Canto VI
I.
Man is born on a battle-field. Round him, to rendOr resist, the dread Powers he displaces attend,By the cradle which Nature, amidst the stern shocksThat have shatter’d creation, and shapen it, rocks.He leaps with a wail into being; and lo!His own mother, fierce Nature herself, is his foe.Her whirlwinds are roused into wrath o’er his head:’Neath his feet roll her earthquakes: her solitudes spreadTo daunt him: her forces dispute his command:Her snows fall to freeze him: her suns burn to brand:Her seas yawn to engulf him: her rocks rise to crush:And the lion and leopard, allied, lurk to rushOn their startled invader.In lone Malabar,Where the infinite forest spreads breathless and far,‘Mid the cruel of eye and the stealthy of claw(Striped and spotted destroyers!) he sees, pale with awe,On the menacing edge of a fiery sky,Grim Doorga, blue-limb’d and red-handed, go by,And the first thing he worships is Terror.Anon,Still impell’d by necessity hungrily on,He conquers the realms of his own self-reliance,And the last cry of fear wakes the first of defiance.From the serpent he crushes its poisonous soul;Smitten down in his path see the dead lion roll!On toward Heaven the son of Alcmena strides high onThe heads of the Hydra, the spoils of the lion:And man, conquering terror, is worshipp’d by man.
A camp has the world been since first it began!From his tents sweeps the roving Arabian; at peace,A mere wandering shepherd that follows the fleece;But, warring his way through a world’s destinies,Lo from Delhi, from Bagdadt, from Cordova, riseDomes of empiry, dower’d with science and art,Schools, libraries, forums, the palace, the mart!
New realms to man’s soul have been conquer’d. But thoseForthwith they are peopled for man by new foes!The stars keep their secrets, the earth hides her own,And bold must the man be that braves the Unknown!Not a truth has to art or to science been given,But brows have ached for it, and souls toil’d and striven;And many have striven, and many have fail’d,And many died, slain by the truth they assail’d,But when Man hath tamed Nature, asserted his placeAnd dominion, behold! he is brought face to faceWith a new foe—himself!Nor may man on his shieldEver rest, for his foe is ever afield,Danger ever at hand, till the armed ArchangelSound o’er him the trump of earth’s final evangel.
II.
Silence straightway, stern Muse, the soft cymbals of pleasure,Be all bronzen these numbers, and martial the measure!Breathe, sonorously breathe, o’er the spirit in meOne strain, sad and stern, of that deep EpopeeWhich thou, from the fashionless cloud of far time,Chantest lonely, when Victory, pale, and sublimeIn the light of the aureole over her head,Hears, and heeds not the wound in her heart fresh and red.Blown wide by the blare of the clarion, unfoldThe shrill clanging curtains of war!And beholdA vision!The antique Heraclean seats;And the long Black Sea billow that once bore those fleets,Which said to the winds, “Be ye, too, Genoese!”And the red angry sands of the chafed Cheronese;And the two foes of man, War and Winter, alliedRound the Armies of England and France, side by sideEnduring and dying (Gaul and Briton abreast!)Where the towers of the North fret the skies of the East.
III.
Since that sunrise which rose through the calm linden stemsO’er Lucile and Eugene, in the garden of Ems,Through twenty-five seasons encircling the sun,This planet of ours on its pathway hath gone,And the fates that I sing of have flowed with the fatesOf a world, in the red wake of war, round the gatesOf that doom’d and heroical city, in which(Fire crowning the rampart, blood bathing the ditch!),At bay, fights the Russian as some hunted bear,Whom the huntsmen have hemm’d round at last in his lair.
IV.
A fang’d, arid plain, sapp’d with underground fire,Soak’d with snow, torn with shot, mash’d to one gory mire!There Fate’s iron scale hangs in horrid suspense,While those two famished ogres—the Siege, the Defence,Face to face, through a vapor frore, dismal, and dun,Glare, scenting the breath of each other.The oneDouble-bodied, two-headed—by separate waysWinding, serpent-wise, nearer; the other, each day’sSullen toil adding size to,—concentrated, solid,Indefatigable—the brass-fronted, embodied,And audible [Greek text omitted] gone sombrely forthTo the world from that Autocrat Will of the north!
V.
In the dawn of a moody October, a paleGhostly motionless vapor began to prevailOver city and camp; like the garment of deathWhich (is formed by) the face it conceals.’Twas the breathWar, yet drowsily yawning, began to suspire;Wherethrough, here and there, flash’d an eye of red fire,And closed, from some rampart beginning to bellowHoarse challenge; replied to anon, through the yellowAnd sulphurous twilight: till day reel’d and rock’dAnd roar’d into dark. Then the midnight was mock’dWith fierce apparitions. Ring’d round by a rainOf red fire, and of iron, the murtherous plainFlared with fitful combustion; where fitfully fellAfar off the fatal, disgorged scharpenelle,And fired the horizon, and singed the coil’d gloomWith wings of swift flame round that City of Doom.
VI.
So the day—so the night! So by night, so by day,With stern patient pathos, while time wears away,In the trench flooded through, in the wind where it wails,In the snow where it falls, in the fire where it hailsShot and shell—link by link, out of hardship and pain,Toil, sickness, endurance, is forged the bronze chainOf those terrible siege-lines!No change to that toilSave the mine’s sudden leap from the treacherous soil.Save the midnight attack, save the groans of the maim’d,And Death’s daily obolus due, whether claim’dBy man or by nature.
VII.
Time passes. The dumb,Bitter, snow-bound, and sullen November is come.And its snows have been bathed in the blood of the brave;And many a young heart has glutted the grave:And on Inkerman yet the wild bramble is gory,And those bleak heights henceforth shall be famous in story.
VIII.
The moon, swathed in storm, has long set: through the campNo sound save the sentinel’s slow sullen tramp,The distant explosion, the wild sleety wind,That seems searching for something it never can find.The midnight is turning: the lamp is nigh spent:And, wounded and lone, in a desolate tentLies a young British soldier whose sword…In this place,However, my Muse is compell’d to retraceHer precipitous steps and revert to the past.The shock which had suddenly shatter’d at lastAlfred Vargrave’s fantastical holiday nature,Had sharply drawn forth to his full size and statureThe real man, conceal’d till that moment beneathAll he yet had appear’d. From the gay broider’d sheathWhich a man in his wrath flings aside, even soLeaps the keen trenchant steel summon’d forth by a blow.And thus loss of fortune gave value to life.The wife gain’d a husband, the husband a wife,In that home which, though humbled and narrow’d by fate,Was enlarged and ennobled by love. Low their state,But large their possessions.Sir Ridley, forgivenBy those he unwittingly brought nearer heavenBy one fraudulent act, than through all his sleek speechThe hypocrite brought his own soul, safe from reachOf the law, died abroad.Cousin John, heart and hand,Purse and person, henceforth (honest man!) took his standBy Matilda and Alfred; guest, guardian, and friendOf the home he both shared and assured, to the end,With his large lively love. Alfred Vargrave meanwhileFaced the world’s frown, consoled by his wife’s faithful smile.Late in life he began life in earnest; and still,With the tranquil exertion of resolute will,Through long, and laborious, and difficult days,Out of manifold failure, by wearisome ways,Work’d his way through the world; till at last he began(Reconciled to the work which mankind claims for man),After years of unwitness’d, unwearied endeavor,Years impassion’d yet patient, to realize everMore clear on the broad stream of current opinionThe reflex of powers in himself—that dominionWhich the life of one man, if his life be a truth,May assert o’er the life of mankind. Thus, his youthIn his manhood renew’d, fame and fortune he wonWorking only for home, love, and duty.One sonMatilda had borne him; but scarce had the boy,With all Eton yet fresh in his full heart’s frank joy,The darling of young soldier comrades, just glancedDown the glad dawn of manhood at life, when it chancedThat a blight sharp and sudden was breath’d o’er the bloomOf his joyous and generous years, and the gloomOf a grief premature on their fair promise fell:No light cloud like those which, for June to dispel,Captious April engenders; but deep as his ownDeep nature. Meanwhile, ere I fully make knownThe cause of this sorrow, I track the event.When first a wild war-note through England was sent,He, transferring without either token or word,To friend, parent, or comrade, a yet virgin sword,From a holiday troop, to one bound for the war,Had march’d forth, with eyes that saw death in the starWhence others sought glory. Thus fighting, he fellOn the red field of Inkerman; found, who can tellBy what miracle, breathing, though shatter’d, and borneTo the rear by his comrades, pierced, bleeding, and torn.Where for long days and nights, with the wound in his side,He lay, dark.
