Evolution of Expression Volume Ii Part 7

LIFE AND SONG.

I.

If life were caught by a clarionet, And a wild heart throbbing in the reed, Should thrill its joy and trill its fret, And utter its heart in every deed,

II.

Then would this breathing clarionet Type what the poet fain would be; For none o' the singers ever yet Has wholly lived his minstrelsy;

III.

Or clearly sung his true, true thought; Or utterly bodied forth his life, Or out of life and song has wrought The perfect one of man and wife;

IV.

Or lived and sung, that Life and Song Might each express the other's all, Careless if life or art were long Since both were one, to stand or fall.

V.

So that the wonder struck the crowd, Who shouted it about the land: His song was only living aloud, His work, a singing with his hand!

SIDNEY LANIER.

GATHERING SONG OF DONALD THE BLACK.

I.

Pibroch of Donuil Dhu Pibroch of Donuil Wake thy wild voice anew, Summon Clan Conuil.

Come away, come away, Hark to the summons!

Come in your war-array, Gentles and commons.

II.

Come from deep glen, and From mountain so rocky; The war-pipe and pennon Are at Inverlocky.

Come every hill-plaid, and True heart that wears one, Come every steel blade, and Strong hand that bears one.

III.

Leave untended the herd, The flock without shelter; Leave the corpse uninterr'd, The bride at the altar; Leave the deer, leave the steer, Leave nets and barges: Come with your fighting gear, Broadswords and targes.

IV.

Come as the winds come, when Forests are rended, Come as the waves come, when Navies are stranded: Faster come, faster come, Faster and faster, Chief, va.s.sal, page and groom, Tenant and master.

V.

Fast they come, fast they come; See how they gather!

Wide waves the eagle plume Blended with heather.

Cast your plaids, draw your blades, Forward each man set!

Pibroch of Donuil Dhu Knell for the onset!

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

NUTTING.

I.

It seems a day (I speak of one from many singled out) One of those heavenly days that cannot die; When, in the eagerness of boyish hope, I left our cottage-threshold, sallying forth With a huge wallet o'er my shoulders slung, A nutting-crook in hand; and turned my steps Tow'rd some far-distant wood, a Figure quaint, Tricked out in proud disguise of cast-off weeds Which for that service had been husbanded, By exhortation of my frugal Dame-- Motley accoutrement, of power to smile At thorns, and brakes, and brambles,--and, in truth, More ragged than need was!

II.

O'er pathless rocks, Through beds of matted fern, and tangled thickets, Forcing my way, I came to one dear nook Unvisited, where not a broken bough Drooped with its withered leaves, ungracious sign Of devastation; but the hazels rose Tall and erect, with tempting cl.u.s.ters hung, A virgin scene!--A little while I stood, Breathing with such suppression of the heart As joy delights in; and, with wise restraint Voluptuous, fearless of a rival, eyed The banquet;--or beneath the trees I sate Among the flowers, and with the flowers I played; A temper known to those, who, after long And weary expectation, have been blest With sudden happiness beyond all hope.

III.

Perhaps it was a bower beneath whose leaves The violets of five seasons re-appear And fade, unseen by any human eye; Where fairy water-breaks do murmur on Forever; and I saw the sparkling foam, And--with my cheek on one of those green stones That, fleeced with moss, under the shady trees, Lay round me, scattered like a flock of sheep-- I heard the murmur and the murmuring sound, In that sweet mood when pleasure loves to pay Tribute to ease; and, of its joy secure, The heart luxuriates with indifferent things, Wasting its kindliness on stocks and stones, And on the vacant air.

IV.

Then up I rose, And dragged to earth both branch and bough, with crash And merciless ravage; and the shady nook Of hazels, and the green and mossy bower, Deformed and sullied, patiently gave up Their quiet being: and, unless I now Confound my present feelings with the past; Ere from the mutilated bower I turned Exulting, rich beyond the wealth of kings, I felt a sense of pain when I beheld The silent trees, and saw the intruding sky-- Then, dearest Maiden, move along these shades In gentleness of heart; with gentle hand Touch--for there is a spirit in the woods.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

THE DODSON FAMILY.

