THE PRIEST’S HEART
It was Sir John, the fair young Priest,
He strode up off the strand;
But seven fisher maidens he left behind
All dancing hand in hand.
He came unto the wise wife’s house:
‘Now, Mother, to prove your art;
To charm May Carleton’s merry blue eyes
Out of a young man’s heart.’
‘My son, you went for a holy man,
Whose heart was set on high;
Go sing in your psalter, and read in your books;
Man’s love fleets lightly by.’
‘I had liever to talk with May Carleton,
Than with all the saints in Heaven;
I had liever to sit by May Carleton
Than climb the spherès seven.
‘I have watched and fasted, early and late,
I have prayed to all above;
But I find no cure save churchyard mould
For the pain which men call love.’
‘Now Heaven forefend that ill grow worse:
Enough that ill be ill.
I know of a spell to draw May Carleton,
And bend her to your will.’
‘If thou didst that which thou canst not do,
Wise woman though thou be,
I would run and run till I buried myself
In the surge of yonder sea.
‘Scathless for me are maid and wife,
And scathless shall they bide.
Yet charm me May Carleton’s eyes from the heart
That aches in my left side.’
She charmed him with the white witchcraft,
She charmed him with the black,
But he turned his fair young face to the wall,
Till she heard his heart-strings crack.
1870
‘QU’EST QU’IL DIT’ [{330}]
Espion ailé de la jeune amante
De l’ombre des palmiers pourquoi ce cri?
Laisse en paix le beau garçon plaider et vaincre—
Pourquoi, pourquoi demander ‘Qu’est qu’il dit?’
‘Qu’est qu’il dit?’ Ce que tu dis toi-même
Chaque mois de ce printemps eternel;
Ce que disent les papillons qui s’entre-baisent,
Ce que dit tout bel jeun être à toute belle.
Importun! Attende quelques lustres:
Quand les souvenirs 1’emmeneront ici—
Mère, grand’mère, pâle, lasse, et fidèle,
Demande mais doucement—‘Et le vieillard,
Qu’est qu’il dit?’
Trinidad, January 10, 1870
THE LEGEND OF LA BREA [{331a}]
Down beside the loathly Pitch Lake,
In the stately Morichal, [{331b}]
Sat an ancient Spanish Indian,
Peering through the columns tall.
Watching vainly for the flashing
Of the jewelled colibris; [{331c}]
Listening vainly for their humming
Round the honey-blossomed trees.
‘Few,’ he sighed, ‘they come, and fewer,
To the cocorité [{331d}] bowers;
Murdered, madly, through the forests
Which of yore were theirs—and ours
By there came a negro hunter,
Lithe and lusty, sleek and strong,
Rolling round his sparkling eyeballs,
As he loped and lounged along.
Rusty firelock on his shoulder;
Rusty cutlass on his thigh;
Never jollier British subject
Rollicked underneath the sky.
British law to give him safety,
British fleets to guard his shore,
And a square of British freehold—
He had all we have, and more.
Fattening through the endless summer,
Like his own provision ground,
He had reached the summum bonum
Which our latest wits have found.
So he thought; and in his hammock
Gnawed his junk of sugar-cane,
Toasted plantains at the fire-stick,
Gnawed, and dozed, and gnawed again.
Had a wife in his ajoupa [{332}]—
Or, at least, what did instead;
Children, too, who died so early,
He’d no need to earn their bread.
Never stole, save what he needed,
From the Crown woods round about;
Never lied, except when summoned—
Let the warden find him out.
Never drank, except at market;
Never beat his sturdy mate;
She could hit as hard as he could,
And had just as hard a pate.
Had no care for priest nor parson,
Hope of heaven nor fear of hell;
And in all his views of nature
Held with Comte and Peter Bell.
Healthy, happy, silly, kindly,
Neither care nor toil had he,
Save to work an hour at sunrise,
And then hunt the colibri.
Not a bad man; not a good man:
Scarce a man at all, one fears,
If the Man be that within us
Which is born of fire and tears.
Round the palm-stems, round the creepers,
Flashed a feathered jewel past,
Ruby-crested, topaz-throated,
Plucked the cocorité bast,
Plucked the fallen ceiba-cotton, [{333}]
Whirred away to build his nest,
Hung at last, with happy humming,
Round some flower he fancied best.
Up then went the rusty muzzle,
’Dat de tenth I shot to-day:’
But out sprang the Indian shouting,
Balked the negro of his prey.
