utter silence died.

Fair Reader! have you ever been
Sauntering in meditative mood,
In some sequestered sunny scene,
Some perfect solitude serene,
Where tenantless a building stood—
Old ruined Castle, if you will—
Neglected Hall of recent days,
page 461 Though fit for habitation still,
Long empty;—any place almost
Where human beings once have dwelt
And ceased to dwell;—but if your gaze,
On such deserted Mansion lone
Were fixed awhile, will you not own
How strong a fancy you have felt,
That some still human visage—ghost
Or not—through one blank window, less
Observed—or loophole's high recess—
With eyes in vague abstraction lost,
Not marking, minding you at all—
Was looking out?—Did you not feel
As if you saw or soon would see,
A lonely Figure, silently,
With features, haply, undiscerned
Because its back towards you was turned,
Across some empty courtyard steal—
Or glide bcneath some ruined wall?—

As Ranolf leant there so distrest.
Once, with a writhe of ill-represt
Impatient anguish, at the tide
Of keen regrets which o'er his breast—
Remorseful, merciless, upheld
By that full moon of memory, swelled—
As wearily his head he raised,
His glance unconscious chanced to rest
Upon a distant cot—whose side
Of close-packed wisps of bulrush dried,
page 462 Stood half in brightness—half in gloom;
The sunbeam's glow still bright below—
Its upper part, in clear deep shade,
Beneath some palm-trees' tufts of bloom,
With a square opening in it, made
For light—a window though unglazed;
And suddenly he seemed aware
A wan pale face—how wan and fair,
Was in the square of blackness there,
With eyes unmoving—eyes all light—
So preternaturally bright—
Haggardly beautiful!—Amazed,
His very heart turned sick and faint;
Almost he could have fallen with fear—
That Spirit from the Dead—so near!
He rallied quickly; for he knew
How fancy can send back again,
Some image from the heated brain,
And on the retina repaint
Such apparitions, till they seem
External, actual, and no dream.
He passed his hand, across his eyes;
Sprang forward; shook himself to free
His fancy from such phantasies,
His brain from this delusion. There,
Framed in the blackness of that square,
Still shewed the visage, haggard, fair,
And would not vanish into air!—
And then it changed before his sight;
A sudden gleam of wild delight
Illumed it; the next moment checked,
As from the Vision seemed to come
A shriek that died off in a moan—
page 463 Painful, unnatural—as the lone
Wrung from the wretched deaf and dumb
Whom sudden pangs of passion stir.
Then to the hut—for nought lie recked—
"What could it be?" he thought, "but her!"
He would have rushed; but yet once more
Those earnest gestures—looks—deter;
So vehemently they implore,
So unmistakably entreat
Silence—and that he should not greet—
Heed—recognise the vision then.
For the same moment might be seen
Behind him, close upon the fence,
What stifled as it ruse, that keen
Great cry of joy or pain intense;—
The inmates of the village—men
And women and a merry crowd
Of children; all with laughter loud
Returning from the plot where they
Within the woods not far away
Had been at pleasant work all day.

III.

With lips comprest—clenched hand—knit brow—
By violent effort he restrained
Emotions nigh o'ermastering now.
He turned—accosted them—explained
In terms he scarce knew what, but brief,
To one who seemed to be their Chief
Why he had come to that seaport.
At once they knew their guest unknown
Must be, from bearing, mien and tone,
page 464 Though roughly drest and travel-stained,
A "Rangatira" *—of the sort
Who paid for all attentions shewn:
So to his use a cot assigned;
Brought food; and as he seemed inclined
For little converse, or to care
About themselves or ways; or share
The interest newer comers take
In all that might the curious wake
To wonder; but appeared to be
Absorbed in troubles of his own:
They soon with truest courtesy
Left him to his reflections lone.