IX.
But a wound deeper far, undescried,The young heart was rankling; for there, of a truth,In the first earnest faith of a pure pensive youth,A love large as life, deep and changeless as death,Lay ensheath’d: and that love, ever fretting its sheath,The frail scabbard of life pierced and wore through and through.There are loves in man’s life for which time can renewAll that time may destroy. Lives there are, though, in love,Which cling to one faith, and die with it; nor move,Though earthquakes may shatter the shrine.Whence or howLove laid claim to this young life, it matters not now.
X.
Oh is it a phantom? a dream of the night?A vision which fever hath fashion’d to sight?The wind wailing ever, with motion uncertain,Sways sighingly there the drench’d tent’s tattered curtain,To and fro, up and down.But it is not the windThat is lifting it now: and it is not the mindThat hath moulded that vision.A pale woman enters,As wan as the lamp’s waning light, which concentersIts dull glare upon her. With eyes dim and dimmerThere, all in a slumberous and shadowy glimmer,The sufferer sees that still form floating on,And feels faintly aware that he is not alone.She is flitting before him. She pauses. She standsBy his bedside all silent. She lays her white handsOn the brow of the boy. A light finger is pressingSoftly, softly the sore wounds: the hot blood-stain’d dressingSlips from them. A comforting quietude stealsThrough the rack’d weary frame; and, throughout it, he feelsThe slow sense of a merciful, mild neighborhood.Something smooths the toss’d pillow. Beneath a gray hoodOf rough serge, two intense tender eyes are bent o’er him,And thrill through and through him. The sweet form before him,It is surely Death’s angel Life’s last vigil keeping!A soft voice says… “Sleep!”And he sleeps: he is sleeping.
XI.
He waked before dawn. Still the vision is there.Still that pale woman moves not. A minist’ring careMeanwhile has been silently changing and cheeringThe aspect of all things around him.ReveringSome power unknown, and benignant, he bless’dIn silence the sense of salvation. And restHaving loosen’d the mind’s tangled meshes, he faintlySigh’d… “Say what thou art, blessed dream of a saintlyAnd minist’ring spirit!”A whisper sereneSlid, softer than silence… “The Soeur Seraphine,A poor Sister of Charity. Shun to inquireAught further, young soldier. The son of thy sire,For the sake of that sire, I reclaim from the grave.Thou didst not shun death: shun not life: ’Tis more braveTo live than to die. Sleep!”He sleeps: he is sleeping.
XII.
He waken’d again, when the dawn was just steepingThe skies with chill splendor. And there, never flitting,Never flitting, that vision of mercy was sitting.As the dawn to the darkness, so life seemed returningSlowly, feebly within him. The night-lamp yet burning,Made ghastly the glimmering daybreak.He said,“If thou be of the living, and not of the dead,Sweet minister, pour out yet further the healingOf that balmy voice; if it may be, revealingThy mission of mercy; whence art thou?”“O sonOf Matilda and Alfred, it matters not! OneWho is not of the living nor yet of the dead:To thee, and to others, alive yet”… she said…“So long as there liveth the poor gift in meOf this ministration; to them, and to thee,Dead in all things beside. A French Nun, whose vocationIs now by this bedside. A nun hath no nation.Wherever man suffers, or woman may soothe,There her land! there her kindred!”She bent down to smoothThe hot pillow; and added… “Yet more than anotherIs thy life dear to me. For thy father, thy mother,I know them—I know them.”“Oh, can it be? you!My dearest dear father! my mother! you knew,’You know them?”She bowed, half averting her headIn silence.He brokenly, timidly said,“Do they know I am thus?”“Hush!”… she smiled, as she drewFrom her bosom two letters: and—can it be true?That beloved and familiar writing!He burstInto tears… “My poor mother—my father! the worstWill have reach’d them!”“No, no!” she exclaimed, with a smile,“They know you are living; they know that meanwhileI am watching beside you. Young soldier, weep not!”But still on the nun’s nursing bosom, the hotFever’d brow of the boy weeping wildly is press’d.There, at last, the young heart sobs itself into rest:And he hears, as it were between smiling and weeping,The calm voice say… “Sleep!”And he sleeps, he is sleeping.
XIII.
And day follow’d day. And, as wave follow’d wave,With the tide, day by day, life, re-issuing, draveThrough that young hardy frame novel currents of health.Yet some strange obstruction, which life’s health by stealthSeemed to cherish, impeded life’s progress. And stillA feebleness, less of the frame than the will,Clung about the sick man—hid and harbor’d withinThe sad hollow eyes: pinch’d the cheek pale and thin:And clothed the wan fingers with languor.And there,Day by day, night by night, unremitting in care,Unwearied in watching, so cheerful of mien,And so gentle of hand, sat the Soeur Seraphine!
XIV.
A strange woman truly! not young; yet her face,Wan and worn as it was, bore about it the traceOf a beauty which time could not ruin. For the wholeQuiet cheek, youth’s lost bloom left transparent, the soulSeemed to fill with its own light, like some sunny fountainEverlastingly fed from far off in the mountainThat pours, in a garden deserted, its streams,And all the more lovely for loneliness seems.So that, watching that face, you could scarce pause to guessThe years which its calm careworn lines might express,Feeling only what suffering with these must have pastTo have perfected there so much sweetness at last.
XV.
Thus, one bronzen evening, when day had put out,His brief thrifty fires, and the wind was about,The nun, watchful still by the boy, on his ownLaid a firm quiet hand, and the deep tender toneOf her voice moved the silence.She said… “I have heal’dThese wounds of the body. Why hast thou conceal’d,Young soldier, that yet open wound in the heart?Wilt thou trust NO hand near it?”He winced, with a start,As of one that is suddenly touched on the spotFrom which every nerve derives suffering.“What?Lies my heart, then, so bare?” he moaned bitterly.“Nay,”With compassionate accents she hastened to say,“Do you think that these eyes are with sorrow, young man,So all unfamiliar, indeed, as to scanHer features, yet know them not?“Oh, was it spoken,‘Go ye forth, heal the sick, lift the low, bind the broken!’Of the body alone? Is our mission, then, done,When we leave the bruised hearts, if we bind the bruised bone?Nay, is not the mission of mercy twofold?Whence twofold, perchance, are the powers that we holdTo fulfil it, of Heaven! For Heaven doth stillTo us, Sisters, it may be, who seek it, send skillWon from long intercourse with affliction, and artHelp’d of Heaven, to bind up the broken of heart.Trust to me!” (His two feeble hands in her ownShe drew gently.) “Trust to me!” (she said, with soft tone):“I am not so dead in remembrance to allI have died to in this world, but what I recallEnough of its sorrow, enough of its trial,To grieve for both—save from both haply! The dialReceives many shades, and each points to the sun.The shadows are many, the sunlight is one.Life’s sorrows still fluctuate: God’s love does not.And His love is unchanged, when it changes our lot.Looking up to this light, which is common to all,And down to these shadows, on each side, that fallIn time’s silent circle, so various for each,Is it nothing to know that they never can reachSo far, but what light lies beyond them forever?Trust to me! Oh, if in this hour I endeavorTo trace the shade creeping across the young lifeWhich, in prayer till this hour, I have watch’d through its strifeWith the shadow of death, ’tis with this faith alone,That, in tracing the shade, I shall find out the sun.Trust to me!”She paused: he was weeping. Small needOf added appeal, or entreaty, indeed,Had those gentle accents to win from his paleAnd parch’d, trembling lips, as it rose, the brief taleOf a life’s early sorrow. The story is old,And in words few as may be shall straightway be told.