‘Eh, you Señor Trinidada!
What dis new ondacent plan?
Spoil a genl’man’s chance ob shooting?
I as good as any man.
‘Dese not your woods; dese de Queen’s woods:
You seem not know whar you ar,
Gibbin’ yuself dese buckra airs here,
You black Indian Papist! Dar!’
Stately, courteous, stood the Indian;
Pointed through the palm-tree shade:
‘Does the gentleman of colour
Know how yon Pitch Lake was made?’
Grinned the negro, grinned and trembled—
Through his nerves a shudder ran—
Saw a snake-like eye that held him;
Saw—he’d met an Obeah man.
Saw a fêtish—such a bottle—
Buried at his cottage door;
Toad and spider, dirty water,
Rusty nails, and nine charms more.
Saw in vision such a cock’s head
In the path—and it was white!
Saw Brinvilliers [{334}] in his pottage:
Faltered, cold and damp with fright.
Fearful is the chance of poison:
Fearful, too, the great unknown:
Magic brings some positivists
Humbly on their marrow-bone.
Like the wedding-guest enchanted,
There he stood, a trembling cur;
While the Indian told his story,
Like the Ancient Mariner.
Told how—‘Once that loathly Pitch Lake
Was a garden bright and fair;
How the Chaymas off the mainland
Built their palm ajoupas there.
‘How they throve, and how they fattened,
Hale and happy, safe and strong;
Passed the livelong days in feasting;
Passed the nights in dance and song.
‘Till they cruel grew, and wanton:
Till they killed the colibris.
Then outspake the great Good Spirit,
Who can see through all the trees,
‘Said—“And what have I not sent you,
Wanton Chaymas, many a year?
Lapp, [{335a}] agouti, [{335b}] cachicame, [{335c}]
Quenc [{335d}] and guazu-pita deer.
‘“Fish I sent you, sent you turtle,
Chip-chip, [{335e}] conch, flamingo red,
Woodland paui, [{335f}] horned screamer, [{335g}]
And blue ramier [{335h}] overhead.
‘“Plums from balata [{335i}] and mombin, [{335j}]
Tania, [{335k}] manioc, [{335l}] water-vine; [{335m}]
Let you fell my slim manacques, [{335n}]
Tap my sweet morichè wine. [{335o}]
‘“Sent rich plantains, [{336a}] food of angels;
Rich ananas, [{336b}] food of kings;
Grudged you none of all my treasures:
Save these lovely useless things.”
‘But the Chaymas’ ears were deafened;
Blind their eyes, and could not see
How a blissful Indian’s spirit
Lived in every colibri.
‘Lived, forgetting toil and sorrow,
Ever fair and ever new;
Whirring round the dear old woodland,
Feeding on the honey-dew.
‘Till one evening roared the earthquake:
Monkeys howled, and parrots screamed:
And the Guaraons at morning
Gathered here, as men who dreamed.
‘Sunk were gardens, sunk ajoupas;
Hut and hammock, man and hound:
And above the Chayma village
Boiled with pitch the cursed ground.
‘Full, and too full; safe, and too safe;
Negro man, take care, take care.
He that wantons with God’s bounties
Of God’s wrath had best beware.
‘For the saucy, reckless, heartless,
Evil days are sure in store.
You may see the Negro sinking
As the Chayma sank of yore.’
Loudly laughed that stalwart hunter—
‘Eh, what superstitious talk!
Nyam [{337}] am nyam, an’ maney maney;
Birds am birds, like park am park;
An’ dere’s twenty thousand birdskins
Ardered jes’ now fram New Yark.’
Eversley, 1870.
HYMN [{338}]
Accept this building, gracious Lord,
No temple though it be;
We raised it for our suffering kin,
And so, Good Lord, for Thee.
Accept our little gift, and give
To all who here may dwell,
The will and power to do their work,
Or bear their sorrows well.
From Thee all skill and science flow;
All pity, care, and love,
All calm and courage, faith and hope,
Oh! pour them from above.
And part them, Lord, to each and all,
As each and all shall need,
To rise like incense, each to Thee,
In noble thought and deed.
And hasten, Lord, that perfect day,
When pain and death shall cease;
And Thy just rule shall fill the earth
With health, and light, and peace.
When ever blue the sky shall gleam,
And ever green the sod;
And man’s rude work deface no more
The Paradise of God.
Eversley, 1870.