And all that evening, in a maze
He seemed: a sort of luminous haze
Of anxious, wondering, strange delight
Moved with him, move where'er he might:
Nor could he lie, or sit, or stand,
Or many moments keep at rest,
Howe'er he strove at self-command.
He closed his eyes—his temples pressed;—
That light, fur all his efforts vain
Still Werecl o'er his haunted brain:
And once, in this his feverish fret,
He checked himself in looking round
As half expectant he would yet
See, though long since the sun had set,
His shadow fall upon the ground.
And oft he tried if he could still
By strong exertion of the will
page 465 Make that fair, haggard vision rise
Again, and stand before his eyes
With such a sharp external show
Of life, and every feature, so
Distinct in joy, surprise, or woe!
That face, so sweet, though so careworn,
And of its brilliant beauty shorn;
The hollow cheek; the shrunken hand;
And the too delicate finger laid
Upon the faded lips; and grand
All wonder, joy, or woe above—
That deep unfathomable love
In eyes whose brightness could not fade!
Yes! he could shape them in his mind;
But overjoyed was he to find
No yearning made the illusion dear
As real or outward reappear.

IV.

Night came at last; at last ev'n midnight came.
How wearily the hours for Ranolf passed—
On tenterhooks of expectation cast—
Such incomplete and tantalising joy!
But even the noisy natives sunk at last
To rest—the earlier for their day's employ.
The flittings to and fro, from hut to hut,
Ceased by degrees, and every door was shut;
The laughter loud and lazy chat were o'er;
The smouldering firesticks on each earthen floor
Had for the last time been together raked,
And blown with lips far-pouted, to a flame;
The last pipe smoked; and the consuming thirst
For gossip haply for the moment slaked.
page 466 The large-limbed lounging men upon the ground,
Naked whene'er the heat too great was found;
And every active, restless, wrinkled dame,—
Crowded in some convenient house at first,
Had to their separate homes retired to sleep;
And all the 'pah' was wrapt in silence deep.

Then Ranolf, with a quicker-throbbing heart,
Watched in the cot consigned to him apart;
With door ajar, and sharp attentive ear
Watched—listened for the faint delicious sound—
The footstep that he felt must now be near.—
A rustle … No?—'twas fancy!—then more clear
Another!—'Tis herself! with that wan face,
Locked in his almost fiercely fond embrace!—
Yes, 'tis herself! and never, come what may,
Shall she be torn from that fond heart away!
And She—into his arms herself she flung
With what a burst of passionate sobs! and hung
Upon his neck with moans of happiness;
And felt once more his vehement caress,
With what an ecstacy of soothing tears!
And revelled in the burning kiss on kiss,
With such intense relief from doubts and tears;
Such sense of infinite agony supprest.
Swallowed, like night in lightning-sheets—in this,
This full fruition of exceeding bliss—
As if upon the heaven of that breast
Her soul had reached its everlasting rest!

But when the Sea of their emotion's ran
In less tumultuous billows, and began
In gentler agitation to subside,
page 467 So that clear Thought and Speech articulate
Above the tide unwrecked could ride;
Then Ranolf, holding at arms' length awhile
His new-found treasure, his recovered bride,
Gazes with mournful gladness in his smile—
Gazes with fond and pitying tenderness—
At those thin pallid features, which the weight
And anguish of despair no more depress—
Into those eyes which happy tears beteem—
As to make sure it was not all a dream!

"No Spirit then!—my own
Own Amo, loving and alive again!
O God! can such delight indeed be mine!"—

"No Spirit—no—nor dead; but with the pain
To lose thy love; and thought of that alone
Would kill me any time—"

"Then never think
The thought; the thing itself, my dearest, best.
Shall never be a grief of thine!"

"What! you will never be distrest
For want of all that sunset-tinted snow
And hair, such as the moonbeams link …
What was it?"
"Amo!—"
"Nay, then nay—
Not that upbraiding look to-day!
See! O'er these dear, dear features, worn with care,
page 468 See, see! my murmuring lips must stray
With flying faint hair-kisses, so
To brush all that reproach away!
No, I will never doubt again—
Do not these features, pale with grief,
Do they not say ray Stranger-Chief
My lord, my life, will never choose
His poor wild maiden's love to lose?—
But how then could you be so sad
When I was with you?"

"I was mad—
An idiot, dearest! just to shun
A small misfortune, so to run
The risk of that o'erwhelming one
By which I were indeed undone!—
But small and great shall soon be o'er,
And neither shall afflict us more,
If you will leave this land with me,
And dare to cross yon starlit sea!"