XVI.
A few years ago, ere the fair form of PeaceWas driven from Europe, a young girl—the nieceOf a French noble, leaving an old Norman pileBy the wild northern seas, came to dwell for a whileWith a lady allied to her race—an old dameOf a threefold legitimate virtue, and name,In the Faubourg Saint Germain.Upon that fair child,From childhood, nor father nor mother had smiled.One uncle their place in her life had supplied,And their place in her heart: she had grown at his side,And under his roof-tree, and in his regard,From childhood to girlhood.This fair orphan wardSeem’d the sole human creature that lived in the heartOf that stern rigid man, or whose smile could impartOne ray of response to the eyes which, aboveHer fair infant forehead, look’d down with a loveThat seem’d almost stern, so intense was its chillLofty stillness, like sunlight on some lonely hillWhich is colder and stiller than sunlight elsewhere.
Grass grew in the court-yard; the chambers were bareIn that ancient mansion; when first the stern treadOf its owner awaken’d their echoes long dead:Bringing with him this infant (the child of a brother),Whom, dying, the hands of a desolate motherHad placed on his bosom. ’Twas said—right or wrong—That, in the lone mansion, left tenantless long,To which, as a stranger, its lord now return’d,In years yet recall’d, through loud midnights had burn’dThe light of wild orgies. Be that false or true,Slow and sad was the footstep which now wander’d throughThose desolate chambers; and calm and severeWas the life of their inmate.Men now saw appearEvery morn at the mass that firm sorrowful face,Which seem’d to lock up in a cold iron caseTears harden’d to crystal. Yet harsh if he were,His severity seem’d to be trebly severeIn the rule of his own rigid life, which, at least,Was benignant to others. The poor parish priest,Who lived on his largess, his piety praised.The peasant was fed, and the chapel was raised,And the cottage was built, by his liberal hand.Yet he seem’d in the midst of his good deeds to standA lone, and unloved, and unlovable man.There appear’d some inscrutable flaw in the planOf his life, that love fail’d to pass over.That childAlone did not fear him, nor shrink from him; smiledTo his frown, and dispell’d it.The sweet sportive elfSeem’d the type of some joy lost, and miss’d, in himself.Ever welcome he suffer’d her glad face to glideIn on hours when to others his door was denied:And many a time with a mute moody lookHe would watch her at prattle and play, like a brookWhose babble disturbs not the quietest spot,But soothes us because we need answer it not.
But few years had pass’d o’er that childhood beforeA change came among them. A letter, which boreSudden consequence with it, one morning was placedIn the hands of the lord of the chateau. He pacedTo and fro in his chamber a whole night aloneAfter reading that letter. At dawn he was gone.Weeks pass’d. When he came back again he return’dWith a tall ancient dame, from whose lips the child learn’dThat they were of the same race and name. With a faceSad and anxious, to this wither’d stock of the raceHe confided the orphan, and left them aloneIn the old lonely house.In a few days ’twas known,To the angry surprise of half Paris, that oneOf the chiefs of that party which, still clinging onTo the banner that bears the white lilies of France,Will fight ’neath no other, nor yet for the chanceOf restoring their own, had renounced the watchwordAnd the creed of his youth in unsheathing his sword,For a Fatherland father’d no more (such is fate!)By legitimate parents.And meanwhile, elateAnd in no wise disturbed by what Paris might say,The new soldier thus wrote to a friend far away:—“To the life of inaction farewell! After all,Creeds the oldest may crumble, and dynasties fall,But the sole grand Legitimacy will endure,In whatever makes death noble, life strong and pure.Freedom! action!… the desert to breathe in—the lanceOf the Arab to follow! I go! vive la France!”
Few and rare were the meetings henceforth, as years fled,‘Twixt the child and the soldier. The two women ledLone lives in the lone house. Meanwhile the child grewInto girlhood; and, like a sunbeam, sliding throughHer green quiet years, changed by gentle degreesTo the loveliest vision of youth a youth seesIn his loveliest fancies: as pure as a pearl,And as perfect: a noble and innocent girl,With eighteen sweet summers dissolved in the lightOf her lovely and lovable eyes, soft and bright!Then her guardian wrote to the dame,… “Let ConstanceGo with you to Paris. I trust that in FranceI may be ere the close of the year. I confideMy life’s treasure to you. Let her see, at your side,The world which we live in.”To Paris then cameConstance to abide with that old stately dameIn that old stately Faubourg.The young EnglishmanThus met her. ’Twas there their acquaintance began,There it closed. That old miracle, Love-at-first-sight,Needs no explanations. The heart reads arightIts destiny sometimes. His love neither chiddenNor check’d, the young soldier was graciously biddenAn habitual guest to that house by the dame.His own candid graces, the world-honor’d nameOf his father (in him not dishonor’d) were bothFair titles to favor. His love, nothing loath,The old lady observed, was return’d by Constance.And as the child’s uncle his absence from FranceYet prolong’d, she (thus easing long self-gratulation)Wrote to him a lengthen’d and moving narrationOf the graces and gifts of the young English wooer:His father’s fair fame; the boy’s deference to her;His love for Constance,—unaffected, sincere;And the girl’s love for him, read by her in those clearLimpid eyes; then the pleasure with which she awaitedHer cousin’s approval of all she had stated.
At length from that cousin an answer there came,Brief, stern; such as stunn’d and astonish’d the dame.
“Let Constance leave Paris with you on the dayYou receive this. Until my return she may stayAt her convent awhile. If my niece wishes everTo behold me again, understand, she will neverWed that man.“You have broken faith with me. Farewell!”No appeal from that sentence.It needs not to tellThe tears of Constance, nor the grief of her lover:The dream they had laid out their lives in was over.Bravely strove the young soldier to look in the faceOf a life where invisible hands seemed to traceO’er the threshold these words… “Hope no more!”
Unreturn’dHad his love been, the strong manful heart would have spurn’dThat weakness which suffers a woman to lieAt the roots of man’s life, like a canker, and dryAnd wither the sap of life’s purpose. But thereLay the bitterer part of the pain! Could he dareTo forget he was loved? that he grieved not alone?Recording a love that drew sorrow uponThe woman he loved, for himself dare he seekSurcease to that sorrow, which thus held him weak,Beat him down, and destroy’d him?News reach’d him indeed,Through a comrade, who brought him a letter to readFrom the dame who had care of Constance (it was oneTo whom, when at Paris, the boy had been known,A Frenchman, and friend of the Faubourg), which saidThat Constance, although never a murmur betray’dWhat she suffer’d, in silence grew paler each day,And seem’d visibly drooping and dying away.It was then he sought death.
XVII.
