Ballads and Sonnets (1881), proof Signature F (Delaware Museum first author's proof, copy 1) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1 Text courtesy of The Delaware Art Museum Ballads and Sonnets Dante Gabriel Rossetti F. S. Ellis Chiswick Press, C. Whittingham and Co. London 1881 April 6 proof 65-80 1 DGR F8 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 the first proofs for Signature F. The proofs carry the printer's date stamp April 81 on the first page as well as the handwritten number 1 in the upper left corner. As in the case of other early date stamped proofs, light inking for the day has resulted in its not being legible. The day should have printed as 6 April.

Textual History: Composition

Textual History: Revision

The library of the Delaware Art Museum has three complete sets of proofs for this signature: besides this first author's proof, a perfect copy of the second revise (dated 14 Apr 81 and numbered 4) and a copy of the final revise (dated 22 Apr 81 and numbered 5). The museum also has an incomplete copy of what appears to be the first revise (unnumbered and undated), an incomplete copy of the second revise (date 14 Apr and numbered 3), an incomplete copy of the third revise (undated, unnumbered), and a loose proof leaf for pages 79-80 that shows DGR calling for a revision on page 80 that he failed to include in the first author's proof. The British Library proofs include an undated copy of the first revise (numbered 2).

Printing History

Reception History

Historical

Literary

Translation

Autobiographical

Bibliographic

1 Printer's proof-sequence number in upper left corner. [Charles Whittingham and Chiswick Press Printer's Stamp, dated Apr. 81] Stamped at upper left. F “Though naught for the poor corpse lying here Remain to-day but the cold white bier, But burial-chaunt and bended knee, But sighs and tears that heaviest be, But rent rose-flower and rosemary.” <hi rend="c">Beryl-Song</hi>. We, cast forth from the Beryl, Gyre-circling spirits of fire, Whose pangs begin With God's grace to S sin, For whose spent powers the immortal hours are sterile,— Woe! must We behold this mother Find grace in her dead child's face, and doubt of none other But that perfect pardon, alas! hath assured her guerdon? Woe! must We behold this daughter, Made clean from the soil of S sin wherewith We had fraught her, Shake off a man's blood like water? Write up her story, On the Gate of Heaven's glory, Whom there We behold so fair in shining apparel, And beneath her the ruin Of our own undoing! Alas, the Beryl! We had for a foeman But one weak woman; In one day's strife, Her hope fell dead from her life; And yet no iron, Her soul to environ, Could this manslayer, this false soothsayer imperil! Lo, where she bows In the Holy House! Who now shall deli issever her soul from its joy for ever, While every ditty Of love and plentiful pity Fills the White City, And the floor of Heaven to her feet for ever is given? Hark, a voice cries “Flee!” Woe! woe! what shelter have We, Whose pangs begin With God's grace to S sin, For whose spent powers the immortal hours are sterile, Gyre-circling spirits of fire, We, cast forth from the Beryl? <hi rend="c"> <hi rend="center">THE WHITE SHIP</hi> </hi>. blank page <hi rend="c">THE WHITE SHIP.</hi> <lb/> <hi rend="sc">HENRY I. OF ENGLAND.—25TH NOV., 1120.</hi> BY none but me can the tale be told, The butcher of Rouen, poor Berold. (Lands are swayed by a King on a throne.) 'Twas a royal train put forth to sea, Yet the tale can be told by none but me. (The sea hath no King but God alone.) King Henry held it as life's whole gain That after his death his son should reign. `Twas so in my youth I heard men say, And my old age calls it back to-day. King Henry of England's realm was he, And Henry Duke of Normandy. The times had changed when on either coast “Clerkly Harry” was all his boast. Of ruthless strokes full many an one He had struck to crown himself and his son; And his elder brother's eyes were gone. And when to the chase his court would crowd, The poor flung ploughshares on his road, And shrieked: “Our cry is from King to God!” But all the chiefs of the English land Had knelt and kissed the Prince's hand. And next with his son he sailed to France To claim the Norman allegiance: And every baron in Normandy Had taken the oath of fealty. 'Twas sworn and sealed, and the day had come When the King and the Prince might journey home: For Christmas cheer is to home hearts dear, And Christmas now was drawing near. Stout Fitz-Stephen came to the King,— A pilot famous in seafaring; And he held to the King, in all men's sight, A mark of gold for his tribute's right. “Liege Lord! my father guided the ship From whose boat your father's foot did slip When he caught the English soil in his grip, “And cried: ‘By this clasp I claim command O'er every rood of English land!’ “He was borne to the realm you rule o'er now In that ship with the archer carved at her prow: “And thither I'll bear, an' it be my due, Your father's son and his grandson too. “The famed White Ship is mine in the bay; From Harfleur's harbour she sails to-day, “With masts fair pi -pennoned as Norman spears And with fifty well-tried mariners.” Quoth the King: “My ships are chosen each one, But I'll not say nay to Stephen's son. “My son and daughter and fellowship Shall cross the water in the White Ship.” The King set sail with the eve's south wind, And soon he left that coast behind. The Prince and all his, a princely show, Remained in the good White Ship to go. With noble knights and with ladies fair, With courtiers and sailors gathered there, Three hundred living souls we were: And I Berold was the meanest hind In all that train to the Prince assign'd. The Prince was a lawless shameless youth; From his father's loins he sprang without ruth: Eighteen years till then he had seen, And the devil's dues in him were eighteen. And now he cried: “Bring wine from below; Let the sailors revel ere yet they row: “Our speed shall o'ertake my father's flight Though we sail from the harbour at midnight.” The rowers made good cheer without check; The lords and ladies obeyed his beck; The night was light, and they danced on the deck. But at midnight's stroke they cleared the bay, And the White Ship furrowed the water-way. The sails were set, and the oars kept tune To the double flight of the ship and the moon: Swifter and swifter the White Ship sped Till she flew as the spirit flies from the dead: As white as a lily glimmered she Like a ship's fair ghost upon the sea. And the Prince cried, “Friends, 'tis the hour to sing! Is a songbird's course so swift on the wing?” And under the winter stars' still throng, From brown throats, white throats, merry and strong, The knights and the ladies raised a song. A song,—nay, a shriek that rent the sky, That leaped o'er the deep!—the grievous cry Of three hundred living that now must die. An instant shriek that sprang to the shock As the ship's keel felt the sunken rock. 'Tis said that afar—a shrill strange sigh— The King's ships heard it and knew not why. Pale Fitz-Stephen stood by the helm 'Mid all those folk that the waves must whelm. A great King's heir for the waves to whelm, And the helpless pilot pale at the helm! The ship was eager and sucked athirst, By the stealthy stab of the sharp reef pierced: And like the moil round a sinking cup, The waters against her crowded up. A moment the pilot's senses spin,— The next he snatched the Prince 'mid the din, Cut the boat loose, and the youth leaped in. A few friends leaped with him, standing near. “Row! the sea's smooth and the night is clear!” “What! none to be saved but these and I?” Row, row as you'd live! All here must die!” Out of the churn of the choking ship, Which the gulf grapples and the waves strip, They struck with the strained oars' flash and dip. 'Twas then o'er the splitting bulwarks' brim The Prince's sister screamed to him.