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MAUD. 
 
 A POEM. 
 
 BY ALFRED TENNYSON, 
 
 %l^ ''""'^'*^"*v\*\''^\; 
 
 
 \ 
 
 IL L US TRA TED BY 11. A. HE R R 
 
 PH IL.VnELPH lA : 
 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO. 
 
 1878. 
 

 Copyright, 1877, by j. 15. Ln 
 
 L I !• I'l ncott's Press, 
 
 PhILADKI, PHIA. 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 I llATK THK DRKADIIM, IK )I.I,()\V IJKHINI) THK LITILIi WdoD" . 
 
 For thkrk in thk cjhastly rrr lonc sinck a body was kound" 
 
 (iRINO ON THK WAKKllL KAR IN Till', HUSH OK THK MOONLESS NKiHTS' 
 
 i will iiury myskl.k in my books, am) ihe devil may itl'e to his own' 
 
 Listening now to thk tide in its broad-klung, shipwrhkinc; roar' 
 
 Walk'd in a wintry wind by a ghastly glimmer" . 
 
 Half lost in thk lk.H'id a/irk bloom ok a crescent ok sea" 
 
 I bow'd to his lady-sister as she rodk by on ihk moor" 
 
 Vt)UR mother is mcte in her grave as her ima(;e in marble above' 
 
 Morning arises sTt)RMY and bale" 
 
 And she touch'd my hand wiih a smile so sweet" . 
 
 Here halk hid in thk (ji.kamini; wood" 
 
 Did I drkam it an hour ago, 
 
 Whkn aslkei' in this arm-chair?" 
 
 And once, but onck, she liktkd hkr eye: 
 
 And riding at set ok day" . 
 
 Thkn lki' come what comk may" . 
 
 Birds in the high Hall-garden'" . 
 
 She sits by her music and books" 
 
 Or thk voice ok thk lon(; sea-wavk as 
 
 Now and then in the dim-(;ray dawn" 
 
 When the habby Yes 
 
 Falters from her lips" 
 
 (iii) 
 
 PAGE 
 
 7 
 
ILLUSTRA TIONS. 
 
 Rosy is the West" .... 
 
 Dark cedar, tho' thy limhs have here incrkasI' 
 
 Ant; hark the clock within, the silver knei 
 
 Beat, haitv stars, timing with things helow" 
 
 Betroth'd us over their wine" . 
 
 Sat with her, read to her, night and day"" 
 
 And mean to lincier in it" . 
 
 Come into the (;arden, Maud" 
 
 And a hush with the setting moon" 
 
 She is coming, my own, my sweet" 
 
 Tine TINY cell is forlorn" . 
 
 We stood tranced in long emdkaces' 
 
 She is walking in the meadow"" . 
 
 By the curtains ok my hed 
 
 That abiding phantom cold"" 
 
 The day comes, a dull red ball"" 
 
 Dead, long dead" .... 
 
 And the cobweb woven across the cannon's throat"" 
 
 T embrace the purpose ok God and the doom assign'd" 
 
 PAGE 
 
 44 
 45 
 47 
 48 
 50 
 52 
 55 
 57 
 58 
 61 
 67 
 71 
 73 
 
 74 
 75 
 81 
 86 
 87 
 
 
PART I. 
 
MAUD. 
 
 I. 
 
 T HATP: the dreadful hollow behind the little wood. 
 -*- Its lips in the field above are dabbled with blood-red heath, 
 The red-ribb'd ledges drip with a silent horror of blood, 
 And Fxho there, whatever is ask'd her, answers " Death." 
 
 7 
 
MA UD. 
 
 For there in the ghastly pit \o\\^ since a body was found. 
 His who had given me hfe — O father! O God ! was it well ? — 
 Mangled, and flatten'd, and crush'd, and dinted into the ground 
 There yet lies the rock that fell with him when he fell. 
 
A/A UD. g 
 
 III. 
 Did he fling himself down? who knows? for a vast speculation 
 
 had fail'd, 
 And ever he mutter'd and madden'd, and ever wann'd with 
 
 despair, 
 And out he walk'd when the wind h'ke a broken worldh'ng wail'd, 
 And the flying gold of the ruin'd woodlands drove thro' the air. 
 
 IV. 
 
 I remember the time, for the roots of my hair were stirr'd 
 
 By a shuffled step, by a dead weight trail'd, by a whisper'd fright. 
 
 And my pulses closed their gates with a shock on my heart as I 
 
 heard 
 The shrill-edged shriek of a mother divide the shuddering night. 
 
 V. 
 
 Villany somewhere ! whose ? One says, we are villains all. 
 Not he: his honest fame should at least by me be maintain'd : 
 But that old man, now lord of the broad estate and the Hall, 
 Dropt off gorged from a scheme that had left us flaccid and 
 drain'd. 
 