Thus the tale ends. ’Twas toldWith such broken, passionate words, as unfoldIn glimpses alone, a coil’d grief. Through each pauseOf its fitful recital, in raw gusty flaws,The rain shook the canvas, unheeded; aloof,And unheeded, the night-wind around the tent-roofAt intervals wirbled. And when all was said,The sick man, exhausted, droop’d backward his head,And fell into a feverish slumber.Long whileSat the Soeur Seraphine, in deep thought. The still smileThat was wont, angel-wise, to inhabit her faceAnd made it like heaven, was fled from its placeIn her eyes, on her lips; and a deep sadness thereSeem’d to darken the lines of long sorrow and care,As low to herself she sigh’d…“Hath it, Eugene,Been so long, then, the struggle?… and yet, all in vain!Nay, not all in vain! shall the world gain a man,And yet Heaven lose a soul? Have I done all I can?Soul to soul, did he say? Soul to soul, be it so!And then—soul of mine, whither? whither?”
XVIII.
Large, slow,Silent tears in those deep eyes ascended, and fell.“HERE, at least, I have fail’d not”… she mused… “this is well!”She drew from her bosom two letters.In one,A mother’s heart, wild with alarm for her son,Breathed bitterly forth its despairing appeal.“The pledge of a love owed to thee, O Lucile!The hope of a home saved by thee—of a heartWhich hath never since then (thrice endear’d as thou art!)Ceased to bless thee, to pray for thee, save! save my son!And if not”… the letter went brokenly on,“Heaven help us!”Then follow’d, from Alfred, a fewBlotted heart-broken pages. He mournfully drew,With pathos, the picture of that earnest youth,So unlike his own; how in beauty and truthHe had nurtured that nature, so simple and brave!And how he had striven his son’s youth to saveFrom the errors so sadly redeem’d in his own,And so deeply repented: how thus, in that son,In whose youth he had garner’d his age, he had seem’dTo be bless’d by a pledge that the past was redeem’d,And forgiven. He bitterly went on to speakOf the boy’s baffled love; in which fate seem’d to breakUnawares on his dreams with retributive pain,And the ghosts of the past rose to scourge back againThe hopes of the future. To sue for consentPride forbade: and the hope his old foe might relentExperience rejected… “My life for the boy’s!”(He exclaim’d); “for I die with my son, if he dies!Lucile! Heaven bless you for all you have done!Save him, save him, Lucile! save my son! save my son!”
XIX.
“Ay!” murmur’d the Soeur Seraphine… “heart to heart!THERE, at least, I have fail’d not! Fulfill’d is my part?Accomplish’d my mission? One act crowns the whole.Do I linger? Nay, be it so, then!… Soul to soul!”She knelt down, and pray’d. Still the boy slumber’d on,Dawn broke. The pale nun from the bedside was gone.
XX.
Meanwhile, ‘mid his aides-de-camp, busily bentO’er the daily reports, in his well-order’d tentThere sits a French General—bronzed by the sunAnd sear’d by the sands of Algeria. OneWho forth from the wars of the wild KabyleeHad strangely and rapidly risen to beThe idol, the darling, the dream and the starOf the younger French chivalry: daring in war,And wary in council. He enter’d, indeed,Late in life (and discarding his Bourbonite creed)The Army of France: and had risen, in partFrom a singular aptitude proved for the artOf that wild desert warfare of ambush, surprise,And stratagem, which to the French camp suppliesIts subtlest intelligence; partly from chance;Partly, too, from a name and position which FranceWas proud to put forward; but mainly, in fact,From the prudence to plan, and the daring to act,In frequent emergencies startlingly shown,To the rank which he now held,—intrepidly wonWith many a wound, trench’d in many a scar,From fierce Milianah and Sidi-Sakhdar.
XXI.
All within, and without, that warm tent seems to bearSmiling token of provident order and care.All about, a well-fed, well-clad soldiery standsIn groups round the music of mirth-breathing bands.In and out of the tent, all day long, to and fro,The messengers come and the messengers go,Upon missions of mercy, or errands of toil:To report how the sapper contends with the soilIn the terrible trench, how the sick man is faringIn the hospital tent: and, combining, comparing,Constructing, within moves the brain of one man,Moving all.He is bending his brow o’er some planFor the hospital service, wise, skilful, humane.The officer standing behind him is fainTo refer to the angel solicitous caresOf the Sisters of Charity: one he declaresTo be known through the camp as a seraph of grace;He has seen, all have seen her indeed, in each placeWhere suffering is seen, silent, active—the Soeur…Soeur… how do they call her?“Ay, truly, of herI have heard much,” the General, musing, replies;“And we owe her already (unless rumor lies)The lives of not few of our bravest. You meanAh, how do they call her?… the Soeur—Seraphine(Is it not so?). I rarely forget names once heard.”
“Yes; the Soeur Seraphine. Her I meant.”“On my word,I have much wish’d to see her. I fancy I trace,In some facts traced to her, something more than the graceOf an angel; I mean an acute human mind,Ingenious, constructive, intelligent. Find,And if possible, let her come to me. We shall,I think, aid each other.”“Oui, mon General:I believe she has lately obtained the permissionTo tend some sick man in the Second DivisionOf our Ally; they say a relation.”“Ay, so?A relation?”“’Tis said so.”“The name do you know?”Non, mon General.”While they spoke yet, there wentA murmur and stir round the door of the tent.“A Sister of Charity craves, in a caseOf urgent and serious importance, the graceOf brief private speech with the General there.Will the General speak with her?”“Bid her declareHer mission.”“She will not. She craves to be seenAnd be heard.”“Well, her name, then?”“The Soeur Seraphine.”“Clear the tent. She may enter.”
XXII.
The tent has been clear’d,The chieftain stroked moodily somewhat his beard,A sable long silver’d: and press’d down his browOn his hand, heavy vein’d. All his countenance, nowUnwitness’d, at once fell dejected, and dreary,As a curtain let fall by a hand that’s grown weary,Into puckers and folds. From his lips, unrepress’d,Steals th’ impatient sigh which reveals in man’s breastA conflict conceal’d, and experience at strifeWith itself,—the vex’d heart’s passing protest on life.He turn’d to his papers. He heard the light treadOf a faint foot behind him: and, lifting his head,Said, “Sit, Holy Sister! your worth is well knownTo the hearts of our soldiers; nor less to my own.I have much wish’d to see you. I owe you some thanks;In the name of all those you have saved to our ranksI record them. Sit! Now then, your mission?”The nunPaused silent. The General eyed her anonMore keenly. His aspect grew troubled. A changeDarken’d over his features. He mutter’d “Strange! strange!Any face should so strongly remind me of HER!Fool! again the delirium, the dream! does it stir?Does it move as of old? Psha!“Sit, Sister! I waitYour answer, my time halts but hurriedly. StateThe cause why you seek me.”“The cause? ay, the cause!”She vaguely repeated. Then, after a pause,—As one who, awaked unawares, would put backThe sleep that forever returns in the trackOf dreams which, though scared and dispersed, not the lessSettle back to faint eyelids that yield ’neath their stress,Like doves to a pent-house,—a movement she made,Less toward him than away from herself; droop’d her headAnd folded her hands on her bosom: long, spare,Fatigued, mournful hands! Not a stream of stray hairEscaped the pale bands; scarce more pale than the faceWhich they bound and lock’d up in a rigid white case.She fix’d her eyes on him. There crept a vague aweO’er his sense, such as ghosts cast.“Eugene de Luvois,The cause which recalls me again to your side,Is a promise that rests unfulfill’d,” she replied.“I come to fulfil it.”He sprang from the placeWhere he sat, press’d his hand, as in doubt, o’er his face;And, cautiously feeling each step o’er the groundThat he trod on (as one who walks fearing the soundOf his footstep may startle and scare out of sightSome strange sleeping creature on which he would ‘lightUnawares), crept towards her; one heavy hand laidOn her shoulder in silence; bent o’er her his head,Search’d her face with a long look of troubled appealAgainst doubt: stagger’d backward, and murmur’d… “Lucile?Thus we meet then?… here!… thus?”“Soul to soul, ay,Eugene,As I pledged you my word that we should meet again.Dead,…” she murmur’d, “long dead! all that lived in our lives—Thine and mine—saving that which ev’n life’s self survives,The soul! ’Tis my soul seeks thine own. What may reachFrom my life to thy life (so wide each from each!)Save the soul to the soul? To thy soul I would speak.May I do so?”He said (work’d and white was his cheekAs he raised it), “Speak to me!”Deep, tender, serene,And sad was the gaze which the Soeur SeraphineHeld on him. She spoke.
