ORIGINAL.
CHRISTINE.
[Footnote 196]
[Footnote 196: Christine, and other Poems. By George H. Miles New-York: Lawrence Kehoe.]
The writer of the present remarks made his first acquaintance with the volume under consideration during the magic season of Indian summer, and perused many of its pages beneath the shade of sycamores by the side of a woodland streamlet, ever and anon lifting his eyes from the book to scan the many-colored foliage of trees mellowed by the distance and draped in luminous haze. He took it up a second time when driven into the house by equinoctial storms, and a third when the trees had doffed their painted leaves and stood as black and cold as the iron woods we read of in the Scandinavian Edda. But whether in-doors or out, by waterside or fireside, he always found Christine and her sisters the same genial and charming companions.
Who does not prefer the sunny side of a landscape to the dark one? Are not coins and medals more pleasing when viewed on the side bearing the principal legend and inscription? Juicy fruit, whether plum, peach, or apple—does not the eye dwell with more pleasure upon the side which is tinted with the finest blush and which glows with the rosiest bloom? The same may be said of a pigeon's neck, a maiden's cheek; and why not of a volume of poems? Let us, therefore, fix our eyes upon the bright points, the beauties; and as every human production must have its imperfections, let us, when we discover these last, pass them over lightly and almost in silence. The poet, when he composed his book, hoped that its perusal would add to our enjoyment, and expected to accomplish this, not by means of its defects, but by reason of its many excellences.
Many, many such excellences belong to Christine. Open the book, reader, and as if by magic you will find yourself transported some eight hundred years backward in the world's history, and will fly on fancy's wings from the age of steam-cars and telegraphs to that of chivalry and the crusades. You will find yourself now in the south-east of France, now in Savoy, gazing in succession at the Rhone, the Isère, the Alps, Pilate's Peak, and the Grande Chartreuse, and, in short, wandering over that romantic land so dear to all true lovers of poetry, and so renowned of old for
"Dance, Provençal song, and sun-burnt mirth."
The story is founded on one of those old devotional legends of the early church, many of which have afforded such fine subjects both to the painter and poet. Were I to enumerate one-tenth part of the fine specimens of pictorial art which have been founded on such subjects, I should soon swell out the list to a sufficient number to constitute a good-sized picture-gallery. I will only allude, in passing, to a few masterpieces, most of which are familiar, even to the untravelled reader, from engravings, copies, and written descriptions. Among the most noted are the St. Cecilia by Raphael, the Vision of Constantine by the same artist, the the Assumption of the Virgin by Murillo, the Marriage of St. Catharine by the same, the Archangel Michael by Guido, and St. Patronilla by Guercino. These two last have been copied in mosaic to adorn the interior of St. Peter's. Of poems of this nature might be cited as among the best, Dryden's Ode to St. Cecilia, the Virgin Martyr by Massenger, the Golden Legend by Longfellow, and the Eve of St. Agnes by Keats.
Christine, I think, may fairly be catalogued among the same sainted sisterhood.
These traditions and legends of an earlier and more credulous age may be likened to the eggs, beautifully spotted and fantastically marked, which some delighted school-boy finds in spring-time, after hours of climbing and nest-hunting. Such eggs, curious in themselves, and brooded over by genius, often break forth into winged and musical poems, which afterward soar high above the nests and the tree-tops in which they were first cradled. Such is the case with the one now under consideration. In a new world, in a land which was not then even dreamed to be in existence, it arises lark-like, soaring and singing toward "heaven's gate." Let us watch it for a few moments, reader, and listen to its matin melody; my word for it, we shall be none the worse, either in heart or head, for having done so.
I shall not mar the beauties of this radiant little poem by attempting a cold and prosaic outline; this would, indeed, be to offer a dingy silhouette in place of a picture glowing with all the colors of a Tintoretto. Instead of this, I say, let the volume speak for itself; procure it, read it aloud to your friend; there is music sleeping in the book, awaken it to the sound of your own voice, and even though you may be a Protestant of the strictest school, you will find here nothing to offend, nothing to call forth a word of disapprobation, with one proviso, however, and that is that you read it as the title-page directs. Remember always that it is supposed to be "A song by a Troubadour."