 VI. • 
 
 Why do they prate of the blessings of Peace ? we have made 
 them a curse, 
 
 Pickpockets, each hand lusting for all that is not its own ; 
 
 And lust of gain, in the spirit of Cain, is it better or worse 
 
 Than the heart of the citizen hissing in war on his own hearth- 
 stone ? 
 
lO 
 
 A/A VD. 
 
 But these are the days of advance, the works of the men of 
 
 mind, 
 When who but a fool would have faith in a tradesman's ware or 
 
 his word ? 
 Is it peace or war? Civil war, as I think, and that of a kind 
 The viler, as underhand, not openly bearing the sword. 
 
 Sooner or later I too may passively take the print 
 Of the golden age — why not ? I have neither hope nor trust ; 
 May make my heart as a millstone, set my face as a flint, 
 Cheat and be cheated, and die : who knows ? we are ashes and 
 dust. 
 
 Peace sitting under her olive, and slurring the days gone by. 
 When the poor are hovell'd and hustled together, each sex, like 
 
 swine. 
 When only the ledger lives, and when only not all men lie; 
 Peace in her vineyard — yes ! — but a company forges the wine. 
 
 And the vitriol madness flushes up in the ruffian's head. 
 Till the filthy by-lane rings to the yell of the trampled wife, 
 And chalk and alum and phster are sold to the poor for bread. 
 And the spirit of murder works in the very means of life, 
 
MAUD. 
 
 II 
 
 lim^. 
 
 And Sleep must lie down arm'd, for the villanous centre-bits 
 Grind on the wakeful ear in the hush of the moonless nights, 
 While another is cheating the sick of a few last gasps, as he sits 
 To pestle a poison'd poison behind his crimson lights. 
 
12 
 
 MAUD. 
 
 XII. 
 When a Mammonite mother kills her babe for a burial fee, 
 And Ti mo ur- Mammon grins on a pile of children's bones, 
 Is it peace or war? better, war! loud war by land and by sea. 
 War with a thousand battles, and shaking a hundred thrones. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 For I trust if an enemy's fleet came yonder round by the hill, 
 And the rushing battle-bolt sang from the three-decker out of 
 
 the foam, 
 That the smooth-faced snub-nosed rogue would leap from his 
 
 counter and till, 
 And strike, if he could, were it but with his cheating yard-wand, 
 
 home. — 
 
 XIV. 
 
 What ! am I raging alone as my father raged in his mood ? 
 Must / too creep to the hollow and dash myself down and die 
 Rather than hold by the law that I made, nevermore to brood 
 On a horror of shattered limbs and a wretched swindler's lie? 
 
 XV. 
 
 Would there be sorrow for inc? there was love in the passionate 
 
 shriek, 
 Love for the silent thing that had made false haste to the 
 
 grave — 
 Wrapt in a cloak, as I saw him. and thought he would rise and 
 
 speak 
 And rave at the lie and the liar, ah God, as he used to rave. 
 
MAUD. 13 
 
 XVI. 
 I am sick of the Hall and the hill, I am sick of the moor and 
 
 the main. 
 Why should I stay ? can a sweeter chance ever come to me 
 
 here ? 
 O, having the nerves of motion as well as the nerves of pain, 
 Were it not wise if I fled from the place and the pit and the 
 
 fear? 
 
 XVI r. 
 Workmen up at the Hall ! — they are coming back from abroad ; 
 The dark old place will be gilt by the touch of a millionnaire : 
 I have heard, I know not whence, of the singular beauty of 
 
 Maud; 
 I play'd with the girl when a child ; she promised then to be 
 
 fair. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 Maud with her venturous clinibings and tumbles and childish 
 
 escapes, 
 Maud the delight of the village, the ringing joy of the Hall, 
 Maud with her sweet purse-mouth when my father dangled the 
 
 grapes, 
 Maud the beloved of my mother, the moon-faced darling of all, — 
 
 XIX. 
 
 What is she now? My dreams are bad. She may bring me a 
 
 curse. 
 No, there is fatter game on the moor; she will let me alone. 
 
14 MAUD. 
 
 Thanks, for the fiend best knows whether woman or man be the 
 
 worse. 
 I will bury myself in my books, and the Devil ma}' pipe to his own. 
 
 II. 
 
 Long have I sigh'd for a calm : God grant I may find it at last ! 
 It will never be broken by Maud, she has neither savor nor salt. 
 But a cold and clear-cut face, as I found when her carriage past, 
 Perfectly beautiful : let it be granted her : where is the fault ? 
 All that I saw (for her eyes were downcast, not to be seen) 
 Faultily faultless, icily regular, splendidly null, 
 Dead perfection, no more ; nothing more, if it had not been 
 For a chance of travel, a paleness, an hour's defect of the rose, 
 Or an underlip, you may call it a little too ripe, too full. 
 Or the least little delicate aquiline curve in a sensitive nose. 
 From which I escaped heart-free, with the least little touch of 
 spleen. 
 