XXIII.
As some minstrel may fling,Preluding the music yet mute in each string,A swift hand athwart the hush’d heart of the whole,Seeking which note most fitly must first move the soul;And, leaving untroubled the deep chords below,Move pathetic in numbers remote;—even soThe voice which was moving the heart of that manFar away from its yet voiceless purpose began,Far away in the pathos remote of the past;Until, through her words, rose before him, at last,Bright and dark in their beauty, the hopes that were goneUnaccomplish’d from life.He was mute.
XXIV.
She went onAnd still further down the dim past did she leadEach yielding remembrance, far, far off, to feed‘Mid the pastures of youth, in the twilight of hope,And the valleys of boyhood, the fresh-flower’d slopeOf life’s dawning land!’Tis the heart of a boy,With its indistinct, passionate prescience of joy!The unproved desire—the unaim’d aspiration—The deep conscious life that forestalls consummationWith ever a flitting delight—one arm’s lengthIn advance of the august inward impulse.The strengthOf the spirit which troubles the seed in the sandWith the birth of the palm-tree! Let ages expandThe glorious creature! The ages lie shut(Safe, see!) in the seed, at time’s signal to putForth their beauty and power, leaf by leaf, layer on layer,Till the palm strikes the sun, and stands broad in blue air.So the palm in the palm-seed! so, slowly—so, wroughtYear by year unperceived, hope on hope, thought by thought,Trace the growth of the man from its germ in the boy.Ah, but Nature, that nurtures, may also destroy!Charm the wind and the sun, lest some chance intervene!While the leaf’s in the bud, while the stem’s in the green,A light bird bends the branch, a light breeze breaks the bough,Which, if spared by the light breeze, the light bird, may growTo baffle the tempest, and rock the high nest,And take both the bird and the breeze to its breast.Shall we save a whole forest in sparing one seed?Save the man in the boy? in the thought save the deed?Let the whirlwind uproot the grown tree, if it can!Save the seed from the north wind. So let the grown manFace our fate. Spare the man-seed in youth.He was dumb.She went one step further.
XXV.
Lo! manhood is come.And love, the wild song-bird, hath flown to the tree.And the whirlwind comes after. Now prove we, and see:What shade from the leaf? what support from the branch?Spreads the leaf broad and fair? holds the bough strong and staunch?There, he saw himself—dark, as he stood on that night,The last when they met and they parted: a sightFor heaven to mourn o’er, for hell to rejoice!An ineffable tenderness troubled her voice;It grew weak, and a sigh broke it through.Then he said(Never looking at her, never lifting his head,As though, at his feet, there lay visibly hurl’dThose fragments), “It was not a love, ’twas a world,’Twas a life that lay ruin’d, Lucile!”
XXVI.
She went on.“So be it! Perish Babel, arise Babylon!From ruins like these rise the fanes that shall last,And to build up the future heaven shatters the past.”“Ay,” he moodily murmur’d, “and who cares to scanThe heart’s perish’d world, if the world gains a man?From the past to the present, though late, I appeal;To the nun Seraphine, from the woman Lucile!”
XXVII.
Lucile!… the old name—the old self! silenced long:Heard once more! felt once more!As some soul to the throngOf invisible spirits admitted, baptizedBy death to a new name and nature—surprised‘Mid the songs of the seraphs, hears faintly, and far,Some voice from the earth, left below a dim star,Calling to her forlornly; and (sadd’ning the psalmsOf the angels, and piercing the Paradise palms!)The name borne ‘mid earthly beloveds on earthSigh’d above some lone grave in the land of her birth;—So that one word… Lucile!… stirr’d the Soeur Seraphine,For a moment. Anon she resumed here sereneAnd concentrated calm.“Let the Nun, then, retraceThe life of the soldier!”… she said, with a faceThat glow’d, gladdening her words.“To the present I come:Leave the Past!”There her voice rose, and seem’d as when somePale Priestess proclaims from her temple the praiseOf her hero whose brows she is crowning with bays.Step by step did she follow his path from the placeWhere their two paths diverged. Year by year did she trace(Familiar with all) his, the soldier’s existence.Her words were of trial, endurance, resistance;Of the leaguer around this besieged world of ours:And the same sentinels that ascend the same towersAnd report the same foes, the same fears, the same strife,Waged alike to the limits of each human life.She went on to speak of the lone moody lord,Shut up in his lone moody halls: every wordHeld the weight of a tear: she recorded the goodHe had patiently wrought through a whole neighborhood;And the blessing that lived on the lips of the poor,By the peasant’s hearthstone, or the cottager’s door.There she paused: and her accents seem’d dipp’d in the hueOf his own sombre heart, as the picture she drewOf the poor, proud, sad spirit, rejecting love’s wages,Yet working love’s work; reading backwards life’s pagesFor penance; and stubbornly, many a time,Both missing the moral, and marring the rhyme.Then she spoke of the soldier!… the man’s work and fame,The pride of a nation, a world’s just acclaim!Life’s inward approval!
XXVIII.
Her voice reach’d his heart,And sank lower. She spoke of herself: how, apartAnd unseen,—far away,—she had watch’d, year by year,With how many a blessing, how many a tear,And how many a prayer, every stage in the strife:Guess’d the thought in the deed: traced the love in the life:Bless’d the man in the man’s work!“THY work… oh, not mine!Thine, Lucile!”… he exclaim’d… “all the worth of it thine,If worth there be in it!”Her answer convey’dHis reward, and her own: joy that cannot be saidAlone by the voice… eyes—face—spoke silently:All the woman, one grateful emotion!And sheA poor Sister of Charity! hers a life spentIn one silent effort for others!…She bentHer divine face above him, and fill’d up his heartWith the look that glow’d from it.Then slow, with soft art,Fix’d her aim, and moved to it.
XXIX.
