I
LO! I the man, whose Muse whilom did mask,
As time her taught, in lowly shepheards' weeds,
Am now enforst, a far unfitter task,
For trumpets stern to change mine oaten reeds,
And sing of knights' and ladies' gentle deeds; 5
Whose praises having slept in silence long,
Me, all too mean, the sacred Muse areads° to counsel, advise
To blazon broad emongst her learned throng:
Fierce wars and faithful loves shall moralize my song.
II
Helpe then, O holy virgin, chief of nine, 10
Thy weaker novice to perform thy will;
Lay forth out of thine everlasting scrine chest
The antique rolls, which there lie hidden still,
Of Fairy knights, and fairest Tanaquill,
Whom that most noble Briton Prince so long 15
Sought through the world, and suffered so much ill,
That I must rue his undeserved wrong:
O help thou my weak wit, and sharpen my dull tongue.
III
And thou, most dreaded imp of highest Jove.
Faire Venus' son, that with thy cruel dart 20
At that good knight so cunningly didst rove°, shoot at rovers
That glorious fire it kindled in his heart,
Lay now thy deadly heben° bow apart, ebony
And with thy mother mild come to mine aid:
Come both, and with you bring triumphant Mart, 25
In loves and gentle jollities array'd,
After his murd'rous spoils and bloody rage allay'd.
IV
And with them eke, O Goddess heavenly bright,
Mirror of grace and majesty divine,
Great Lady of the greatest Isle, whose light 30
Like Phœbus' lamp throughout the world doth shine,
Shed thy fair beams into my feeble eyne,
And raise my thoughts, too humble and too vile,
To think of that true glorious type of thine,
The argument of mine afflicted style: 35
The which to heare vouchsafe, O dearest dread, a while.
CANTO I
The patron of true Holiness
Foul Error doth defeat:
Hypocrisy, him to entrap,
Doth to his home entreat.
I
A GENTLE knight was pricking on the plain,
Yclad in mighty arms and silver shield,
Wherein old dints of deepe wounds did remain,
The cruel marks of many’ a bloody field; 40
Yet arms till that time did he never wield:
His angry steed did chide his foming bit,
As much disdaining to the curb to yield:
Full jolly knight he seem'd, and fair did sit,
As one for knightly jiousts and fierce encounters fit. 45
II
But on his breast a bloody cross he bore,
The deare remembrance of his dying Lord,
For whose sweet sake that glorious badge he wore,
And dead as living ever him ador’d:
Upon his shield the like was also scor’d, 50
For sovereign hope, which in his help he had:
Right faithful true he was in deed and word,
But of his cheer did seeme too solemn sad;
Yet nothing did he dread, but ever was ydrad.
III
Upon a great adventure he was bond, 55
That greatest Gloriana to him gave,
That greatest glorious queene of Fairy Lond,
To win him worship, and her grace to have,
Which of all earthly things he most did crave;
And ever as he rode his heart did earne° 60 yearn
To prove his puissance in battle brave
Upon his foe, and his new force to learn;
Upon his foe, a dragon horrible and stern.
IV
A lovely lady rode him fair beside,
Upon a lowly ass more white than snow, 65
Yet she much whiter, but the same did hide
Under a veil, that wimpled was full low,
And over all a black stole she did throw:
As one that inly mourn'd, so was she sad,
And heavy sate upon her palfrey slow: 70
Seemed in heart some hidden care she had;
And by her in a line a milkwhite lamb she lad.
V
So pure and innocent, as that same lamb,
She was in life and every virtuous lore°, (moral) teaching
And by descent from royal linage° came 75 lineage
Of ancient kings and queens, that had of yore
Their scepters stretcht from east to western shore,
And all the world in their subjection held,
Till that infernal fiend with foul uproar
Forwasted° all their land, and them expell'd: 80 to lay waste
Whom to avenge, she had this knight from far compell'd.
VI
Behind her far away a dwarf did lag,
That lazy seem'd, in being ever last,
Or wearied with bearing of her bag
Of needments at his back. Thus as they past,85
The day with clouds was sudden overcast,
And angry Jove an hideous storm of rain
Did pour into his leman's lap so fast,
That every wight to shroud it did constrain, 89
And this fair couple eke to shroud themselves were fain.
VII
Enforst to seeke some covert nigh at hand,
A shady grove not far away they spied,
That promist aid the tempest to withstand:
Whose lofty trees, yclad with summer's pride,
Did spread so broad, that heaven's light did hide,
Not perceable with power of any star: 96
And all within were paths and alleys wide,
With footing worne, and leading inward far:
Fair harbour that them seems, so in they enter'd are.
VIII
And forth they passe, with pleasure forward led,
Joying to heare the birds' sweet harmony, 101
Which, therein shrouded from the tempest dread,
Seem'd in their song to scorn the cruel sky.
Much can they praise the trees so straight and high,
The sapling pine, the cedar proud and tall, 105
The vine-prop elm, the poplar never dry,
The builder oak, sole king of forests all,
The aspen good for staves, the cypress funeral,
IX
The laurel, meed of mighty conquerors
And poets sage, the fir that weepeth still, 110
The willow worn of forlorn paramours,
The ewe obedient to the bender's will,
The birch for shafts, the sallow for the mill,
The myrrh sweete bleeding in the bitter wound,
The warlike beech, the ash for nothing ill, 115
The fruitful olive, and the platane round,
The carver holm, the maple seldom inward sound.
X
Led with delight, they thus beguile the way,
Until the blust'ring storm is overblown;
When, weening to return whence they did stray, 120
They cannot find that path, which first was shown,
But wander to and fro in ways unknown,
Furthest from end then, when they nearest ween,
That makes them doubt, their wits be not their own:
So many paths, so many turnings seen, 125
That which of them to take, in diverse doubt they been.
XI
At last resolving forward still to fare,
Till that some end they finde, or in or out,
That path they take, that beaten seemd most bare,
And like to lead the labyrinth about; 130
Which when by tract they hunted had throughout,
At length it brought them to a hollowe cave,
Amid the thickest woods. The champion stout
Eftsoones dismounted from his courser brave,
And to the dwarfe a while his needlesse spere he gave. 135
XII
‘Be well aware,’ quoth then that ladie milde,
‘Least suddaine mischiefe ye too rash provoke:
The danger hid, the place unknowne and wilde,
Breedes dreadfull doubts: oft fire is without smoke,
And perill without show: therefore your stroke, 140
Sir knight, with-hold, till further tryall made.’
‘Ah, ladie,’ sayd he, ‘shame were to revoke
The forward footing for an hidden shade:
Vertue gives her selfe light, through darkenesse for to wade.’
XIII
‘Yea, but,’ quoth she, ‘the perill of this place 145
I better wot then you; though nowe too late
To wish you backe returne with foule disgrace,
Yet wisedome warnes, whilest foot is in the gate,
To stay the steppe, ere forced to retrate.
This is the wandring wood, this Errours den, 150
A monster vile, whom God and man does hate:
Therefore I read beware.’ ‘Fly, fly!’ quoth then
The fearefull dwarfe: ‘this is no place for living men.’
XIV
But full of fire and greedy hardiment,
The youthfull knight could not for ought be staide, 155
But forth unto the darksom hole he went,
And looked in: his glistring armor made
A litle glooming light, much like a shade,
By which he saw the ugly monster plaine,
Halfe like a serpent horribly displaide, 160
But th’ other halfe did womans shape retaine,
Most lothsom, filthie, foule, and full of vile disdaine.
XV
And as she lay upon the durtie ground,
Her huge long taile her den all overspred,
Yet was in knots and many boughtes upwound, 165
Pointed with mortall sting. Of her there bred
A thousand yong ones, which she dayly fed,
Sucking upon her poisnous dugs, eachone
Of sundrie shapes, yet all ill favored:
Soone as that uncouth light upon them shone, 170
Into her mouth they crept, and suddain all were gone.
XVI
Their dam upstart, out of her den effraide,
And rushed forth, hurling her hideous taile
About her cursed head, whose folds displaid
Were stretcht now forth at length without entraile. 175
She lookt about, and seeing one in mayle,
Armed to point, sought backe to turne againe;
For light she hated as the deadly bale,
Ay wont in desert darknes to remaine,
Where plain none might her see, nor she see any plaine. 180
XVII
Which when the valiant Elfe perceiv’d, he lept
As lyon fierce upon the flying pray,
And with his trenchand blade her boldly kept
From turning backe, and forced her to stay:
Therewith enrag’d she loudly gan to bray, 185
And turning fierce, her speckled taile advaunst,
Threatning her angrie sting, him to dismay:
Who, nought aghast, his mightie hand enhaunst:
The stroke down from her head unto her shoulder glaunst.
XVIII
Much daunted with that dint, her sence was dazd, 190
Yet kindling rage her selfe she gathered round,
And all attonce her beastly bodie raizd
With doubled forces high above the ground:
Tho, wrapping up her wrethed sterne arownd,
Lept fierce upon his shield, and her huge traine 195
All suddenly about his body wound,
That hand or foot to stirr he strove in vaine:
God helpe the man so wrapt in Errours endlesse traine.
XIX
His lady, sad to see his sore constraint,
Cride out, ‘Now, now, sir knight, shew what ye bee: 200
Add faith unto your force, and be not faint:
Strangle her, els she sure will strangle thee.’
That when he heard, in great perplexitie,
His gall did grate for griefe and high disdaine;
And knitting all his force, got one hand free, 205
Wherewith he grypt her gorge with so great paine,
That soone to loose her wicked bands did her constraine.
XX
Therewith she spewd out of her filthie maw
A floud of poyson horrible and blacke,
Full of great lumps of flesh and gobbets raw, 210
Which stunck so vildly, that it forst him slacke
His grasping hold, and from her turne him backe:
Her vomit full of bookes and papers was,
With loathly frogs and toades, which eyes did lacke,
And creeping sought way in the weedy gras: 215
Her filthie parbreake all the place defiled has.
XXI
As when old father Nilus gins to swell
With timely pride above the Aegyptian vale,
His fattie waves doe fertile slime outwell,
And overflow each plaine and lowly dale: 220
But when his later spring gins to avale,
Huge heapes of mudd he leaves, wherin there breed
Ten thousand kindes of creatures, partly male
And partly femall, of his fruitful seed;
Such ugly monstrous shapes elswher may no man reed. 225
XXII
The same so sore annoyed has the knight,
That, welnigh choked with the deadly stinke,
His forces faile, ne can no lenger fight.
Whose corage when the feend perceivd to shrinke,
She poured forth out of her hellish sinke 230
Her fruitfull cursed spawne of serpents small,
Deformed monsters, fowle, and blacke as inke,
Which swarming all about his legs did crall,
And him encombred sore, but could not hurt at all.
XXIII
As gentle shepheard in sweete eventide, 235
When ruddy Phebus gins to welke in west,
High on an hill, his flocke to vewen wide,
Markes which doe byte their hasty supper best;
A cloud of cumbrous gnattes doe him molest,
All striving to infixe their feeble stinges, 240
That from their noyance he no where can rest,
But with his clownish hands their tender wings
He brusheth oft, and oft doth mar their murmurings.
XXIV
Thus ill bestedd, and fearefull more of shame
Then of the certeine perill he stood in, 245
Halfe furious unto his foe he came,
Resolvd in minde all suddenly to win,
Or soone to lose, before he once would lin;
And stroke at her with more then manly force,
That from her body, full of filthie sin, 250
He raft her hatefull heade without remorse:
A streame of cole black blood forth gushed from her corse.
XXV
Her scattred brood, soone as their parent deare
They saw so rudely falling to the ground,
Groning full deadly, all with troublous feare, 255
Gathred themselves about her body round,
Weening their wonted entrance to have found
At her wide mouth: but being there withstood,
They flocked all about her bleeding wound,
And sucked up their dying mothers bloud, 260
Making her death their life, and eke her hurt their good.
XXVI
That detestable sight him much amazde,
To see th’ unkindly impes, of heaven accurst,
Devoure their dam; on whom while so he gazd,
Having all satisfide their bloudy thurst, 265
Their bellies swolne he saw with fulnesse burst,
And bowels gushing forth: well worthy end
Of such as drunke her life, the which them nurst!
Now needeth him no lenger labour spend;
His foes have slaine themselves, with whom he should contend. 270
XXVII
His lady, seeing all that chaunst, from farre,
Approcht in hast to greet his victorie,
And saide, ‘Faire knight, borne under happie starre,
Who see your vanquisht foes before you lye,
Well worthie be you of that armory, 275
Wherein ye have great glory wonne this day,
And proov’d your strength on a strong enimie,
Your first adventure: many such I pray,
And henceforth ever wish that like succeed it may.’