"What is to me land, sea, or sky
So that with you, I live and die!"—

Then soon a plan for their escape
Was moulded into practicable shape:
Only the pressing, first, immediate need
Was that before these natives they should be
Absolute strangers, nor each other heed.
This need did Amo when she first caught sight
Of Ranolf, feel—this, somehow could foresee;
And this perception made her first wild cry,
page 469 That sudden cry of wonder and delíght
Die off in such a strange unmeaning moan.

V.

But she had told ere this, the how and why
She had been saved, and now was here alone;
How it was true, by that wild freshet's force
She was whirled down till consciousness was gone;
And soon upon a gravel-bank was thrown.
How a chance Traveller saw the seeming corse;
Apprised these natives; and observed them bear
The breathless body home with sorrowing care,
Home to their huts hard-by; then went his way,
Thinking her dead; that nought required his stay;
And anxious by no loss of time to lose
The importance, well he knew, none would refuse
To the first bearer of such startling news.
But those good Women, in the senseless Form
They carried, saw or felt there yet might lurk
Some faintest spark of life; so set to work
Its embers to re-waken and re-warm;
Made fires; applied hot stones, and rubbed her feet
And hands and heart with toil incessant; poured
Down her unconscious throat for greater heat
Some of the white man's liquid fire; implored
With moaned and murmured incantations meet
The Water-God and Storm-God; till at length
Her feeble fluttering pulse began to beat;
And that suspended current in her veins
To run, and rack her, as it gathered strength,
And prick with tingling tortures, pangs and pains,
Far worse than any she in drowning felt.
So with their patient patiently they dealt,
page 470 And charmed and chafed her till to life restored.
But with her life her first resolve returned;
And in her recklessness she let them know
The scheme which to accomplish still she burned,
To yield herself, ere he could strike a blow,
To save her people, to her people's foe.
How she repented soon that she had told
Her secret: for the Chief, of no great name
Or note, and doubtless of as little worth,
"Who ruled this petty village, stood,
With that marauding magnate of the North,—
Though some remote connexion he could claim,
So she was told, by marriage or by blood—
On terms of doubtful amity; and hence
The crafty schemer was too glad to seize
An opportunity like this to please
The mightier potentate; so forthwith hatched
A plan—to feign he could not trust her tale;
And hold her captive, on the false pretence
He did so to secure her without fail
For the great Chief, until the last couid say
What was his will about her: then dispatched
A trusty messenger that will to learn;
And issued strict commands, till his return
Her every movement should be closely watched,
Nor she permitted from the pah to stray.
And thus the great man's favour would be won;
Besides that, for such shining sen-ice done,
A splendid claim, he reckoned, would arise
For 'utu'—compensation or reward,
The other could not fail to recognise.
But she, determined not to be debarred
From fully working out her first intent,
page 471 To put both Chief and people off their guard,
Affected in this plan to acquiesce;
Resolved whene'er their watchfulness grew less,
As finding 'twas but trouble vainly spent,
She would escape; her lonely road resume;
Self-guided seek her self-inflicted doom;
The merit of her sacrifice retain,
And greater power o'er proud Pomarë gain.
So at the village patiently she stayed;
Till all their first suspicions were allayed;
About her ways it seemed they little cared;
And she had everything for flight prepared:
Nay, would that very night, unseen, unknown,
Upon her errand of despair have flown;
Rushed on the fate she loathed, yet would have braved
Had she not been, by gift of all she craved,
This blest return of his affection, saved.

VI.

So, parting ere the dawn, with life renewed,
The plan concerted, calmly they pursued.
Two days they passed, eventless and serene,
Each by the other seemingly unseen;
Or in what intercourse they chanced to hold
Making a mock indifference, forced and cold,
Their fervid interest in each other screen.
In sad regards dissembling deep delight,
Impassioned, with how passionless a mien,
They crossed each other's path! with loving slight,
Hidden half-glances of such dear deceit—
Unrecognising recognition sly and sweet!
page 472 Then Ranolf to his hosts kind farewell bade;
Much to their grief—so handsomely he paid;
Nor seemed to notice Amo was not there
Just at the instant that farewell to share:
Then went on board; and found the busy Ship
With cheery noise of near departure gay;
Sails shaken loose and anchor now atrip,
Waiting the evening hour of ebbing tide;
Worked by the steadiest of the men—a few
Exceptions to the riot-wearied crew—
Who jaded with rude revel, listless lay,
Nor longer to evade their duty tried,
Content at last, or glad, to get away.