He, the soldier humane,He, the hero; whose heart hid in glory the painOf a youth disappointed; whose life had made knownThe value of man’s life!… that youth overthrownAnd retrieved, had it left him no pity for youthIn another? his own life of strenuous truthAccomplish’d in act, had it taught him no careFor the life of another?… oh no! everywhereIn the camp which she moved through, she came face to faceWith some noble token, some generous traceOf his active humanity…“Well,” he replied,“If it be so?”“I come from the solemn bedsideOf a man that is dying,” she said. “While we speak,A life is in jeopardy.”“Quick then! you seekAid or medicine, or what?”“’Tis not needed,” she said.“Medicine? yes, for the mind! ’Tis a heart that needs aid!You, Eugene de Luvois, you (and you only) canSave the life of this man. Will you save it?”“What man?How?… where?… can you ask?”She went rapidly onTo her object in brief vivid words… The young sonOf Matilda and Alfred—the boy lying thereHalf a mile from that tent door—the father’s despair,The mother’s deep anguish—the pride of the boyIn the father—the father’s one hope and one joyIn the son:—the son now—wounded, dying! She toldOf the father’s stern struggle with life: the boy’s bold,Pure, and beautiful nature: the fair life before himIf that life were but spared… yet a word might restore him!The boy’s broken love for the niece of Eugene!Its pathos: the girl’s love for him; how, half slainIn his tent, she had found him: won from him the tale;Sought to nurse back his life; found her efforts still failBeaten back by a love that was stronger than life;Of how bravely till then he had stood in that strifeWherein England and France in their best blood, at last,Had bathed from remembrance the wounds of the past.And shall nations be nobler than men? Are not greatMen the models of nations? For what is a stateBut the many’s confused imitation of one?Shall he, the fair hero of France, on the sonOf his ally seek vengeance, destroying perchanceAn innocent life,—here, when England and FranceHave forgiven the sins of their fathers of yore,And baptized a new hope in their sons’ recent gore?She went on to tell how the boy had clung stillTo life, for the sake of life’s uses, untilFrom his weak hands the strong effort dropp’d, stricken downBy the news that the heart of Constance, like his own,Was breaking beneath…But there “Hold!” he exclaim’d,Interrupting, “Forbear!”… his whole face was inflamedWith the heart’s swarthy thunder which yet, while she spoke,Had been gathering silent—at last the storm brokeIn grief or in wrath…“’Tis to him, then,” he cried,…Checking suddenly short the tumultuous stride,“That I owe these late greetings—for him you are here—For his sake you seek me—for him, it is clear,You have deign’d at the last to bethink you againOf this long-forgotten existence!”“Eugene!”“Ha! fool that I was!”… he went on,… “and just now,While you spoke yet, my heart was beginning to growAlmost boyish again, almost sure of ONE friend!Yet this was the meaning of all—this the end!Be it so! There’s a sort of slow justice (admit!)In this—that the word that man’s finger hath writIn fire on my heart, I return him at last.Let him learn that word—Never!”“Ah, still to the pastMust the present be vassal?” she said. “In the hourWe last parted I urged you to put forth the powerWhich I felt to be yours, in the conquest of life.Yours, the promise to strive: mine—to watch o’er the strife.I foresaw you would conquer; you HAVE conquer’d much,Much, indeed, that is noble! I hail it as such,And am here to record and applaud it. I sawNot the less in your nature, Eugene de Luvois,One peril—one point where I feared you would failTo subdue that worst foe which a man can assail,—Himself: and I promised that, if I should seeMy champion once falter, or bend the brave knee,That moment would bring me again to his side.That moment is come! for that peril was pride,And you falter. I plead for yourself, and another,For that gentle child without father or mother,To whom you are both. I plead, soldier of France,For your own nobler nature—and plead for Constance!”At the sound of that name he averted his head.“Constance!… Ay, she enter’d MY lone life” (he said)“When its sun was long set; and hung over its nightHer own starry childhood. I have but that light,In the midst of much darkness! Who names me but sheWith titles of love? And what rests there for meIn the silence of age save the voice of that child?The child of my own better life, undefiled!My creature, carved out of my heart of hearts!”“Say,”Said the Soeur Seraphine—“are you able to layYour hand as a knight on your heart as a manAnd swear that, whatever may happen, you canFeel assured for the life you thus cherish?”“How so?”He look’d up. “if the boy should die thus?”“Yes, I knowWhat your look would imply… this sleek stranger forsooth!Because on his cheek was the red rose of youthThe heart of my niece must break for it!”She cried,“Nay, but hear me yet further!”With slow heavy stride,Unheeding her words, he was pacing the tent,He was muttering low to himself as he went.Ay, these young things lie safe in our heart just so longAs their wings are in growing; and when these are strongThey break it, and farewell! the bird flies!”…The nunLaid her hand on the soldier, and murmur’d, “The sunIs descending, life fleets while we talk thus! oh, yetLet this day upon one final victory set,And complete a life’s conquest!”He said, “Understand!If Constance wed the son of this man, by whose handMy heart hath been robb’d, she is lost to my life!Can her home be my home? Can I claim in the wifeOf that man’s son the child of my age? At her sideShall he stand on my hearth? Shall I sue to the brideOf… enough!“Ah, and you immemorial hallsOf my Norman forefathers, whose shadow yet fallsOn my fancy, and fuses hope, memory, past,Present,—all, in one silence! old trees to the blastOf the North Sea repeating the tale of old days,Nevermore, nevermore in the wild bosky waysShall I hear through your umbrage ancestral the windProphesy as of yore, when it shook the deep mindOf my boyhood, with whispers from out the far yearsOf love, fame, the raptures life cools down with tears!Henceforth shall the tread of a Vargrave aloneRouse your echoes?”“O think not,” she said, “of the sonOf the man whom unjustly you hate; only thinkOf this young human creature, that cries from the brinkOf a grave to your mercy!“Recall your own words(Words my memory mournfully ever records!)How with love may be wreck’d a whole life! then, Eugene,Look with me (still those words in our ears!) once againAt this young soldier sinking from life here—dragg’d downBy the weight of the love in his heart: no renown,No fame comforts HIM! nations shout not aboveThe lone grave down to which he is bearing the loveWhich life has rejected! Will YOU stand apart?You, with such a love’s memory deep in your heart!You the hero, whose life hath perchance been led onThrough the deeds it hath wrought to the fame it hath won,By recalling the visions and dreams of a youth,Such as lies at your door now: who have but, in truth,To stretch forth a hand, to speak only one word,And by that word you rescue a life!”He was stirr’d.Still he sought to put from him the cup, bow’d his faceon his hand; and anon, as though wishing to chaseWith one angry gesture his own thoughts aside,He sprang up, brush’d past her, and bitterly cried,“No!—Constance wed a Vargrave!”—I cannot consent!”Then up rose the Soeur Seraphine.The low tentIn her sudden uprising, seem’d dwarf’d by the heightFrom which those imperial eyes pour’d the lightOf their deep silent sadness upon him.No wonderHe felt, as it were, his own stature shrink underThe compulsion of that grave regard! For betweenThe Duc de Luvois and the Soeur SeraphineAt that moment there rose all the height of one soulO’er another; she look’d down on him from the wholeLonely length of a life. There were sad nights and days,There were long months and years in that heart-searching gaze;And her voice, when she spoke, with sharp pathos thrill’d throughAnd transfix’d him.“Eugene de Luvois, but for you,I might have been now—not this wandering nun,But a mother, a wife—pleading, not for the sonOf another, but blessing some child of my own,His,—the man’s that I once loved!… Hush! that which is doneI regret not. I breathe no reproaches. That’s bestWhich God sends. ’Twas his will: it is mine. And the restOf that riddle I will not look back to. He readsIn your heart—He that judges of all thoughts and deeds.With eyes, mine forestall not! This only I say:You have not the right (read it, you, as you may!)To say… ‘I am the wrong’d.”’…“Have I wrong’d thee?—wrong’d THEE!”He falter’d, “Lucile, ah, Lucile!”“Nay, not me,”She murmur’d, “but man! The lone nun standing hereHas no claim upon earth, and is pass’d from the sphereOf earth’s wrongs and earth’s reparations. But she,The dead woman, Lucile, she whose grave is in me,Demands from her grave reparation to man,Reparation to God. Heed, O heed, while you can,This voice from the grave!”“Hush!” he moan’d, “I obeyThe Soeur Seraphine. There, Lucile! let this payEvery debt that is due to that grave. Now lead on:I follow you, Soeur Seraphine!… To the sonOf Lord Alfred Vargrave… and then,”…As he spokeHe lifted the tent-door, and down the dun smokePointed out the dark bastions, with batteries crown’d,Of the city beneath them…“Then, THERE, underground,And valete et plaudite, soon as may be!Let the old tree go down to the earth—the old treeWith the worm at its heart! Lay the axe to the root!Who will miss the old stump, so we save the young shoot?A Vargrave!… this pays all… Lead on! In the seedSave the forest!…I follow… forth, forth! where you lead.”
