Poems (1870): Exhumation Proofs, First Issue (partial), Princeton/Troxell (copy 1) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1 Used with permission of Princeton University. From the Princeton University Library, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections. All rights reserved. Redistribution or republication in any medium requires express written consent from Princeton University Library. Permissions inquiries should be addressed to Associate University Librarian, Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library. [Untitled] Dante Gabriel Rossetti Strangeways and Walden London 1869 October 30 (late October) This is an imperfect copy of the first issue of the Exhumation Proofs. [1]-2, 5-32, 35-36, 39-42, 49-52, 55-60, 63-67, [68 blank] 1 DGR B - E8, F2 The collation described here is ideal DGR Princeton Library, Troxell Collection 23302 16 x 12.5 cm Commentary
Introduction

This is an imperfect set of the first issue of the Exhumation Proofs. The Troxell Collection has another copy of this issue with no pages after page 36, but including pages 33-34 (missing here). The proofs were printed off in October 1869 from copies of the poems made by DGR from the manuscript copies he had buried in his wife's grave in 1862. The poems were exhumed on 5 October 1869 and DGR began recopying immediately. He then used these proofs to make further corrections and additions to the exhumed poems.

A second issue of the Exhumation Proofs was pulled, incorporating many but not all of the corrections from the first issue. Copies of the second issue (imperfect) are also in the Troxell Collection. The onlyperfect copy of the Exhumation Proofs is in the Huntington Library. It is a second issue and is bound with a nearly perfect copy of the First Trial Book.

