Ballads and Sonnets (1881), proof Signature B (Delaware Museum, author's first proofs) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1 Text courtesy of The Delaware Art Museum Ballads and Sonnets Dante Gabriel Rossetti F. S. Ellis Chiswick Press, C. Wittingham and Co. London 1881 April 5 proof [1-3], 4-16 1 DGR B8 Library, Delaware Art Museum 10 point; 6 point leading roman 17 2 cm 3.8 cm 2 cm 2.5 cm 19 x 12.8cm (crown octavo) Commentary
Introduction

This is a complete set of proofs for Signature B, the earliest of the extant proofs for this signature. The pages on the conjugate leaves B5 and B6 are separated, but all the other pages are intact. The proofs carry the printer's date stamp 5 April 81 on the first page as well as the handwritten number 1 in the upper left corner. DGR's corrections on every page except 1, 2, and 15.

These are the proofs for this signature sent for correction to DGR. Another author's set of this signature is gathered in the composite group of proofs housed in the British Museum. The latter set was the first that DGR sent back to the printer. It is marked for correction as the present set, except that it does not have the correction at line 39, which —as DGR's note on page 5 shows—was made later and conveyed to the printer separately. DGR must have kept the present set himself and returned the set in the British Library for the revised printing. This analysis seems confirmed by the imperfect printer's revise set that is date stamped 7 April. The latter prints all but one of the corrections DGR called for in this set of proofs. It also notes a pair of other corrections that DGR missed (for lines 105 and 125). This printer's revise marks line 39 for correction, a fact which indicates that DGR made this correction later and separately, and then noted the late correction on page 5 of this set of the proofs, which he would have retained for his own reference.

Textual History: Composition

Textual History: Revision

The library of the Delaware Art Museum has six distinct sets of proofs for this signature, each but the last numbered and all date stamped by the printer Charles Wittingham, of Chiswick Press. In addition to these author's proofs, the other sets at Delaware are: the first printer's revise (numbered 2; imperfect, dated 7 April); the second printer's revise (numbered 4; perfect, dated 14 April); the third printer's revise (numbered 5; imperfect, dated 22 April); second printer's revise (WMR's copy, with his notes and corrections) (numbered 5; perfect, dated 22 April); and what appears to be the final proof (unnumbered; perfect, dated 21 May). The Delaware library also has a fragment (pages 9-10) of what must have once been a complete second copy of the first revise proof. As already noted, the British Library has a duplicate set of the 5 April author's proofs with corrections.