XXVIII
Then mounted he upon his steede againe, 280
And with the lady backward sought to wend;
That path he kept which beaten was most plaine,
Ne ever would to any by way bend,
But still did follow one unto the end,
The which at last out of the wood them brought. 285
So forward on his way (with God to frend)
He passed forth, and new adventure sought:
Long way he traveiled, before he heard of ought.
XXIX
At length they chaunst to meet upon the way
An aged sire, in long blacke weedes yclad, 290
His feete all bare, his beard all hoarie gray,
And by his belt his booke he hanging had;
Sober he seemde, and very sagely sad,
And to the ground his eyes were lowly bent,
Simple in shew, and voide of malice bad, 295
And all the way he prayed as he went,
And often knockt his brest, as one that did repent.
XXX
He faire the knight saluted, louting low,
Who faire him quited, as that courteous was;
And after asked him, if he did know 300
Of straunge adventures, which abroad did pas.
‘Ah! my dear sonne,’ quoth he, ‘how should, alas!
Silly old man, that lives in hidden cell,
Bidding his beades all day for his trespas,
Tydings of warre and worldly trouble tell? 305
With holy father sits not with such thinges to mell.
XXXI
‘But if of daunger, which hereby doth dwell,
And homebredd evil ye desire to heare,
Of a straunge man I can you tidings tell,
That wasteth all this countrie farre and neare.’ 310
‘Of such,’ saide he, ‘I chiefly doe inquere,
And shall you well rewarde to shew the place,
In which that wicked wight his dayes doth weare:
For to all knighthood it is foule disgrace,
That such a cursed creature lives so long a space.’ 315
XXXII
‘Far hence,’ quoth he, ‘in wastfull wildernesse,
His dwelling is, by which no living wight
May ever passe, but thorough great distresse.’
‘Now,’ saide the ladie, ‘draweth toward night,
And well I wote, that of your later fight 320
Ye all forwearied be: for what so strong,
But, wanting rest, will also want of might?
The Sunne, that measures heaven all day long,
At night doth baite his steedes the ocean waves emong.
XXXIII
‘Then with the Sunne take, sir, your timely rest, 325
And with new day new worke at once begin:
Untroubled night, they say, gives counsell best.’
‘Right well, sir knight, ye have advised bin,’
Quoth then that aged man; ‘the way to win
Is wisely to advise: now day is spent; 330
Therefore with me ye may take up your in
For this same night.’ The knight was well content:
So with that godly father to his home they went.
XXXIV
A litle lowly hermitage it was,
Downe in a dale, hard by a forests side, 335
Far from resort of people, that did pas
In traveill to and froe: a litle wyde
There was an holy chappell edifyde,
Wherein the hermite dewly wont to say
His holy thinges each morne and even-tyde: 340
Thereby a christall streame did gently play,
Which from a sacred fountaine welled forth alway.
XXXV
Arrived there, the litle house they fill,
Ne looke for entertainement, where none was:
Rest is their feast, and all thinges at their will; 345
The noblest mind the best contentment has.
With faire discourse the evening so they pas:
For that olde man of pleasing wordes had store,
And well could file his tongue as smooth as glas:
He told of saintes and popes, and evermore 350
He strowd an Ave-Mary after and before.
XXXVI
The drouping night thus creepeth on them fast,
And the sad humor loading their eye liddes,
As messenger of Morpheus, on them cast
Sweet slombring deaw, the which to sleep them biddes: 355
Unto their lodgings then his guestes he riddes:
Where when all drownd in deadly sleepe he findes,
He to his studie goes, and there amiddes
His magick bookes and artes of sundrie kindes,
He seekes out mighty charmes, to trouble sleepy minds. 360
XXXVII
Then choosing out few words most horrible,
(Let none them read) thereof did verses frame;
With which and other spelles like terrible,
He bad awake blacke Plutoes griesly dame,
And cursed heven, and spake reprochful shame 365
Of highest God, the Lord of life and light:
A bold bad man, that dar’d to call by name
Great Gorgon, prince of darknes and dead night,
At which Cocytus quakes, and Styx is put to flight.
XXXVIII
And forth he cald out of deepe darknes dredd 370
Legions of sprights, the which, like litle flyes
Fluttring about his ever damned hedd,
Awaite whereto their service he applyes,
To aide his friendes, or fray his enimies:
Of those he chose out two, the falsest twoo, 375
And fittest for to forge true-seeming lyes;
The one of them he gave a message too,
The other by him selfe staide, other worke to doo.
XXXIX
He, making speedy way through spersed ayre,
And through the world of waters wide and deepe, 380
To Morpheus house doth hastily repaire.
Amid the bowels of the earth full steepe,
And low, where dawning day doth never peepe,
His dwelling is; there Tethys his wet bed
Doth ever wash, and Cynthia still doth steepe 385
In silver deaw his ever-drouping hed,
Whiles sad Night over him her mantle black doth spred.
XL
Whose double gates he findeth locked fast,
The one faire fram’d of burnisht yvory,
The other all with silver overcast; 390
And wakeful dogges before them farre doe lye,
Watching to banish Care their enimy,
Who oft is wont to trouble gentle Sleepe.
By them the sprite doth passe in quietly,
And unto Morpheus comes, whom drowned deepe 395
In drowsie fit he findes: of nothing he takes keepe.
XLI
And more, to lulle him in his slumber soft,
A trickling streame from high rock tumbling downe,
And ever drizling raine upon the loft,
Mixt with a murmuring winde, much like the sowne 400
Of swarming bees, did cast him in a swowne:
No other noyse, nor peoples troublous cryes,
As still are wont t’ annoy the walled towne,
Might there be heard: but carelesse Quiet lyes,
Wrapt in eternall silence farre from enimyes. 405
XLII
The messenger approching to him spake,
But his waste wordes retournd to him in vaine:
So sound he slept, that nought mought him awake.
Then rudely he him thrust, and pusht with paine,
Whereat he gan to stretch: but he againe 410
Shooke him so hard, that forced him to speake.
As one then in a dreame, whose dryer braine
Is tost with troubled sights and fancies weake,
He mumbled soft, but would not all his silence breake.
XLIII
The sprite then gan more boldly him to wake, 415
And threatned unto him the dreaded name
Of Hecate: whereat he gan to quake,
And, lifting up his lompish head, with blame
Halfe angrie asked him, for what he came.
‘Hether,’ quoth he, ‘me Archimago sent, 420
He that the stubborne sprites can wisely tame;
He bids thee to him send for his intent
A fit false dreame, that can delude the sleepers sent.’
XLIV
The god obayde, and calling forth straight way
A diverse dreame out of his prison darke, 425
Delivered it to him, and downe did lay
His heavie head, devoide of careful carke;
Whose sences all were straight benumbd and starke.
He, backe returning by the yvorie dore,
Remounted up as light as chearefull larke, 430
And on his litle winges the dreame he bore
In hast unto his lord, where he him left afore.
XLV
Who all this while, with charmes and hidden artes,
Had made a lady of that other spright,
And fram’d of liquid ayre her tender partes, 435
So lively and so like in all mens sight,
That weaker sence it could have ravisht quight:
The maker selfe, for all his wondrous witt,
Was nigh beguiled with so goodly sight:
Her all in white he clad, and over it 440
Cast a black stole, most like to seeme for Una fit.
XLVI
Now when that ydle dreame was to him brought,
Unto that Elfin knight he bad him fly,
Where he slept soundly, void of evil thought,
And with false shewes abuse his fantasy, 445
In sort as he him schooled privily:
And that new creature, borne without her dew,
Full of the makers guyle, with usage sly
He taught to imitate that lady trew,
Whose semblance she did carrie under feigned hew. 450
XLVII
Thus well instructed, to their worke they haste,
And comming where the knight in slomber lay,
The one upon his hardie head him plaste,
And made him dreame of loves and lust-full play,
That nigh his manly hart did melt away, 455
Bathed in wanton blis and wicked joy.
Then seemed him his lady by him lay,
And to him playnd, how that false winged boy
Her chaste hart had subdewd to learne Dame Pleasures toy.
XLVIII
And she her selfe, of beautie soveraigne queene, 460
Fayre Venus, seemde unto his bed to bring
Her, whom he, waking, evermore did weene
To bee the chastest flowre that aye did spring
On earthly braunch, the daughter of a king,
Now a loose leman to vile service bound: 465
And eke the Graces seemed all to sing
Hymen iö Hymen, dauncing all around,
Whylst freshest Flora her with yvie girlond crownd.
XLIX
In this great passion of unwonted lust,
Or wonted feare of doing ought amis, 470
He started up, as seeming to mistrust
Some secret ill, or hidden foe of his:
Lo! there before his face his ladie is,
Under blacke stole hyding her bayted hooke,
And as halfe blushing offred him to kis, 475
With gentle blandishment and lovely looke,
Most like that virgin true, which for her knight him took.
L
All cleane dismayd to see so uncouth sight,
And halfe enraged at her shamelesse guise,
He thought have slaine her in his fierce despight; 480
But hastie heat tempring with sufferance wise,
He stayde his hand, and gan himselfe advise
To prove his sense, and tempt her faigned truth.
Wringing her hands in wemens pitteous wise,
Tho can she weepe, to stirre up gentle ruth, 485
Both for her noble blood, and for her tender youth.
LI
And sayd, ‘Ah sir, my liege lord and my love,
Shall I accuse the hidden cruell fate,
And mightie causes wrought in heaven above,
Or the blind god, that doth me thus amate, 490
For hoped love to winne me certaine hate?
Yet thus perforce he bids me do, or die.
Die is my dew: yet rew my wretched state
You, whom my hard avenging destinie
Hath made judge of my life or death in differently. 495
LII
‘Your owne deare sake forst me at first to leave
My fathers kingdom’—There she stopt with teares;
Her swollen hart her speech seemd to bereave;
And then againe begonne: ‘My weaker yeares,
Captiv’d to fortune and frayle worldly feares, 500
Fly to your fayth for succour and sure ayde:
Let me not die in languor and long teares.’
‘Why, dame,’ quoth he, ‘what hath ye thus dismayd?
What frayes ye, that were wont to comfort me affrayd?’
LIII
‘Love of your selfe,’ she saide, ‘and deare constraint, 505
Lets me not sleepe, but waste the wearie night
In secret anguish and unpittied plaint,
Whiles you in carelesse sleepe are drowned quight.’
Her doubtfull words made that redoubted knight
Suspect her truth: yet since no’ untruth he knew, 510
Her fawning love with foule disdainefull spight
He would not shend, but said, ‘Deare dame, I rew,
That for my sake unknowne such griefe unto you grew.
LIV
‘Assure your selfe, it fell not all to ground;
For all so deare as life is to my hart, 515
I deeme your love, and hold me to you bound;
Ne let vaine feares procure your needlesse smart,
Where cause is none, but to your rest depart.’
Not all content, yet seemd she to appease
Her mournefull plaintes, beguiled of her art, 520
And fed with words, that could not chose but please;
So slyding softly forth, she turnd as to her ease.
LV
Long after lay he musing at her mood,
Much griev’d to thinke that gentle dame so light,
For whose defence he was to shed his blood. 525
At last dull wearines of former fight
Having yrockt a sleepe his irkesome spright,
That troublous dreame gan freshly tosse his braine
With bowres, and beds, and ladies deare delight:
But when he saw his labour all was vaine, 530
With that misformed spright he backe returnd againe.
Monday, July 27, 2015
Sunday, June 1, 2014
Canzoniere III
By Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374).
Era il giorno ch'al sol si scoloraro°
per la pietà del suo fattore i rai,
quando i' fui preso, et non me ne guardai,
ché i be' vostr'occhi, donna, mi legaro°.
Tempo non mi parea° da far riparo° 5
contra colpi° d'Amor: però m'andai
secur, senza sospetto; onde i miei guai°
nel commune dolor s'incominciaro°.
Trovommi Amor del tutto disarmato
et aperta la via per gli occhi al core, 10
che di lagrime son fatti uscio° et varco°:
però al mio parer non li fu onore
ferir° me de saetta° in quello stato,
a voi armata non mostrar pur° l'arco.
Notes:
Line 1: si scoloraro. Si scolorarano, from scolorar(si): to fade, discolor.
Line 4: legaro. Legarono, from legare: to bind, tie.
Line 5: parea. Pareva, it appeared, seemed. From parere.
Line 5: riparo. Shelter, refuge.
Line 6: colpi. Blows, shots.
Line 7: guai. Troubles. Sing. il guaio.
Line 8: s'incominciaro. Si incominciarono, from incominciar(si): to start, begin.
Line 11: uscio. Door.
Line 11: varco. Passage. "Uscio et varco" is a hendiadys.
Line 13: ferir. Wound, injure.
Line 13: saetta. Arrow, dart.
Line 14: pur. Even.