Textual History: Composition

Textual History: Revision

Production History

Reception History

Iconographic

Printing History

Pictorial

Historical

Literary

Translation

Autobiographical

Bibliographic

Notations made on blank page of ms, not in DGR's penmanship. B <hi rend="c">A LAST CONFESSION.</hi> <lb/>(<hi rend="i">Regno Lombardo-Veneto,</hi> 1848.) * * * * * * * * * Our Lombard country-girls along the coast Wear daggers in their garters; for they know That they might hate another girl to death Or meet a German lover. Such a knife I bought her, with a hilt of horn and pearl. Put the first lines of each paragraph except the first in, so as to indicate the change of paragraph. This to be done both in this piece, & in “Jenny.” Notation by DGR linked to line 6. Father, you cannot know of all my thoughts That day in going to meet her,—that last day For the last time, she said;—of all the love And all the hopeless hope that she might change And go back with me. Ah! and everywhere, At places we both knew along the road, Some fresh shape of herself as once she was Grew present at my side; until it seemed— So close they gathered round me—they would all Be with me when I reached the spot at last, To plead my cause with her against herself So changed. O Father, if you knew all this You cannot know, then you would know too, Father, And only then, if God can pardon me. What can be told I'll tell, if you will hear. Carry these 2 lines to next page, to prevent so many paragraphs further on beginning at tops of page. This and the lines added here and there may throw out the present arrangement of the Song at page 11. But that may probably be remedied by printing only 2 lines of the Italian Notation by DGR attached to lines 19 and 20. Paragraph indentation symbol, attached by DGR to line 21. I passed a village-fair upon my road, And thought, being empty-handed, I would take Some little present, which might prove that day Either a pledge between us, or (God help me!) A parting gift. And there I bought the knife. it was I bought The knife I spoke of, such as women wear. That day, some three hours afterwards, I found For certain, it must be a parting gift. And, standing silent now at last, I looked Into her scornful face; and heard the sea Still trying hard to din into my ears Some speech it knew which still might change her heart If only it could make me understand. One moment thus. Another, and her face Seemed further off than the last line of sea, So that I thought, if now she were to speak I could not hear her. Then again I knew All, as we stood together on the sand At Iglio, in the first thin shade o'the hills. ‘Take it,’ I said, and held it out to her, While the hilt glanced within my trembling hold; ‘Take it,’I said, ‘and keep it for my sake.’ Her neck did not unbend, nor did her eyes drooped her eyes Fall, nor Nor did her foot left leave beating of the sand; Only she put it by from her and laughed. Father, you hear my speech and not her laugh; But God was there and heard. Father, will God Pardon me this? Remember it all? He heard her when she laughed. New paragraph Note by DGR with line drawn between lines 45 and 46. Pages 3-4 missing from extant manuscript. I have been speaking to you of some matters There was no need to speak of, have I not? You do not know how clearly those things stood Within my mind, which I have spoken of, Nor how they strove for utterance. Life all past Is like the sky when the sun sets in it, Clearest where furthest off. I told you how She scorned my parting gift and laughed. And yet A woman's laugh 's another thing sometimes: I think they laugh in Heaven. I know last night I dreamed I saw into the garden of God, Where women walked whose painted images I have seen with candles round them in the Church. They bent this way and that, one to another, Playing: and over the long golden hair Of each there floated like a ring of fire Which when she stooped stooped with her, and when she rose Rose with her. Then a breeze flew in among them, As if a window had been opened in heaven For God to give his blessing from, before This world of ours should set; (for in my dream I thought our world was setting, and the sun Flared a spent taper;) and beneath that gust The rings of light quivered like forest-leaves. Then all the blessed maidens who were there Stood up together, as it were a voice That called them; and they threw their white throats tresses back, Making their bosoms all jut out at once, And smote their palms, and all laughed up at once, For the strong heavenly joy they had in them To hear God bless the world. Wherewith I woke: And looking round, I saw as usual That she was standing there with her long locks Pressed to her side; and her laugh ended theirs. For always when I see her now, she laughs. And yet her childish laughter haunts me too, The life of this dead terror; as in days When she, a child, dwelt with me. I must tell Something of those days yet before the end. I brought her from the city—one such day When she was still a merry loving child,— The earliest gift I mind my giving her; A little image of a flying love Made of our coloured glass ware, in his hands A dart of gilded metal and a torch. And him she kissed and me, and fain would know Why were his poor eyes blindfold, why the wings And why the arrow. What I knew I told Of Venus and of Cupid,—strange old tales. And when she heard that he could rule the loves Of men and women, still she shook her head And wondered; and, ‘Nay, nay,’ she murmured still, ‘So strong, and he a younger child than I!’ And then she'd have me fix him on the wall Fronting her little bed; and then again ab Lower-case letters hand-written in upper-left corner of page. Not in DGR's penmanship. She needs must fix him there herself, because I gave him to her and she loved him so, And he should make her love me better yet, If women loved the more, the more they grew. But the fit place upon the wall was high For her, and so I held her in my arms: And each time that the heavy pruning-hook I gave her for a hammer slipped away As it would often, still she laughed and laughed And kissed and kissed me. But amid her mirth, Just as she hung the image on the nail, It slipped and all its fragments strewed the ground: And as it fell she screamed, for in her hand The dart had entered deeply and drawn blood. And so her laughter turned to tears: and ‘Oh!’ I said, the while I bandaged the small hand,— ‘That I should be the first to make you bleed, Who love and love and love you!’—kissing still The fingers till I got her safe to bed. And still she sobbed,—‘not for the pain at all,’ She said, ‘but for the Love, the poor good Love You gave me.’ So she cried herself to sleep. Another later thing comes back to me, 'Twas in those hardest foulest days of all, When still from his shut palace, sitting clean Above the splash of blood, old Mi etternich (May his soul die, and never-dying worms Feast on its pain for ever!) used to thin His year's doomed hundreds daintily, each month Thirties and fifties. This time, as I think, Was when his thrift forbad the poor to take That evil brackish salt which the dry rocks Keep all through winter when the sea draws in. The first I heard of it was a chance shot Here and there in the street, and on the stones A stumbling clatter as of horse hemmed round. Then, when she saw me hurry out of doors, My gun slung at my shoulder and my knife Stuck in my girdle, she smoothed down my hair And laughed to see me look so brave, and leaped Up to my neck and kissed me. She was still A child; and yet that kiss was on my lips So hot all day where the smoke shut us in. For now, being always with her, the first love I had—the father's brother's— , love—was changed, I think, in somewise; like a holy thought Which is a prayer before one knows of it. The first time I perceived this, I remember, Was once when after hunting I came home Weary, and she brought food and fruit for me, And sat down at my feet upon the floor Leaning against my side. But when I felt Her sweet head reach from that low seat of hers So high as to be laid upon my heart, I turned and looked upon my darling there And marked for the first time how tall she was; And my heart beat with so much violence Under her cheek, I thought she could not choose a Lower-case letter hand-written in upper left-hand corner of page. Not in DGR's penmanship. But