The Yellow Book Volume I Part 22

"How did you know?"

"I sent Liz to listen," she answered mechanically.

He looked about him, helpless.

"I think I'll smoke," he said feebly.

She made no answer.

"Here, put the gla.s.s down," she said.

He obeyed.

He lit a cigarette over the lamp, sat down opposite her, puffing dense clouds of smoke.

And, for a long while, neither spoke.

"Is that doctor a good man?"

"I don't know. People say so," he answered.

Two Songs

By John Davidson

I--London

Athwart the sky a lowly sigh From west to east the sweet wind carried; The sun stood still on Primrose Hill; His light in all the city tarried: The clouds on viewless columns bloomed Like smouldering lilies unconsumed.

"Oh, sweetheart, see, how shadowy, Of some occult magician's rearing, Or swung in s.p.a.ce of Heaven's grace, Dissolving, dimly reappearing, Afloat upon ethereal tides St. Paul above the city rides!"

A rumour broke through the thin smoke Enwreathing Abbey, Tower, and Palace, The parks, the squares, the thoroughfares, The million-peopled lanes and alleys, An ever-muttering prisoned storm, The heart of London beating warm.

II-Down-a-down

Foxes peeped from out their dens, Day grew pale and olden; Blackbirds, willow-warblers, wrens, Staunched their voices golden.

High, oh high, from the opal sky, Shouting against the dark, "Why, why, why must the day go by?"

Fell a pa.s.sionate lark.

But the cuckoos beat their brazen gongs, Sounding, sounding so; And the nightingales poured in starry songs A galaxy below.

Slowly tolling the vesper bell Ushered the stately night.

Down-a-down in a hawthorn dell A boy and a girl and love's delight.

The Love-Story of Luigi Tansillo

By Richard Garnett

Now that my wings are spread to my desire, The more vast height withdraws the dwindling land, Wider to wind these pinions I expand, And earth disdain, and higher mount and higher Nor of the fate of Icarus inquire, Or cautious droop, or sway to either hand; Dead I shall fall, full well I understand; But who lives gloriously as I expire?

Yet hear I my own heart that pleading cries, Stay, madman! Whither art thou bound? Descend!

Ruin is ready Rashness to chastise.

But I, Fear not, though this indeed the end; Cleave we the clouds, and praise our destinies, If n.o.ble fall on n.o.ble flight attend.

The above sonnet, one of the finest in Italian literature, is already known to many English readers in another translation by the late Mr. J.

Addington Symonds, which originally appeared in the _Cornhill Magazine_, and is prefixed to his translation of the sonnets of Michael Angelo and Campanella (London, 1878), under the t.i.tle of "The Philosopher's Flight." In his preface Mr. Symonds says: "The sonnet prefixed as a proem to the whole book is generally attributed to Giordano Bruno, in whose Dialogue in the 'Eroici Furori' it occurs. There seems, however, good reason to suppose that it was really written by Tansillo, who recites it in that dialogue. Whoever may have been its author, it expresses in n.o.ble and impa.s.sioned verse the sense of danger, the audacity, and the exultation of those pioneers of modern thought, for whom philosophy was a voyage of discovery into untravelled regions." Mr.

Symonds's knowledge of Italian literature was so extensive that he must have had ground for stating that the sonnet is generally attributed to Giordano Bruno; as it certainly is by De Sanctis, though it is printed as Tansillo's in all editions of his works, imperfect as these were before the appearance of Signor Fiorentino's in 1882. It is, nevertheless, remarkable that he should add: "_There seems good reason to suppose_ that it was really written by Tansillo," as if there could be a shadow of doubt on the matter. "Eroici Furori" is professedly a series of dialogues between Luigi Tansillo the Neapolitan poet, who had died about twenty years before their composition, and Cicero, but is in reality little more than a monologue, for Tansillo does nearly all the talking, and Cicero receives his instructions with singular docility.

The reason of Tansillo's selection for so great an honour was undoubtedly that, although born at Venosa, he belonged by descent to Nola, Bruno's own city. In making such free use of Tansillo's poetry as he has done throughout these dialogues, Bruno was far from the least idea of pillaging his distinguished countryman. In introducing the four sonnets he has borrowed (for there are three besides that already quoted) he is always careful to make Tansillo speak of them as his own compositions, which he never does when Bruno's own verses are put into his mouth. If a particle of doubt could remain, it would be dispelled by the fact that this sonnet, with other poems by Tansillo, including the three other sonnets introduced into Bruno's dialogue, is published under his name in the "Rime di diversi ill.u.s.tri Signori Napoletani," edited by Lodovico Dolce at Venice, in 1555, when Bruno was about seven years old!

Mr. Symonds's interpretation of the sonnet also is erroneous--in so far, at least, as that the meaning a.s.signed by him never entered into the head of the author. It is certainly fully susceptible of such an exposition. But Tansillo, no philosopher, but a cavalier, the active part of whose life was mainly spent in naval expeditions against the Turks, no more thought with Mr. Symonds of "the pioneers of modern philosophy," than he thought with Bruno of "arising and freeing himself from the body and sensual cognition." On the contrary, the sonnet is a love-sonnet, and depicts with extraordinary grandeur the elation of spirit, combined with a sense of peril, consequent upon the poet having conceived a pa.s.sion for a lady greatly his superior in rank. The proof of this is to be found in the fact that the sonnet is one of a series, unequivocally celebrating an earthly pa.s.sion; and especially in the sonnet immediately preceding it in Dolce's collection, manifestly written at the same time and referring to the same circ.u.mstance, in which the poet ascribes his Icarian flight, not to the influence of Philosophy, but of Love:

Love fits me forth with wings, which so dilate, Sped skyward at the call of daring thought, I high and higher soar, with purpose fraught Soon to lay smiting hand on Heaven's gate.

