But such is man, who thinks, he knows himself,
And—like Sordino—very much besides,
Quite fortified by wisdom’s splendid armor,
Who thinks his heart is dead to any charmer,
Will suddenly discover that there hides
Within its chambers still a little elf.
She was a coy, elusive little creature,
Uncaptured yet by suitors manifold,
Her father’s only child, and motherless,
Whose cheerfulness his saddened heart did bless,
Whose eyes of Danube blue and hair of gold,
Commingled with her Mother’s Grecian feature.
She was proficient in the classic learning,
Read Greek and Latin like her native tongue,
Italian, too, and did on Dante dote,
And metaphysics studied, but by rote,
For mental subtleties she was too young,
And was to Hella’s songs too often turning.
Anacreon she knew by heart and set
His lyric and erotic odes to tunes,
And most of all she did with fondness love
His ἐραςμίη πέλεια—the dove
Of Venus, odorous with sweet perfumes,
Her payment for the poet’s canzonet.
And like an Amathusia she seemed,
To fond Sordino, who had ne’er beheld
Such loveliness of mind and body wed,
And then he knew that ’mid the past and dead
Of his own life, no being had compelled
His love like she whom he a goddess deemed.
But when he saw her father’s jealous care,
He did not dare his hand to tender her,
But first of all sought to ingratiate
Himself to both, but most to the sedate,
Pedantic scholar, ready to concur
In all his views, though fallacy lay bare.
Thus suavity did win the learned man,
And he became Sordino’s ardent friend,
And asked him to return with them to Wien,
Another thing he failed not to agree in,
And when their stay in Paris had an end,
He gladly journeyed with this Austrian.
XIII
On Danube’s shores, ’mid wooded hills, a villa
Was smiling welcome to its lord and guest,
But most of all to her—whose name was Stella,
(Her father called her “pulchra me’ puella”)
For whom the servants ready had ein Fest,
Where once encamped the hosts of Attila.
A Florentine among Teutonic scenes,
Led thither by a love, yet unexpressed,
Forgot his sorrows, yea, forgot his bells,
Since nought like love its victim so compels
To full submission to a sweet behest,
The looks and smiles of one still in her teens.