wonder at it soon and ask me why; And so I bade her rise and eat with me. And when, remembering all and counting back The times , I made out thirteen years for her And told her so, she gazed into my face at me with eyes As of the sky and sea on agrey days And bent her body back like a bent bow, And drew her long hands through her hair, and asked me If she was not a woman; and then laughed: And as she stooped in laughing, I could see Beneath the growing throat the breasts half globed Like folded lilies deepest deepset in the stream. one word In right hand margin, next to “under lip.” Yes, let me think of her as then; for so Her image, Father, does not bring the sights Which come when you are gone. She had a mouth Made to bring death to life,—the underlip Sucked in, as if it strove to kiss itself. Her face was ever pale, as when one stoops Over wan water; and the dark crisped hair And the hair's shadow made it paler still, :— [?]Deep-serried locks, a the darkness like of the cloud That the moon [?] in eddying waves of gloom. Where Where the moon's gaze is shrined in eddying gloom. Two lines curving around the bottom right corner, which are apparently intended to follow the existing lines inserted after line 180, have been stricken through several times. Her body bore her neck as the tree's stem Bears the top branch; and as the branch sustains Its pride of flowers and fruit, her high neck bore That face made wonderful with night and day. Her voice was swift, yet ever the last words Fell lingeringly; and rounded finger-tips She had, that clung a little where they touched And then were gone o' the instant. Her great eyes, That sometimes turned half dizzily beneath The passionate lids, as faint, when she would speak, Eyes of the sky and sea on a grey morn Note by DGR in right margin, attached to "Her great Eyes," line 190. Ink from stricken lines on page 9 has bled through, partially obscuring line 197. Had also in them hidden springs of mirth, Which under the dark lashes evermore Shook to her laugh, as when a bird flies low Between the water and the willow-leaves, And the shade quivers till he wins the light. I was a moody comrade to her then, For all the love I bore her. Italy, The weeping desolate mother, long has claimed Her sons' strong arms to lean on, and their hands To lop thy e poisonous thicket from her path, Cleaving her way to light. And from her need Had grown the fashion of my whole poor life Which I was proud to yield her, as my father Had yielded his. And this had come to be A game to play, a love to clasp, a hate To wreak, all things together that a man Needs for his blood to ripen: till at times All else seemed shadows, and I wondered still To see such life pass muster and be deemed Time's bodily substance. In those hours, no doubt, To the young girl my eyes were like my soul,— Dark wells of death-in-life that yearned for day. And though she ruled me always, I remember That once when I was thus and she still kept Leaping about the place and laughing, I Did almost chide her; whereupon she knelt And putting her two hands into my breast Sang me a song. Are these tears in my eyes? 'Tis long since I have wept for anything. a Lower-case letter hand-written in upper left-hand corner of page. not in DGR's penmanship I thought that song forgotten out of mind, And now, just as I spoke of it, it came All back. It is but a rude thing, ill rhymed, Such as a blind man chaunts and his dog hears Holding the platter, when the children run To merrier sport and leave him. Thus it goes:— La bella donna* Piangendo disse: ‘Come son fisse Le stelle in cielo! Pagenote formatted in two columns at bottom of page. * She wept, sweet lady, And said in weeping: ‘What spell is keeping The stars so steady? Why does the power Of the sun's noon-hour To sleep so move me? And the moon in heaven, Stained where she passes As a worn-out glass is,— Wearily driven, Why walks she above me? ‘Stars, moon, and sun too, I'm tired of either And all together! Whom speak they unto That I should listen? For very surely, Though my arms and shoulders Dazzle beholders, And my eyes glisten, All's nothing purely! What are words said for At all about them, If he they are made for Can do without them!’ She laughed, sweet lady, And said in laughing: ‘His hand clings half in Mine My own already! Oh! do you love me? Oh! speak of passion In no new fashion, No loud inveighings, But the old sayings You once said of me. You said, ‘As summer, Through boughs grown brittle, Comes back a little Ere frosts benumb her,— So bring'st thou to me All leaves and flowers, Though autumn's gloomy To-day in the bowers.’ ‘Oh! does he love me, When my voice teaches The very speeches He then spoke of me? Alas! what flavour Still with me lingers?’ (But she laughed as my kisses Glowed in her fingers With love's old blisses.) ‘Oh! where's one favour Left me to woo him, Whose whole poor savour Belongs not to him?’ Quel fiato anelo Dello stanco sole, Quanto m'assonna! E la luna, macchiata Come uno specchio Logoro e vecchio,— Faccia affannata. Chè cosa vuole? ‘Che è stelle, luna, e sole, Ciascun m'annoja E m'annojano insieme; Non me ne preme Nè ci prendo gioja. E veramente, Che le spalle sien franche E le braccia bianche E il seno caldo e tondo, Non mi fa niente. Chè cosa al mondo Posso più far di questi Se non piacciono a te, come dicesti?’ La donna rise E riprese ridendo:— ‘Questa mano che prendo E dunque mia? Tu m'ami dunque? Dimmelo ancora, Non in modo qualunque, Ma le parole Belle e precise Che dicesti pria. ‘Siccome suole La state talora (Dicesti) un qualche istante Tornare innanzi inverno, Così ta fai ch'io scerno Le foglie tutte quante Ben ch'io certo tenessi Per passato l'autunno. ‘Eccolo il mio alunno! Io debbo insegnargli Quei cari detti istessi Ch'ei mi disse una volta! Oimè! Che cosa dargli,’ (Ma ridea piano piano Dei baci in sulla mano,) ‘Ch'ei non m'abbia da lungo tempo tolta?’ That I should sing upon this bed!—with you To listen, and such words still left to say! Yet was it I that sang? The voice seemed hers, As on the very day she sang to me; When, having sang, done, she took out of my hand Something that I had played with all the while And laid it down beyond my reach; and so Turning my face round till it fronted hers,— ‘Weeping or laughing, which was best?’ she said. But these are foolish tales. How should I show The heart that glowed then with love's heat, each day More and more brightly?—when for long years now The very flame that flew about the heart, And gave it fiery wings, has come to be The lapping blaze of hell's environment Whose tongues all bid the molten heart despair. Yet one more thing comes back on me to-night Which I may tell you: for it bore my soul Dread firstlings of the brood that rea nd it now. It chanced that in our last year's wanderings We dwelt at Monza, far away from home, If home we had: and in the Duomo there I sometimes entered with her when she prayed. An Image of Our Lady stands there, wrought In marble by some great Italian hand In the great days when she and Italy Sat on one throne together: and to her, And to none else, my darling told/child would tell loved one told her heart. She was a woman then; and as she knelt,— Her sweet brow in the sweet brow's shadow there,— They seemed two kindred forms whereby our land (Whose work still serves the world for miracle) Made manifest herself in womanhood. Father, the day I speak of was the first For weeks that I had borne her company Into the Duomo; and those weeks had been Much troubled, for then first the glimpses came Or Of some impenetrable restlessness Growing in her to make her changed and cold. And as we entered there that day, I bent My eyes on the fair Image, and I said, Within my heart, ‘Oh warm turn her heart to me!’ And so I left her to her prayers, and went To gaze upon the pride of Monza's shrine, Where in the sacristy the day light still falls Upon the Iron Crown of Italy, On whose crowned heads the day has closed, nor yet Its hale The daybreak gilds another head to crown. But coming back, I wondered when I saw That the sweet Lady of her prayers now stood Alone without her; until further off, Before some fresh new Madonna newly gaily decked, Tinselled and gewgawed, a slight German toy, I saw her kneel, still praying. At my step She rose, and side by side we left the church. I was much moved, and sharply questioned her Of her transferred devotion; but she seemed Stubborn and heedless; till she lightly laughed And said: ‘The old Madonna? Aye indeed, ‘She had my old thoughts,—this one has my new.’ Then silent to the soul I held my way: And from the fountains of the public place Unto the pigeon-haunted pinnacles, Bright wings and water winnowed the bright air; And stately with her laugh's subsiding smile She went, with clear-swayed waist and towering neck And hands held light before her; and the face Which long had made a day in my life's night Was night in day to me; as all men's eyes Turned on her beauty, and she seemed to tread Beyond my heart to the world made for her. Ah there! my wounds will snatch my sense again: The pain comes billowing on like a full cloud Of thunder, and the flash that breaks from it Leaves my brain burning. That's the wound he gave, The Austrian whose white coat I still made match With his white face, only the two were red As suits his trade. The devil makes them wear White for a livery, that the blood may show Braver that brings them to him. So he looks Sheer o'er the field and knows his own at once. Give me a draught of water in that cup; My voice feels thick; perhaps you do not hear; But you must hear. If you mistake my words And so absolve me, I am sure the blessing Will burn my soul. If you mistake my words And so absolve me, Father, the great sin Is yours, not mine: mark this: your soul shall burn With mine for it. I have seen pictures where Souls burned with Latin shriekings in their mouths: Shall my end be as theirs? Nay, but I know 'Tis you shall shriek in Latin. Some bell rings, Rings through my brain: it strikes the hour in hell. You see I cannot, Father; I have tried, But cannot, as you see. These twenty times Beginning, I have come to the same point And stopped. Beyond, there are but broken words Which will not let you understand my tale. C It is that then we have her with us here, As when she wrung her hair out in my dream To-night, till all the darkness rec eked of it. Her hair is always wet; , for she has kept Its tresses wrapped about her side for years; And when she wrung them round over the floor, I heard the blood hiss through her fingers; so That I sat straight up in my bed and screamed Once and again; and once to once, she laughed. Look that you turn not now; ,—she's at your back: Gather your robe up, Father, and keep close, Or she'll sit down on it and send you mad. At Iglio in the first thin shade o' the hills The sand is black and red. The black was black When what was split spilt that day sank into it, And the red scarcely darkened. There I stood This night with her, and saw the sand the same. * * * * * * What would you have me tell you? Father, father, How shall I make you know? You have not known The dreadful soul of woman, who one day Forgets the old and takes the new to heart, Forgets what man remembers, and therewith Forgets the man. Nor can I clearly tell How the change happened between her and me. Her eyes looked on me from an emptied heart When most my heart was full of her; and still In every corner of myself I sought To find what service failed her; and no less Than in the good time past, there all was hers. What do you love? Your Heaven? Conceive it spread For one first year of all eternity All round you with all joys and gifts of God; And then when most your soul is blent with it And all yields song together,—then it stands O' the sudden like a pool that once gave back Your image, but now drowns it and is clear Again,—or like a sun bewitched, that burns Your shadow from you, and still shines in sight. How could you bear it? Would you not cry out, Among those eyes grown blind to you, those ears That hear no more your voice you hear the same,— ‘God! what is left but hell for company, But hell, hell, hell?’—until the name so breathed Whirled with hot wind and sucked you down in fire? Even so I stood the day her empty heart Left her place empty in our home, while yet I knew not why she went nor where she went Nor how to reach her: so I stood the day When to my prayers at last one sight of her Was granted, and I looked on heaven made pale With scorn, and heard heaven mock me in that laugh. O sweet, long sweet! Was that some ghost of you Even as your ghost that haunts me now,—twin shapes Of fear and hatred? May I find you yet Mine when death wakes? Ah! be it even in flame, We may have sweetness yet, if you but say As once in childish sorrow: ‘Not my pain, My pain was nothing: oh your poor poor love, Your broken love!’ My Father, I forgot it is hard To tell you of one thing on the last things of that last day; And But I must tell you all now. While I stopped To buy the dagger at the village fair, I saw two cursed rats about the place I knew for spies—blood-sellers both. That day Was not yet over; for three hours to come I prized my life: and so I looked around For safety. A poor painted mountebank Was playing pranks and shouting in a crowd. I knew he must have heard my name, so I Pushed past and whispered to him who I was, And of my danger. Straight he hustled me Into his booth, as it were in the trick, And brought me out next minute with my face All smeared in patches and a zany's gown; And there I handed him his cups and balls, And swung the sand-bags round to clear the ring For half an hour. The spies came once and looked; And while they stopped, and made all sights and sounds, Sharp to my startled senses, I remember A woman laughed above me. I looked around up And saw her—a brown, handsome harlot—leaning Half through a tavern window thick with vine. Some man had come behind her in the room, And caught her by her arms, and she had turned With that coarse empty laugh. I saw him there Munching her neck with kisses, while the vine Crawled in her back. And three hours afterwards, When she that I had run all risks to meet Laughed as I told you, my life burned to death Within me, for I thought it like the laugh Heard at the fair. She had not left me long; But all she might have changed to, or might change to, (I know nought since—she never speaks a word—) Seemed in that laugh. Have I not told you yet, Not told you all this time what happened, Father, When I had offered her the little knife, And bade her keep it for my sake that loved her, And she had laughed? Have I not told you yet? ‘Take it,’ I said to her the second time, And keep it for my sake; .’ a And in her heart I plunged the blade, . a And with her blood my hand Was burnt; and like some wine of hell, her blood Rushed to my brain, ; and as in fire my soul Swam in it, ; and it filled the sun and sea With one red blindness. So she took the knife, — Took it, not laughing, as I bade her then,— And fell, and her stiff boddice scooped the sand Into her bosom. Last stanza on page 20 entirely stricken by DGR. Replaced with first stanza on page 21. Why has all my punctuation been altered here? Note by DGR at top of page. “Take it,” I said to her the second time, “And keep it for my sake.” “Take it and keep it.” And then came a fire That burnt my hand; and then the fire was blood, And sea and sky were blood and fire, and all The day was one red blindness; till it seemed And Within the whirling brain's entanglement And That she h d into the d and I or I or all things bled to death. And last then I found her lying at my feet And knew that I had stabbed her, and knew well saw still The look she gave me when she took the knife Deep in her heart, even as I bade her then, And fell, and her stiff boddice scooped the sand Into her bosom. And she keeps it, see— , Do you not see she keeps it? T —there beneath, , Wet fingers and wet tresses— , in her heart! . For look you, when she stirs her hand, it shows The little hilt of horn and pearl,—even such A dagger as our women of the coast Twist in their garters. Father, I have done— : And from her side now she unwinds the thick Dark hair; all round her side it is wet through, But, like the sand at Iglio, does not change. Now you may see the dagger clearly. Father, I have told all. T : tell me at once what hope Can reach me still; f . For now she draws it out Slowly, and only smiles as yet. L : look, Father: , She scarcely smiles: but I shall hear her laugh Soon, when she shows the crimson blade to God. blank page a Lower-case letter hand-written in upper left-hand corner of page. Not in DGR's penmanship <hi rend="c">JENNY</hi>