XXX.
The day was declining; a day sick and damp.In a blank ghostly glare shone the bleak ghostly campOf the English. Alone in his dim, spectral tent(Himself the wan spectre of youth), with eyes bentOn the daylight departing, the sick man was sittingUpon his low pallet. These thoughts, vaguely flitting,Cross’d the silence between him and death, which seem’d near,—“Pain o’erreaches itself, so is balk’d! else, how bearThis intense and intolerable solitude,With its eye on my heart and its hand on my blood?Pulse by pulse! Day goes down: yet she comes not again.Other suffering, doubtless, where hope is more plain,Claims her elsewhere. I die, strange! and scarcely feel sad.Oh, to think of Constance THUS, and not to go mad!But Death, it would seem, dulls the sense to his ownDull doings…”
XXXI.
Between those sick eyes and the sunA shadow fell thwart.
XXXII.
’Tis the pale nun once more!But who stands at her side, mute and dark in the door?How oft had he watch’d through the glory and gloomOf the battle, with long, longing looks, that dim plumeWhich now (one stray sunbeam upon it) shook, stoop’dTo where the tent-curtain, dividing, was loop’d!How that stern face had haunted and hover’d aboutThe dreams it still scared! through what fond fear and doubtHad the boy yearn’d in heart to the hero. (What’s likeA boy’s love for some famous man?)… Oh, to strikeA wild path through the battle, down striking perchanceSome rash foeman too near the great soldier of France,And so fall in his glorious regard!… Oft, how oft,Had his heart flash’d this hope out, whilst watching aloftThe dim battle that plume dance and dart—never seenSo near till this moment! how eager to gleanEvery stray word, dropp’d through the camp-babble in praiseOf his hero—each tale of old venturous daysIn the desert! And now… could he speak out his heartFace to face with that man ere he died!
XXXIII.
With a startThe sick soldier sprang up: the blood sprang up in him,To his throat, and o’erthrew him: he reel’d back: a dimSanguine haze fill’d his eyes; in his ears rose the dinAnd rush, as of cataracts loosen’d within,Through which he saw faintly, and heard, the pale nun(Looking larger than life, where she stood in the sun)Point to him and murmur, “Behold!” Then that plumeSeem’d to wave like a fire, and fade off in the gloomWhich momently put out the world.
XXXIV.
To his sideMoved the man the boy dreaded yet loved… “Ah!”… he sigh’d,“The smooth brow, the fair Vargrave face! and those eyes,All the mother’s! The old things again!“Do not rise.You suffer, young man?”
THE BOY.
Sir, I die.
THE DUKE.
Not so young!
THE BOY.
So young? yes! and yet I have tangled amongThe fray’d warp and woof of this brief life of mineOther lives than my own. Could my death but untwineThe vext skein… but it will not. Yes, Duke, young—so young!And I knew you not? yet I have done you a wrongIrreparable!… late, too late to repair.If I knew any means… but I know none!… I swear,If this broken fraction of time could extendInto infinite lives of atonement, no endWould seem too remote for my grief (could that be!)To include it! Not too late, however, for meTo entreat: is it too late for you to forgive?
THE DUKE.
You wrong—my forgiveness—explain.
THE BOY.
Could I live!Such a very few hours left to life, yet I shrink,I falter… Yes, Duke, your forgiveness I thinkShould free my soul hence.Ah! you could not surmiseThat a boy’s beating heart, burning thoughts, longing eyesWere following you evermore (heeded not!)While the battle was flowing between us: nor whatEager, dubious footsteps at nightfall oft wentWith the wind and the rain, round and round your blind tent,Persistent and wild as the wind and the rain,Unnoticed as these, weak as these, and as vain!Oh, how obdurate then look’d your tent! The waste airGrew stern at the gleam which said… “Off! he is there!”I know not what merciful mystery nowBrings you here, whence the man whom you see lying lowOther footsteps (not those!) must soon bear to the grave.But death is at hand, and the few words I haveYet to speak, I must speak them at once.Duke, I swear,As I lie here, (Death’s angel too close not to hear!)That I meant not this wrong to you. Duc de Luvois,I loved your niece—loved? why, I LOVE her! I saw,And, seeing, how could I but love her? I seem’dBorn to love her. Alas, were that all! Had I dream’dOf this love’s cruel consequence as it rests nowEver fearfully present before me, I vowThat the secret, unknown, had gone down to the tombInto which I descend… Oh why, whilst there was roomIn life left for warning, had no one the heartTo warn me? Had any one whisper’d… “Depart!”To the hope the whole world seem’d in league then to nurse!Had any one hinted… “Beware of the curseWhich is coming!” There was not a voice raised to tell,Not a hand moved to warn from the blow ere it fell,And then… then the blow fell on BOTH! This is whyI implore you to pardon that great injuryWrought on her, and, through her, wrought on you, Heaven knowsHow unwittingly!
THE DUKE.
Ah!… and, young soldier, supposeThat I came here to seek, not grant, pardon?—
THE BOY.
Of whom?
THE DUKE.
Of yourself.
THE BOY.
Duke, I bear in my heart to the tombNo boyish resentment; not one lonely thoughtThat honors you not. In all this there is naught’Tis for me to forgive.Every glorious actOf your great life starts forward, an eloquent fact,To confirm in my boy’s heart its faith in your own.And have I not hoarded, to ponder upon,A hundred great acts from your life? Nay, all these,Were they so many lying and false witnesses,Does there rest not ONE voice which was never untrue?I believe in Constance, Duke, as she does in you!In this great world around us, wherever we turn,Some grief irremediable we discern;And yet—there sits God, calm in Heaven above!Do we trust one whit less in his justice or love?I judge not.
THE DUKE.
Enough! Hear at last, then, the truthYour father and I—foes we were in our youth.It matters not why. Yet thus much understand:The hope of my youth was sign’d out by his hand.I was not of those whom the buffets of fateTame and teach; and my heart buried slain love in hate.If your own frank young heart, yet unconscious of allWhich turns the heart’s blood in its springtide to gall,And unable to guess even aught that the furrowAcross these gray brows hides of sin or of sorrow,Comprehends not the evil and grief of my life,‘Twill at least comprehend how intense was the strifeWhich is closed in this act of atonement, wherebyI seek in the son of my youth’s enemyThe friend of my age. Let the present releaseHere acquitted the past! In the name of my niece,Whom for my life in yours as a hostage I give,Are you great enough, boy, to forgive me,—and live?
Whilst he spoke thus, a doubtful tumultuous joyChased its fleeting effects o’er the face of the boy:As when some stormy moon, in a long cloud confined,Struggles outward through shadows, the varying windAlternates, and bursts, self-surprised, from her prison,So that slow joy grew clear in his face. He had risenTo answer the Duke; but strength fail’d every limb;A strange, happy feebleness trembled through him.With a faint cry of rapturous wonder, he sankOn the breast of the nun, who stood near.“Yes, boy! thankThis guardian angel,” the Duke said. “I—you,We owe all to her. Crown her work. Live! be trueTo your young life’s fair promise, and live for her sake!”“Yes, Duke: I will live. I MUST live—live to makeMy whole life the answer you claim,” the boy said,“For joy does not kill!”Back again the faint headDeclined on the nun’s gentle bosom. She sawHis lips quiver, and motion’d the Duke to withdrawAnd leave them a moment together.He eyedThem both with a wistful regard; turn’d and sigh’d,And lifted the tent-door, and pass’d from the tent.
