The Athenaeum, 1852 John Francis (publisher) 1 In this electronic edition, we have omitted the pages of all issues that do not contain material by or related to DGR. Unpaginated front and back matter from these issues has also been omitted. The structure of this electronic document allows for the future addition of the omitted material. The Athenaeum John Francis James Holmes London 1852 1852 ap4.a85 3 Commentary
Introduction

DGR's poem appears in issue number 1304 in this volume.

Textual History: Composition

Textual History: Revision

Production History

Reception History

Iconographic

Printing History

Pictorial

Historical

Literary

Translation

Autobiographical

Bibliographic

All pages containing "The Card Dealer" are formatted in three columns. <hi rend="c">THE CARD DEALER;</hi> or, <hi rend="c">VINGT-ET-UN.</hi> <lb/> <hi rend="sc">FROM A PICTURE.</hi>* Ambition, Cupidité, Et délicieuse Volupté, Sont les sœurs de la Destinée, Après la vingt-première année. Calendrier de la Vie, 1630. Could you not drink her gaze like wine? Yet, though their splendour swoon Into the lamplight languidly As a tune into a tune, Those eyes are wide and clear, as if They saw the stars at noon. The gold that's heaped beside her hand, In truth, rich prize it were; And rich the dreams that wreathe her brows With magic silence there; And he were rich who should unwind That woven golden hair. Some music surely fans the sense, A breath like closing plumes: You know it by the spark called up From her eyes' purple glooms; You almost feel the instant thrill Pulse through the lighted rooms. And surely, where she sits, the dance Now pants its eager heat: But not more lightly or more true Fall there the dancers' feet, Than fall her cards upon the board As 'twere a heart that beat. Her fingers let them softly through,— Smooth, polished, silent things; And each one, as it falls, reflects, In swift light-shadowings, Crimson and orange, green and blue, The great eyes of her rings. Whom plays she with?—With thee: thou lov'st Those gems upon her hand. With me: I search her secret will. All deem her bosom grand. We play together, she and we, Within a vain strange land:— A land without any order, Whose substance is as breath; Where one lying down ariseth not Nor the sleeper awakeneth; A land of darkness, as darkness itself, And of the shadow of death. What be her cards, you ask? Even these:— The heart, that does but crave More, being fed; the diamond, Skilled to make base seem brave; The club, for smiting in the dark; The spade, to dig a grave. And do you ask, what game she plays? With him, 'tis lost or won; ----------------------------------

* The picture is one painted by the late Theodore von Holst; and represents a beautiful woman, richly dressed, who is sitting at a lamp-lit table, dealing out cards, with a peculiar fixedness of expression.

The poem continues onto the second column starting here. With him it is playing still; with him, It is not yet begun; But 'tis a game she plays with all, The game of Twenty-One. H. H. H. ------------------ ------------------