Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series
Page 139
Pompilia, whom last week I sainted so?
I, it is, teach the monk what scripture means,
And that the tongue should prove a two-edged sword,
No axe sharp one side, blunt the other way,
Like what amused the town at Guido’s cost!
Astræa redux! I’ve a second chance
Before the self-same Court o’ the Governor
Who soon shall see volte-face and chop, change sides!
Accordingly, I charge you on your life,
Send me with all despatch the judgment late
O’ the Florence Rota Court, confirmative
O’ the prior judgment at Arezzo, clenched
Again by the Granducal signature,
Wherein Pompilia is convicted, doomed,
And only destined to escape through flight
The proper punishment. Send me the piece, —
I’ll work it! And this foul-mouthed friar shall find
His Noah’s-dove that brought the olive back,
Is turned into the other sooty scout,
The raven, Noah first of all put forth the ark,
And never came back, but ate carcasses!
No adequate machinery in law?
No power of life and death i’ the learned tongue?
Methinks I am already at my speech,
Startle the world with “Thou, Pompilia, thus?
“How is the fine gold of the Temple dim!”
And so forth. But the courier bids me close,
And clip away one joke that runs through Rome,
Side by side with the sermon which I send —
How like the heartlessness of the old hunks
Arcangeli! His Count is hardly cold,
His client whom his blunders sacrificed,
When somebody must needs describe the scene —
How the procession ended at the church
That boasts the famous relic: quoth our brute,
“Why, that’s just Martial’s phrase for ‘make an end’ —
“Ad umbilicum sic perventum est!”
The callous dog, — let who will cut off head,
He cuts a joke, and cares no more than so!
I think my speech shall modify his mirth:
“How is the fine gold dim!” — but send the piece!
Alack, Bottini, what is my next word
But death to all that hope? The Instrument
Is plain before me, print that ends my Book
With the definitive verdict of the Court,
Dated September, six months afterward,
(Such trouble and so long, the old Pope gave!)
“In restitution of the perfect fame
“Of dead Pompilia, quondam Guido’s wife,
“And warrant to her representative
“Domenico Tighetti, barred hereby,
“While doing duty in his guardianship,
“From all molesting, all disquietude,
“Each perturbation and vexation brought
“Or threatened to be brought against the heir
“By the Most Venerable Convent called
“Saint Mary Magdalen o’ the Convertites
“I’ the Corso.”
Justice done a second time!
Well judged, Marc Antony, Locum-tenens
O’ the Governor, a Venturini, too!
For which I save thy name, — last of the list!
Next year but one, completing his nine years
Of rule in Rome, died Innocent my Pope
— By some accounts, on his accession-day.
If he thought doubt would do the next age good,
‘Tis pity he died unapprised what birth
His reign may boast of, be remembered by —
Terrible Pope, too, of a kind, — Voltaire.
And so an end of all i’ the story. Strain
Never so much my eyes, I miss the mark
There lived or died that Gaetano, child
Of Guido and Pompilia: only find,
Immediately upon his father’s death,
A record in the annals of the town
That Porzia, sister of our Guido, moved
The Priors of Arezzo and their head
Its Gonfalonier to give loyally
A public attestation to the right
O’ the Franceschini to men’s reverence —
Apparently because of the incident
O’ the murder, — there’s no mention made of crime,
But what else caused such urgency to cure
The mob, just then, of chronic greediness
For scandal, love of lying vanity,
And appetite to swallow crude reports
That bring annoyance to their betters? — Bane
Which, here, was promptly met by antidote.
I like and shall translate the eloquence
Of nearly the worst Latin ever writ:
“Since antique time whereof the memory
“Holds the beginning, to this present hour,
“Our Franceschini ever shone, and shine,
“Still i’ the primary rank, supreme amid
“The lustres of Arezzo, proud to own
“In this great family — her flag-bearer,
“Guide of her steps and guardian against foe, —
“As in the first beginning, so to-day!”
There, would you disbelieve stern History,
Trust rather to the babble of a bard?
I thought, Arezzo, thou hadst fitter souls,
Petrarch, — nay, Buonarroti at a pinch,
To do thee credit as vexillifer!
Was it mere mirth the Patavinian meant,
Making thee out, in his veracious page,
Founded by Janus of the Double Face?
Well, proving of such perfect parentage,
Our Gaetano, born of love and hate,
Did the babe live or die? — one fain would find!
What were his fancies if he grew a man?
Was he proud, — a true scion of the stock, —
Of bearing blason, shall make bright my Book —
Shield, Azure, on a Triple Mountain, Or,
A Palm-tree, Proper, whereunto is tied
A Greyhound, Rampant, striving in the slips?
Or did he love his mother, the base-born,
And fight i’ the ranks, unnoticed by the world?