“Vengeance of Jenny's case! Fie on her! Never name her,child!”—(Mrs. Quickly.)

 Lazy laughing languid Jenny, Fond of a kiss and fond of a guinea, Whose head is on my knee to-night;— (Have all our dances left it light With their wild tunes?)—Ah, Jenny, queen Of kisses which the blush between Could hardly make much daintier!— Nay, Poor flower left torn since yesterday Until to-morrow leave you bare; Poor handful of bright spring-water Flung in the whirlpool's shrieking face!— Poor shameful Jenny, full of grace Thus with your head upon my knee;— Whose look, whose voice, person or whose purse may be The lodestar of your reverie? This room of yours, my Jenny, looks A change from mine so full of books, Whose serried ranks hold fast, forsooth, So many captive hours of youth,— The hours they thieve from day and night To make one's cherished work come right, And leave it wrong for all their theft, Even as to-night my work was left: Until I vowed that since my brain And eyes of dancing seemed so fain, My feet should have some dancing too:— And thus it was I met with you. Well, I suppose 'twas hard to part, For here I am. And now, sweetheart, You seem too tired to get to bed. It was a careless life I led When rooms like this were not scarce so strange No long time since. Not long ago. What breeds the change,— The many aims or the few years? Because to-night it all appears Something I do not know again. The cloud's not danced out of my brain,— The cloud that made the books so swim At every effort's interim Why, Jenny, as I watch you there,— For all your wealth of loosened hair, Your silk ungirdled and unlac'd And warm sweets open to the waist, All golden in the lamplight's gleam,— You know not what a book you seem, Half-read by lightning in a dream! 50 Number hand-written in bottom center of page. Not in DGR's penmanship How should you know, my Jenny? Nay, And I should be ashamed to say:— Poor beauty, so well worth a kiss! But while my thought runs on like this With wasteful whims more than enough, I wonder what you're thinking of. If of myself you think at all, What is the thought?—conjectural On sorry matters best unsolved?— Or inly is each grace revolved To fit me with a lure?—or (sad To think!) perhaps you're merely glad That I'm not drunk or ruffianly And let you rest upon my knee. For sometimes, were the truth confess'd, You're thankful for a little rest,— Glad from the crush to rest within, From the heart-sickness and the din When re envy's voice, at virtue's pitch Mocks you because your gown is rich; And from the pale girl's dumb rebuke, Whose ill-clad grace and toil-worn look Proclaim the strength that keeps her weak And other nights than yours bespeak; And from the wild wise unchildish elf, To schoolmate lesser than himself Pointing you out, what thing you are:— Yes, from the daily jeer and jar, From shame and shame's outbraving too, Is rest not sometimes sweet to you?— But most from the hatefulness of man Who spares not to end what he began, Whose acts are foul and his speech hard, Who, having used you, afterward Thrusts you aside, as when I dine I serve the dishes and the wine. Well, handsome Jenny mine, sit up, I've filled our glasses, let us sup, And do not let me think of you, Lest shame of yours suffice for two. What, still so tired? Well, well then, keep Your head there, so you do not sleep; But that the weariness may pass And leave you merry, take this glass. Ah! lazy lily hand, more bless'd If ne'er in rings it had been dress'd Nor ever by a glove conceal'd! Behold the lilies of the field, They toil not neither do they spin; (So doth the ancient text begin,— Not of such rest as one of these Can share.) Another rest and ease Along each summer-sated path From its new lord the garden hath, b Lower-case letter hand-written in upper left-hand corner of page. Not in DGR's penmanship Than that whose spring in blessings ran Which praised the righteous husbandman, Ere yet, in days of hankering breath, The lilies sickened unto death. What, Jenny, are your lilies dead? Aye, and the snow-white leaves are spread Like winter on the garden-bed. But you had roses left in May,— They were not gone too. Jenny, nay, But must your roses die away? Even so; the leaves are curled apart, Still red as from the broken heart, And here's the naked stem of thorns. Nay, nay, mere words. Here nothing warns As yet of winter. Sickness here Or want alone could waken fear,— Nothing but passion wrings a tear. Except when there may rise unsought Haply at times a passing thought Of the old days which seem to be Much older than any history That is written in any book; When she would lie in fields and look Along the ground through the thick grass, And wonder where the city was, Far out of sight, whose broil and bale They told her then for a child's tale. Paragraph indentation symbol, attached by DGR to line 128. Jenny, you know the city now— . A child can tell the tale there, how Some things, which are not yet enroll'd In market-lists, are bought and sold Even till the early Sunday light, When Saturday night is market-night Everywhere, be it dry or wet, And market-night in the Haymarket. Our learned London children know, Poor Jenny, all your mirth and woe; Have seen your lifted silken skirt Advertize dainties through the dirt; Have seen your coach-wheels splash rebuke On virtue; and have learned your look When, wealth and health slipped past, you stare Along the streets alone, and there, Round the long park, across the bridge, The cold lamps at the pavement's edge Wind on together and apart, A fiery serpent for your heart. Whose sermoned stones on Sunday morn (The golden London pavement, worn Afresh with every Sabbath-bell Bring thoughts the wind may not dispel Of well-intentioned streets in Hell New five line stanza composed and deleted by DGR at bottom of page. Let the thoughts pass, an empty cloud! Suppose I were to think aloud,— What if to her all this were said? Why, as a volume seldom read Being opened halfway shuts again, So might the pages of her brain Be parted at such words, and thence Close back upon the dusty sense. 52 Number hand-written in upper right-hand corner of page. Not in DGR's penmanship a Lower-case letter hand-written in upper left-hand corner of page. Not in DGR's penmanship For is there hue or shape defin'd In Jenny's desecrated mind, Where all contagious currents meet, A Lethe of the middle street? Nay, it reflects not any face, Nor sound is in its sluggish pace, But as they coil those eddies clot, And night and day remember not. What Jenny, fast asleep? . . . . How fair, Why, Jenny, you're asleep at last! Asleep, poor Jenny, hard and fast, So young and sweet soft and tired; so fair With chin thus nestled in her your hair, Mouth quiet, eyelids almost blue As if some sky of dreams shone through! Just as another woman sleeps! Enough to throw one's thoughts in heaps Of doubt and horror,—what to say Or think,—this awful secret sway, The potter's power over the clay! Of the same lump (it has been said) For honour and dishonour made, Two sister vessels. Here is one. My cousin Nell is fond of fun, And fond of dress, and change, and praise, So mere a woman in her ways: And if her sweet eyes rich in youth Are like her lips that tell the truth, My cousin Nell is fond of love. And she's the girl I'm proudest of. Who does not prize her, guard her well? The love of change, in cousin Nell, Shall find the best and hold it dear: The unconquered mirth turn quieter Not through her own, through others' woe: The conscious pride of beauty glow Beside another's pride in her, One little part of all they share. For Love himself shall ripen these In a kind soil to just increase Through years of fertilizing peace. Of the same lump (as it is said) To For honour and dishonour made, Two sister vessels. Here is one. It makes a goblin of the sun. So pure, so fallen fall'n! How dare to think Of the first common kindred link? Yet, Jenny, till the world shall burn It seems that all things take their turn; And who shall say but this fair tree May need, in changes that may be, Your children's children's charity? Scorned then, no doubt, as you are scorn'd! Shall no man hold his pride forewarn'd Till in the end, the Day of Days, At Judgment, one of his own race, As frail and lost as you, shall rise, His daughter, with his mother's eyes? Each of such curdled lives alike A life for which my twelve hours strike And time must be and time must end. Hard to keep sight of! What might tend To give the thought clear presence? Well, Remember it is possible, Whether I please or do not please, That in the making each of these A separate man has lost his soul. Fair shines the gilded aureole In which our highest painters place Some living woman's simple face. And the stilled features thus descried As Jenny's long throat droops aside,— The loving underlip drawn in, The shadows where the cheeks are thin, And pure wide curve from ear to chin,— With Raffael's or Da Vinci's hand To show them to men's souls, might stand, Whole ages long, the whole world through, For preachings of what God can do. What has man done here? How atone, Great God, for this which man has done? And for the body and soul which by Man's pitiless doom must now comply With lifelong hell, what lullaby Of sweet forgetful second birth Remains? All dark. No sign on earth What measure of God's rest endows The many mansions of his house. If but a woman's heart might see Such erring heart unerringly For once! But that can never be. Like a rose shut in a book In which pure woma en may not look, For its base pages claim control To crush the flower within the soul; Where through each dead rose-leaf that clings, Pale as transparent psyche-wings, To the vile text, are traced such things As might make lady's cheek indeed More than a living rose to read; So nought save foolish foulness may Watch with hard eyes the sure decay; And so the life-blood of this rose, Puddled with shameful knowledge, flows Through leaves no chaste hand may unclose: Yet still it keeps such faded show Of when 'twas gathered long ago, That the crushed petals' lovely grain, The sweetness of the sanguine stain, Among stirred clouds and veils withdrawn Strikes greyly on her. Let her sleep. But will it wake her if I heap These cushions thus beneath her head