WITH CHARLES AVISON

The manuscript of the Grand March written by Avison was in the possession of Browning's father, and a copy is given at the end of the poem. The Relfe who is two or three times mentioned was Browning's teacher of music, who was a learned contrapuntist.

How strange!—but, first of all, the little fact

Which led my fancy forth. This bitter morn

Showed me no object in the stretch forlorn

Of garden-ground beneath my window, backed

By yon worn wall wherefrom the creeper, tacked

To clothe its brickwork, hangs now, rent and racked

By five months' cruel winter,—showed no torn

And tattered ravage worse for eyes to see

Than just one ugly space of clearance, left

Bare even of the bones which used to be

Warm wrappage, safe embracement: this one cleft—

—Oh, what a life and beauty filled it up

Startlingly, when methought the rude clay cup

Ran over with poured bright wine! 'T was a bird

Breast-deep there, tugging at his prize, deterred

No whit by the fast-falling snow-flake: gain

Such prize my blackcap must by might and main—

The cloth-shred, still a-flutter from its nail

That fixed a spray once. Now, what told the tale

To thee,—no townsman but born orchard-thief,—

That here—surpassing moss-tuft, beard from sheaf

Of sun-scorched barley, horsehairs long and stout,

All proper country-pillage—here, no doubt,

Was just the scrap to steal should line thy nest

Superbly? Off he flew, his bill possessed

The booty sure to set his wife's each wing

Greenly a-quiver. How they climb and cling,

Hang parrot-wise to bough, these blackcaps! Strange

Seemed to a city-dweller that the finch

Should stray so far to forage: at a pinch,

Was not the fine wool's self within his range

—Filchings on every fence? But no: the need

Was of this rag of manufacture, spoiled

By art, and yet by nature near unsoiled,

New-suited to what scheming finch would breed

In comfort, this uncomfortable March.

Yet—by the first pink blossom on the larch!—

This was scarce stranger than that memory,—

In want of what should cheer the stay-at-home,

My soul,—must straight clap pinion, well-nigh roam

A century back, nor once close plume, descry

The appropriate rag to plunder, till she pounced—

Pray, on what relic of a brain long still?

What old-world work proved forage for the bill

Of memory the far-flyer? "March" announced,

I verily believe, the dead and gone

Name of a music-maker: one of such

In England as did little or did much,

But, doing, had their day once. Avison!

Singly and solely for an air of thine,

Bold-stepping "March," foot stept to ere my hand

Could stretch an octave, I o'erlooked the band

Of majesties familiar, to decline

On thee—not too conspicuous on the list

Of worthies who by help of pipe or wire

Expressed in sound rough rage or soft desire—

Thou, whilom of Newcastle organist!

III

So much could one—well, thinnish air effect!

Am I ungrateful? for, your March, styled "Grand,"

Did veritably seem to grow, expand,

And greaten up to title as, unchecked,

Dream-marchers marched, kept marching, slow and sure,

In time, to tune, unchangeably the same,

From nowhere into nowhere,—out they came,

Onward they passed, and in they went. No lure

Of novel modulation pricked the flat

Forthright persisting melody,—no hint

That discord, sound asleep beneath the flint,

Struck—might spring spark-like, claim due tit-for-tat,

Quenched in a concord. No! Yet, such the might

Of quietude's immutability,

That somehow coldness gathered warmth, well-nigh

Quickened—which could not be!—grew burning-bright

With fife-shriek, cymbal-clash and trumpet-blare,

To drum-accentuation: pacing turned

Striding, and striding grew gigantic, spurned

At last the narrow space 'twixt earth and air,

So shook me back into my sober self.

And where woke I? The March had set me down

There whence I plucked the measure, as his brown

Frayed flannel-bit my blackcap. Great John Relfe,

Master of mine, learned, redoubtable,

It little needed thy consummate skill

To fitly figure such a bass! The key

Was—should not memory play me false—well, C.

Ay, with the Greater Third, in Triple Time,

Three crochets to a bar: no change, I grant,

Except from Tonic down to Dominant.

And yet—and yet—if I could put in rhyme

The manner of that marching!—which had stopped

—I wonder, where?—but that my weak self dropped

From out the ranks, to rub eyes disentranced

And feel that, after all the way advanced,

Back must I foot it, I and my compeers,

Only to reach, across a hundred years,

The bandsman Avison whose little book

And large tune thus had led me the long way

(As late a rag my blackcap) from to-day

And to-day's music-manufacture,—Brahms,

Wagner, Dvorak, Liszt,—to where—trumpets, shawms,

Show yourselves joyful!—Handel reigns—supreme?