Era il giorno ch'al sol si scoloraro°
per la pietà del suo fattore i rai,
quando i' fui preso, et non me ne guardai,
ché i be' vostr'occhi, donna, mi legaro°.
Tempo non mi parea° da far riparo° 5
contra colpi° d'Amor: però m'andai
secur, senza sospetto; onde i miei guai°
nel commune dolor s'incominciaro°.
Trovommi Amor del tutto disarmato
et aperta la via per gli occhi al core, 10
che di lagrime son fatti uscio° et varco°:
però al mio parer non li fu onore
ferir° me de saetta° in quello stato,
a voi armata non mostrar pur° l'arco.
Notes:
Line 1: si scoloraro. Si scolorarano, from scolorar(si): to fade, discolor.
Line 4: legaro. Legarono, from legare: to bind, tie.
Line 5: parea. Pareva, it appeared, seemed. From parere.
Line 5: riparo. Shelter, refuge.
Line 6: colpi. Blows, shots.
Line 7: guai. Troubles. Sing. il guaio.
Line 8: s'incominciaro. Si incominciarono, from incominciar(si): to start, begin.
Line 11: uscio. Door.
Line 11: varco. Passage. "Uscio et varco" is a hendiadys.
Line 13: ferir. Wound, injure.
Line 13: saetta. Arrow, dart.
Line 14: pur. Even.
Canzoniere I
By Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374).
Voi ch'ascoltate in rime sparse il suono
di quei sospiri ond'io nudriva° 'l core
in sul mio primo giovenile errore
quand'era in parte altr'uom da quel ch'i' sono,
del vario stile° in ch'io piango et ragiono 5
fra le vane speranze e 'l van dolore°,
ove° sia chi per prova intenda amore,
spero trovar pietà , nonché° perdono.
Ma ben veggio° or° sà come al popol tutto
favola fui gran tempo, onde° sovente° 10
di me medesmo° meco mi° vergogno°;
et del mio vaneggiar° vergogna° è 'l frutto,
e 'l pentersi°, e 'l conoscer chiaramente
che quanto° piace al mondo è breve sogno.
Notes:
Line 2: nudriva. Nutrivo, I fed. From nutrire, to feed. Compare Ovid's description of Orpheus feeding on worry, sorrow and tears (Metamorphoses 10,75: "cura dolorque animi lacrimaeque alimenta fuere").
Line 5: stile. Style or way, manner. Here it signifies the latter, though with a poetic nod to the former.
Line 5: piango. I weep, from piangere, to weep (at).
Line 5: ragiono. I talk, from ragionare, to think, reason.
Lines 5-6: piango et ragiono / Fra le vane speranze e 'l van dolore. Chiastic construction.
Line 7: ove. Dove, where.
Line 8: nonché. As well as.
Line 9: veggio. Vedo, I see. From vedere, to see.
Line 9: or. Ora, now.
Line 10: onde. Whence, so that
Line 10: sovente. Often.
Line 11: medesmo. Medesimo, (self)same.
Line 11: meco. (With) me.
Line 11: me medesmo meco mi. Alliteration.
Line 11: mi vergogno. I feel ashamed, from vergognarsi, to feel ashamed.
Line 12: vaneggiar. Vannegiare, vain longing (?) or raving.
Line 12: vergogna. Shame (feminine noun).
Line 13: pentersi. Pentirsi, regret, repent.
Line 14: quanto. Here: what, that which.
Voi ch'ascoltate in rime sparse il suono
di quei sospiri ond'io nudriva° 'l core
in sul mio primo giovenile errore
quand'era in parte altr'uom da quel ch'i' sono,
del vario stile° in ch'io piango et ragiono 5
fra le vane speranze e 'l van dolore°,
ove° sia chi per prova intenda amore,
spero trovar pietà , nonché° perdono.
Ma ben veggio° or° sà come al popol tutto
favola fui gran tempo, onde° sovente° 10
di me medesmo° meco mi° vergogno°;
et del mio vaneggiar° vergogna° è 'l frutto,
e 'l pentersi°, e 'l conoscer chiaramente
che quanto° piace al mondo è breve sogno.
Notes:
Line 2: nudriva. Nutrivo, I fed. From nutrire, to feed. Compare Ovid's description of Orpheus feeding on worry, sorrow and tears (Metamorphoses 10,75: "cura dolorque animi lacrimaeque alimenta fuere").
Line 5: stile. Style or way, manner. Here it signifies the latter, though with a poetic nod to the former.
Line 5: piango. I weep, from piangere, to weep (at).
Line 5: ragiono. I talk, from ragionare, to think, reason.
Lines 5-6: piango et ragiono / Fra le vane speranze e 'l van dolore. Chiastic construction.
Line 7: ove. Dove, where.
Line 8: nonché. As well as.
Line 9: veggio. Vedo, I see. From vedere, to see.
Line 9: or. Ora, now.
Line 10: onde. Whence, so that
Line 10: sovente. Often.
Line 11: medesmo. Medesimo, (self)same.
Line 11: meco. (With) me.
Line 11: me medesmo meco mi. Alliteration.
Line 11: mi vergogno. I feel ashamed, from vergognarsi, to feel ashamed.
Line 12: vaneggiar. Vannegiare, vain longing (?) or raving.
Line 12: vergogna. Shame (feminine noun).
Line 13: pentersi. Pentirsi, regret, repent.
Line 14: quanto. Here: what, that which.
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
The Grave
By Robert Blair (1699-1746).
Whilst some affect° the sun, and some the shade,
Some flee the city, some the hermitage;
Their aims as various as the roads they take
In journeying through life; the task be mine
To paint the gloomy horrors of the tomb; 5
Th’ appointed place of rendezvous, where all
These trav’llers meet. Thy succours I implore,
Eternal King°! whose potent arm sustains
The keys of hell and death. The Grave, dread thing!
Men shiver when thou’rt nam’d: nature appall’d 10
Shakes off her wonted firmness. Ah! how dark
Thy long-extended realms, and rueful wastes,
Where nought but silence reigns, and night, dark night,
Dark as was chaos ere the infant sun
Was roll’d together, or had tried his beams 15
Athwart the gloom profound! The sickly taper
By glimm’ring through thy low-brow’d misty vaults,
Furr’d° round with mouldy damps and ropy slime,
Lets fall a supernumerary horror,
And only serves to make thy night more irksome! 20
Well do I know thee by thy trusty yew°,
Cheerless, unsocial plant! that loves to dwell
’Midst sculls and coffins, epitaphs and worms;
Where light-heel’d ghosts and visionary° shades,
Beneath the wan cold moon (as fame reports) 25
Embodied thick, perform their mystic rounds.
No other merriment, dull tree! is thine.
See yonder hallow’d fane°! the pious work
Of names once fam’d, now dubious or forgot,
And buried ’midst the wreck of things which were: 30
There lie interred the more illustrious dead.
The wind is up: hark—how it howls! Methinks
Till now I never heard a sound so dreary.
Doors creak, and windows clap, and night’s foul bird,
Rook’d in the spire, screams loud! The gloomy aisles 35
Black plaister’d°, and hung round with shreds of ’scutcheons°
And tatter’d coats of arms, send back the sound,
Laden with heavier airs, from the low vaults,
The mansions of the dead! Rous’d from their slumbers,
In grim array the grisly spectres rise, 40
Grin horrible, and obstinately sullen
Pass and repass, hush’d as the foot of night!
Again the screech owl shrieks—ungracious sound!
I’ll hear no more; it makes one’s blood run chill.
Quite round the pile, a row of reverend elms, 45
Coeval° near with that, all ragged shew,
Long lash’d by the rude winds; some rift half down
Their branchless trunks, others so thin a-top
That scarce two crows could lodge in the same tree.
Strange things, the neighbours say, have happen’d here. 50
Wild shrieks have issued from the hollow tombs;
Dead men have come again, and walk’d about;
And the great bell has toll’d, unrung, untouch’d!
Such tales their cheer, at wake or gossiping,
When it draws near the witching-time of night. 55
Oft in the lone church-yard at night I’ve seen,
By glimpse of moon-shine, chequering through the trees,
The school-boy, with his satchel in his hand,
Whistling aloud to bear his courage up,
And lightly tripping o’er the long flat stones 60
(With nettles skirted, and with moss o’ergrown)
That tell in homely° phrase who lies below.
Sudden he starts! and hears, or thinks he hears,
The sound of something purring at his heels.
Full fast he flies, and dares not look behind him, 65
Till out of breath he overtakes his fellows;
Who gather round, and wonder at the tale
Of horrid apparition, tall and ghastly,
That walks at dead of night, or takes his stand
O’er some new open’d grave; and, strange to tell, 70
Evanishes° at crowing of the cock!
The new-made widow too I’ve sometimes spied,
(Sad sight!) slow moving o’er the prostrate dead:
Listless she crawls along in doleful black,
While bursts of sorrow gush from either eye, 75
Fast falling down her now untasted cheek.
Prone° on the lowly grave of the man
She drops: while busy meddling memory,
In barbarous succession, musters up
The past endearments of their softer hours, 80
Tenacious of its theme. Still, still she thinks
She sees him, and, indulging the fond thought,
Clings yet more closely to the senseless turf,
Nor heeds the passenger who looks that way.
Invidious Grave—how dost thou rend in sunder 85
Whom love has knit, and sympathy made one!
A tie more stubborn far than nature’s band.
Friendship! mysterious cement of the soul!
Sweet’ner of life! and solder° of society!
I owe thee much. Thou hast deserv’d from me 90
Far, far beyond what I can ever pay.
Oft have I prov’d° the labours of thy love,
And the warm efforts of the gentle heart,
Anxious to please. O! when my friend and I
In some thick wood have wander’d heedless on, 95
Hid from the vulgar eye; and sat us down
Upon the sloping cowslip°-cover’d bank,
Where the pure limpid stream has slid along
In grateful errors through the under-wood,
Sweet murm’ring; methought the shrill-tongu’d thrush° 100
Mended his song of love, the sooty blackbird
Mellow’d his pipe, and soften’d every note;
The eglantine° smell’d sweeter, and the rose
Assum’d a dye more deep; whilst ev’ry flower
Vied with its fellow plant in luxury 105
Of dress. O! then the longest summer’s day
Seemed too, too much in haste; still the full heart
Had not imparted half; ’twas happiness
Too exquisite to last! Of joys departed,
Not to return, how painful the remembrance! 110
Dull Grave! thou spoil’st the dance of youthful blood,
Strik’st out the dimple from the cheek of mirth,
And every smirking feature from the face;
Branding our laughter with the name of madness.
Where are the jesters now?° the men of health 115
Complexionally pleasant? Where the droll,
Whose very look and gesture was a joke
To clapping theatres and shouting crowds,
And made e’en thick-lipp’d musing Melancholy
To gather up her face into a smile 120
Before she was aware? Ah! sullen now
And dumb as the green turf that covers them!
Where are the mighty thunderbolts of war,
The Roman Caesars and the Grecian chiefs,
The boast of story? Where the hot-brain’d youth, 125
Who the tiara at his pleasure tore
From kings of all the then discovered globe;
And cried, forsooth, because his arm was hamper’d,
And had not room enough to do its work,
Alas, how slim—dishonourably slim!— 130
And cramm’d into a space we blush to name—
Proud royalty! How alter’d in thy looks!
How blank thy features, and how wan thy hue!
Son of the morning! whither art thou gone?
Where hast thou hid thy many-spangled head, 135
And the majestic menace of thine eyes,
Felt from afar? Pliant and pow’rless now;
Like new-born infant wound up in his swathes,
Or victim tumbled flat upon his back,
That throbs beneath the sacrificer’s knife; 140
Mute must thou bear the strife of little tongues,
And coward insults of the base-born crowd,
That grudge a privilege thou never hadst,
But only hop’d for in the peaceful Grave—
Of being unmolested and alone! 145
Arabia’s gums and odoriferous drugs,
And honours by the heralds duly paid
In mode and form, e’en to a very scruple;
(O cruel irony!) these come too late;
And only mock whom they were meant to honour! 150
Surely there’s not a dungeon slave that’s buried
In the highway, unshrouded and uncoffin’d,
But lies as soft, and sleeps as sound, as he.
Sorry pre-eminence of high descent
Above the baser born, to rot in state! 155
But see! the well-plum’d hearse comes nodding on,
Stately and slow; and properly attended
By the whole sable tribe, that painful watch
The sick man’s door, and live upon the dead,
By letting out their persons by the hour 160
To mimic sorrow, when the heart’s not sad!
How rich the trappings, now they’re all unfurl’d
And glitt’ring in the sun! Triumphant entries
Of conquerors and coronation pomps
In glory scarce exceed. Great gluts of people 165
Retard th’ unwieldy show; whilst from the casements°
And houses’ tops, ranks behind ranks, close wedg’d,
Hang bellying o’er. But tell us, why this waste?