A troubadour? And what was a troubadour? And what were his mainsprings of action? Hear an answer in the language of one of the most gifted of their number.
"A Dien mon ame, ma vie au roi,
Mon coeur aux dames, l'honneur pour moi!"
This, interpreted into tamer and more prosaic language, means that his ruling principles of action were religion, loyalty, gallantry, and honor; in other words, his soul, his life, his heart belonged respectively to God, to the king, to the ladies, and only his honor he reserved to himself. Such was his creed, such was the disinterested and noble spirit which animated him, and which breathed through all his lays, his vire-lays, his morning songs, his serenades, his sonnets, his idyls, his villanercas, his madrigals, and his canzonets. In this spirit acted the enthusiastic Rudel, who became enamored of the Countess of Tripoli from the reports which he heard of the hospitable manner in which she treated the Crusaders, and who, without having ever seen her, actually started of on a long voyage to visit the object of his admiration. Who has not heard of Blondel, and of the romantic incident by which he discovered the lion-hearted Richard while imprisoned in the castle of Lovenstein?
But in addition to the above-mentioned motive principles, the troubadour was influenced by another sentiment, which had a powerful effect on all the feelings and actions of his life. This was an intense and romantic veneration for the Virgin Mary. In fact, with little variation the following words, which we find in another poem in the same volume, entitled "Raphael Sanzio," might with equal propriety be attributed to one of the troubadours.
—"Her whose colors I have worn since first
I dreamed of beauty in the chestnut shades
Of Umbria—Her for whom my best of life
Has been one labor—Her, the Nazareth maid,
Who gave to heaven a queen, to man a God,
To God a mother."
Such, then, was the troubadour. His birthplace was Provence. It was there, in fact, that during the darkness of the Middle Ages the muse relit her torch which had long been extinguished. Many years before Dante's great poem rose like a sun—never again to set—the troubadours, those morning-stars of poesy, "sang together and shouted for joy." The troubadour preceded the Saxon bard, the Anglo-Norman minstrel, and the German minnesinger. There were held those curious courts of love where [{683}] queens and noble ladies often presided, and there were exhibited, on green and flowery meadows, those poetical contests, those festive jousts and tournaments, the idea of which seems to have been caught from the neighboring Saracens of Spain. The cross and the crescent both added something to the great result, the one contributing the deep and earnest glow of devotion, the other the pomp and circumstance of chivalry.
Of all these circumstances our poet has, with exquisite tact and skill, availed himself. Christine herself, when only ten years old, had accompanied her father to the Holy Land. This throws an oriental richness around her whole bearing and manner of thinking:
"Sooth thou art fair,
O ladye dear,
Yet one may see
The shadow of the East in thee;
Tinting to a riper flush
The faint vermilion of thy blush;
Deepening in thy dark-brown hair
Till sunshine sleeps in starlight there."
The gray charger which plays so conspicuous a part in the action was born under the palm-trees of Palestine, and his name, Caliph, would seem to indicate an Arabian descent. By this subtle link the connection between Provençal and Arabic poesy seems delicately to be hinted at. The fact that the main poem concludes in sonnet-form, if accidental, is curious; if brought about by design, is a happy thought, inasmuch as the sonnet derived its birth in Provence, and also from the fact that, from the number of its lines (twice seven), and the collocation of its rhymes, it is instinct with Christian symbolism.
The song itself, or story of Christine, is divided into five cantos or sub-songs, which, like the five acts of some romantic melodrama, arrest the attention from the start, and conduct the reader by five stages of increasing interest to the jubilant conclusion.
This main picture, as it may be called, has hanging on each side of it a smaller lateral one, one of which is a kind of prelude and the other the finale to the whole performance. This reminds us of some of those works of art by the older masters, in which a smaller side-picture may be seen to the right and left of the main representation. These appendages, though apparently slight and worded with extreme conciseness, are artistically conceived and add greatly to the general effect. They are also in fine keeping with the time and spirit of the legend itself, reminding us of one of those triple-arched emblazoned windows so often seen in old Gothic edifices. But the chief advantage derived from such an arrangement is, that the two smaller or lateral pieces serve as links to connect the more confined interests of the story with that grandest event in history, namely the Crusades, and thus to impart to the whole a breadth and grandeur of design which the size of the poem scarcely led us to expect. In the prelude we are presented with a view of the troubadour himself, who is supposed to sing the song, and not only himself, but his lady love, together with Richard of the Lion Heart, his queen, and all his chivalry. These last are at the time gazing over the blue Mediterranean, on which, in the distance, King Philip of France is seen sailing homeward with his receding vessels. The finale exhibits the arrival of a fleet under English banners. In both, a glimpse is caught of the troubadour who sings the song; in the one case, before he commences his romaunt, in the other, as he retires unnoticed and unthanked by the English monarch.
