Eyes waking when near me another slept,
Lest I might mutter it in my sleep?
And now at the last to blab is clear!
How the women will shrink from my pictures! And worse
Will the men do, spit on my name and curse;
But, then, up in heaven I shall not hear
Quick, Fra Bernardo! The figure stands
There in the niche, my patron saint;
Put it within my trembling hands
Till they are steadier. So! my brain
Whirled and grew dizzy with sudden pain,
Trying to span that gulf of years,
Fronting again those long-laid fears.
Confess? Why, yes, if I must, I must.
Now, good Saint Andrea, be my trust!
But fill me first from that crystal flask,
Strong wine to strengthen me for my task.
(That thing is a gem of craftsmanship:
Just mark how its curvings fit the lip.)
Ah, you in your dreamy, tranquil life,
How can you fathom the rage and strife,
The blinding envy, the burning smart,
That, worm-like, gnaws the Maestro's heart
When he sees another snatch the prize
Out from under his very eyes,
For which he would barter his soul? You see, I taught him his art from first to last:
Whatever he was he owed to me;
And then to be brow-beat, overpassed,
Stealthily jeered behind the hand!
Why, that was more than a saint could stand;
And I was no saint! And if my soul,
With a pride like Lucifer's, mocked control,
And goaded me on to madness, till
I lost all measure of good or ill,
Whose gift was it, pray? Oh, many a day
I've cursed it, yet whose is the blame, I say?
His name? How strange that you question so,
When I'm sure I have told it o'er and o'er,
And why should you care to hear it more?
Well, as I was saying, Domenico
Was wont of my skill to make such light,
That, seeing him go on a certain night
Out with his lute, I followed.
From a war of words, I heeded not
Whither I went, till I heard him twang
A madrigal under the lattice where
Only the night before I sang.
-A double robbery! and I swear
'Twas overmuch for the flesh to bear.
Don't ask me. I knew not what I did,
But I hastened home with my rapier hid
Under my cloak, and the blade was wet.
Just open that cabinet there, and see
The strange red rustiness on it yet.
A calm that was dead as dead could be
Numbed me: I seized my chalks to trace-
What think you?-Judas Iscariot's face!
I just had finished the scowl, no more,
When the shuffle of feet drew near my door
(We lived together, you know, I said):
Then wide they flung it, and on the floor
Laid down Domenico-dead!
Back swam my senses: a sickening pain
Tingled like lightning through my brain;
And ere the spasm of fear was broke,
The men who had borne him homeward spoke
Soothingly: "Some assassin's knife
Had taken the innocent artist's life
Wherefore 't were hard to say: all men
Were prone to have troubles now and then
The world knew naught of. Toward his friend
Florence stood waiting to extend
Tenderest dole." Then came my tears,
And I've been sorry these twenty years.
Now, Fra Bernardo, you have my sin:
Do you think Saint Peter will let me in?
CXLIII.-BILL MASON'S BRIDE.
HALF an hour till train time, sir,
An' a fearful dark night, too;
Take a look at the switch-lights, Tom,
And fetch a stick when you're through.
"On time?" Well, yes, I guess so-
Left the last station all right-
She'll come round the curve a flyin’—
Bill Mason comes up to-night.
You know Bill? No! He's engineer:
Been on the road all his life.
I'll never forget the mornin'
He married his chick of a wife,'Twas the summer the mill-hands struck, Just off work every one,
They kicked up a row in the village,
And killed old Donovan's son.
Bill had n't been married mor'n an hour,
When up comes a message from Kress
Orderin' Bill to go up there
And bring down the night express.
He left his gal in a hurry,
And went up on train number one, Thinking of nothing but Mary
And the train he had to run.
And Mary sat by the window
To wait for the night express, And, sir, if she had n't a' done so, She'd been a widow, I guess; For it must a' been nigh midnight When the mill-hands left the Ridge, They came down-the drunken devils!And tore up a rail from the bridge.
But Mary heard 'em a workin',
And guessed there was somethin' wrong,
And in less than fifteen minutes
Bill's train it would be along!
She could n't a' come here to tell us,
A mile-it couldn't be done-
So she jest grabbed up a lantern,
And made for the bridge alone;
Then down came the night express, sir,
And Bill was makin' her climb!
But Mary held up the lantern,
A swingin' it all the time.
Well, by Jove! Bill saw the signal,
And he stopped the night express,
And he found his Mary cryin'
On the track, in her weddin' dress;
Cryin' an' laughin' for joy, sir,
An' holdin' on to the light—
Hello! here's the train-good bye, sir,
Bill Mason's on time to-night!
CXLIV. CATO'S SOLILOQUY ON IMMORTALITY.
IT must be so-Plato, thou reasonest well!
Else, whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire,
This longing after immortality?
Or, whence this secret dread and inward horror
Of falling into nought? Why shrinks the soul
Back on herself, and startles at destruction?
'Tis the divinity that stirs within us:
'Tis heaven itself that points out an hereafter,
And intimates eternity to man.
Eternity! thou pleasing, dreadful thought!
Through what variety of untried being,
Through what new scenes and changes must we pass?
The wide, unbounded prospect lies before me;
But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it.
Here will I hold. If there's a Power above us-
And that there is, all Nature cries aloud
Through all her works-he must delight in virtue,
And that which he delights in must be happy.
But when? or where? This world was made for Cæsar.
I'm weary of conjectures-this must end them.
Thus am I doubly armed. My death and life,
My bane and antidote, are both before me.
This, in a moment, brings me to an end;
But this informs me I shall never die.
The sovl, secured in her existence, smiles
At the drawn dagger and defies its point.
The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
Grow dim with age, and Nature sink in years;
But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth,
Unhurt amidst the war of elements,
The wrecks of matter, and the crush of worlds.
CXLV. DAVID'S LAMENT OVER ABSALOM.
Till the last echo died; then, throwing off
The sack-cloth from his brow, and laying back
The pall from the still features of his child,
He bowed his head upon him, and broke forth
In the resistless eloquence of woe:
"Alas! my noble boy, that thou shouldst die!
Thou, who wert made so beautifully fair!
That death should settle in thy glorious eye,
And leave his stillness in this clustering hair!
How could he mark thee for the silent tomb
My proud boy, Absalom!
"Cold is thy brow, my son, and I am chill,
As to my bosom I have tried to press thee. How was I wont to feel my pulses thrill,
Like a rich harp-string, yearning to caress thee, And hear thy sweet 'my father,' from these dumb And cold lips, Absalom!
"The grave hath won thee. I shall hear the gush Of music, and the voices of the young:
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