Why this ado in earthing up a carcass
That’s fall’n into disgrace, and in the nostril 170
Smells horrible? Ye undertakers! tell us,
’Midst all the gorgeous figures you exhibit,
Why is the principal conceal’d, for which
You make this mighty stir? ’Tis wisely done;
What would offend the eye in a good picture, 175
The painter casts discreetly into shades.
Proud lineage! now how little thou appear’st!
Below the envy of the private man!
Honour, that meddlesome officious ill,
Pursues thee e’en to death! nor there stops short 180
Strange persecution! when the Grave itself
Is no protection from rude sufferance.
Absurd! to think to over-reach the Grave,
And from the wreck of names to rescue ours!
The best concerted schemes men lay for fame 185
Die fast away; only themselves die faster.
The far-fam’d sculptor and the laurell’d bard,
These bold insurancers of deathless fame,
Supply their little feeble aids in vain.
The tapering pyramid, th’ Egyptian’s pride, 190
And wonder of the world! whose spiky top
Has wounded the thick cloud, and long outliv’d
The angry shaking of the winter’s storm;
Yet, spent at last by the injuries of heav’n,
Shatter’d with age and furrow’d o’er with years, 195
The mystic cone, with hieroglyphics crusted,
At once gives way. O lamentable sight!
The labour of whole ages lumbers down,
A hideous and mis-shapen length of ruins!
Sepulchral columns wrestle but in vain 200
With all-subduing Time: her cank’ring hand
With calm delib’rate malice wasteth them.
Worn on the edge of days, the brass consumes°,
The busto° moulders, and the deep cut marble,
Unsteady to the steel, gives up its charge! 205
Ambition, half convicted of her folly,
Hangs down the head, and reddens at the tale!
Here all the mighty troublers of the earth,
Who swam to sov’reign rule through seas of blood;
Th’ oppressive, sturdy, man-destroying villains, 210
Who ravag’d kingdoms, and laid empires waste,
And in a cruel wantonness of pow’r
Thinn’d states of half their people, and gave up
To want the rest; now, like a storm that’s spent,
Lie hush’d, and meanly sneak behind the covert°. 215
Vain thought! to hide them from the general scorn,
That haunts and dogs them like an injured ghost
Implacable! Here too the petty tyrant,
Whose scant domains geographer ne’er notic’d,
And, well for neighb’ring grounds, of arm as short; 220
Who fix’d his iron talons on the poor,
And grip’d° them like some lordly beast of prey,
Deaf to the forceful cries of gnawing hunger,
And piteous plaintive voice of misery
(As if a slave were not a shred of nature, 225
Of the same common substance with his Lord);
Now tame and humble, like a child that’s whipp’d,
Shakes hands with dust, and calls the worm his kinsman!
Nor pleads his rank and birthright. Under ground
Precedency’s a jest; vassal and lord, 230
Grossly familiar, side by side consume°!
When self-esteem, or other’s adulation,
Would cunningly persuade us we were something
Above the common level of our kind,
The Grave gainsays the smooth-complexion’d flattery, 235
And with blunt truth acquaints us what we are.
Beauty! thou pretty plaything! dear deceit!
That steals so softly o’er the stripling’s heart,
And gives it a new pulse unknown before!
The Grave discredits thee. Thy charms expung’d°, 240
Thy roses faded, and thy lilies soil’d,
What hast thou more to boast of? Will thy lovers
Flock round thee now, to gaze and do thee homage?
Methinks I see thee with thy head low laid;
Whilst surfeited upon thy damask cheek, 245
The high-fed worm, in lazy volumes roll’d,
Riots unscar’d. For this was all thy caution?
For this thy painful labours at thy glass,
T’ improve those charms, and keep them in repair,
For which the spoiler thanks thee not? Foul feeder! 250
Coarse fare and carrion please thee full as well,
And leave as keen a relish on the sense.
Look, how the fair one weeps! The conscious tears
Stand thick as dew-drops on the bells of flowers:
Honest effusion! The swoln heart in vain 255
Works hard to put a gloss on its distress.
Strength too! thou surly, and gentle boast
Of those that loud laugh at the village ring!
A fit of common sickness pulls thee down
With greater ease than e’er thou didst the stripling 260
That rashly dar’d thee to th’ unequal fight.
What groan was that I heard? Deep groan indeed,
With anguish heavy laden! let me trace it:
From yonder bed it comes, where the strong man,
By stronger arm belabour’d°, gasps for breath 265
Like a hard hunted beast. How his great heart
Beats thick! his roomy chest by far too scant
To give the lungs full play! What now avail
The strong-built sinewy limbs, and well spread shoulders!
See, how he tugs for life, and lays about him, 270
Mad with his pain! Eager he catches hold
Of what comes next to hand, and grasps it hard,
Just like a creature drowning! Hideous sight!
O how his eyes stand out, and stare full ghastly!
Whilst the distemper’s rank and deadly venom 275
Shoots like a burning arrow ’cross his bowels,
And drinks his marrow up. Heard you that groan!
It was his last. See how the great Goliath,
Just like a child that brawl’d itself to rest,
Lies still! What mean’st thou then, O mighty boaster, 280
To vaunt of nerves of thine? What means the bull,
Unconscious of his strength, to play the coward,
And flee before a feeble thing like man;
That, knowing well the slackness of his arm,
Trusts only in the well-invented knife? 285
With study pale, and midnight vigils spent,
The star-surveying sage close to his eye
Applies the sight-invigorating tube;
And, trav’lling through the boundless length of space,
Marks well the courses of the far-seen orbs, 290
That roll with regular confusion there,
In ecstasy of thought. But ah! proud man!
Great heights are hazardous to the weak head;
Soon, very soon, thy firmest footing fails,
And down thou dropp’st into that darksome° place 295
Where nor device nor knowledge ever came.
Here the tongue-warrior lies! disabled now,
Disarm’d, dishonour’d, like a wretch that’s gagg’d,
And cannot tell his ails to passers-by!
Great man of language! whence this mighty change, 300
This dumb despair, and drooping of the head?
Though strong Persuasion hung upon thy lip,
And sly Insinuation’s softer arts
In ambush lay about thy flowing tongue,
Alas, how chop-fall’n now! thick mists and silence 305
Rest, like a weary cloud, upon thy breast
Unceasing. Ah! where is the lifted arm,
The strength of action, and the force of words,
The well-turn’d period, and the well-tun’d voice,
With all the lesser ornaments of phrase? 310
Ah! fled for ever, as they ne’er had been!
Raz’d from the book of fame; or, more provoking,
Perchance some hackney hunger-bitten scribbler
Insults thy memory, and blots thy tomb
With long flat narrative, or duller rhymes, 315
With heavy halting pace that drawl° along—
Enough to rouse a dead man into rage,
And warm, with red resentment, the wan cheek!
Here the great masters of the healing arts,
Those mighty mock-defrauders of the tomb, 320
Spite of their juleps° and catholicons°,
Resign to fate! Proud Æsculapius’ son,
Where are thy boasted implements of art,
And all thy well-cramm’d magazines of health?
Nor hill, nor vale, as far as ship could go, 325
Nor margin of the gravel-bottom’d brook,
Escap’d thy rifling hand! From stubborn shrubs
Thou wrung’st their shy retiring virtues out,
And vex’d them in the fire. Nor fly, nor insect,
Nor writhy snake, escap’d thy deep research! 330
But why this apparatus? why this cost?
Tell us, thou doughty keeper of the grave,
Where are thy recipes and cordials° now,
With the long list of vouchers° for thy cures?
Alas, thou speak’st not. The bold impostor 335
Looks not more silly when the cheat’s found out.
Here the lank-sided miser, worst of felons,
Who meanly stole (discreditable shift,)
From back and belly too their proper cheer,
Eas’d of a tax it irk’d the wretch to pay 340
To his own carcass, now lies cheaply lodg’d,
By clam’rous appetites no longer teas’d,
Nor tedious bills of charges and repairs.
But ah, where are his rents, his comings in?
Aye, now you’ve made the rich man poor indeed! 345
Robb’d of his gods, what has he left behind?
O cursed lust of gold, when for thy sake
The fool throws up his interest in both worlds,
First starv’d in this, then damn’d in that to come!
How shocking must thy summons be, O Death, 350
To him that is at ease in his possessions,
Who, counting on long years of pleasure here,
Is quite unfurnish’d for that world to come!
In that dread moment how the frantic soul
Raves round the walls of her clay tenement, 355
Runs to each avenue, and shrieks for help,
But shrieks in vain! How wishfully she looks
On all she’s leaving, now no longer her’s!
A little longer, yet a little longer,
O might she stay to wash away her stains, 360
And fit her for her passage! mournful sight!
Her very eyes weep blood, and every groan
She heaves is big with horror! But the foe,
Like a stanch° murd’rer steady to his purpose,
Pursues her close through every lane of life, 365
Nor misses once the track, but presses on;
Till, forc’d at last to the tremendous verge,
At once she sinks to everlasting ruin!
Sure ’tis a serious thing to die! My soul,
What a strange moment must it be when, near 370
Thy journey’s end, thou hast the gulf in view!
That awful gulf no mortal e’er repass’d
To tell what’s doing on the other side!
Nature runs back and shudders at the sight,
And every life-string bleeds at thoughts of parting! 375
For part they must—body and soul must part!
Fond couple! link’d more close than wedded pair.
This wings its way to its Almighty Source,
The witness of its actions, now its judge;
That drops into the dark and noisome° grave, 380
Like a disabled pitcher of no use.
If death were nothing, and nought after death,
If when men died, at once they ceas’d to be,
Returning to the barren womb of nothing,
Whence first they sprung! then might the debauchee° 385
Untrembling mouth the Heavens; then might the drunkard
Reel° over his full bowl, and when ’tis drain’d
Fill up another to the brim, and laugh
At the poor bugbear Death; then might the wretch
That’s weary of the world, and tir’d of life, 390
At once give each inquietude the slip°,
By stealing out of being when he pleas’d,
And by what way, whether by hemp or steel:—
Death’s thousand doors stand open. Who could force
The ill-pleas’d guest to sit out his full time, 395
Or blame him if he goes? Sure he does well
That helps himself as timely as he can,
When able. But, if there’s an hereafter—
And that there is, conscience, uninfluenc’d
And suffer’d to speak out, tells every man— 400
Then must it be an awful thing to die:
More horrid yet to die by one’s own hand!
Self-murder! Name it not; our island’s shame;
That makes her the reproach of neighb’ring states.
Shall nature, swerving from her earliest dictate, 405
Self-preservation, fall by her own act?
Forbid it, Heaven! Let not, upon disgust,
The shameless hand be fully crimson’d o’er
With blood of its own lord! Dreadful attempt,
Just reeking from self-slaughter, in a rage 410
To rush into the presence of our Judge!
As if we challeng’d him to do his worst,
And matter’d not his wrath. Unheard-of tortures
Must be reserv’d for such: these herd together;
The common damn’d shun their society, 415
And look upon themselves as fiends less foul.
Our time is fix’d, and all our days are number’d!
How long, how short, we know not: this we know,
Duty requires we calmly wait the summons,
Nor dare to stir till Heaven shall give permission: 420
Like sentries that must keep their destin’d stand,
And wait th’ appointed hour till they’re reliev’d.
Those only are the brave that keep their ground,
And keep it to the last. To run away
Is but a coward’s trick: to run away 425
From this world’s ills, that at the very worst
Will soon blow o’er, thinking to mend ourselves
By boldly venturing on a world unknown,
And plunging headlong in the dark—’tis mad!
No frenzy half so desperate as this. 430
Tell us, ye dead I will none of you in pity
To those you left behind disclose the secret?
O! that some courteous ghost would blab it out
What ’tis you are, and we must shortly be.
I’ve heard that souls departed have sometimes 435
Forewarn’d men of their death. ’Twas kindly done
To knock and give the alarm. But what means
This stinted charity? ’Tis but lame kindness
That does its work by halves. Why might you not
Tell us what ’tis to die? Do the strict laws 440
Of your society forbid your speaking
Upon a point so nice? I’ll ask no more.
Sullen, like lamps in sepulchres, your shine
Enlightens but yourselves. Well—’tis no matter:
A very little time will clear up all, 445
And make us learn’d as you are, and as close.
Death’s shafts fly thick! Here fall the village swain°,
And there his pamper’d lord! The cup goes round,
And who so artful as to put it by?
’Tis long since death had the majority, 450
Yet, strange, the living lay it not to heart!
See yonder maker of the dead man’s bed,
The sexton°, hoary-headed chronicle!