Then down the harbour she was seen to glide,
Past the bare windy outer heads sunbright,
The glossy yellowish bluffs—into the blue;
There on the dim expanse, she lingering lay
With slowly changing altitudes, in sight,
As if her stately beauty to display;
Then, dwindling ever in the fading light,
Looked, now a column sloping softly white,
Now ruddy, blushing in the sunset's ray;
Till silently absorbed in growing grey
She vanished—wrapt in close-encircling Night.

VII.

These moving moveless Mountains and still Main,
Had nearly in their unfelt flight again
Slipped from beneath the funnel of deep shade,
For ever shot from our Sun-circling ball,
page 473 Through which we peer into Infinity;—
Those four grand worlds tremendous which we call
A Cross—and their immensity invade
With faiths and fancies of our tiny Star,
Seemed to have turned them in their watch on high,
And changed the side from which to gaze afar
On the dark Pole—the seeming vacant Throne
Of One that Warder bright adored alone!
As in blue Syrian midnights long bygone,
Some jewel-armoured Satrap Damascene,
More from the fevered restlessness inspired
By Love, than with his tedious vigil tired,
Might oft have changed the spot where he would lean
Ami keep his fierce enamoured glances, keen
And glittering as his falchion, rapt and fast
Upon the lattice-screen, whereat at last
His maddening matchless quests—sonic miracle-Queen,
In loveliness and learnedness and loftiness
Of spirit, perfect as that Palmyrene—
But one ecstatic moment might appear,
Zenobia-like—too dazzlingly severe—
And frown a sunrise on the love's excess
Its glory could reward but not repress!—
Beneath the myriad eyes of that still Sky
Cowering, the conscious Ocean seemed to lie,
With faint soft murmuring, finely-wrinkled swell;
As if it scarcely dared to heave or sigh
Beneath the fascination of their spell;—
In brief, dear tortured Reader—it was near
The dawn; and Sea and Sky were calm and clear.

Not far below the Port the Ship had left,
The hills into a little cove were cleft;
page 474 The stony faces of the cliffs thus rent
Showed twisted strata, strangely earthquake-bent,
Running on each side circularly up—
A great grey hollow like a broken cup!
From crest and crevice, tortuously flung
Those monstrous iron-hearted myrtles hung—
Stiff snaky writhing trunks, and roots that clave
And crawled to any hold the ramparts gave.
Below, the level floor of sea-smoothed stone
Was all scooped out and scored by wear and tear
Of tides into round baths, and channels—bare
Or with sea-windflowers, scarlet-ringed, o'ergrown:
And big clay-coloured rocks and boulders,
dropt From mould like hollows in the cliffs above,
Where others like them sticking still, outcropped,
Lay scattered round the margin of the cove.

Look! in the starlit stillness, there and then,
A boat emerging from the gloom appears;
Rowed by four stalwart, darkling, silent, men,
With muffled oars and faintest plash scarce heard;
No sound beside, but the rare muttered word
Of brief command from him who mutelv steers
And keenly round him through the darkness peers.
How cautiously her channelled way she feels,
And towards the rocks above the tide line steals!
There with suspended oars the boatmen wait,
Careful lest even their drip be heard; the Chief
Steps out and listens on the lonely reef;
No sight—no sound of anything that lives—
A 'cooey!' low and cautious, then he gives
See! one of those clay-coloured rocks, descried
Dimly from where, with boathook held, the skiff,
page 475 Lies gently tilting with the lapping tide,
Seems, 'mid its dumb companions 'neath the cliff
With life and motion suddenly endowed!
It rises—swiftly running—leaping o'er
The stony-ribbed and channel-furrowed floor;
See! 'tis a female form—a graceful shape
Not even the clay-hued mats that thickly drape
The head and shoulders, all the figure shroud—
Can wholly hide; and see! as it draws near
And Ranolf ('twas none other) runs to meet
And with glad gesture greet the vision dear,
Beneath the hood—this time no doubtful dream—
Two great delighted sparkling eyes appear—
A wan glad face appears, so wan and sweet,
And kindling with triumphant love supreme!