Such, then, the final state o’ the story. So
Did the Star Wormwood in a blazing fall
Frighten awhile the waters and lie lost:
So did this old woe fade from memory,
Till after, in the fulness of the days,
I needs must find an ember yet unquenched,
And, breathing, blow the spark to flame. It lives,
If precious be the soul of man to man.
So, British Public, who may like me yet,
(Marry and amen!) learn one lesson hence
Of many which whatever lives should teach:
This lesson, that our human speech is naught,
Our human testimony false, our fame
And human estimation words and wind.
Why take the artistic way to prove so much?
Because, it is the glory and good of Art,
That Art remains the one way possible
Of speaking truth, to mouths like mine, at least.
How look a brother in the face and say
“Thy right is wrong, eyes hast thou yet art blind,
“Thine ears are stuffed and stopped, despite their length,
“And, oh, the foolishness thou countest faith!”
Say this as silverly as tongue can troll —
The anger of the man may be endured,
The shrug, the disappointed eyes of him
Are not so bad to bear — but here’s the plague
That all this trouble comes of telling truth,
Which truth, by when it reaches him, looks false,
Seems to be just the thing it
would supplant,
Nor recognisable by whom it left —
While falsehood would have done the work of truth.
But Art, — wherein man nowise speaks to men,
Only to mankind, — Art may tell a truth
Obliquely, do the thing shall breed the thought,
Nor wrong the thought, missing the mediate word.
So may you paint your picture, twice show truth,
Beyond mere imagery on the wall, —
So, note by note, bring music from your mind,
Deeper than ever the Andante dived, —
So write a book shall mean, beyond the facts,
Suffice the eye and save the soul beside.
And save the soul! If this intent save mine, —
If the rough ore be rounded to a ring,
Render all duty which good ring should do,
And, failing grace, succeed in guardianship, —
Might mine but lie outside thine, Lyric Love,
Thy rare gold ring of verse (the poet praised)
Linking our England to his Italy!
BALAUSTION’S ADVENTURE
DEDICATION
TO THE COUNTESS COWPER.
If I mention the simple truth: that this poem absolutely owes its existence to you — who not only suggested, but imposed on me as a task, what has proved the most delightful of May-month amusements — I shall seem honest, indeed, but hardly prudent; for, how good and beautiful ought such a poem to be!
Euripides might fear little; but I, also, have an interest in the performance: and what wonder if I beg you to suffer that it make, in another and far easier sense, its nearest possible approach to those Greek qualities of goodness and beauty, by laying itself gratefully at your feet?
R. B.
London, July 23, 1871.
BALAUSTION’S ADVENTURE
Our Euripides, the human,
With his droppings of warm tears,
And his touches of things common
Till they rose to touch the spheres.
About that strangest, saddest, sweetest song
I, when a girl, heard in Kameiros once,
And, after, saved my life by? Oh, so glad
To tell you the adventure!
Petalé,
Phullis, Charopé, Chrusion! You must know,
This “after” fell in that unhappy time
When poor reluctant Nikias, pushed by fate,
Went faulteringly against Syracuse;
And there shamed Athens, lost her ships and men,
And gained a grave, or death without a grave. 10
I was at Rhodes — the isle, not Rhodes the town,
Mine was Kameiros — when the news arrived:
Our people rose in tumult, cried “No more
Duty to Athens, let us join the League,
And side with Sparta, share the spoil, — at worst,
Abjure a headship that will ruin Greece!”
And so, they sent to Knidos for a fleet
To come and help revolters. Ere help came, —
Girl as I was, and never out of Rhodes
The whole of my first fourteen years of life, 20
But nourished with Ilissian mother’s-milk, —
I passionately cried to who would hear
And those who loved me at Kameiros — “No!
Never throw Athens off for Sparta’s sake —
Never disloyal to the life and light
Of the whole world worth calling world at all!
Rather go die at Athens, lie outstretched
For feet to trample on, before the gate
Of Diomedes or the Hippadai,
Before the temples and among the tombs, 30
Than tolerate the grim felicity
Of harsh Lakonia! Ours the fasts and feasts,
Choës and Chutroi; ours the sacred grove,
Agora, Dikasteria, Poikilé,
Pnux, Keramikos; Salamis in sight,
Psuttalia, Marathon itself, not far!
Ours the great Dionusiac theatre,
And tragic triad of immortal fames,
Aischulos, Sophokles, Euripides!
To Athens, all of us that have a soul, 40
Follow me!” And I wrought so with my prayer,
That certain of my kinsfolk crossed the strait
And found a ship at Kaunos; well-disposed
Because the Captain — where did he draw breath
First but within Psuttalia? Thither fled
A few like-minded as ourselves. We turned
The glad prow westward, soon were out at sea,
Pushing, brave ship with the vermilion cheek,
Proud for our heart’s true harbour. But a wind
Lay ambushed by Point Malea of bad fame, 50
And leapt out, bent us from our course. Next day
Broke stormless, and so next blue day and next.