Of hard unmeaning° face, down which ne’er stole
A gentle tear; with mattock° in his hand 455
Digs through whole rows of kindred and acquaintance,
By far his juniors! Scarce a scull’s cast up
But well he knew its owner, and can tell
Some passage of his life. Thus hand in hand
The sot has walk’d with Death twice twenty years; 460
And yet ne’er younker° on the green laughs louder,
Or clubs a smuttier tale: when drunkards meet,
None sings a merrier catch, or lends a hand
More willing to his cup. Poor wretch! he minds not
That soon some trusty brother of the trade 465
Shall do for him what he has done for thousands.
On this side, and on that, men see their friends
Drop off, like leaves in Autumn; yet launch out
Into fantastic schemes, which the long livers
In the world’s hale and undegenerate days 470
Could scarce have leisure for; fools that we are!
Never to think of Death and of ourselves
At the same time!—as if to learn to die
Were no concern of ours. O more than sottish!
For creatures of a day in gamesome° mood 475
To frolic on eternity’s dread brink,
Unapprehensive; when, for aught we know,
The very first swoln surge shall sweep us in!
Think we, or think we not, time hurries on
With a resistless unremitting stream, 480
Yet treads more soft than e’er did midnight thief,
That slides his hand under the miser’s pillow,
And carries off his prize. What is this world?
What but a spacious burial-field unwall’d,
Strew’d with Death’s spoils, the spoils of animals 485
Savage and tame, and full of dead men’s bones!
The very turf on which we tread once liv’d;
And we that live must lend our carcasses
To cover our own offspring: in their turns
They too must cover theirs. ’Tis here all meet! 490
The shiv’ring Icelander and sun-burnt Moor;
Men of all climes, that never met before,
And of all creeds, the Jew, the Turk, the Christian.
Here the proud prince, and favourite yet prouder,
His sov’reign’s keeper, and the people’s scourge, 495
Are huddled out of sight! Here lie abash’d
The great negotiators of the earth,
And celebrated masters of the balance,
Deep read in stratagems and wiles of courts,
Now vain their treaty-skill; Death scorns to treat. 500
Here the o’erloaded slave flings down his burden
From his gall’d shoulders; and, when the stern tyrant,
With all his guards and tools of power about him,
Is meditating new unheard-of hardships,
Mocks his short arm, and quick as thought escapes, 505
Where tyrants vex not, and the weary rest.
Here the warm lover, leaving the cool shade,
The tell-tale echo, and the babbling stream,
Time out of mind the fav’rite seats of love,
Fast by his gentle mistress lays him down, 510
Unblasted by foul tongue. Here friends and foes
Lie close, unmindful of their former feuds.
The lawn-rob’d prelate and plain presbyter,
Erewhile that stood aloof, as shy to meet,
Familiar mingle here, like sister-streams 515
That some rude interposing rock has split.
Here is the large-limb’d peasant; here the child
Of a span long, that never saw the sun,
Nor press’d the nipple, strangled in life’s porch.
Here is the mother with her sons and daughters; 520
The barren wife; the long-demurring maid,
Whose lonely unappropriated sweets
Smil’d like yon knot of cowslips on the cliff,
Not to be come at by the willing hand.
Here are the prude severe, and gay coquette, 525
The sober widow, and the young green virgin,
Cropp’d like a rose before ’tis fully blown,
Or half its worth disclos’d. Strange medley here!
Here garrulous old age winds up his tale;
And jovial youth, of lightsome vacant heart, 530
Whose every day was made of melody,
Hears not the voice of mirth; the shrill-tongu’d shrew,
Meek as the turtle-dove, forgets her chiding.
Here are the wise, the generous, and the brave;
The just, the good, the worthless, and profane; 535
The downright clown, and perfectly well-bred;
The fool, the churl, the scoundrel and the mean;
The supple statesman, and the patriot stern;
The wrecks of nations and the spoils of time,
With all the lumber of six thousand years! 540
Poor man! how happy once in thy first state,
When yet but warm from thy great Maker’s hand
He stamp’d thee with his image, and well pleas’d,
Smil’d on his last fair work! Then all was well.
Sound was the body, and the soul serene; 545
Like two sweet instruments, ne’er out of tune,
That play their several parts. Nor head nor heart
Offer’d to ache; nor was there cause they should,
For all was pure within. No fell remorse,
Nor anxious castings up of what might be, 550
Alarm’d his peaceful bosom. Summer seas
Shew not more smooth when kiss’d by southern winds,
Just ready to expire. Scarce importun’d,
The generous soil with a luxurious hand
Offer’d the various produce of the year, 555
And every thing most perfect in its kind.
Blessed, thrice blessed days! But ah! how short!
Bless’d as the pleasing dreams of holy men;
But fugitive, like those, and quickly gone.
O slipp’ry state of things! What sudden turns, 560
What strange vicissitudes, in the first leaf
Of man’s sad history! To-day most happy,
And ere to-morrow’s sun has set most abject!
How scant the space between these vast extremes!
Thus far’d it with our sire; not long he enjoy’d 565
His Paradise! Scarce had the happy tenant
Of the fair spot due time to prove its sweets,
Or sum them up, when straight he must be gone,
Ne’er to return again! And must he go?
Can nought compound° for the first dire offence 570
Of erring man? Like one that is condemn’d
Fain would he trifle° time with idle talk,
And parley with his fate. But ’tis in vain.
Not all the lavish odours of the place,
Offer’d in incense, can procure his pardon, 575
Or mitigate his doom. A mighty angel
With flaming sword forbids his longer stay,
And drives the loit’rer forth: nor must he take
One last and farewell round. At once he lost
His glory and his God! If mortal now, 580
And sorely maim’d, no wonder—Man has sinn’d!
Sick of his bliss, and bent on new adventures,
Evil he would needs try; nor tried in vain.
Dreadful experiment—destructive measure—
Where the worst thing could happen, is success! 585
Alas! too well he sped; the good he scorn’d
Stalk’d° off reluctant, like an ill-used ghost,
Not to return; or, if it did, its visits,
Like those of angels, short, and far between:
Whilst the black demon, with his hell-scap’d train, 590
Admitted once into its better room,
Grew loud and mutinous, nor would be gone;
Lording it o’er the man, who now too late
Saw the rash error which he could not mend;
An error fatal not to him alone, 595
But to his future sons, his fortune’s heirs.
Inglorious bondage! human nature groans
Beneath a vassalage so vile and cruel,
And its vast body bleeds through every vein.
What havoc hast thou made, foul monster, sin! 600
Greatest and first of ills! the fruitful parent
Of woes of all dimensions! But for thee
Sorrow had never been. All-noxious thing,
Of vilest nature! Other sorts of evils
Are kindly circumscrib’d, and have their bounds. 605
The fierce volcano, from its burning entrails
That belches molten stone and globes of fire,
Involv’d in pitchy clouds of smoke and stench,
Mars the adjacent fields for some leagues round,
And there it stops. The big-swoln inundation, 610
Of mischief more diffusive, raving loud,
Buries whole tracts of country, threat’ning more:
But that too has its shore it cannot pass.
More dreadful far than those, sin has laid waste,
Not here and there a country, but a world; 615
Dispatching at a wide extended blow
Entire mankind, and for their sakes defacing
A whole creation’s beauty with rude hands;
Blasting the foodful grain, and loaded branches,
And marking all along its way with ruin! 620
Accursed thing! O where shall fancy find
A proper name to call thee by, expressive
Of all thy horrors? Pregnant womb of ills!
Of temper so transcendently malign,
That toads and serpents of most deadly kind 625
Compar’d to thee are harmless! Sicknesses,
Of every size and symptom, racking pains,
And bluest plagues, are thine! See how the fiend
Profusely scatters the contagion round!
Whilst deep-mouth’d Slaughter, bellowing at her heels, 630
Wades deep in blood new-spilt; yet for to-morrow
Shapes out new work of great uncommon daring,
And inly pines till the dread blow is struck.
But hold! I’ve gone too far; too much discover’d
My father’s nakedness and nature’s shame. 635
Here let me pause, and drop an honest tear,
One burst of filial duty and condolence,
O’er all those ample deserts Death hath spread,
This chaos of mankind! O great man-eater!
Whose every day is carnival, not sated yet! 640
Unheard-of epicure, without a fellow!
The veriest gluttons do not always cram;
Some intervals of abstinence are sought
To edge the appetite; thou seekest none!
Methinks the countless swarms thou hast devour’d, 645
And thousands that each hour thou gobblest up,
This, less than this, might gorge thee to the full.
But ah! rapacious still, thou gasp’st for more;
Like one, whole days defrauded of his meals,
On whom lank Hunger lays her skinny hand, 650
And whets to keenest eagerness his cravings:
As if Diseases, Massacres, and Poison,
Famine, and War, were not thy caterers!
But know that thou must render up the dead,
And with high interest too! they are not thine; 655
But only in thy keeping for a season,
Till the great promis’d day of restitution;
When loud diffusive sound from brazen trump
Of strong lung’d cherub shall alarm thy captives,
And rouse the long, long sleepers into life, 660
Daylight, and liberty.—
Then must thy doors fly open, and reveal
The minds that lay long forming under ground,
In their dark cells immur’d; but now full ripe,
And pure as silver from the crucible°, 665
That twice has stood the torture of the fire,
And inquisition of the forge. We know
Th’ illustrious Deliverer of mankind,
The Son of God, thee foil’d. Him in thy power
Thou could’st not hold; self-vigorous he rose, 670
And, shaking off thy fetters, soon retook
Those spoils his voluntary yielding lent:
(Sure pledge of our releasement from thy thrall!)
Twice twenty days he sojourn’d here on earth,
And shewed himself alive to chosen witnesses, 675
By proofs so strong, that the most slow assenting
Had not a scruple left. This having done,
He mounted up to Heaven. Methinks I see him
Climb the aerial heights, and glide along
Athwart the severing clouds: but the faint eye, 680
Flung backwards in the chase, soon drops its hold,
Disabled quite, and jaded with pursuing.
Heaven’s portals wide expand to let him in,
Nor are his friends shut out: as a great prince
Not for himself alone procures admission, 685
But for his train; it was his royal will,
That where he is there should his followers be.
Death only lies between, a gloomy path!
Made yet more gloomy by our coward fears!
But nor untrod, nor tedious; the fatigue 690
Will soon go off. Besides, there’s no by-road
To bliss. Then why, like ill-condition’d children,
Start we at transient hardships in the way
That leads to purer air and softer skies,
And a ne’er-setting sun? Fools that we are! 695
We wish to be where sweets unwith’ring bloom;
But straight our wish revoke, and will not go.
So have I seen, upon a summer’s even,
Fast by the rivulet’s brink, a youngster play:
How wishfully he looks to stem the tide! 700
This moment resolute, next unresolv’d,
At last he dips his foot; but as he dips,
His fears redouble, and he runs away
From th’ inoffensive stream, unmindful now
Of all the flowers that paint the further bank, 705
And smil’d so sweet of late. Thrice welcome Death!
That, after many a painful bleeding step,
Conducts us to our home, and lands us safe
On the long wish’d-for shore. Prodigious change!
Our bane turn’d to a blessing. Death disarm’d 710
Loses its fellness quite; all thanks to him
Who scourg’d the venom out! Sure the last end
Of the good man is peace. How calm his exit!
Night-dews fall not more gently to the ground,
Nor weary worn-out winds expire so soft. 715
Behold him in the ev’ning-tide of life,
A life well spent, whose early care it was
His riper years should not upbraid his green;
By unperceiv’d degrees he wears away;
Yet like the sun seems larger at his setting! 720
High in his faith and hopes, look how he reaches
After the prize in view! and, like a bird
That’s hamper’d struggles hard to get away!
Whilst the glad gates of sight are wide expanded
To let new glories in, the first fair fruits 725
Of the fast-coming harvest! Then—O then
Each earth-born joy grows vile, or disappears,
Shrunk to a thing of nought! O how he longs
To have his passport sign’d, and be dismiss’d!
’Tis done—and now he’s happy! The glad soul 730
Has not a wish uncrown’d. E’en the lag flesh
Rests too in hope of meeting once again
Its better half, never to sunder more.
Nor shall it hope in vain: the time draws on
When not a single spot of burial-earth, 735
Whether on land or in the spacious sea,
But must give back its long committed dust
Inviolate: and faithfully shall these
Make up the full account; not the least atom
Embezzled, or mislaid, of the whole tale. 740
Each soul shall have a body ready furnish’d;
And each shall have his own. Hence, ye profane!
Ask not how this can be. Sure the same power
That rear’d the piece at first, and took it down,
Can re-assemble the loose scatter’d parts, 745
And put them as they were. Almighty God
Has done much more; nor is his arm impair’d
Through length of days; and what he can he will:
His faithfulness stands bound to see it done.