An ardent pressure of the hand (before
That crew) a whisper of fond cheer—no more;
And in the boat he makes her take her seat;—
"Push off, my lads—look sharp!"—and from the shore
They steal; while she, her trustful heart at last
At peace, albeit from apprehension past
Still fluttering with a somewhat quicker beat,
Crouches by that loved form; and by degrees
With his rude comrades learns to feel at ease,
Confiding in the rough respect she sees
They pay to his sea-knowledge—ready hand—
Firm lip—and eye accustomed to command.
The men 'give way' with vigorous strokes, nor fear
Nor care, who now may see the boat or hear;
With hoisted sail to catch what airs there be,
She soon is gently trampling through the sea.
page 476 The Ship that in the offing, out of sight
Had with scarce flapping canvas hung all night
Becalmed, now as the breeze begins to rise
With topsails backed and filled alternate, lies
About one spot, till o'er the clearing main
The boat returning is descried again;
Then, with her yards braced round, and fair inclined,
She lets them curve out boldly to the wind,
Tacks towards the boat, and soon receives on board
The wondering Maid, to life and love restored!

How all this had been planned need we describe?
That night when Ranolf found the drowned alive;
How he had won, and hardly had to bribe
The bluff Ship-Master's soon-accorded aid;
How unobserved, while for the Ship he stayed,
The neighbouring coast he carefully surveyed
And found a cove whence they could well embark;
How 'twas agreed that Amo should contrive
After the Ship's departure, in the dark,
When towards the morning all were sunk in sleep,
Out of the village secretly to creep,
And to the spot he pointed out repair;
There wait until she saw his boat arrive;
And do the same, as he would—'twas agreed-
If obstacles were met with, and need were-
Night after night, until they should succeed.

VIII.

Then, as some choice and cherished plant,
erewhile A thousand-blossomed wonder and a show-
Camellia or Azalea—one great pile
Of rounded knots of lovely-moulded snow,
page 477 Starring the glistening gloom of dark-green leaves
With such luxuriance in simplicity,
A purity so lavish and so free;—
Or one unbroken broad diaphanous flush
Of delicate flow'rets, luminous and lush
As they were fashioned of the finest blush
Of light, the heart's core of soft summer-eves,
The tenderest recess of sunset, weaves;—-
As such a Plant—if set in hard-bound soil,
Where cutting winds could wither and despoil,
Till cankered leaves and scanty blooms declared
How ill in such environment it fared;
But then again transferred from clay and cold,
To some warm nook of mellow-crumbling mould;
Reviving and re-blooming, would outburst
In all the glory it could boast at first:—
Even thus did Amo, and in days as few
As this in months, her fairest charms renew;
Thus, tooted in the soil of rich Content,
And breathing Love's serenest element.
Recovered fast, elastic and erect—
The sprightliness of form by sorrow checked;
Once more, its supple roundness, sinuous grace,
With slim and slender vigour chastely vied;
Her eyes regained their dancing lights—her face
Its winning frankness—sweet and sunny pride;
Thus did she, brilliant as again a bride,
The shape and hues of happy health resume.
And all her wild magnificence of bloom!

So, with its loving freight, to scenes untold—
As daybreak wrapt her in its rosy fold,
page 478 So—down and down, beneath the horizon's brink—
Hull—sails—and masts—did that lone Vessel sink,
And melt into the flood of morning gold.
The Husband-lover and the lover-Wife
Dipped down into the chequered deep of Life!
So vanished—gliding down the blue hill-slope
Of Ocean into an abyss of Hope;
Plunged deep and deeper, every day that flew
In golden gulf's of bright Expectance—new-
Experience—all of glad and glowing True
Or glorious Seeming, that can soothe and bless
Youth, Fancy, fondest Love, with dreams of Happiness!

IX.