By no means! Buononcini's work is theme

For fit laudation of the impartial few:

(We stand in England, mind you!) Fashion too

Favors Geminiani—of those choice

Concertos: nor there wants a certain voice

Raised in thy favor likewise, famed Pepusch

Dear to our great-grandfathers! In a bush

Of Doctor's wig, they prized thee timing beats

While Greenway trilled "Alexis." Such were feats

Of music in thy day—dispute who list—

Avison, of Newcastle organist!

And here 's your music all alive once more—

As once it was alive, at least: just so

The figured worthies of a waxwork-show

Attest—such people, years and years ago,

Looked thus when outside death had life below,

—Could say "We are now" not "We were of yore,"

—"Feel how our pulses leap!" and not "Explore—

Explain why quietude has settled o'er

Surface once all awork!" Ay, such a "Suite"

Roused heart to rapture, such a "Fugue" would catch

Soul heavenwards up, when time was: why attach

Blame to exhausted faultlessness, no match

For fresh achievement? Feat once—ever feat!

How can completion grow still more complete?

Hear Avison! He tenders evidence

That music in his day as much absorbed

Heart and soul then as Wagner's music now,

Perfect from centre to circumference—

Orbed to the full can be but fully orbed:

And yet—and yet—whence comes it that "O Thou"—

Sighed by the soul at eve to Hesperus—

Will not again take wing and fly away

(Since fatal Wagner fixed it fast for us)

In some unmodulated minor? Nay,

Even by Handel's help!

I state it thus:

There is no truer truth obtainable

By Man than comes of music. "Soul"—(accept

A word which vaguely names what no adept

In word-use fits and fixes so that still

Thing shall not slip word's fetter and remain

Innominate as first, yet, free again,

Is no less recognized the absolute

Fact underlying that same other fact

Concerning which no cavil can dispute

Our nomenclature when we call it "Mind"—

Something not Matter)—"Soul," who seeks shall find

Distinct beneath that something. You exact

An illustrative image? This may suit.

VII

We see a work: the worker works behind,

Invisible himself. Suppose his act

Be to o'erarch a gulf: he digs, transports,

Shapes and, through enginery—all sizes, sorts,

Lays stone by stone until a floor compact

Proves our bridged causeway. So works Mind—by stress

Of faculty, with loose facts, more or less,

Builds up our solid knowledge: all the same,

Underneath rolls what Mind may hide not tame,

An element which works beyond our guess,

Soul, the unsounded sea—whose lift of surge,

Spite of all superstructure, lets emerge,

In flower and foam, Feeling from out the deeps

Mind arrogates no mastery upon—

Distinct indisputably. Has there gone

To dig up, drag forth, render smooth from rough

Mind's flooring,—operosity enough?

Still the successive labor of each inch,

Who lists may learn: from the last turn of winch

That let the polished slab-stone find its place,

To the first prod of pickaxe at the base

Of the unquarried mountain,—what was all

Mind's varied process except natural,

Nay, easy even, to descry, describe,

After our fashion? "So worked Mind: its tribe

Of senses ministrant above, below,

Far, near, or now or haply long ago

Brought to pass knowledge." But Soul's sea,—drawn whence,

Fed how, forced whither,—by what evidence

Of ebb and flow, that 's felt beneath the tread,

Soul has its course 'neath Mind's work overhead,—

Who tells of, tracks to source the founts of Soul?

Yet wherefore heaving sway and restless roll

This side and that, except to emulate

Stability above? To match and mate

Feeling with knowledge,—make as manifest

Soul's work as Mind's work, turbulence as rest,

Hates, loves, joys, woes, hopes, fears, that rise and sink

Ceaselessly, passion's transient flit and wink,

A ripple's tinting or a spume-sheet's spread

Whitening the wave,—to strike all this life dead,

Run mercury into a mould like lead,

And henceforth have the plain result to show—

How we Feel, hard and fast as what we Know—

This were the prize and is the puzzle!—which

Music essays to solve: and here 's the hitch

That balks her of full triumph else to boast.

VIII

All Arts endeavor this, and she the most

Attains thereto, yet fails of touching: why?

Does Mind get Knowledge from Art's ministry?

What 's known once is known ever: Arts arrange,

Dissociate, re-distribute, interchange

Part with part, lengthen, broaden, high or deep

Construct their bravest,—still such pains produce

Change, not creation: simply what lay loose

At first lies firmly after, what design

Was faintly traced in hesitating line

Once on a time, grows firmly resolute

Henceforth and evermore. Now, could we shoot

Liquidity into a mould,—some way

Arrest Soul's evanescent moods, and keep

Unalterably still the forms that leap

To life for once by help of Art!—which yearns

To save its capture: Poetry discerns,

Painting is 'ware of passion's rise and fall,

Bursting, subsidence, intermixture—all

A-seethe within the gulf. Each Art a-strain

Would stay the apparition,—nor in vain:

The Poet's word-mesh, Painter's sure and swift

Color-and-line-throw—proud the prize they lift!