_From Mill on the Floss._

PART I.

1. The Dodsons were certainly a handsome family, and Mrs. Glegg was not the least handsome of the sisters. As she sat in Mrs. Tulliver's arm-chair, no impartial observer could have denied that for a woman of fifty she had a very comely face and figure. It is true she despised the advantages of costume, for though, as she often observed, no woman had better clothes, it was not her way to wear her new things out before her old ones. Other women, if they liked, might have their best thread-lace in every wash; but when Mrs. Glegg died, it would be found that she had better lace laid by in the right-hand drawer of her wardrobe, in the Spotted Chamber, than ever Mrs. Wooll of St. Ogg's had bought in her life, although Mrs. Wooll wore her lace before it was paid for.

2. So of her curled fronts: to look out on the week-day world from under a crisp and glossy front, would be to introduce a most dreamlike and unpleasant confusion between the sacred and the secular. Occasionally, indeed, Mrs. Glegg wore one of her third-best fronts on a week-day visit, but not at a sister's house; especially not at Mrs. Tulliver's, who, since her marriage, had hurt her sisters' feelings greatly by wearing her own hair. But Bessy was always weak!

3. So if Mrs. Glegg's front to-day was more fuzzy and lax than usual, she had a design under it: she intended the most pointed and cutting allusion to Mrs. Tulliver's bunches of blond curls, separated from each other by a due wave of smoothness on each side of the parting. Mrs.

Tulliver had shed tears several times at sister Glegg's unkindness on the subject of these unmatronly curls, but the consciousness of looking the handsomer for them, naturally administered support.

4. Mrs. Glegg chose to wear her bonnet in the house to-day--untied and tilted slightly, of course--a frequent practice of hers when she was on a visit, and happened to be in a severe humor: she didn't know what draughts there might be in strange houses. For the same reason she wore a small sable tippet, which reached just to her shoulders, and was very far from meeting across her well-formed chest, while her long neck was protected by a _chevaux-de-frise_ of miscellaneous frilling. One would need to be learned in the fas.h.i.+ons of those times to know how far in the rear of them Mrs. Glegg's slate-colored silk gown must have been; but from certain constellations of small yellow spots upon it, and a mouldy odor about it suggestive of a damp clothes-chest, it was probable that it belonged to a stratum of garments just old enough to have come recently into wear.

5. Mrs. Glegg held her large gold watch in her hand with the many-doubled chain round her fingers, and observed to Mrs. Tulliver, who had just returned from a visit to the kitchen, that whatever it might be by other people's clocks and watches, it was gone half-past twelve by hers.

6. "I don't know what ails sister Pullet," she continued. "It used to be the way in our family for one to be as early as another,--I'm sure it was so in my poor father's time,--and not for one sister to sit half an hour before the others came. But if the ways o' the family are altered, it shan't be _my_ fault--_I'll_ never be the one to come into a house when all the rest are going away. I wonder _at_ sister Deane--she used to be more like me. But if you'll take my advice, Bessy, you'll put the dinner forrard a bit, sooner than put it back, because folks are late as ought to ha' known better."

7. "Oh dear, there's no fear but what they'll be all here in time, sister," said Mrs. Tulliver, in her mild-peevish tone. "The dinner won't be ready till half-past one. But if it's long for you to wait, let me fetch you a cheesecake and a gla.s.s o' wine."

"Well, Bessy!" said Mrs. Glegg, with a bitter smile, and a scarcely perceptible toss of her head, "I should ha' thought you'd known your own sister better. I never _did_ eat between meals, and I'm not going to begin. Not but what I hate that nonsense of having your dinner at half-past one, when you might have it at one. You was never brought up in that way, Bessy."