“But whither bound in this white waste?” We plagued
The pilot’s old experience: “Cos or Crete?”
Because he promised us the land ahead.
While we strained eyes to share in what he saw,
The Captain’s shout startled us; round we rushed:
What hung behind us but a pirate-ship
Panting for the good prize! “Row! harder row!
Row for dear life!” the Captain cried: “‘t is Crete, 60
Friendly Crete looming large there! Beat this craft
That’s but a keles, one-benched pirate-bark,
Lokrian, or that bad breed off Thessaly!
Only, so cruel are such water-thieves,
No man of you, no woman, child, or slave,
But falls their prey, once let them board our boat!”
So, furiously our oarsmen rowed and rowed;
And when the oars flagged somewhat, dash and dip,
As we approached the coast and safety, so
That we could hear behind us plain the threats 70
And curses of the pirate panting up
In one more throe and passion of pursuit, —
Seeing our oars flag in the rise and fall,
I sprang upon the altar by the mast
And sang aloft, — some genius prompting me, —
That song of ours which saved at Salamis:
“O sons of Greeks, go, set your country free,
Free your wives, free your children, free the fanes
O’ the Gods, your fathers founded, — sepulchres
They sleep in! Or save all, or all be lost!” 80
Then, in a frenzy, so the noble oars
Churned the black water white, that well away
We drew, soon saw land rise, saw hills grow up,
Saw spread itself a sea-wide town with towers,
Not fifty stadia distant; and, betwixt
A large bay and a small, the islet-bar,
Even Ortugia’s self — oh, luckless we!
For here was Sicily and Syracuse:
We ran upon the lion from the wolf.
Ere we drew breath, took counsel, out there came 90
A galley, hailed us. “Who asks entry here
In war-time? Are you Sparta’s friend or foe?”
“Kaunians,” — our Captain judged his best reply,
“The mainland-seaport that belongs to Rhodes;
Rhodes that casts in her lot now with the League,
Forsaking Athens, — you have heard belike!”
“Ay, but we heard all Athens in one ode
Just now! we heard her in that Aischulos!
You bring a boatful of Athenians here,
Kaunians although you be: and prudence bids, 100
For Kaunos’ sake, why, carry them unhurt
To Kaunos, if you will: for Athens’ sake,
Back must you, though ten pirates blocked the bay!
We want no colony from Athens here,
With memories of Salamis, forsooth,
To spirit up our captives, that pale crowd
; I’ the quarry, whom the daily pint of corn
Keeps in good order and submissiveness.”
Then the grey Captain prayed them by the Gods,
And by their own knees, and their fathers’ beards, 110
They should not wickedly thrust suppliants back,
But save the innocent on traffic bound —
Or, may be, some Athenian family
Perishing of desire to die at home, —
From that vile foe still lying on its oars,
Waiting the issue in the distance. Vain!
Words to the wind! And we were just about
To turn and face the foe, as some tired bird
Barbarians pelt at, drive with shouts away
From shelter in what rocks, however rude, 120
She makes for, to escape the kindled eye,
Split beak, crook’d claw o’ the creature, cormorant
Or ossifrage, that, hardly baffled, hangs
Afloat i’ the foam, to take her if she turn.
So were we at destruction’s very edge,
When those o’ the galley, as they had discussed
A point, a question raised by somebody,
A matter mooted in a moment, — “Wait!”
Cried they (and wait we did, you may be sure)
“That song was veritable Aischulos, 130
Familiar to the mouth of man and boy,
Old glory: how about Euripides?
The newer and not yet so famous bard,
He that was born upon the battle-day
While that song and the salpinx sounded him
Into the world, first sound, at Salamis —
Might you know any of his verses too?”
Now, some one of the Gods inspired this speech:
Since ourselves knew what happened but last year —
How, when Gulippos gained his victory 140
Over poor Nikias, poor Demosthenes,
And Syracuse condemned the conquered force
To dig and starve i’ the quarry, branded them —
Freeborn Athenians, brute-like in the front
With horse-head brands, — ah, “Region of the Steed”! —
Of all these men immersed in misery,
It was found none had been advantaged so
By aught in the past life he used to prize
And pride himself concerning, — no rich man
By riches, no wise man by wisdom, no 150
Wiser man still (as who loved more the Muse)
By storing, at brain’s edge and tip of tongue,
Old glory, great plays that had long ago
Made themselves wings to fly about the world, —
Not one such man was helped so at his need
As certain few that (wisest they of all)
Had, at first summons, oped heart, flung door wide
At the new knocking of Euripides,