Printing History

Reception History

Historical

Literary

Translation

Autobiographical

Bibliographic

1 Printer's proof-sequence number in upper left corner. [Charles Wittingham and Chiswick Press Printer's Stamp, dated 5 Apr. 81] Stamped at upper left. B <hi rend="c"> <hi rend="center">ROSE MARY</hi> </hi>. blank page The second word in line 5 is type-damaged and marked for correction by the printer. <hi rend="c"> <hi rend="center">ROSE MARY</hi> </hi>. Of her two fights with the Beryl-stone, : Lost the first, but the second won. <hi rend="c"> <hi rend="center">PART I</hi>. </hi> “MARY mine that art Mary's Rose, Come in to me from the garden-close. The sun sinks fast with the rising dew, And we marked not how the faint moon grew; But the hidden stars are calling you. “Tall Rose Mary, come to my side, And read the stars if you'd be a bride. In hours whose need was not your own, While you were a young maid yet ungrown, You've read the stars in the Beryl-stone. “Daughter, once more I bid you read; But now let it be for your own need: Because to-morrow, at break of day, To Holy Cross he rides on his way, Your knight, Sir James of Heronhaye. “Ere he wed you, flower of mine, For a heavy shrift he seeks the shrine. Now hark to my words and do not fear; Ill news next I have for your ear; But be you strong, and our help is here. “On his road, as the rumour's rife, An ambush waits to take his life. He needs will go, and will go alone; Where the peril lurks may not be known; But in this glass all things are shown.” This correction I have overlooked till now. DGR's note at the foot of the page on the right. It seems to refer only to the correction for line 39. The first two stanzas are crossed through by DGR. Pale Rose Mary sank to the floor:— “The night will come if the day is o'er!” “Nay, heaven takes counsel, star with star, And help shall reach your heart from afar: A bride you'll be, as a maid you are.” The lady unbound her jewelled zone And drew from her robe the Beryl-stone. Shaped it was to a shadowy sphere,— World of our world, the sun's compeer, That bears and buries the toiling year. With shuddering light 'twas stirred and strewn Like the cloud-nest of the wading moon: Freaked it was as the bubble's ball, Rainbow-hued through a misty pall, Like the middle light of the waterfall. The stanzas on the page are crossed through by DGR. Shadows dwelt in its teeming girth Of the known and unknown things of earth; The cloud above and the wave around,— The central fire at the sphere's heart bound, Like doomsday prisoned underground. A thousand years it lay in the sea With a treasure wrecked from Thessaly; Deep it lay 'mid the coiled sea-wrack, But the ocean-spirits found the track; A soul was lost to win it back. The lady upheld the wondrous thing:— “I'll fare”(she said) “with a fiend's-fairing: But Moslem blood poured forth like wine, Can hallow Hell, 'neath thy e s Sacred s Sign; And my lord brought this from Palestine. “Spirits who fear the Blessed Rood, Dra ove forth the accursed multitude That heathen worship housed herein,— Never again such home to win, Save only by a Christian's sin. “All last night at an altar fair I burnt strange fires and strove with prayer; Till the flame paled to the red sunrise, All rites I then did solemnize; And the spell lacks nothing but your eyes.” Low spake maiden Rose Mary:— “O mother mine, if I should not see!” “Nay, daughter, cover your face no more, But bend love's heart to the hidden lore, And you shall see now as heretofore.” Paler yet were the pale cheeks grown As the grey eyes sought the Beryl-stone: Then over her mother's lap leaned she, And stretched her thrilled throat passionately, And sighed from her soul, and said, “I see.” Even as she spoke, they two were 'ware Of music-notes that fell through the air; A chiming shower of strange device, Drop echoing drop, once, twice, and thrice, As rain may fall in Paradise. An instant come, in an instant gone, No time there was to think thereon. The mother held the sphere on her knee:— “Lean this way and speak low to me, And take no note but of what you see.” “I see a man with a besom grey That sweeps the flying dust away.” “Ay, that comes first in the mystic sphere; But now that the way is swept and clear, Heed well what next you look on there.” “Stretched aloft, and adown I see Two roads that part in waste-country: The glen lies deep and the ridge stands tall; What's great below is above seen small, And the hill-side is the valley-wall.” “Stream-bank, daughter, or moor and moss, Both roads will take to Holy Cross. The hills are a weary waste to wage; But what of the valley-road's presage? That way must tend his pilgrimage.” 2 DGR's marginal numbering to indicate that the last stanza on this page should be transposed with the succeeding stanza on the next page. “As 'twere the turning leaves of a book, The road runs past me as I look; Or it is even as though mine eye Should watch calm waters filled with sky While lights and clouds and wings went by. “In every covert seek a spear; They'll scarce lie close till he draws near.” “The stream has spread to a river now; The stiff blue sedge is deep in the slough, But the banks are bare of shrub or bough.” “Keep heedful watch by the water's edge,— Some boat might lurk 'neath the shadowed sedge.” “One slid but now 'twixt the winding shores, But a peasant woman bent to the oars And only a young child steered its course.” 1 DGR's marginal numbering to indicate that the first stanza on this page should be transposed with the last stanza on the preceding page. “Is there any roof that near at hand Might shelter yield to a hidden band?” “On the further bank I see but one, And a herdsman now in the sinking sun Unyokes his team at the threshold-stone.” “Mother, something flashed to my sight!— Nay, it is but the lapwing's flight.— What glints there like a lance that flees?— Nay, the flags are stirred in the breeze, And the waters bright through the dart-rushes. “Ah! vainly I search from side to side:— Woe's me! and where do the foemen hide? Woe's me! and perchance I pass them by, And under the new dawn's blood-red sky Even where I gaze the dead shall lie.” Said the mother: “For dear love's sake, Speak more low, lest the spell should break.” Said the daughter: “By love's control, My eyes, my words, are strained to the goal! ; But oh! the voice that cries in my soul!” “Hush, sweet, hush! be calm and behold.” “I see two floodgates broken and old: The grasses wave o'er the ruined weir, But the bridge still leads to the breakwater; And—mother, mother, O mother dear!” The damsel clung to her mother's knee, And dared not let the shriek go free; Low she crouched by the lady's chair, And shrank blindfold in her fallen hair, And whispering said, “The spears are there!” The lady stooped aghast from her place, And cleared the locks from her daughter's face. “More's to see, and she swoons, alas! Look, look again, 'ere the moment pass! One shadow comes but once to the glass. “See you there what you saw but now?” “I see eight men 'neath the willow-bough. All over the weir a wild growth's spread: Ah me! it will hide a living head As well as the water hides the dead. “They lie by the broken water-gate As men who have a while to wait. The chief's high lance has a blazoned scroll,— He seems some lord of tithe and toll With seven squires to his bannerole. “The little pennon quakes in the air, I cannot trace the blazon there:— Ah! now I can see the field of blue, The spurs and the merlins two and two;— It is the Warden of Holycleugh!” “God be thanked for the thing we know! You have named your good knight's mortal foe. Last Shrovetide in the tourney-game He sought his life by treasonous shame; And this way now doth he seek the same. “So, fair lord, such a thing you are! But we too watch till the morning star. Well, June is kind and the moon is clear: Saint Judas send you a merry cheer For the night you lie in Warisweir! “Now, sweet daughter, but one more sight, And you may lie soft and sleep to-night. We know in the vale what perils be: Now look once more in the glass, and see If over the hills the road lies free.” Rose Mary pressed to her mother's cheek, And almost smiled but did not speak; Then turned again to the saving spell, With eyes to search and with lips to tell The heart of things invisible. “Again the shape with the besom grey Comes back to sweep the clouds away. Again I stand where the roads divide; But now all's near on the steep hillside, And a thread far down is the rivertide.” “Ay, child, your road is o'er moor and moss, Past Holycleugh to Holy Cross; Our hunters lurk in the valley's wake, As they knew which way the chase would take: Yet search the hills for your true love's sake.” “Swift and swifter the waste runs by, And nought I see but the heath and the sky; No brake is there that could hide a spear, And the gaps to a horseman's sight lie clear; Still past it goes, and there's nought to fear.” “Fear no trap that you cannot see,— They'd not lurk yet too warily. Below by the weir they lie in sight, And take no heed how they pass the night, Till close they crouch with the morning light.”