In the midst of so many beauties and artistic excellences, it is with reluctance that I notice two little circumstances which some might consider as slight blemishes. Caliph, the charger above alluded to, is spoken of as "the gallant gray." This expression sounds almost too trite and commonplace to find a place in so original a poem. Even if the color were preserved, I should [{684}] prefer some more novel and striking form of words. But would not pure white be a hue more suitable in itself, and also form a finer contrast with the coal-black steed which is ridden by the Goblin Horseman of Pilate's Mount? The last personage forms the evil, as Christine forms the good, principle of the poem. By placing one upon a white and the other on a black horse, the antagonism would be brought out in bolder relief, and we should be reminded of the fine allegory in Plato's Phaedra, where the chariot of Psyche is represented as drawn by two steeds of opposite colors, under the guidance of Reason, who is the charioteer.
The other—a trifle scarcely worthy of mention—is this: For the expression "Santo sudario" I should like to see substituted "Veronica," not so much on account of its effect upon the ear, as on account of those subtle trains of associated ideas which either lead us off from or on to poetical ground, as the case may be.
In justice to the author I must add that of these supposed blemishes I am doubtful, whereas of the beauties above alluded to I feel perfectly certain. It is much more easy to suggest alterations when a work is finished than by one's own effort to finish a perfect work. As a whole, there is a youthful fire and glow about the poem which cannot fail to render it captivating to the young, and a devotional and earnest tone of feeling which must be extremely acceptable to those more advanced. Reserving the "other poems" which accompany it for a future article, I shall conclude my remarks by a short extract taken almost at random from the third song:
"They are coming from this castle,
A bevy of bright-eyed girls,
Some with their long locks braided,
Some with loose golden curls.
Merrily 'mid the meadows
They win their wilful way;
Winding through sun and shadow,
Rivulets at play.
Brows with white rosebuds blowing,
Necks with white pearl intertwined,
Gowns whose white folds imprison
Wafts of the wandering wind.
The boughs of the charmed woodland
Sing to the vision sweet,
The daisies that couch in the clover
Nod to their twinkling feet
They see Christine by the river,
And, deeming the bridegroom near.
They wave her a dewy rose-wreath
Fresh plucked from her dark-brown hair.
Hand in hand tripping to meet her
Bird-like they carol their joy,
Wedding soft Provençal numbers
To a dulcet old strain of Savoy."
How trippingly and buoyantly do these verses gallopade adown the jocund page, as if one of the blithest of the old masters of the "gaya scientia." had been thrown by Merlin into an enchanted sleep, and, awaking from his slumber of eight centuries, was even now pouring into verse one of the freshest of his matin visions. And that bevy of dancing maidens! long may they continue to bound in tiptoe jollity adown the salient page. The glad creatures are as yet ignorant of the fact that Christine's noble lover is lying in a death-like a swoon, and that Christine herself has just had an interview with the fearful demon who wishes to bear her off in triumph. Each one of them seems to be a kind of Provençal Minnehaha, and may be compared to one of those merry waterfalls which come tumbling down the mountain-side, leaping in joy from rock to rock, and quite heedless of the black precipices which surround them.
But enough. As Cleopatra's barge of old went sailing down the river Cydnus, with burnished hull and perfumed sails, and silver oars rowing in unison with dulcet flutes, so ever and anon, at long intervals, is launched into the world some rare poem, which moves sailing down the river of time, to the admiration of all beholders. It behooves us, when such an apparition heaves in sight, whether it be poem or vessel, to be on the lookout and not to miss the pleasure of saluting it with our heartiest cheers.