When the dread trumpet sounds, the slumb’ring dust, 750
Not unattentive to the call, shall wake;
And every joint possess its proper place,
With a new elegance of form, unknown
To its first state. Nor shall the conscious soul
Mistake its partner; but, amidst the crowd 755
Singling its other half, into its arms
Shall rush with all th’ impatience of a man
That’s new come home, who having long been absent,
With haste runs over every different room,
In pain to see the whole. Thrice happy meeting! 760
Nor time, nor death, shall ever part them more!
’Tis but a night, a long and moonless night;
We make the grave our bed, and then are gone!
Thus at the shut of even, the weary bird
Leaves the wide air, and in some lonely brake 765
Cow’rs down, and dozes till the dawn of day;
Then claps his well-fledg’d wings, and bears° away.
Notes:
Line 1: affect. From Latin affectare, to strive after. Here: find pleasing. Compare The Taming of the Shrew, I.1.39-40: "No profit grows where is no pleasure ta'en./ In brief, Sir, study what you most affect."
Line 8: Eternal King. God. Compare 1 Timothy 1:17.
Line 18: furr'd. Coated with (foul or deposited) matter.
Line 21: yew. This tree often symbolizes death or sorrow.
Line 24: visionary. Unreal, imaginary.
Line 28: fane. Temple or church.
Line 36: plaistered. Plastered.
Line 36: 'scutcheons. An escutcheon is the shieldlike surface on which a coat of arms is displayed.
Line 46: coeval. Of the same age, contemporary.
Line 62: homely. Plain.
Line 71: evanish. Vanish.
Line 77: prone. Lying face downward.
Line 89: solder. Something that unites.
Line 92: proved. Felt.
Line 97: cowslip. Primula veris.
Line 100: thrush. A brown songbird.
Line 103: eglantine. The sweetbrier.
Line 115: Where are the jesters now? Compare Hamlet V-i: "Where be your gibes now? your gambols? your songs?"
Line 166: casement. Hinged window sash.
Line 203, 231: consume. Here: waste away.
Line 204: busto. Bust, statue.
Line 215: covert. Cover; concealment.
Line 222: gripe. Distress, oppress.
Whilst some affect° the sun, and some the shade,
Some flee the city, some the hermitage;
Their aims as various as the roads they take
In journeying through life; the task be mine
To paint the gloomy horrors of the tomb; 5
Th’ appointed place of rendezvous, where all
These trav’llers meet. Thy succours I implore,
Eternal King°! whose potent arm sustains
The keys of hell and death. The Grave, dread thing!
Men shiver when thou’rt nam’d: nature appall’d 10
Shakes off her wonted firmness. Ah! how dark
Thy long-extended realms, and rueful wastes,
Where nought but silence reigns, and night, dark night,
Dark as was chaos ere the infant sun
Was roll’d together, or had tried his beams 15
Athwart the gloom profound! The sickly taper
By glimm’ring through thy low-brow’d misty vaults,
Furr’d° round with mouldy damps and ropy slime,
Lets fall a supernumerary horror,
And only serves to make thy night more irksome! 20
Well do I know thee by thy trusty yew°,
Cheerless, unsocial plant! that loves to dwell
’Midst sculls and coffins, epitaphs and worms;
Where light-heel’d ghosts and visionary° shades,
Beneath the wan cold moon (as fame reports) 25
Embodied thick, perform their mystic rounds.
No other merriment, dull tree! is thine.
See yonder hallow’d fane°! the pious work
Of names once fam’d, now dubious or forgot,
And buried ’midst the wreck of things which were: 30
There lie interred the more illustrious dead.
The wind is up: hark—how it howls! Methinks
Till now I never heard a sound so dreary.
Doors creak, and windows clap, and night’s foul bird,
Rook’d in the spire, screams loud! The gloomy aisles 35
Black plaister’d°, and hung round with shreds of ’scutcheons°
And tatter’d coats of arms, send back the sound,
Laden with heavier airs, from the low vaults,
The mansions of the dead! Rous’d from their slumbers,
In grim array the grisly spectres rise, 40
Grin horrible, and obstinately sullen
Pass and repass, hush’d as the foot of night!
Again the screech owl shrieks—ungracious sound!
I’ll hear no more; it makes one’s blood run chill.
Quite round the pile, a row of reverend elms, 45
Coeval° near with that, all ragged shew,
Long lash’d by the rude winds; some rift half down
Their branchless trunks, others so thin a-top
That scarce two crows could lodge in the same tree.
Strange things, the neighbours say, have happen’d here. 50
Wild shrieks have issued from the hollow tombs;
Dead men have come again, and walk’d about;
And the great bell has toll’d, unrung, untouch’d!
Such tales their cheer, at wake or gossiping,
When it draws near the witching-time of night. 55
Oft in the lone church-yard at night I’ve seen,
By glimpse of moon-shine, chequering through the trees,
The school-boy, with his satchel in his hand,
Whistling aloud to bear his courage up,
And lightly tripping o’er the long flat stones 60
(With nettles skirted, and with moss o’ergrown)
That tell in homely° phrase who lies below.
Sudden he starts! and hears, or thinks he hears,
The sound of something purring at his heels.
Full fast he flies, and dares not look behind him, 65
Till out of breath he overtakes his fellows;
Who gather round, and wonder at the tale
Of horrid apparition, tall and ghastly,
That walks at dead of night, or takes his stand
O’er some new open’d grave; and, strange to tell, 70
Evanishes° at crowing of the cock!
The new-made widow too I’ve sometimes spied,
(Sad sight!) slow moving o’er the prostrate dead:
Listless she crawls along in doleful black,
While bursts of sorrow gush from either eye, 75
Fast falling down her now untasted cheek.
Prone° on the lowly grave of the man
She drops: while busy meddling memory,
In barbarous succession, musters up
The past endearments of their softer hours, 80
Tenacious of its theme. Still, still she thinks
She sees him, and, indulging the fond thought,
Clings yet more closely to the senseless turf,
Nor heeds the passenger who looks that way.
Invidious Grave—how dost thou rend in sunder 85
Whom love has knit, and sympathy made one!
A tie more stubborn far than nature’s band.
Friendship! mysterious cement of the soul!
Sweet’ner of life! and solder° of society!
I owe thee much. Thou hast deserv’d from me 90
Far, far beyond what I can ever pay.
Oft have I prov’d° the labours of thy love,
And the warm efforts of the gentle heart,
Anxious to please. O! when my friend and I
In some thick wood have wander’d heedless on, 95
Hid from the vulgar eye; and sat us down
Upon the sloping cowslip°-cover’d bank,
Where the pure limpid stream has slid along
In grateful errors through the under-wood,
Sweet murm’ring; methought the shrill-tongu’d thrush° 100
Mended his song of love, the sooty blackbird
Mellow’d his pipe, and soften’d every note;
The eglantine° smell’d sweeter, and the rose
Assum’d a dye more deep; whilst ev’ry flower
Vied with its fellow plant in luxury 105
Of dress. O! then the longest summer’s day
Seemed too, too much in haste; still the full heart
Had not imparted half; ’twas happiness
Too exquisite to last! Of joys departed,
Not to return, how painful the remembrance! 110
Dull Grave! thou spoil’st the dance of youthful blood,
Strik’st out the dimple from the cheek of mirth,
And every smirking feature from the face;
Branding our laughter with the name of madness.
Where are the jesters now?° the men of health 115
Complexionally pleasant? Where the droll,
Whose very look and gesture was a joke
To clapping theatres and shouting crowds,
And made e’en thick-lipp’d musing Melancholy
To gather up her face into a smile 120
Before she was aware? Ah! sullen now
And dumb as the green turf that covers them!
Where are the mighty thunderbolts of war,
The Roman Caesars and the Grecian chiefs,
The boast of story? Where the hot-brain’d youth, 125
Who the tiara at his pleasure tore
From kings of all the then discovered globe;
And cried, forsooth, because his arm was hamper’d,
And had not room enough to do its work,
Alas, how slim—dishonourably slim!— 130
And cramm’d into a space we blush to name—
Proud royalty! How alter’d in thy looks!
How blank thy features, and how wan thy hue!
Son of the morning! whither art thou gone?
Where hast thou hid thy many-spangled head, 135
And the majestic menace of thine eyes,
Felt from afar? Pliant and pow’rless now;
Like new-born infant wound up in his swathes,
Or victim tumbled flat upon his back,
That throbs beneath the sacrificer’s knife; 140
Mute must thou bear the strife of little tongues,
And coward insults of the base-born crowd,
That grudge a privilege thou never hadst,
But only hop’d for in the peaceful Grave—
Of being unmolested and alone! 145
Arabia’s gums and odoriferous drugs,
And honours by the heralds duly paid
In mode and form, e’en to a very scruple;
(O cruel irony!) these come too late;
And only mock whom they were meant to honour! 150
Surely there’s not a dungeon slave that’s buried
In the highway, unshrouded and uncoffin’d,
But lies as soft, and sleeps as sound, as he.
Sorry pre-eminence of high descent
Above the baser born, to rot in state! 155
But see! the well-plum’d hearse comes nodding on,
Stately and slow; and properly attended
By the whole sable tribe, that painful watch
The sick man’s door, and live upon the dead,
By letting out their persons by the hour 160
To mimic sorrow, when the heart’s not sad!
How rich the trappings, now they’re all unfurl’d
And glitt’ring in the sun! Triumphant entries
Of conquerors and coronation pomps
In glory scarce exceed. Great gluts of people 165
Retard th’ unwieldy show; whilst from the casements°
And houses’ tops, ranks behind ranks, close wedg’d,
Hang bellying o’er. But tell us, why this waste?
Why this ado in earthing up a carcass
That’s fall’n into disgrace, and in the nostril 170
Smells horrible? Ye undertakers! tell us,
’Midst all the gorgeous figures you exhibit,
Why is the principal conceal’d, for which
You make this mighty stir? ’Tis wisely done;
What would offend the eye in a good picture, 175
The painter casts discreetly into shades.
Proud lineage! now how little thou appear’st!
Below the envy of the private man!
Honour, that meddlesome officious ill,
Pursues thee e’en to death! nor there stops short 180
Strange persecution! when the Grave itself
Is no protection from rude sufferance.
Absurd! to think to over-reach the Grave,
And from the wreck of names to rescue ours!
The best concerted schemes men lay for fame 185
Die fast away; only themselves die faster.
The far-fam’d sculptor and the laurell’d bard,
These bold insurancers of deathless fame,
Supply their little feeble aids in vain.
The tapering pyramid, th’ Egyptian’s pride, 190
And wonder of the world! whose spiky top
Has wounded the thick cloud, and long outliv’d
The angry shaking of the winter’s storm;
Yet, spent at last by the injuries of heav’n,
Shatter’d with age and furrow’d o’er with years, 195
The mystic cone, with hieroglyphics crusted,
At once gives way. O lamentable sight!
The labour of whole ages lumbers down,
A hideous and mis-shapen length of ruins!
Sepulchral columns wrestle but in vain 200
With all-subduing Time: her cank’ring hand
With calm delib’rate malice wasteth them.
Worn on the edge of days, the brass consumes°,
The busto° moulders, and the deep cut marble,
Unsteady to the steel, gives up its charge! 205
Ambition, half convicted of her folly,
Hangs down the head, and reddens at the tale!
Here all the mighty troublers of the earth,
Who swam to sov’reign rule through seas of blood;
Th’ oppressive, sturdy, man-destroying villains, 210
Who ravag’d kingdoms, and laid empires waste,
And in a cruel wantonness of pow’r
Thinn’d states of half their people, and gave up
To want the rest; now, like a storm that’s spent,
Lie hush’d, and meanly sneak behind the covert°. 215
Vain thought! to hide them from the general scorn,
That haunts and dogs them like an injured ghost
Implacable! Here too the petty tyrant,
Whose scant domains geographer ne’er notic’d,
And, well for neighb’ring grounds, of arm as short; 220
Who fix’d his iron talons on the poor,
And grip’d° them like some lordly beast of prey,
Deaf to the forceful cries of gnawing hunger,
And piteous plaintive voice of misery
(As if a slave were not a shred of nature, 225
Of the same common substance with his Lord);
Now tame and humble, like a child that’s whipp’d,
Shakes hands with dust, and calls the worm his kinsman!
Nor pleads his rank and birthright. Under ground
Precedency’s a jest; vassal and lord, 230
Grossly familiar, side by side consume°!
When self-esteem, or other’s adulation,
Would cunningly persuade us we were something
Above the common level of our kind,
The Grave gainsays the smooth-complexion’d flattery, 235
And with blunt truth acquaints us what we are.
Beauty! thou pretty plaything! dear deceit!