Well then—for this time—Ranolf has escaped
The threatened doom, the shattering blow that might
By that Soul-Sculptor's hammer have been dealt.
Perhaps—who knows?—there was no need to smite:
Perhaps the marble could, with blow more slight
Or shadow of that heavy one, be shaped;
For he was of a nature that delight
Could sooner than despair, refine and melt.
Yet—never doubt it—Life and Time will teach
Him too what they enforce on all and each;
That for all Souls, however richly dowered
With amplest gifts by fate or fortune showered,
Something, where to the full they seem possest,
Will surely seem deficient in the best;
Or those that seem complete, will flit or fade
Long ere the thirst they cause can be allayed;
page 479 As if their only end, undoubted, clear,
Was to make one, old, world-wide Truth appear—
Man ne'er shall find full satisfaction here;
To teach him—bound upon this earthly ball,
The power and practice to renounce them all.

Yes 1 doubt it not; he too in time will glean
A glimpse so far into the mighty Plan,
Into the working of this strange Machine
The Universe; and what mysterious ways
The Wonder-worker takes to solve
The problem he has set himself; to make
His glorious World in one rich round revolve
Of beauty and attractiveness; yet wean
By Good disguised as Evil—helpless Man
Her nursling, from her lovely breast
And bid him from the sleep awake
Wherein contented else he would for ever rest.

X.

Now of his feelings in the after-day,
Of all his findings by Life's varied way,
But little further—little fuller—may
This realistic record sing or say.

First—for the tasks of Life;—whate'er the sphere
Wherein his fleeting forces may be spent
Will he not learn, herein too, Life was lent
But as one stage for our development?—
God's studio is this Earth,
page 480 And we, his pupils, for instruction sent,
Are pottering at our work of little worth
But to attain to faculties that here
Reach no perfection, or at least complete
No works that seem for such perfection meet.
How oft does mastery, even the most assure,
Moral or mental, seem in vain secured!
Our poets—artists—heroes—those
Whose ripening powers or ripened could not fail.
Their transient tools and organs lose,
Oft when their Souls seem fittest to prevail—
Most apt for thoughts or deeds sublime!
As if their lives were but a blossoming time;
They students—and the works they leave,
So far beneath what they conceive,
But tyros' crude essays lo what in vain
Their growing Souls may long indeed
In this life—but in this life are in train
Only in larger—loftier to achieve;
Essaying here, but elsewhere to succeed.
Till not alone the buds of beauty left
By Nature's younger darlings, soon bereft
Of life and lyre—too soon!—a Shelley made
All spirit—nay—frail spirit-tortured flesh,
Self-fevering through false theories, griefs and heats
And phantasms, to pure Spirit; or a Keats,
In senses for a human Soul too fresh
And keen and fine, too dangerously arrayed—
Our young-eyed Cherubim, who like poor bees
Over a citron-blossom lifeless curled,
Not hall their honey gathered for the world,
Died at their sweet vocation—O not these—
Nor the rathe buds of amaranth they seize—
page 481 But roses fully blown; the gorgeous train
Of bright humanities a Shakspcare's brain
Bids into being, deathless and intense,
With hue for hue, and gleam for gleam
Reflecting God's creations till they seem
The double Rainbow's second Arch, in stripe
And stain as lovely as its archetype!—
Even these, to his great Spirit, taken hence
Seem left but like the drooping coronet
Of threaded anthers lunging still around
Some liny nectarine-fruit, green, newly-set;
The poor triumphant relic that once crowned
Its flowering-time incipient, immature;
Just dropping from the fruit that must expand
To golden richness in the radiance pure
Of wider Skies and some diviner Land!

XI.

And as the Will Supreme intends
Life's highest work as means, not ends:
Its joys and pleasures, coarse—refined—
Alike to be renounced—resigned;
Will he not feel at last, and see
The more for every misery,
The rolling seasons as they flee,
To him too, as to all mankind
Full surely will dispense—decree—
That Life itself is meant to be
Held loosely—lightly?—as one day
When he with Amohia gay
Roamed in that earliest bliss of love,
He held upon his open palm
A slender beetle, silver-bright
page 482 Beneath, all pure grass-green above;
And bade her come and look how fair
The dainty creature, 'lighted there,
And running to his finger-tip
To gain a vantage-ground, to slip
Off into air, its native balm;
"So should we hold this Life" he thought,
So watch with interest, deep delight,
The flitting thing with beauty fraught,
Long as it lingers in our sight;—
So let it take, nor e'er repine,
When go it must, its mystic flight,
Into the limitless Divine!"