XXXV.
Like a furnace, the fervid, intense occidentFrom its hot seething levels a great glare struck upOn the sick metal sky. And, as out of a cupSome witch watches boiling wild portents arise,Monstrous clouds, mass’d, misshapen, and ting’d with strange dyes,Hover’d over the red fume, and changed to weird shapesAs of snakes, salamanders, efts, lizards, storks, apes,Chimeras, and hydras: whilst—ever the sameIn the midst of all these (creatures fused by his flame,And changed by his influence!) changeless, as when,Ere he lit down to death generations of men,O’er that crude and ungainly creation, which thereWith wild shapes this cloud-world seem’d to mimic in air,The eye of Heaven’s all-judging witness, he shone.And shall shine on the ages we reach not—the sun!
XXXVI.
Nature posted her parable thus in the skies,And the man’s heart bore witness. Life’s vapors ariseAnd fall, pass and change, group themselves and revolveRound the great central life, which is love: these dissolveAnd resume themselves, here assume beauty, there terror;And the phantasmagoria of infinite error,And endless complexity, lasts but a while;Life’s self, the immortal, immutable smileOf God, on the soul in the deep heart of HeavenLives changeless, unchanged: and our morning and evenAre earth’s alternations, not Heaven’s.
XXXVII.
While he yetWatched the skies, with this thought in his heart; while he setThus unconsciously all his life forth in his mind,Summ’d it up, search’d it out, proved it vapor and wind,And embraced the new life which that hour had reveal’d,—Love’s life, which earth’s life had defaced and conceal’d;Lucile left the tent and stood by him.Her treadAroused him; and, turning towards her, he said:“O Soeur Seraphine, are you happy?”“Eugene,What is happier than to have hoped not in vain?”She answer’d,—“And you?”“Yes.”“You do not repent?”“No.”“Thank Heaven!” she murmur’d. He musingly bentHis looks on the sunset, and somewhat apartWhere he stood, sigh’d, as though to his innermost heart,“O bless’d are they, amongst whom I was not,Whose morning unclouded, without stain or spot,Predicts a pure evening; who, sunlike, in lightHave traversed, unsullied, the world, and set bright!”But she in response, “Mark yon ship far away,Asleep on the wave, in the last light of day,With all its hush’d thunders shut up! Would you knowA thought which came to me a few days ago,Whilst watching those ships?… When the great Ship of LifeSurviving, though shatter’d, the tumult and strifeOf earth’s angry element,—masts broken short,Decks drench’d, bulwarks beaten—drives safe into port;When the Pilot of Galilee, seen on the strand,Stretches over the waters a welcoming hand;When, heeding no longer the sea’s baffled roar,The mariner turns to his rest evermore;What will then be the answer the helmsman must give?Will it be… ‘Lo our log-book! Thus once did we liveIn the zones of the South; thus we traversed the seasOf the Orient; there dwelt with the Hesperides;Thence follow’d the west wind; here, eastward we turn’d;The stars fail’d us there; just here land we discern’dOn our lee; there the storm overtook us at last;That day went the bowsprit, the next day the mast;There the mermen came round us, and there we saw baskA siren?’ The Captain of Port will he askAny one of such questions? I cannot think so!But… ‘What is the last Bill of Health you can show?’Not—How fared the soul through the trials she pass’d?But—What is the state of that soul at the last?”
“May it be so!” he sigh’d. “There the sun drops, behold!”And indeed, whilst he spoke all the purple and goldIn the west had turn’d ashen, save one fading stripOf light that yet gleam’d from the dark nether lipOf a long reef of cloud; and o’er sullen ravinesAnd ridges the raw damps were hanging white screensOf melancholy mist.“Nunc dimittis?” she said.“O God of the living! whilst yet ‘mid the deadAnd the dying we stand here alive, and thy daysReturning, admit space for prayer and for praise,In both these confirm us!“The helmsman, Eugene,Needs the compass to steer by. Pray always. AgainWe two part: each to work out Heaven’s will: you, I trust,In the world’s ample witness; and I, as I must,In secret and silence: you, love, fame, await;Me, sorrow and sickness. We meet at one gateWhen all’s over. The ways they are many and wide,And seldom are two ways the same. Side by sideMay we stand at the same little door when all’s done!The ways they are many, the end it is one.He that knocketh shall enter: who asks shall obtain:And who seeketh, he findeth. Remember, Eugene!”She turn’d to depart.“Whither? whither?”… he said.She stretch’d forth her hand where, already outspreadOn the darken’d horizon, remotely they sawThe French camp-fires kindling.“See yonder vast host, with its manifold heartMade as one man’s by one hope! The hope ’tis your partTo aid towards achievement, to save from reverseMine, through suffering to soothe, and through sickness to nurse.I go to my work: you to yours.”
XXXVIII.
Whilst she spoke,On the wide wasting evening there distantly brokeThe low roll of musketry. Straightway, anon,From the dim Flag-staff Battery bellow’d a gun.“Our chasseurs are at it!” he mutter’d.She turn’d,Smiled, and pass’d up the twilight.He faintly discern’dHer form, now and then, on the flat lurid skyRise, and sink, and recede through the mists: by and byThe vapors closed round, and he saw her no more.
XXXIX.
Nor shall we. For her mission, accomplish’d, is o’er.The mission of genius on earth! To uplift,Purify, and confirm by its own gracious gift,The world, in despite of the world’s dull endeavorTo degrade, and drag down, and oppose it forever.The mission of genius: to watch, and to wait,To renew, to redeem, and to regenerate.The mission of woman on earth! to give birthTo the mercy of Heaven descending on earth.The mission of woman: permitted to bruiseThe head of the serpent, and sweetly infuse,Through the sorrow and sin of earth’s register’d curse,The blessing which mitigates all: born to nurse,And to soothe, and to solace, to help and to healThe sick world that leans on her. This was Lucile.
XL.
A power hid in pathos: a fire veil’d in cloud:Yet still burning outward: a branch which, though bow’dBy the bird in its passage, springs upward again:Through all symbols I search for her sweetness—in vain!Judge her love by her life. For our life is but loveIn act. Pure was hers: and the dear God above,Who knows what His creatures have need of for life,And whose love includes all loves, through much patient strifeLed her soul into peace. Love, though love may be givenIn vain, is yet lovely. Her own native heavenMore clearly she mirror’d, as life’s troubled dreamWore away; and love sigh’d into rest, like a streamThat breaks its heart over wild rocks toward the shoreOf the great sea which hushes it up evermoreWith its little wild wailing. No stream from its sourceFlows seaward, how lonely soever its course,But what some land is gladden’d. No star ever roseAnd set, without influence somewhere. Who knowsWhat earth needs from earth’s lowest creature? No lifeCan be pure in its purpose and strong in its strifeAnd all life not be purer and stronger thereby.The spirits of just men made perfect on high,The army of martyrs who stand by the ThroneAnd gaze into the face that makes glorious their own,Know this, surely, at last. Honest love, honest sorrow,Honest work for the day, honest hope for the morrow,Are these worth nothing more than the hand they make weary,The heart they have sadden’d, the life they leave dreary?Hush! the sevenhold heavens to the voice of the SpiritEcho: He that o’ercometh shall all things inherit.
XLI.
The moon was, in fire, carried up through the fog;The loud fortress bark’d at her like a chained dog.The horizon pulsed flame, the air sound. All without,War and winter, and twilight, and terror, and doubt;All within, light, warmth, calm!In the twilight, longwhileEugene de Luvois with a deep, thoughtful smileLinger’d, looking, and listening, lone by the tent.At last he withdrew, and night closed as he went.