CANTO III.
But turn we now to other scenes than these,
At least awhile, and take a cheerful look,
As trav'ler looks from sand to greenleaf trees,
And 'neath the shade where runs the babbling brook,
Who doffs his hat to the refreshing breeze,
And reading nature as a living book,
He feels her smiling, in its joyous glim,
Has such a sweet affinity for him.
Life should not be all terrors—nor its charms
Be life-long raptures, or unending songs;
When both are blended, each alike disarms;
Nor constant good nor ill, alone belongs
To life—one only brings us moral harms,
And on our poor humanity, great wrongs;
For by the constant sameness would man's deeds
Defeat all progress that to greatness leads.
So from the gloomy picture drawn above,
We'll turn away and find a brighter side.
Let not the drooping Mary die of love,
As many storied ones have lov'd and died;
Nor solitaire in heart forever rove;
But bid her all life's changes firm abide;
Her case is hom'opathic, we discover—
Similia similibus curanter.
Months came and went, and still she linger'd on,
At home by the sea. Its solitary shore,
Was travers'd often by her step alone;
Somehow the dark sea's surging, sullen roar,
Brought quietude, when elsewhere she found none;
Her daily lone walks there were many score.
Philosophy no pedagogue can teach
Is sometimes found upon a lonely beach.
The saddest, yet the sweetest melancholy,
Inspires a feeble, slow reviving frame,
If but allow'd to steal from heartless folly,
Away from all that bears the social name;
And 'neath the spreading evergreen sea-holly,
Check down the fires of disappointment's flame;
And thereby give the thoughts a purer turn,
And cool the heated caldron where they burn.
In such a state, the bubbles we pursue
Seem but the vaunt of sickly strength and pride;
We're on our way, a weary wand'ring through,
With fallen hopes flung losely on the tide
Of morbid aims—whose almost crying hue
Is pencil'd by dull care. Nor can we hide
The care-worn hues with careful toilet hands;
The glass of life drops slow, but sure, the sands.
The tameless passions frequent in the breast,
Are like the molten waves of Ætna's fire;
Knowing nor years, nor months, nor weeks of rest—
Tho' some there are to better things aspire—
Impulses whatsoe'er, not one repress'd;
Their every song's a ceaseless never tire,
And no reflection in its secret springs,
On what demands it 'mid a thousand things.
Her letters oft were fill'd with moaning words,
Whose sadden'd tone inspir'd one's heart with awe;
E'en her description of sweet singing birds
Did moan—and so did all she heard and saw.
Home-sheltered—like the flock the shepherd herds—
Where she would fain from prying eyes withdraw,
There dead monotony did reign and sigh,
That tells how near the fount of tears is dry.
And yet me thought her grief had soften'd down
More in that calm inertia—settled state—
Whose features wore, nor smile, nor cheer, nor frown;
A kind of understanding with Dame Fate,
That wreathing thus her brow with sorrow's crown,
Were far less sad than when 'twere wrought too late
To wear its jagging ugly thorns, and give
A single farthing for such life to live.
At length news came—how Arthur Wildbent had
So kindly driven her along the strand;
And air-improv'd, it made us all so glad.
That last reunion, while the Melrose Band
Discoursed sweet music, she had been less sad;
That once she gam'd croquet with cheerful hand,
And beat—but beat old Melancholy better,
And hence she boasted of it in her letter.
She frequent made the balmy ev'ning drive
Adown the beach, so like a sanded floor;
Where white-capp'd waves, that seem'd almost alive,
Did chase each other to the shining shore,
Buzzing like restless bees within the hive;
Or, like the porpoise, rolling by the score,
Tho' gathering nothing in their briny splash,
Except the wat'ry pearls to shore they dash.
'Tis true, she always miss'd good Charley when,
The ev'ning throngs were wont to congregate—
The greatest press was on her spirits then—
Howe'er they whirl'd in dance, or stood, or sat,
Not one amid the gallant crowd of men,
Could for his absence ever compensate,
Unless it might be Lewis—who to-day
Reminded her of him who'd pass'd away.
Life had its pleasures, beauty had the world;
Tho' fewest of them had been brought to bear
Upon a destiny like hers, so furl'd;
Scarce naught of either could be painted there;
All romance so remotely had been hurl'd,
She lik'd some work of lonely quiet, where
By somber daylight, or by flick'ring taper,
Her inburst feelings she could note on paper.
Life's new sensations are but few and precious—
Thus speaks some writer of some wondrous cave;
It may be Mammoth, with its caverns spacious;
Whose floors, obliv'ous, Leth'an waters lave;
And when we wander thro' them, strange refresh us;
Most surely do, if we but catch and save,
For rarest of all rare delicious dishes,
A string full of the tiny eyeless fishes.
But where find we in life, sensations new?
Such as have never yet been told, we mean.
Of Such, me thinks indeed, the number's few;
And may not reach one even in a dream.
'Tis true, we often all the old renew,
Which to one's own sensations new may seem;
And yet they but repeat—so we believe—
All those once told by Adam to his Eve.
Yes, so far told, as then it could be done,
In the beginning time of this world's ways—
Thro' which their course to pick, they'd just begun—
But not express'd in such poetic lays,
As down the rippling tide of language run
The thought and feeling of the later days;
And more's the pity—since their employment
Seems but a very circumscribed enjoyment.
"'Tis now two years since Charley pass'd away,"
She wrote, "and I have liv'd for him as true
As any one who keeps her wedding day;
'Till lately I have somewhat chang'd my view;
'Tis not so well for one to mourn alway;
The news, sweet friend, the news I'll break to you—
Unless this letter meet with a miscarriage—
And own to you, again I think of marriage.
"And you may guess my choice, the favor'd one;
He's more like him than any I have met,
Indeed, than any I have ever known;
And this is why my heart is on him set;
I can not always pass my life alone,
The choice I feel that I shall ne'er regret;
You know him well, and know I never can—
Search o'er the earth—secure a better man.
"Somehow I feel myself so sadly chang'd,
I'm scarce the same you knew in days of yore;
My sorrow hath so much my mind derang'd,
Instead of twenty years, I feel fourscore.
From youthful pleasures I'm so far estrang'd,
Myself doth seem a matron grave, and hoar
With silvered front, and seems a grave surprise,
That I'm not trying to repair my eyes.
"I aim to do my duty as I ought,
And of his life be crowning joy and bliss,
That Lew may realize how ev'ry thought,
From wedding day to death, shall be all his;
And ev'ry purpose shall be truly taught,
That wifely love should point alone to this;
So in our union we may find repair
For all the sorrows both have had to bear."