And he will feel—for such as he,
Of healthy frame and reason free,
Are more than most, secure to feel,
As straight he steers through rocks and shoals.
What haven rests for noble souls!
Yes, he will feel through woe and weal,
The power of Time to soothe and heal;
And tune the Soul to full concent
With its surrounding element.
The wear and tear of right and wrong
Less injure than befriend, the strong;
And cheerful heart and chastened will
Uplift them; and Experience still
Maturing, lends a masters skill,
Life's rich Harmonium-reeds to sound,
Once dumb, or so discordant found;
With easy stop some pain prevent;
With facile touches, lightly thrown,
Give simpler pleasures fuller tone
page 483 And from the ebon-ivory range
Of chequered days and chance and change,
Draw symphonies serene and strange,
Melodious Music of Content.
They gain, like fruits, as ripe they grow,
More sweetness, with a sunnier glow;
Till, mellowing ever, they begin
The faith as very truth to hold—
The best of worlds is that wherein
Is much of Evil, so-called 'Sin';
With active wish and earnestness
To make that 'Sin' and Evil less.
So by degrees to Fate they mould
The Will that seemed so uncontrolled;
And patience comes—and passions cool;
And where they once were ruled, they rule;
Love's wing grows wider—Thought's more bold '.
The iron bonds are turned to gold;
The chafing and restraint are past;
And what were chains at first, are ornaments at last.

XII.

And what if he one day shall see, nor dream—
Though from the Soul's own intimate emotions
It be conceded the profoundest notions
Of the unfathomable unison
Between it and the Universe be won—
What if it grow with gathering years more plain,
That the divine Developer's Life-Scheme
Might yet by Science in her own domain,
The Positive—that euphrasy and rhue,
The mental vision from the mists to purge
Of Speculation beyond Reason's verge—
page 484 Be caught a glimpse of; with no logic-strain,
Transcendent or empiric, or the twain
United, over-subtle for sound brain;
But patient observation, record true
Of all the agencies clear sight may trace
Of Circumstance, beyond its own control
That make and mould each individual Soul
Of myriad myriads of the human race;—
Of all the hints and seeming accidents,
Felicitous and opportune events,
Though slight, so often from without supplied,
The balanced Will that seems so free, to guide;
And be the fountains of a cataract wide
Involving the whole being in its tide;
All that strange Loom of Life that round us plays,
That made the grand old Greek, beyond all praise,
The wisest, bravest, best, of Ancient Days,
Paint it a guardian Angel by his side—
His prescient Diotima piteous-eyed;
All this shall make at last a Science grand
Of Circumstance—no sceptic shall withstand,
Wherein shall be perceived a law and laws,
Not to be gathered from a single mind,
But myriad inner histories combined;
And in the laws, clear purpose, conscious Cause.
What! shall the very Winds of heaven that rise
And sink and run their seeming reckless round,
Like Tartar cavalry scouring the wide skies,
Intractable and trackless! shall all these
And every Storm that tears the limitless seas,
Ranging the Ocean's amplitude—be found—
Obedient to fixed Law—to Order bound?—
Shall all that shifting swift Aurora-dance,
page 485 Those phantom revels round the secret Poles,
Be set to Clod-made music that controls
And bids each brilliant spasm up-leap and glance
By happy rule—harmonious governance?
Vet this—Humanity's abounding Mould,
The ever-active matrix manifold
Of Spirit, restless round Earth's millions rolled,
This vast Machinery for making Souls,
Be but chaotic Force—the child of Chance?—
A vain surmise!—but as that Law of Storms
Cannot be gathered from a single breeze
Or local gale; so must a myriad forms
Of lives and their environments be learned
And disentangled ere can be discerned
The law that flows round each, unguessed, unseen,
Like fluid wool that through the ribbed machine
Which looks so bare, so finely runs and fast
O'er whirling cylinders, a viewless stream,
Till in a visible flue scraped off at last:—
Even so, the presence of a Power supreme
Shall be detected as its subtle way
It works throughout the infinite whirl and play
Of ever-rolling restless Circumstance;
So from a million inmost beings scanned
With cool and scrutinising vigilance
That marks each motive when cesoever brought,
Each faintest impulse from without them caught;
So may at last material pure be won
Whence ductile threads of reasoning may be spun,
Which all the strain of logic shall withstand;
And such a radiant raiment woven alone
By Intellect, as—warmly, widely thrown
About the shivering Soul—shall make it feel
Aglow with full assurance of eternal weal!

page 486

XIII.