Where my knee was? No,—there's your bed, My Jenny, while you dream. And there I lay among your golden hair Perhaps the subject of your dreams, These golden coins. For still one deems That in poor Jenny's sleep, there stirs That Jenny's thoughtlessflattering sleep confers A spell around the magic purse,— New magic on the magic purse,— Grim web, how clogged with shrivelled flies! Between the threads fine fumes arise And shape their pictures in the brain. There roll no streets in glare and rain, Nor flagrant man-swine whets his tusk; But delicately sighs in musk The homage of the dim boudoir; Or like a palpitating star Thrilled into song, the opera-night Breathes faint in the quick pulse of light; Or at the carriage-window shine Rich wares for choice; or, free to drive, dine, Whirls through its hour of health (divine For her) the concourse of the park. And though in the discontented discounted dark Her functions there and here are one, Beneath the lamps and in the sun There reigns at least the acknowledged belle Apparelled beyond parallel. Ah Jenny! yes, we know your dreams. For even the Paphian Venus seems A goddess o'er the realms of love, When silver-shrined in shadowy grove: Aye, or let offerings nicely placed But hide Priapus to the waist, And whoso looks on him shall see An eligible deity. Why, Jenny, waking here alone May help you to remember one! I think I see you when you wake, And rub your eyes for me, and shake My gold, in rising, from your hair, A Danaë for a moment there. Jenny, my love rang true! for still Love at first sight is vague, until That tinkling makes him audible. And must I mock you to the last, Ashamed of my own shame—aghast Because some thoughts not born amiss Rose at a poor fair face like this? Well, of such thoughts so much I know: <hi rend="c">THE PORTRAIT.</hi> This is her picture as she was: It seems a thing to wonder on, As though mine image in the glass Should tarry when myself am gone. I gaze until she seems to stir,— Until mine eyes almost aver That now, even now, the sweet lips part To breathe the words of the sweet heart:— And yet the earth is over her. In painting her I shrined her face Mid mystic trees, where light falls in Hardly at all; a covert place Where you might think to find a din Of doubtful talk, and a live flame Wandering, and many a shape whose name Not itself knoweth, and old dew, And your own footsteps meeting you, And all things going as they came. A deep dim wood; and there she stands As in that wood that day. At least, Carry these two lines to the next page. Notation by DGR, attached to lines 19 and 20. Punctuation altered again. Notation by DGR at top of page. Thus was the movement of her hands, And thus the carriage of her waist. And passing fair the type must seem, Unknown the presence and the dream. 'Tis she: though of herself, alas! Less than her shadow on the grass, Or than her image in the stream. That day we met there, I and she, One with the other all alone: ; And we were blithe; yet memory Saddens those hours, as when the moon Looks upon daylight. And with her I stooped to drink the spring-water, Athirst where other waters sprang; And where the echo is, she sang,— My soul another echo there. Last night at last I could have slept, And yet I delayed my sleep till dawn, Still wandering. Then it was I wept, : For unawares I came upon Those glades where then she walked with me: And as I stood there suddenly, All wan with traversing the night, Upon the desolate verge of light Yearned loud the iron-bosomed sea. Even so, where Heaven holds breath and hears Carry this line to next page. Noted by DGR at line 46. 12 Number hand-written in top center of page. Not in DGR's penmanship The beating heart of l Love's own breast, Where round the secret of all spheres All angels lay their wings to rest, How shall my soul stand rapt and awed, When, by the new birth borne abroad, Throughout the music of the suns, It enters in her soul at once, And knows the silence there for God! Here with her face doth memory sit Meanwhile, and wait the day's decline, Till other eyes shall look from it, Eyes of the spirit's Palestine, Even than the old gaze tenderer: While hopes and aims long lost with her Stand round her image side by side, Like tombs of pilgrims that have died About the Holy Sepulchre. blank page The first two pages of the poem are missing from the ms. E A 3rd page 47-48 In upper left corner of page. Not in DGR's penmanship; probably Troxell. ‘Lo! thou art gone now, and we stay:’ (The curled lips mutter): ‘and no star Is from the thy mortal path so far As streets were where childhood knew the way. To Heaven and Hell thy feet may win, But thine own house they come not in.’ Therefore, the loftier rose the song To touch the secret things of God, The deeper pierced the hate that trod On base men's track who wrought the wrong; Till the soul's effluence came to be Its own exceeding agony. Arriving only to depart, From court to court, from land to land, Like flame within the naked hand His body bore his burning heart That still on Florence strove to bring God's fire for a burnt offering. Even such was Dante's mood, when now, Mocked for long years with Fortune's sport, He dwelt at yet another court, There where Verona's knee did bow And her voice hailed with proud acclaim Can Grande della Scala's name. As that lord's kingly guest awhile His life we follow; through the days Which walked in exile's barren ways,— The nights which still beneath one smile Heard through all spheres one song increase,— ‘Even I, even I am Beatrice.’ At Can La Scala's court, no doubt, Due reverence did his steps attend; The ushers on his path would bend At ingoing as at going out; The penmen waited on his call At council-board, the grooms in hall. And pages hushed their laughter down, And gay squires would still stilled the merry stir, When he passed up the dais-chamber With set brows lordlier than a frown; And tire-maids hidden among these Drew close their loosened boddices. Perhaps the priests, fed there to ban (exact to span Or bless on bidding, All God's circumference) if at whiles They found him wandering in their aisles, Grudged ghostly greeting to the man By whom, though not of ghostly guild, With Heaven and Hell men's hearts were fill'd. And the court-poets (he, forsooth, A whole world's poet strayed to court!) Had for his scorn their hate's retort. He'd meet them flushed with easy youth, Hot on their errands. Like noon-flies They vexed him in the ears and eyes. But at this court, peace still must wrench Her chaplet from the teeth of war: By day they held high watch afar, At night they cried across the trench; And still, in Dante's path, the fierce Gaunt soldiers wrangled o'er their spears. But vain seemed all the strength to him, As golden convoys sunk at sea Whose wealth might root out penury: Because it was not, limb with limb, Knit like his heart-strings round the wall Of Florence, that her foes might fall. Yet in the tiltyard, when the dust Cleared from the sundered press of knights Ere yet again it swoops and smites, He almost deemed his longing must Find force to wield that multitude And hurl that strength the way he would. How should he move them,—fame and gain On all hands calling them at strife? He still might find but his one life To give, by Florence counted vain; One heart the false hearts made her doubt; One voice she heard once and cast out. Oh! if his Florence could but come, A lily-sceptered damsel fair, As her own Giotto painted her On many shields and gates at home,— A lady crowned, at her a soft pace Riding the lists round to the dais: Till where Can Grande rules the lists, As young as Truth, as calm as Fa orce, She draws her rein now, while her horse Bows at the turn of the white wrists; And when each knight within his stall Gives ear, she speaks and tells them all: All the foul tale,—truth sworn untrue And falsehood's triumph. All the tale? Great God! and must she not prevail To fire them ere they heard it through,— And hand achieve ere heart could rest That high adventure of her g quest? How would His Florence lead them forth, Her bridle ringing as she went; And at the last within her tent, 'Neath golden lilies worship-worth, How queenly would she bend the while And thank the victors with her smile! Also her lips should turn his way And murmur: “O thou tried and true, With whom I wept the long years through! What shall it profit if I say, Thee I remember? Nay, through thee All ages shall remember me.” verse 34 Notation in upper left corner of page. Not in DGR's penmanship. The window thou, a youth, hast sought, Flushed in the limpid eventime, Ending with daylight the day's rhyme Of her; where oftenwhiles her thought Held thee—the lamp untrimmed to write— In joy through the blue lapse of night. At Can La Scala's court, no doubt, Guests seldom wept. It was brave sport, No doubt, at Can La Scala's court, Within the palace and without; Where music, set to madrigals, Loitered all day through groves and halls. Because Can Grande of his life Had not had six-and-twenty years As yet. And when the chroniclers Tell you of that Vicenza strife And of strifes elsewhere,—you must not Conceive for church—sooth he had got. Just nothing in his wits but war: Though certes 'twas the young man's joy (Grown with his growth from a mere boy,) To mark his ‘Viva Cane!’ scare The foe's shut front, till it would reel All blind with shaken points of steel. But there were places—held too sweet For eyes that had not the due veil Of lashes and clear lids—as well In favour as in his saddle-seat: Breath of low speech he scorned not there Nor light cool fingers in his hair. Yet if the child whom the sire's plan Made free of a deep treasure-chest Scoffed it with ill-conditioned jest,— We may be sure too that the man Was not mere thews, nor all content With lewdness swathed in sentiment. So you may read and marvel not That such a man as Dante—one Who, while Can Grande's deeds were done, Had drawn his robe round him and thought— Now at the same guest-table far'd Where keen Uguccio wiped his beard.* Through leaves and trellis-work the sun Left the wine cool within the glass,— They feasting where no sun could pass: And when the women, all as one, Rose up with brightened cheeks to go, It was a comely thing, we know.