Thus felt Man and thus looked Man,—passions caught

I' the midway swim of sea,—not much, if aught,

Of nether-brooding loves, hates, hopes and fears,

Enwombed past Art's disclosure. Fleet the years,

And still the Poet's page holds Helena

At gaze from topmost Troy—"But where are they,

My brothers, in the armament I name

Hero by hero? Can it be that shame

For their lost sister holds them from the war?"

—Knowing not they already slept afar

Each of them in his own dear native land.

Still on the Painter's fresco, from the hand

Of God takes Eve the life-spark whereunto

She trembles up from nothingness. Outdo

Both of them, Music! Dredging deeper yet,

Drag into day,—by sound, thy master-net,—

The abysmal bottom-growth, ambiguous thing

Unbroken of a branch, palpitating

With limbs' play and life's semblance! There it lies.

Marvel and mystery, of mysteries

And marvels, most to love and laud thee for!

Save it from chance and change we most abhor!

Give momentary feeling permanence,

So that thy capture hold, a century hence,

Truth's very heart of truth as, safe to-day,

The Painter's Eve, the Poet's Helena

Still rapturously bend, afar still throw

The wistful gaze! Thanks, Homer, Angelo!

Could Music rescue thus from Soul's profound,

Give feeling immortality by sound,

Then were she queenliest of Arts! Alas—

As well expect the rainbow not to pass!

"Praise 'Radamisto'—love attains therein

To perfect utterance! Pity—what shall win

Thy secret like 'Rinaldo'?"—so men said:

Once all was perfume—now, the flower is dead—

They spied tints, sparks have left the spar! Love, hate,

Joy, fear, survive,—alike importunate

As ever to go walk the world again,

Nor ghost-like pant for outlet all in vain

Till Music loose them, fit each filmily

With form enough to know and name it by

For any recognizer sure of ken

And sharp of ear, no grosser denizen

Of earth than needs be. Nor to such appeal

Is Music long obdurate: off they steal—

How gently, dawn-doomed phantoms! back come they

Full-blooded with new crimson of broad day—

Passion made palpable once more. Ye look

Your last on Handel? Gaze your first on Gluck!

Why wistful search, O waning ones, the chart

Of stars for you while Haydn, while Mozart

Occupies heaven? These also, fanned to fire,

Flamboyant wholly,—so perfections tire,—

Whiten to wanness, till ... let others note

The ever-new invasion!

I devote

Rather my modicum of parts to use

What power may yet avail to re-infuse

(In fancy, please you!) sleep that looks like death

With momentary liveliness, lend breath

To make the torpor half inhale. O Relfe,

An all-unworthy pupil, from the shelf

Of thy laboratory, dares unstop

Bottle, ope box, extract thence pinch and drop

Of dusts and dews a many thou didst shrine

Each in its right receptacle, assign

To each its proper office, letter large

Label and label, then with solemn charge,

Reviewing learnedly the list complete

Of chemical reactives, from thy feet

Push down the same to me, attent below,

Power in abundance: armed wherewith I go

To play the enlivener. Bring good antique stuff!

Was it alight once? Still lives spark enough

For breath to quicken, run the smouldering ash

Red right-through. What, "stone-dead" were fools so rash

As style my Avison, because he lacked

Modern appliance, spread out phrase unracked

By modulations fit to make each hair

Stiffen upon his wig? See there—and there!

I sprinkle my reactives, pitch broadcast

Discords and resolutions, turn aghast

Melody's easy-going, jostle law

With license, modulate (no Bach in awe)

Change enharmonically (Hudl to thank)

And lo, upstart the flamelets,—what was blank

Turns scarlet, purple, crimson! Straightway scanned

By eyes that like new lustre—Love once more

Yearns through the Largo, Hatred as before

Rages in the Rubato: e'en thy March,

My Avison, which, sooth to say—(ne'er arch

Eyebrows in anger!)—timed, in Georgian years

The step precise of British Grenadiers

To such a nicety,—if score I crowd,

If rhythm I break, if beats I vary,—tap

At bar's off-starting turns true thunder-clap,

Eyer the pace augmented till—what 's here?

Titanic striding toward Olympus!

Fear

No such irreverent innovation! Still

Glide on, go rolling, water-like, at will—

Nay, were thy melody in monotone,

The due three-parts dispensed with!

