Then came to yield herself in all and wed
Her husband’s own indomitable will:
He having gained her, cherished her, and loved
Her mild compliance with the strength of life.
He was a man of thews and goodly frame
Made swart in battle. Under Indian suns
Our foes had often there been taught to know
That weight of arm, resistless when he closed
Charging upon them with his sword and eye.
But when his father died, he left the East
For England; here to rule his own estate,
And reign among the county gentlemen,
Who duly came with pride to own him chief.
He had the kingly look of born command,
An eagle set of eye and curve of neck;
A cutting insight backed by solid sense;
Vast knowledge, and the facile use of it,
To break obstruction, or direct the force
Of will resolved to compass every end.
Withal a broad and generous natured man
Who ever kindly turned the doubtful scale
Against himself: no tenant ever mourned
The day when the new master came to rule;
Nor were old village gossips heard lament
The good times fled with their departed lord.
Culture went hand in hand with strength in him:
Broad-versed was he in science; rock and soil,
Plant, shell, bird, beast, to complex form of man,
With something of the stars. Historic works
He mostly read; and ofttimes dug for trace
Of steps long past in archæology.
He loved the singers of our native land
Who take our souls up to the worth of life;
And those deep thinkers whose conclusions show
The secret principles that work the world.
He prized laborious Hallam; but declared
Carlyle half mad; “A coil of restive thoughts,
That touch on nothing sound or practical,
Told in outrageous jargon, cumbersome
As any Laplander’s costume!” Which I
In ruffled pride would always straight oppose,
“Sound or unsound, his word is daylight truth,
That breeding heroes once was England’s boast,
And now we brag of making millionaires.
Your ‘practical’ means shortest cut to wealth:
But far too frequently purse robs the heart;
One growing heavy drains the other dry.
His style, poetically pregnant, oft
By note of admiration merely, hints
More than crammed Pro Con of your favourite’s page.”
At this he shouts a scornful roaring laugh,
The table shaking, and the vessels chinked
As fell his weighty arm: with massive gaze
In hurly-burly sort he bantered me:
“Young bubble-dreamer, plotting stanza rhymes,
What can you know of laws: what know of plans
Which bound these varied interests of ours,
Through crossing currents, fixed for certain ends,
To frame this state we call society,
The full outcome of immemorial time?
Know, here on earth wealth must not be despised,
For we are as we are. While men subsist
By interchanging goods and service, gold
Will be the grease that smooths the whole machine.
I grant a few, the greatest, live content
To give forth what has ripened in their minds;
But greed alone brings each result to grow
And spread its uses through the mass. Beside
Where honour, reason, or instinctive life,
Quite fails, there gold will prick the sluggard loon.
It wakes the drowsy lounger of the East,
Who lolls in sunshine idle as a gourd,
To toil like Irish hodmen. Roused, he hears
Coin ringing lively music; falls to work,
And digs, and hews, and grinds: he sees, not far,
Himself, a chief of horsemen richly clad,
Armed with long spears and silver-halted blades,
Seizing pachalic power by a swift blow.
But labour, having brought him gold, brings fears.
The weight of wealth has made his footfall staid;
He longs for order, settled government,
And stands, a stern upholder, by the law.
“I know you flout this ‘gold materialism,’
For what you call the ‘gold of evening skies:’
But let me tell you, boy, for you ’tis well
My lands are broad and bankers true, or else
Your maiden, she, poor girl, I often think,
Would want a crust to eat and shoes to wear.”
Thus he, in what I call his ‘copper-gilt,’
For which I paid him tinsel; “She want shoes!
Her feet will press the flowers of paradise,
And, being angel, she will need no food.”
“Eugh! Get your tackle, let us catch some trout.”
She never stayed a long while from her home,
But lived a quiet life; contentedly
Taking the continent and many things
On trust; feeling our landscapes satisfied
Her love for scenes. When from a visit she
Returned, no lovelier picture ever blessed
My sight than when she swam into his arms,
And stood in beauty, frail, against his strength
Supporting her, and kissed his lips and cheeks
And brow. He then, as if his daughter yet
Were but a child, would press the upturned head
Between his hands, where peered the innocent face
Rosy with smile and blush, like a sweet flower
Bursting its tawny sheath: whereon he gazed
A father’s gaze immeasurably kind;
And long, in tenderness akin to pity,
There held her, who was beautiful and good.
One eve full late in balmy summer time
We feared the wind breathing of night had chilled
Her tranquil mother, as we paced a walk
Leading espalier-trellised to the house;
She ever heedful parted silently,
And flushed with sunset vanished from our gaze;
But we beheld her soon dawn from the porch
In haste bringing her mother’s mantle. When,
As comes the tide-wave up an easy beach,
Played with a billowy sound and look of foam
The thousand folds round her advancing feet,
Her shape divine looking as great as ocean’s
Light beyond: yet no sea bird that gleams
From the blue-arched illimitable heaven
Could glide with lightness airier than she
To hang the garment round her mother’s neck;
And then strike, womanlike, the folds in place;
Kissing the thankful lips, and deftly fix
The fastening at her throat. While pondering thus
And patching these rich fragments, strange it seems
What little things obtrude on my regard!
I now remember every sculptured group,
And painted scene, and portrait, figured vase,
Each print unique, and gem, we once beheld
When visiting a mansion near, enriched
By generations of collected Art:
The masters, by whose hands the works were wrought,
Long mouldered into dust. Ah, well I know
Why some have burned their symbols in my brain
And rise before me now!
Stone-bound, Narcissus
Droops melting in himself; and Echo by,
In shrunk despair, hangs envying what he wastes.
Through smouldering morning mists a glorious sun
The mountain-shoulder burns; above, transmutes
The zenith cloudlets into airy gold;
And deep down, seen through pure crystalline blue,
Glimmer the village, lake, and mountain range.
Superb at ease a Lady stands and smiles
Sweet welcome to the world: though centuries
Have lapsed since she approved her painter’s work,
Her smile has such sincerity, all feel
They must have known her some time in their lives.
Here bossed on silver vase, a marriage train
Moves round to music: lookers-on cast flowers
Before the timid bending bride: meanwhile,