MA UD. 
 
 15 
 
 III. 
 Cold and clear-cut face, why come you so cruelly meek, 
 Breaking a slumber in which all spleenful folly was drown'd, 
 Pale with the golden beam of an eyelash dead on the cheek, 
 Passionless, pale, cold face, star-sweet on a gloom profound; 
 
i6 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 Womanlike, taking revenge too deep for a transient wrong 
 Done but in thought to your beauty, and ever as pale as before 
 Growing and fading and growing upon me without a sound, 
 Luminous, gemlike, ghostlike, deathlike, half the night long 
 Growing and fading and growing, till I could bear it no more, 
 But arose, and all by myself in my own dark garden ground, 
 Listening now to the tide in its broad-flung shipwrecking roar, 
 Now to the scream of a madden'd beach dragg'd down by the 
 
 Walk'd in a wintry wind by a ghastly glimmer, and found 
 The shining daffodil dead, and Orion low in his grave. 
 
 IV. 
 
 A MILLION emeralds break from the ruby-budded lime 
 In the little grove where I sit— ah, wherefore cannot I be 
 Like things of the season gay, like the bountiful season bland, 
 When the far-off sail is blown by the breeze of a softer clime. 
 
MA UD. 
 
 17 
 
 Half lost in the liquid azure bloom of a crescent of sea, 
 The silent sapphire-spangled marriage ring of the land ? 
 
 Below me, there, is the village, and looks how quiet and small! 
 And yet bubbles o'er like a city, with gossip, scandal, and spite; 
 And Jack on his alehouse bench has as many lies as a Czai- ; 
 And here, on the landward side, by a red rock, glimmers tht 
 
 Hall; 
 And up in the high Hall-garden I see her pass like a light ; 
 But sorrow seize me if ever that light be my leading star ! 
 
 III. 
 
 When have I bow'd to her father, the wrinkled head of the 
 
 race? 
 
 I met her to-day with her brother ; but not to her brother I 
 
 bow'd; 
 
 2 
 
i8 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 I bow'd to his lady-sister as she rode by on the moor; 
 But the fire of a fooh'sh pride flash'd over her beautiful face. 
 O child, you wrong your beauty, believe it. in being so proud ; 
 Your father has wealth well gotten, and I am nameless and pooi 
 
 IV. 
 
 I keep but a man and a maid, ever ready to slander and steal 
 I know it, and smile a hard-set smile, like a stoic, or hke 
 A wiser epicurean, and let the world have its way : 
 
MAUD. IQ 
 
 For nature is one with rapine, a harm no preacher can heal ; 
 The Mayfly is torn by the swallow, the sparrow spear'd by the 
 
 shrike. 
 And the whole little wood where I sit is a world of plunder and 
 
 prey. 
 
 V. 
 
 We are puppets, Man in his pride, and Beauty fair in her flower; 
 Do we move ourselves, or are moved by an unseen hand at a game 
 That pushes us off" from the board, and others ever succeed ? 
 Ah yet, we cannot be kind to each other here for an hour; 
 We whisper, and hint, and chuckle, and grin at a brother's shame ; 
 However we brave it out, we men are a little breed. 
 
 VI. 
 
 A monstrous eft was of old the Lord and Master of Earth, 
 For him did his high sun flame, and his river billowing ran. 
 And he felt himself in his force to be Nature's crowning race. 
 As nine months go to the shaping an infant ripe for his birth, 
 So many a million of ages have gone to the making of man : 
 He now is first, but is he the last ? is he not too base ? 
 
 VII. 
 
 The man of science himself is fonder of glory, and vain, 
 An eye well practised in nature, a spirit bounded and poor; 
 The passionate heart of the poet is whirl'd into folly and vice. 
 I would not marvel at either, but keep a temperate brain ; 
 For not to desire or admire, if a man could learn it, were more 
 Than to walk all day like the sultan of old in a garden of spice. 
 
20 ^^^ VD. 
 
 VIII. 
 For the drift of the Maker is dark, an Isis hid by the veil. 
 Who knows the ways of the world, how God will bring theni 
 
 abon.t ? 
 Our planet is one, the suns are many, the world is wide. 
 Shall I weep if a Poland fall ? shall 1 shriek if a Hungary fail ? 
 Or an infant civilization be ruled with rod or with knout? 
 I have not made the world, and He that made it will guide. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Be mine a philosopher's life in the quiet woodland ways. 
 Where if I cannot be gay let a passionless peace be my lot. 
 Far off from the clamor of liars belied in the hubbub of lies ; 
 From the long-neck'd geese of the world that are ever hissing 
 
 dispraise 
 Because their natures are little, and, whether he heed it or not. 
 Where each man walks with his head in a cloud of poisonous 
 
 flies. 
 