This alone

Comes of my tiresome talking: Music's throne

Seats somebody whom somebody unseats,

And whom in turn—by who knows what new feats

Of strength—shall somebody as sure push down,

Consign him dispossessed of sceptre, crown,

And orb imperial—whereto? Never dream

That what once lived shall ever die! They seem

Dead—do they? lapsed things lost in limbo? Bring

Our life to kindle theirs, and straight each king

Starts, you shall see, stands up, from head to foot

No inch that is not Purcell! Wherefore? (Suit

Measure to subject, first—no marching on

Yet in thy bold C major, Avison,

As suited step a minute since: no: wait—

Into the minor key first modulate—

Gently with A, now—in the Lesser Third!)

XII

Of all the lamentable debts incurred

By Man through buying knowledge, this were worst:

That he should find his last gain prove his first

Was futile—merely nescience absolute,

Not knowledge in the bud which holds a fruit

Haply undreamed of in the soul's Spring-tide,

Pursed in the petals Summer opens wide,

And Autumn, withering, rounds to perfect ripe,—

Not this,—but ignorance, a blur to wipe

From human records, late it graced so much.

"Truth—this attainment? Ah, but such and such

Beliefs of yore seemed inexpugnable

When we attained them! E'en as they, so will

This their successor have the due morn, noon,

Evening and night—just as an old-world tune

Wears out and drops away, until who hears

Smilingly questions—'This it was brought tears

Once to all eyes,—this roused heart's rapture once?'

So will it be with truth that, for the nonce,

Styles itself truth perennial: 'ware its wile!

Knowledge turns nescience,—foremost on the file,

Simply proves first of our delusions."

XIII

Now—

Blare it forth, bold C major! Lift thy brow,

Man, the immortal, that wast never fooled

With gifts no gifts at all, nor ridiculed—

Man knowing—he who nothing knew! As Hope,

Fear, Joy, and Grief,—though ampler stretch and scope

They seek and find in novel rhythm, fresh phrase,—

Were equally existent in far days

Of Music's dim beginning—even so,

Truth was at full within thee long ago,

Alive as now it takes what latest shape

May startle thee by strangeness. Truths escape

Time's insufficient garniture: they fade,

They fall—those sheathings now grown sere, whose aid

Was infinite to truth they wrapped, saved fine

And free through March frost: May dews crystalline

Nourish truth merely,—does June boast the fruit

As—not new vesture merely but, to boot,

Novel creation? Soon shall fade and fall

Myth after myth—the husk-like lies I call

New truth's corolla-safeguard: Autumn comes,

So much the better!

XIV

Therefore—bang the drums,

Blow the trumpets, Avison! March-motive? that's

Truth which endures resetting. Sharps and flats,

Lavish at need, shall dance athwart thy score

When ophicleide and bombardon's uproar

Mate the approaching trample, even now

Big in the distance—or my ears deceive—

Of federated England, fitly weave

March-music for the Future!

Or suppose

Back, and not forward, transformation goes?

Once more some sable-stoled procession—say,

From Little-ease to Tyburn—wends its way,

Out of the dungeon to the gallows-tree

Where heading, hacking, hanging is to be

Of half-a-dozen recusants—this day

Three hundred years ago! How duly drones

Elizabethan plain-song—dim antique

Grown clarion-clear the while I humbly wreak

A classic vengeance on thy March! It moans—

Larges and Longs and Breves displacing quite

Crotchet-and-quaver pertness—brushing bars

Aside and filling vacant sky with stars

Hidden till now that day return to night.

XVI

Nor night nor day: one purpose move us both,

Be thy mood mine! As thou wast minded, Man 's

The cause our music champions: I were loth

To think we cheered our troop to Preston Pans

Ignobly: back to times of England's best!

Parliament stands for privilege—life and limb

Guards Hollis, Haselrig, Strode, Hampden, Pym,

The famous Five. There 's rumor of arrest.

Bring up the Train Bands, Southwark! They protest:

Shall we not all join chorus? Hark the hymn,

—Rough, rude, robustious—homely heart a-throb,

Harsh voice a-hallo, as beseems the mob!

How good is noise! what 's silence but despair

Of making sound match gladness never there?

Give me some great glad "subject," glorious Bach,

Where cannon-roar not organ-peal we lack!

Join in, give voice robustious rude and rough,—

Avison helps—so heart lend noise enough!

Fife, trump, drum, sound! and singers then

Marching say "Pym, the man of men!"

Up, heads, your proudest,—out throats, your loudest—

"Somerset's Pym!"

Strafford from the block, Eliot from the den,

Foes, friends, shout "Pym, our citizen!"

Wail, the foes he quelled,—hail, the friends he held,

"Tavistock's Pym!"

Hearts prompt heads, hands that ply the pen

Teach babes unborn the where and when.

—Tyrants, he braved them,—patriots, he saved them—

"Westminster's Pym!"

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