* Uguccione della Faggiuola, Dante's former protector, wasnow his fellow-guest at Verona.

 But Dante recked not of the wine, Whether the women stayed or went, His visage held one stern intent: And when the music had its sign To breathe upon them for more ease, Sometimes he turned and bade it cease. And as he spared not to rebuke The mirth, so oft in council he To bitter truth bore testimony: And when the crafty balance shook Well poised to make the wrong prevail, Then Dante's hand would turn the scale. And if some envoy from afar Sailed to Verona's sovereign port For aid or peace, and all the court Fawned on its lord, ‘the Mars of war, Sole arbiter of life and death,’— Be sure that Dante saved his breath. And Can La Scala marked askance These things, accepting them for shame And scorn, till Dante's guestship came To be a peevish sufferance: His host sought ways to make his days Hateful; and such have many ways. There was a Jester, a foul lout Whom the court loved for graceless arts; Sworn scholiast of the bestial parts Of speech; a ribald mouth to shout In Folly's horny tympanum Such things as make the wise man dumb. Much loved, him Dante loathed. And so, One day when Dante felt perplex'd If any day that could come next Were worth the waiting for or no, Till now his scanty speech quite ceas'd,— And mute he sat amid their din,— Can Grande summoned in this beast. Can Grande called the Jester in. Rank words, with such, are wit's best wealth. Lords mouthed approval; ladies kept Twittering with clustered heads, except Some few that took their trains by stealth And went. Can Grande shook his hair And smote his thighs and laughed i' the air. Then, facing on his guest, he cried,— ‘Say, Messer Dante, how it is I get out of a clown like this More than your wisdom can provide?’ And Dante: ‘'Tis man's ancient whim That still his like seems good to him’— But wherefore should we turn the grout In a drained cup, or be at strife From the worn garment of a life To rip the twisted ravel out? Good needs expounding; but of all ill Each hath enough to guess his fill. 160 Number hand-written in bottom center of page. Not in DGR's penmanship They named him Justicer-at-Law: Each month to bear the tale in mind Of hues a wench might wear unfin'd And of the load an ox might draw; To cavil in the weight of bread And to see purse-thieves gibbeted. And when his spirit wove the spell (From under even to over noon In converse with itself alone,) As high as Heaven, as low as Hell,— He would be summoned and must go: For had not Gian stabbed Giacomo? Therefore the bread he had to eat Seemed brackish, less like corn than tares; And the rush-strown accustomed stairs Each day were steeper to his feet; And when the night-vigil was done, His brows would ache to feel the sun. Nevertheless, when through from his kin There came the tidings how at last In Florence a decree was pass'd Whereby all banished folk might win Free pardon so a fine were paid And act of public penance made,— This Dante writ in answer thus, Words such as these: ‘That clearly they In Florence must not have to say,— The man abode aloof from us Nigh fifteen years, yet lastly skulk'd Hither to candleshrift or and mulct. ‘That he was one the Heavens forbid To traffic in God's justice sold By market-weight of earthly gold, Or to bow down over the lid Of steaming censers, and so be Made clean of manhood's obloquy. ‘That since no gate led, by God's will, To Florence, but the one whereat The priests and money-changers sat, He still would wander; for that still, Even through the body's prison-bars, His soul possessed the sun and stars.’ Such were his words. It is indeed For ever well our singers should Utter good words and know them good Not through song merely; with close heed Lest, having spent for the work's sake Six days, the man be left to make. What of his work for Beatrice? Now well-nigh was the third song writ,— The stars a third time scaling it With sudden music of pure peace: For echoing thrice the threefold song, The unnumbered stars the tone prolong.*