That steals so softly o’er the stripling’s heart,
And gives it a new pulse unknown before!
The Grave discredits thee. Thy charms expung’d°, 240
Thy roses faded, and thy lilies soil’d,
What hast thou more to boast of? Will thy lovers
Flock round thee now, to gaze and do thee homage?
Methinks I see thee with thy head low laid;
Whilst surfeited upon thy damask cheek, 245
The high-fed worm, in lazy volumes roll’d,
Riots unscar’d. For this was all thy caution?
For this thy painful labours at thy glass,
T’ improve those charms, and keep them in repair,
For which the spoiler thanks thee not? Foul feeder! 250
Coarse fare and carrion please thee full as well,
And leave as keen a relish on the sense.
Look, how the fair one weeps! The conscious tears
Stand thick as dew-drops on the bells of flowers:
Honest effusion! The swoln heart in vain 255
Works hard to put a gloss on its distress.
Strength too! thou surly, and gentle boast
Of those that loud laugh at the village ring!
A fit of common sickness pulls thee down
With greater ease than e’er thou didst the stripling 260
That rashly dar’d thee to th’ unequal fight.
What groan was that I heard? Deep groan indeed,
With anguish heavy laden! let me trace it:
From yonder bed it comes, where the strong man,
By stronger arm belabour’d°, gasps for breath 265
Like a hard hunted beast. How his great heart
Beats thick! his roomy chest by far too scant
To give the lungs full play! What now avail
The strong-built sinewy limbs, and well spread shoulders!
See, how he tugs for life, and lays about him, 270
Mad with his pain! Eager he catches hold
Of what comes next to hand, and grasps it hard,
Just like a creature drowning! Hideous sight!
O how his eyes stand out, and stare full ghastly!
Whilst the distemper’s rank and deadly venom 275
Shoots like a burning arrow ’cross his bowels,
And drinks his marrow up. Heard you that groan!
It was his last. See how the great Goliath,
Just like a child that brawl’d itself to rest,
Lies still! What mean’st thou then, O mighty boaster, 280
To vaunt of nerves of thine? What means the bull,
Unconscious of his strength, to play the coward,
And flee before a feeble thing like man;
That, knowing well the slackness of his arm,
Trusts only in the well-invented knife? 285
With study pale, and midnight vigils spent,
The star-surveying sage close to his eye
Applies the sight-invigorating tube;
And, trav’lling through the boundless length of space,
Marks well the courses of the far-seen orbs, 290
That roll with regular confusion there,
In ecstasy of thought. But ah! proud man!
Great heights are hazardous to the weak head;
Soon, very soon, thy firmest footing fails,
And down thou dropp’st into that darksome° place 295
Where nor device nor knowledge ever came.
Here the tongue-warrior lies! disabled now,
Disarm’d, dishonour’d, like a wretch that’s gagg’d,
And cannot tell his ails to passers-by!
Great man of language! whence this mighty change, 300
This dumb despair, and drooping of the head?
Though strong Persuasion hung upon thy lip,
And sly Insinuation’s softer arts
In ambush lay about thy flowing tongue,
Alas, how chop-fall’n now! thick mists and silence 305
Rest, like a weary cloud, upon thy breast
Unceasing. Ah! where is the lifted arm,
The strength of action, and the force of words,
The well-turn’d period, and the well-tun’d voice,
With all the lesser ornaments of phrase? 310
Ah! fled for ever, as they ne’er had been!
Raz’d from the book of fame; or, more provoking,
Perchance some hackney hunger-bitten scribbler
Insults thy memory, and blots thy tomb
With long flat narrative, or duller rhymes, 315
With heavy halting pace that drawl° along—
Enough to rouse a dead man into rage,
And warm, with red resentment, the wan cheek!
Here the great masters of the healing arts,
Those mighty mock-defrauders of the tomb, 320
Spite of their juleps° and catholicons°,
Resign to fate! Proud Æsculapius’ son,
Where are thy boasted implements of art,
And all thy well-cramm’d magazines of health?
Nor hill, nor vale, as far as ship could go, 325
Nor margin of the gravel-bottom’d brook,
Escap’d thy rifling hand! From stubborn shrubs
Thou wrung’st their shy retiring virtues out,
And vex’d them in the fire. Nor fly, nor insect,
Nor writhy snake, escap’d thy deep research! 330
But why this apparatus? why this cost?
Tell us, thou doughty keeper of the grave,
Where are thy recipes and cordials° now,
With the long list of vouchers° for thy cures?
Alas, thou speak’st not. The bold impostor 335
Looks not more silly when the cheat’s found out.
Here the lank-sided miser, worst of felons,
Who meanly stole (discreditable shift,)
From back and belly too their proper cheer,
Eas’d of a tax it irk’d the wretch to pay 340
To his own carcass, now lies cheaply lodg’d,
By clam’rous appetites no longer teas’d,
Nor tedious bills of charges and repairs.
But ah, where are his rents, his comings in?
Aye, now you’ve made the rich man poor indeed! 345
Robb’d of his gods, what has he left behind?
O cursed lust of gold, when for thy sake
The fool throws up his interest in both worlds,
First starv’d in this, then damn’d in that to come!
How shocking must thy summons be, O Death, 350
To him that is at ease in his possessions,
Who, counting on long years of pleasure here,
Is quite unfurnish’d for that world to come!
In that dread moment how the frantic soul
Raves round the walls of her clay tenement, 355
Runs to each avenue, and shrieks for help,
But shrieks in vain! How wishfully she looks
On all she’s leaving, now no longer her’s!
A little longer, yet a little longer,
O might she stay to wash away her stains, 360
And fit her for her passage! mournful sight!
Her very eyes weep blood, and every groan
She heaves is big with horror! But the foe,
Like a stanch° murd’rer steady to his purpose,
Pursues her close through every lane of life, 365
Nor misses once the track, but presses on;
Till, forc’d at last to the tremendous verge,
At once she sinks to everlasting ruin!
Sure ’tis a serious thing to die! My soul,
What a strange moment must it be when, near 370
Thy journey’s end, thou hast the gulf in view!
That awful gulf no mortal e’er repass’d
To tell what’s doing on the other side!
Nature runs back and shudders at the sight,
And every life-string bleeds at thoughts of parting! 375
For part they must—body and soul must part!
Fond couple! link’d more close than wedded pair.
This wings its way to its Almighty Source,
The witness of its actions, now its judge;
That drops into the dark and noisome° grave, 380
Like a disabled pitcher of no use.
If death were nothing, and nought after death,
If when men died, at once they ceas’d to be,
Returning to the barren womb of nothing,
Whence first they sprung! then might the debauchee° 385
Untrembling mouth the Heavens; then might the drunkard
Reel° over his full bowl, and when ’tis drain’d
Fill up another to the brim, and laugh
At the poor bugbear Death; then might the wretch
That’s weary of the world, and tir’d of life, 390
At once give each inquietude the slip°,
By stealing out of being when he pleas’d,
And by what way, whether by hemp or steel:—
Death’s thousand doors stand open. Who could force
The ill-pleas’d guest to sit out his full time, 395
Or blame him if he goes? Sure he does well
That helps himself as timely as he can,
When able. But, if there’s an hereafter—
And that there is, conscience, uninfluenc’d
And suffer’d to speak out, tells every man— 400
Then must it be an awful thing to die:
More horrid yet to die by one’s own hand!
Self-murder! Name it not; our island’s shame;
That makes her the reproach of neighb’ring states.
Shall nature, swerving from her earliest dictate, 405
Self-preservation, fall by her own act?
Forbid it, Heaven! Let not, upon disgust,
The shameless hand be fully crimson’d o’er
With blood of its own lord! Dreadful attempt,
Just reeking from self-slaughter, in a rage 410
To rush into the presence of our Judge!
As if we challeng’d him to do his worst,
And matter’d not his wrath. Unheard-of tortures
Must be reserv’d for such: these herd together;
The common damn’d shun their society, 415
And look upon themselves as fiends less foul.
Our time is fix’d, and all our days are number’d!
How long, how short, we know not: this we know,
Duty requires we calmly wait the summons,
Nor dare to stir till Heaven shall give permission: 420
Like sentries that must keep their destin’d stand,
And wait th’ appointed hour till they’re reliev’d.
Those only are the brave that keep their ground,
And keep it to the last. To run away
Is but a coward’s trick: to run away 425
From this world’s ills, that at the very worst
Will soon blow o’er, thinking to mend ourselves
By boldly venturing on a world unknown,
And plunging headlong in the dark—’tis mad!
No frenzy half so desperate as this. 430
Tell us, ye dead I will none of you in pity
To those you left behind disclose the secret?
O! that some courteous ghost would blab it out
What ’tis you are, and we must shortly be.
I’ve heard that souls departed have sometimes 435
Forewarn’d men of their death. ’Twas kindly done
To knock and give the alarm. But what means
This stinted charity? ’Tis but lame kindness
That does its work by halves. Why might you not
Tell us what ’tis to die? Do the strict laws 440
Of your society forbid your speaking
Upon a point so nice? I’ll ask no more.
Sullen, like lamps in sepulchres, your shine
Enlightens but yourselves. Well—’tis no matter:
A very little time will clear up all, 445
And make us learn’d as you are, and as close.
Death’s shafts fly thick! Here fall the village swain°,
And there his pamper’d lord! The cup goes round,
And who so artful as to put it by?
’Tis long since death had the majority, 450
Yet, strange, the living lay it not to heart!
See yonder maker of the dead man’s bed,
The sexton°, hoary-headed chronicle!
Of hard unmeaning° face, down which ne’er stole
A gentle tear; with mattock° in his hand 455
Digs through whole rows of kindred and acquaintance,
By far his juniors! Scarce a scull’s cast up
But well he knew its owner, and can tell
Some passage of his life. Thus hand in hand
The sot has walk’d with Death twice twenty years; 460
And yet ne’er younker° on the green laughs louder,
Or clubs a smuttier tale: when drunkards meet,
None sings a merrier catch, or lends a hand
More willing to his cup. Poor wretch! he minds not
That soon some trusty brother of the trade 465
Shall do for him what he has done for thousands.
On this side, and on that, men see their friends
Drop off, like leaves in Autumn; yet launch out
Into fantastic schemes, which the long livers
In the world’s hale and undegenerate days 470
Could scarce have leisure for; fools that we are!
Never to think of Death and of ourselves
At the same time!—as if to learn to die
Were no concern of ours. O more than sottish!
For creatures of a day in gamesome° mood 475
To frolic on eternity’s dread brink,
Unapprehensive; when, for aught we know,
The very first swoln surge shall sweep us in!
Think we, or think we not, time hurries on
With a resistless unremitting stream, 480
Yet treads more soft than e’er did midnight thief,
That slides his hand under the miser’s pillow,
And carries off his prize. What is this world?
What but a spacious burial-field unwall’d,
Strew’d with Death’s spoils, the spoils of animals 485
Savage and tame, and full of dead men’s bones!
The very turf on which we tread once liv’d;
And we that live must lend our carcasses
To cover our own offspring: in their turns
They too must cover theirs. ’Tis here all meet! 490
The shiv’ring Icelander and sun-burnt Moor;
Men of all climes, that never met before,
And of all creeds, the Jew, the Turk, the Christian.
Here the proud prince, and favourite yet prouder,
His sov’reign’s keeper, and the people’s scourge, 495
Are huddled out of sight! Here lie abash’d
The great negotiators of the earth,
And celebrated masters of the balance,
Deep read in stratagems and wiles of courts,
Now vain their treaty-skill; Death scorns to treat. 500
Here the o’erloaded slave flings down his burden
From his gall’d shoulders; and, when the stern tyrant,
With all his guards and tools of power about him,
Is meditating new unheard-of hardships,
Mocks his short arm, and quick as thought escapes, 505
Where tyrants vex not, and the weary rest.
Here the warm lover, leaving the cool shade,
The tell-tale echo, and the babbling stream,
Time out of mind the fav’rite seats of love,
Fast by his gentle mistress lays him down, 510
Unblasted by foul tongue. Here friends and foes
Lie close, unmindful of their former feuds.
The lawn-rob’d prelate and plain presbyter,
Erewhile that stood aloof, as shy to meet,
Familiar mingle here, like sister-streams 515
That some rude interposing rock has split.
Here is the large-limb’d peasant; here the child
Of a span long, that never saw the sun,
Nor press’d the nipple, strangled in life’s porch.
Here is the mother with her sons and daughters; 520
The barren wife; the long-demurring maid,
Whose lonely unappropriated sweets
Smil’d like yon knot of cowslips on the cliff,
Not to be come at by the willing hand.
Here are the prude severe, and gay coquette, 525
The sober widow, and the young green virgin,
Cropp’d like a rose before ’tis fully blown,
Or half its worth disclos’d. Strange medley here!