Yet alt.i.tude so vast might well abate My confidence, if Love not succour brought, Pledging my fame not jeopardised in aught, And promising renown as ruin great.

If he whom like audacity inspired, Falling gave name immortal to the flood, As sunny flame his waxen pinion fired; Then of thee too it shall be understood, No meaner prize than Heaven thy soul required, And firmer than thy life thy courage stood.

The meaning of the two sonnets is fully recognised by Muratori, who prints them together in his treatise, "Della perfetta poesia," and adds: "_volea dire costui che s'era imbarcato in un'amor troppo alto, e s'andava facendo coraggio_."

This is surely one of the most remarkable instances possible to adduce of the infinite significance of true poetry, and its capacity for inspiring ideas and suggesting interpretations of which the poet never dreamed, but which are nevertheless fairly deducible from his expressions.

It is now a matter of considerable interest to ascertain the ident.i.ty of this lady of rank, who could inspire a pa.s.sion at once so exalted and so perilous. The point has been investigated by Tansillo's editor, Signor F. Fiorentino, who has done so much to rescue his unpublished compositions from oblivion, and his view must be p.r.o.nounced perfectly satisfactory. She was Maria d'Aragona, Marchioness del Vasto, whose husband, the Marquis del Vasto, a celebrated general of Spanish descent, famous as Charles the Fifth's right hand in his successful expedition against Tunis, and at one time governor of the Milanese, was as remarkable for his jealousy as the lady, grand-daughter of a King of Naples, was for her pride and haughtiness. Fiorentino proves his case by showing how well all personal allusions in Tansillo's poems, so far as they can be traced, agree with the circ.u.mstances of the Marchioness, and in particular that the latter is represented as at one time residing on the island of Ischia, where del Vasto was accustomed to deposit his wife for security, when absent on his campaigns. He is apparently not aware that the object of Tansillo's affection had already been identified with a member of the house of Aragon by Faria e Sousa, the Portuguese editor of Camoens, who, in his commentary on Camoens's sixty-ninth sonnet, gives an interminable catalogue of ladies celebrated by enamoured poets, and says, "Tansillo sang Donna Isabel de Aragon."

This lady, however, the niece of the Marchioness del Vasto, was a little girl in Tansillo's time, and is only mentioned by him as inconsolable for the death of a favourite dwarf.

The sentiment, therefore, of the two sonnets of Tansillo which we have quoted, is sufficiently justified by the exalted station of the lady who had inspired his pa.s.sion, and the risk he ran from the power and jealousy of her husband. It seems certain, however, that the Marquis had on his part no ground for apprehension. Maria d'Aragona does not seem to have had much heart to bestow upon anyone, and would, in any case, have disdained to bestow what heart she had upon a poor gentleman and retainer of Don Garcia de Toledo, son of the Viceroy of Naples. She would think that she honoured him beyond his deserts by accepting his poetical homage. Tansillo, on his part, says in one of his sonnets that his devotion is purely platonic; it might have been more ardent, he hints, but he is dazzled by the splendour of the light he contemplates, and intimidated by the richness of the band by which he is led. So it may have been at first, but as time wore on the poet naturally craved some proof that his lady was not entirely indifferent to him, and did not tolerate him merely for the sake of his verses. This, in the nature of things, could not be given; and the poet's raptures pa.s.s into doubt and suspicion, thence into despairing resignation; thence into resentment and open hostility, terminating in a cold reconciliation, leaving him free to marry a much humbler but probably a more affectionate person, to whom he addresses no impa.s.sioned sonnets, but whom he instructs in a very elegant poem ("La Balia") how to bring up her infant children. These varying affections are depicted with extreme liveliness in a series of sonnets, of which we propose to offer some translated specimens. The order will not be that of the editions of Tansillo, where the pieces are distributed at random, but the probable order of composition, as indicated by the nature of the feeling expressed. It is, of course, impossible to give more than a few examples, though most deserve to be reproduced. Tansillo had the advantage over most Italian poets of his time of being in love with a real woman; hence, though possibly inferior in style and diction to such artists in rhyme as Bembo or Molza, he greatly surpa.s.ses them in all the qualities that discriminate poetry from the accomplishment of verse.

The first sonnet which we shall give is still all fire and rapture:--

I

Lady, the heart that entered through your eyes Returneth not. Well may he make delay, For if the very windows that display Your spirit, sparkle in such wondrous wise, Of her enthroned within this Paradise What shall be deemed? If heart for ever stay, Small wonder, dazzled by more radiant day Than gazers from without can recognise.

Glory of sun and moon and silver star In firmament above, are these not sign Of things within more excellent by far?

Rejoice then in thy kingdom, heart of mine, While Love and Fortune favourable are, Nor thou yet exiled for default of thine.

Although, however, Tansillo's heart might well remain with its lady, Tansillo's person was necessitated to join the frequent maritime expeditions of the great n.o.bleman to whom he was attached, Don Garcia de Toledo, against the Turks. The constant free-booting of the Turkish and Barbary rovers kept the Mediterranean in a state of commotion comparable to that of the Spanish Main in the succeeding age, and these expeditions, whose picturesque history remains to be written, were no doubt very interesting; though from a philosophical point of view it is impossible not to sympathise with the humane and generous poet when he inquires:--

Che il Turco nasca turco, e 'l Moro moro, e giusta causa questa, ond'altri ed io Dobbiam incrudelir nel sangue loro?

With such feelings it may well be believed that in his enforced absence he was thinking at least as much of love as of war, and that the following sonnet is as truthful as it is an animated picture of his feelings:--

II