‘E quirdi uscimmo a riveder le stelle.’ <foreign lang="italian"> <hi rend="sc">Inferno</hi> </foreign> . ‘Puro e disposto a salire alle stelle.’ <foreign lang="italian"> <hi rend="sc">Purgatorio</hi> </foreign> . ‘L'amor che muove il sole e l'altre stelle.’ <foreign lang="italian"> <hi rend="sc">Paradiso</hi> </foreign> .

 Each hour, as then the Vision pass'd, He heard the utter harmony Of the nine trembling spheres, till she Bowed her eyes towards him in the last, So that all ended with her eyes, Hell, Purgatory, Paradise. ‘It is my trust, as the years fall, To write more worthily of her Who now, being made God's minister, Looks on His visage and knows all.’ Such was the hope that he dared send love did blend Forth solemnly, With grief's wan fires, to make an end Of the ‘New Life,’ his youth's dear book. Adding thereunto: ‘In such trust I labour, and believe I must Accomplish this which my soul took In charge, if God, my Lord and hers, Leave my life with me a few years.’ The trust which he had borne in youth Was all at length accomplished. He At length had written worthily— Yea even of her; no rhymes uncouth 'Twixt tongue and tongue; but by God's aid The first words Italy had said. Ah! haply now the heavenly guide Was not the last form seen by him: But there that Beatrice stood slim And bowed in passing at his side, For whom in youth his heart made moan Then when the city sat alone. Clearly herself; the same whom he Met, not past girlhood, in the street, Low-bosomed and with hidden feet; And then as woman perfectly, In years that followed, more than many an once,— And now at last among the suns, In that high vision. But indeed It may be that his mind could fall memory did recall Back soonest to Last to him then the first of all,— The child his boyhood bore in heed Nine years. At length the voice brought peace,— ‘Even I, even I am Beatrice.’ F All this, being there, we had not seen. Seen only was the shadow wrought On the strong features bound in thought; The vagueness gair ning gait and mien; The white streaks gathering clear to view In the burnt beard the women knew. For a tale tells that on his track, As through Verona's streets he went, This saying certain women sent:— ‘Lo, he that strolls to Hell and back At will! Behold him, how Hell's reek Has crisped his beard and singed his cheek.’ ‘Whereat’ (Boccaccio's words) ‘he smil'd For pride in fame.’ It might be so: Nevertheless we cannot know If then his thought haply he were not beguil'd To bitterer mirth, for that he who scarce could tell If he indeed were back from Hell. So the day came, after a space, When Dante felt assured that there The sunshine must lie sicklier Even than in any other place, Save only Florence. When that day Had come, he rose and went his way. He went and turned not. From his shoes It may be that he shook the dust, As every righteous dealer must Not less than once Once and again ere life can close; And unaccomplished destiny Struck cold his forehead, it may be. No book keeps record how the Prince Sunned himself out of Dante's reach, Nor how the Jester stank in speech; While courtiers, used to smile and wince, Poets and harlots, all the throng, Let loose their slaver and their song. No book keeps record if the seat Which Dante held at his host's board Were sat in next by clerk or lord,— If leman lolled with dainty feet At ease, or hostage brooded there, Or priest lacked silence for his prayer. Eat and wash hands, Can Grande;—scarce We know their deeds now: hands which fed Our Dante with that bitter bread; And thou the watch-dog of those stairs Whereon the weary footsteps fell, Which, as the weary footsteps fell, That knew the paths of Heaven and Hell. Were steeper found than Heaven or Hell. Now do Thou let thy servant, Lord— Who now hath suffered all the heart Who hath known all now that man's heart And the soul can on earth, Can suffer on man's earth,—depart In peace according to thy word: . His eyes (are not the lids still wet?) Beheld not thy salvation yet. blank page