But still will he—the thoughtful—sanguine-hearted
With greater zeal by Time and Life imparted
Swear fearless fealty, in age as youth,
To highest Reason and all-questioning Truth!
That Reason which must own
Inferior truths alone
Are yet within the range of proof,
As wholly to be sifted, fathomed, known:
While to some glimpses of the higher,
That wake most wise desire,
Soar as they may above us and aloof,
Through Feeling checked by Reason we may still aspire!
And still will he exclaim,
With thought as daring, earnestness the same:
"O heat of loving Heart! 0 Light of chainless Mind!
When will conviction flash on dull mankind,
That you are One and True; to doubt you, false and blind!
And O, them One Ineffable! O Being
In infinite ubiquitous persistence
By our conceptions inconceivable—to all our seeing
Invisible! yet forced upon us as unknown Existence
By all Existence known! O Thou
The source of Soul and Nature, Man and Brute
Whom in this sensuous deep thou dost immerse—
Thou hast ordained that deep shall still avow
Thyself—some shadow of Thyself reveal—
Potent o'er inmost conscioness to steal;
A conscious brooding Presence—through thy Universe
For ever everywhere intrusive—
For ever everywhere elusive—
Resistlessly suggestive, yet inexorably mute!—
page 487 Thou, in the very strangeness of the Mystery
Of everything that is—this actual Here and Now—
A mystery impenetrable—from the highest cope
Of heaven with Astral Systems flung along its slope
To the minutest microscopic spark
Or speck of life obscure in air or earth or sea—
Some viewless animalcule—such a vivid shield
Of trembling rings of iridescent splendour
The very Rainbow by its side would yield
The palm—has no such glory to attend her
As we are startled to find there, unseen
By unassisted sense; a glow
Of Beauty and Power divine that, from below
Rising to meet the Power and Beauty above
That through those star-worlds limitless expand—
Floods all the Universe with boundless Love!
Until we feel, we darkling men—
So darkling in our nook of narrow days
And cramping thoughts and creeping ways—
As in the midst, stark-blind with light, between
That Infinitesimal and Infinite we stand—
Feel wholly plunged, enveloped in the blaze
Of the abounding Presence then
Of that creative Beauty and Power divine—
Say rather, O Unnameable, of Thine!—
Yes! in this Mystery, though dark as night
Yet beautiful and wonderful beyond the scope
Of utmost admiration; yet a joy to mark
Amd marvel at, exhaustless by all thirst
For joy Thyself didst plant within us first;
Thou hast therein writ thy decree
It shall for Man for ever be
Inevitable to conclude Thee good and just;
page 488 Most rational to hold a boundless Hope;
Most tenderly ennobling utterly to trust
In the Omnipotence of Love and Thee!
Therefore we thank Thee! therefore boldly say:
' Man! thou momentary ray
Shot from the hidden Splendour far away—
Sheet-lightning gleam of a perceptive power
Taking wide Nature's surface for its dower;
0 phantom-puppet of miraculous clay!
Thou that art launched into the infinite void
Upon thy sparkling bubble-world upbuoyed;
And—as an Insect on a floating
leaf Runs to and fro, incapable of flight,
And works and waves in air its horns so slight—
Dost ever, on thy voyage brief,
Keep stretching towards some unimagined goal
Hid in the blank abyss of Light
The feeble feelers of thy Soul!
Poor Atom on the Ocean of the All—
Hold bravely onward! faint not yet nor fall-
Some day shall come full answer'to thy call!'"

Enough—the homely reel of Life we hold—
Of Amo' life and Ranolf' is unrolled;
She and her thoughtful thoughtless Wanderer bold,
Slight subjects of a lingering theme,
Faint visions of a too protracted dream,
Sink down—and like the ghosts of every-day,
The solid real flesh-phantoms—fade away!

* 'Chief or Gentleman'