Here garrulous old age winds up his tale;
And jovial youth, of lightsome vacant heart, 530
Whose every day was made of melody,
Hears not the voice of mirth; the shrill-tongu’d shrew,
Meek as the turtle-dove, forgets her chiding.
Here are the wise, the generous, and the brave;
The just, the good, the worthless, and profane; 535
The downright clown, and perfectly well-bred;
The fool, the churl, the scoundrel and the mean;
The supple statesman, and the patriot stern;
The wrecks of nations and the spoils of time,
With all the lumber of six thousand years! 540
Poor man! how happy once in thy first state,
When yet but warm from thy great Maker’s hand
He stamp’d thee with his image, and well pleas’d,
Smil’d on his last fair work! Then all was well.
Sound was the body, and the soul serene; 545
Like two sweet instruments, ne’er out of tune,
That play their several parts. Nor head nor heart
Offer’d to ache; nor was there cause they should,
For all was pure within. No fell remorse,
Nor anxious castings up of what might be, 550
Alarm’d his peaceful bosom. Summer seas
Shew not more smooth when kiss’d by southern winds,
Just ready to expire. Scarce importun’d,
The generous soil with a luxurious hand
Offer’d the various produce of the year, 555
And every thing most perfect in its kind.
Blessed, thrice blessed days! But ah! how short!
Bless’d as the pleasing dreams of holy men;
But fugitive, like those, and quickly gone.
O slipp’ry state of things! What sudden turns, 560
What strange vicissitudes, in the first leaf
Of man’s sad history! To-day most happy,
And ere to-morrow’s sun has set most abject!
How scant the space between these vast extremes!
Thus far’d it with our sire; not long he enjoy’d 565
His Paradise! Scarce had the happy tenant
Of the fair spot due time to prove its sweets,
Or sum them up, when straight he must be gone,
Ne’er to return again! And must he go?
Can nought compound° for the first dire offence 570
Of erring man? Like one that is condemn’d
Fain would he trifle° time with idle talk,
And parley with his fate. But ’tis in vain.
Not all the lavish odours of the place,
Offer’d in incense, can procure his pardon, 575
Or mitigate his doom. A mighty angel
With flaming sword forbids his longer stay,
And drives the loit’rer forth: nor must he take
One last and farewell round. At once he lost
His glory and his God! If mortal now, 580
And sorely maim’d, no wonder—Man has sinn’d!
Sick of his bliss, and bent on new adventures,
Evil he would needs try; nor tried in vain.
Dreadful experiment—destructive measure—
Where the worst thing could happen, is success! 585
Alas! too well he sped; the good he scorn’d
Stalk’d° off reluctant, like an ill-used ghost,
Not to return; or, if it did, its visits,
Like those of angels, short, and far between:
Whilst the black demon, with his hell-scap’d train, 590
Admitted once into its better room,
Grew loud and mutinous, nor would be gone;
Lording it o’er the man, who now too late
Saw the rash error which he could not mend;
An error fatal not to him alone, 595
But to his future sons, his fortune’s heirs.
Inglorious bondage! human nature groans
Beneath a vassalage so vile and cruel,
And its vast body bleeds through every vein.
What havoc hast thou made, foul monster, sin! 600
Greatest and first of ills! the fruitful parent
Of woes of all dimensions! But for thee
Sorrow had never been. All-noxious thing,
Of vilest nature! Other sorts of evils
Are kindly circumscrib’d, and have their bounds. 605
The fierce volcano, from its burning entrails
That belches molten stone and globes of fire,
Involv’d in pitchy clouds of smoke and stench,
Mars the adjacent fields for some leagues round,
And there it stops. The big-swoln inundation, 610
Of mischief more diffusive, raving loud,
Buries whole tracts of country, threat’ning more:
But that too has its shore it cannot pass.
More dreadful far than those, sin has laid waste,
Not here and there a country, but a world; 615
Dispatching at a wide extended blow
Entire mankind, and for their sakes defacing
A whole creation’s beauty with rude hands;
Blasting the foodful grain, and loaded branches,
And marking all along its way with ruin! 620
Accursed thing! O where shall fancy find
A proper name to call thee by, expressive
Of all thy horrors? Pregnant womb of ills!
Of temper so transcendently malign,
That toads and serpents of most deadly kind 625
Compar’d to thee are harmless! Sicknesses,
Of every size and symptom, racking pains,
And bluest plagues, are thine! See how the fiend
Profusely scatters the contagion round!
Whilst deep-mouth’d Slaughter, bellowing at her heels, 630
Wades deep in blood new-spilt; yet for to-morrow
Shapes out new work of great uncommon daring,
And inly pines till the dread blow is struck.
But hold! I’ve gone too far; too much discover’d
My father’s nakedness and nature’s shame. 635
Here let me pause, and drop an honest tear,
One burst of filial duty and condolence,
O’er all those ample deserts Death hath spread,
This chaos of mankind! O great man-eater!
Whose every day is carnival, not sated yet! 640
Unheard-of epicure, without a fellow!
The veriest gluttons do not always cram;
Some intervals of abstinence are sought
To edge the appetite; thou seekest none!
Methinks the countless swarms thou hast devour’d, 645
And thousands that each hour thou gobblest up,
This, less than this, might gorge thee to the full.
But ah! rapacious still, thou gasp’st for more;
Like one, whole days defrauded of his meals,
On whom lank Hunger lays her skinny hand, 650
And whets to keenest eagerness his cravings:
As if Diseases, Massacres, and Poison,
Famine, and War, were not thy caterers!
But know that thou must render up the dead,
And with high interest too! they are not thine; 655
But only in thy keeping for a season,
Till the great promis’d day of restitution;
When loud diffusive sound from brazen trump
Of strong lung’d cherub shall alarm thy captives,
And rouse the long, long sleepers into life, 660
Daylight, and liberty.—
Then must thy doors fly open, and reveal
The minds that lay long forming under ground,
In their dark cells immur’d; but now full ripe,
And pure as silver from the crucible°, 665
That twice has stood the torture of the fire,
And inquisition of the forge. We know
Th’ illustrious Deliverer of mankind,
The Son of God, thee foil’d. Him in thy power
Thou could’st not hold; self-vigorous he rose, 670
And, shaking off thy fetters, soon retook
Those spoils his voluntary yielding lent:
(Sure pledge of our releasement from thy thrall!)
Twice twenty days he sojourn’d here on earth,
And shewed himself alive to chosen witnesses, 675
By proofs so strong, that the most slow assenting
Had not a scruple left. This having done,
He mounted up to Heaven. Methinks I see him
Climb the aerial heights, and glide along
Athwart the severing clouds: but the faint eye, 680
Flung backwards in the chase, soon drops its hold,
Disabled quite, and jaded with pursuing.
Heaven’s portals wide expand to let him in,
Nor are his friends shut out: as a great prince
Not for himself alone procures admission, 685
But for his train; it was his royal will,
That where he is there should his followers be.
Death only lies between, a gloomy path!
Made yet more gloomy by our coward fears!
But nor untrod, nor tedious; the fatigue 690
Will soon go off. Besides, there’s no by-road
To bliss. Then why, like ill-condition’d children,
Start we at transient hardships in the way
That leads to purer air and softer skies,
And a ne’er-setting sun? Fools that we are! 695
We wish to be where sweets unwith’ring bloom;
But straight our wish revoke, and will not go.
So have I seen, upon a summer’s even,
Fast by the rivulet’s brink, a youngster play:
How wishfully he looks to stem the tide! 700
This moment resolute, next unresolv’d,
At last he dips his foot; but as he dips,
His fears redouble, and he runs away
From th’ inoffensive stream, unmindful now
Of all the flowers that paint the further bank, 705
And smil’d so sweet of late. Thrice welcome Death!
That, after many a painful bleeding step,
Conducts us to our home, and lands us safe
On the long wish’d-for shore. Prodigious change!
Our bane turn’d to a blessing. Death disarm’d 710
Loses its fellness quite; all thanks to him
Who scourg’d the venom out! Sure the last end
Of the good man is peace. How calm his exit!
Night-dews fall not more gently to the ground,
Nor weary worn-out winds expire so soft. 715
Behold him in the ev’ning-tide of life,
A life well spent, whose early care it was
His riper years should not upbraid his green;
By unperceiv’d degrees he wears away;
Yet like the sun seems larger at his setting! 720
High in his faith and hopes, look how he reaches
After the prize in view! and, like a bird
That’s hamper’d struggles hard to get away!
Whilst the glad gates of sight are wide expanded
To let new glories in, the first fair fruits 725
Of the fast-coming harvest! Then—O then
Each earth-born joy grows vile, or disappears,
Shrunk to a thing of nought! O how he longs
To have his passport sign’d, and be dismiss’d!
’Tis done—and now he’s happy! The glad soul 730
Has not a wish uncrown’d. E’en the lag flesh
Rests too in hope of meeting once again
Its better half, never to sunder more.
Nor shall it hope in vain: the time draws on
When not a single spot of burial-earth, 735
Whether on land or in the spacious sea,
But must give back its long committed dust
Inviolate: and faithfully shall these
Make up the full account; not the least atom
Embezzled, or mislaid, of the whole tale. 740
Each soul shall have a body ready furnish’d;
And each shall have his own. Hence, ye profane!
Ask not how this can be. Sure the same power
That rear’d the piece at first, and took it down,
Can re-assemble the loose scatter’d parts, 745
And put them as they were. Almighty God
Has done much more; nor is his arm impair’d
Through length of days; and what he can he will:
His faithfulness stands bound to see it done.
When the dread trumpet sounds, the slumb’ring dust, 750
Not unattentive to the call, shall wake;
And every joint possess its proper place,
With a new elegance of form, unknown
To its first state. Nor shall the conscious soul
Mistake its partner; but, amidst the crowd 755
Singling its other half, into its arms
Shall rush with all th’ impatience of a man
That’s new come home, who having long been absent,
With haste runs over every different room,
In pain to see the whole. Thrice happy meeting! 760
Nor time, nor death, shall ever part them more!
’Tis but a night, a long and moonless night;
We make the grave our bed, and then are gone!
Thus at the shut of even, the weary bird
Leaves the wide air, and in some lonely brake 765
Cow’rs down, and dozes till the dawn of day;
Then claps his well-fledg’d wings, and bears° away.
Notes:
Line 1: affect. From Latin affectare, to strive after. Here: find pleasing. Compare The Taming of the Shrew, I.1.39-40: "No profit grows where is no pleasure ta'en./ In brief, Sir, study what you most affect."
Line 8: Eternal King. God. Compare 1 Timothy 1:17.
Line 18: furr'd. Coated with (foul or deposited) matter.
Line 21: yew. This tree often symbolizes death or sorrow.
Line 24: visionary. Unreal, imaginary.
Line 28: fane. Temple or church.
Line 36: plaistered. Plastered.
Line 36: 'scutcheons. An escutcheon is the shieldlike surface on which a coat of arms is displayed.
Line 46: coeval. Of the same age, contemporary.
Line 62: homely. Plain.
Line 71: evanish. Vanish.
Line 77: prone. Lying face downward.
Line 89: solder. Something that unites.
Line 92: proved. Felt.
Line 97: cowslip. Primula veris.
Line 100: thrush. A brown songbird.
Line 103: eglantine. The sweetbrier.
Line 115: Where are the jesters now? Compare Hamlet V-i: "Where be your gibes now? your gambols? your songs?"
Line 166: casement. Hinged window sash.
Line 203, 231: consume. Here: waste away.
Line 204: busto. Bust, statue.
Line 215: covert. Cover; concealment.
Line 222: gripe. Distress, oppress.
Line 240: expunge. Obliterate.
Line 265: belabour. Beat vigorously.
Line 295: darksome. Dark.
Line 316: drawl. Speak ploddingly.
Line 321: julep. Sweet drink, sometimes medicated.
Line 321: catholicon. Panacea.
Line 333: cordial. Stimulating medicine.
Line 334: voucher. Here: evidence, proof.
Line 364: stanch. Staunch.
Line 380: noisome. Disgusting; noxious.
Line 385: debauchee. One given to debauchery.
Line 387: reel. Whirl, stagger.
Line 391: give each inquietude the slip. Escape each disquietude.
Line 447: swain. Country lad.
Line 453: sexton. Church official.
Line 454: unmeaning. Expressionless.
Line 455: mattock. A tool for loosening the soil when digging.
Line 461: younker. Youngster.
Line 475: gamesome. Playful.
Line 570: compound. Refrain from persecuting or punishing (a crime).
Line 572: trifle. Pass (time) idly or frivolously.
Line 587: stalk. Walk stiffly or haughtily.
Line 665: crucible. Bottom of furnace where metal gathers.
Line 767: bear. Tend.
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