MA UD. 
 
 21 
 
 X. 
 
 And most of all would T flee from the cruel madness of love, 
 The honey of poison-flowers and all the measureless ill. 
 Ah Maud, you milk-white fawn, you are all unmeet for a wife. 
 Your mother is mute in her grave as her image in marble above 
 Your father is ever in London, you wander about at your will ; 
 You have but fed on the roses and lain in the lilies of life. 
 
 V. 
 
 I. 
 A VOICE by the cedar tree, 
 In the meadow under the Hall ! 
 She is singing an air that is known to me. 
 A passionate ballad gallant and gay, 
 A martial song like a trumpet's call ! 
 Singing alone in the morning of life. 
 In the happy morning of life and of May, 
 Singing of men that in battle-array. 
 Ready in heart and ready in hand, 
 March with banner and bugle and fife 
 To the death, for their native land. 
 
 II. 
 Maud with her exquisite face, 
 And wild voice pealing up to the sunny sky. 
 And feet like sunny gems on an English green, 
 Maud in the light of her youth and her grace. 
 Singing of Death, and of Honor that cannot die, 
 Till I well could weep for a time so sordid and mean. 
 And myself so languid and base. 
 
MA UD. 
 
 III. 
 Silence, beautiful voice 
 Be still, for you only trouble the mind 
 With a joy in which I cannot rejoice, 
 A glory I shall not find. 
 Still ! I will hear you no more. 
 For your sweetness hardly leaves me a choice 
 But to move to the meadow and fall before 
 Her feet on the meadow grass, and adore. 
 Not her, who is neither courtly nor kind, 
 Not her, not her, but a voice. 
 
 VI. 
 I. 
 
 Morning arises stormy and pale. 
 
 No sun, but a wannish glare 
 
 In fold upon fold of hueless cloud, 
 
 And the budded peaks of the wood are bow'd 
 
 Caught and cuff'd by the gale : 
 
 I had fancied it would be fair. 
 
 II. 
 Whom but Maud should I meet 
 Last night, when the sunset burn'd 
 On the blossom'd gable-ends 
 At the head of the village-street, 
 Whom but Maud should I meet? 
 And she touch'd my hand with a smile so sweet 
 She made me divine amends 
 For a courtesy not return'd. 
 
J/.-/ UD. 
 
 And thus a delicate spark 
 
 Of glowing and growing light 
 
 Thro' the livelong hours of the dark 
 
 Kept itself warm in the heart of my dreams, 
 
 Ready to burst in a color'd flame ; 
 
 Till at last when the morning came 
 
 In a cloud, it faded, and seems 
 
 But an ashen-gray delight. 
 
 What if with her sunny hair, 
 And smile as sunny as cold. 
 
24 
 
 A/A LD. 
 
 She meant to weave nie a snare 
 
 Of some coquettish deceit, 
 
 Cleopatra-hke as of old 
 
 To entangle me when we met, 
 
 To have her lion roll in a silken net 
 
 And fawn at a victor's feet. 
 
 Ah, what shall I be at fifty 
 Should Nature keep me alive, 
 If I find the world so bitter 
 When I am but twenty-five ? 
 Yet if she were not a cheat, 
 If Maud were all that she seem'd, 
 
JIL4 UD. 
 
 And her smile were all that I dream'd. 
 Then the world were not so bitter 
 But a smile could make it sweet. 
 
 VI. 
 
 What if tho' her eye seeni'd full 
 Of a kind intent to me, 
 What if that dandy-despot, he, 
 That jewell'd mass of millinery, 
 That oil'd and curl'd Assyrian Bull 
 Smelling of musk and of insolence, 
 Her brother, from whom I keep aloof, 
 Who wants the finer politic sense 
 To mask, tho' but in his own behoof, 
 With a glassy smile his brutal scorn — 
 What if he had told her yestermorn 
 How prettily for his own sweet sake 
 A face of tenderness might be feign'd. 
 And a moist mirage in desert eyes, 
 That so, when the rotten hustings shake 
 In another month to his brazen lies, 
 A wretched vote may be gain'd. 
 
 VII. 
 
 For a raven ever croaks, at my side, 
 
 Keep watch and ward, keep watch and ward, 
 
 Or thou wilt prove their tool. 
 
 Yea too, myself from myself I guard. 
 
 For often a man's own angry pride 
 
 Is cap and bells for a fool. 
 
 25 
 
26 
 
 A/A UD. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Perhaps the smile and tender tone 
 
 Came out of her pitying womanhood, 
 
 For am I not, am I not, here alone 
 
 So many a summer since she died, 
 
 My mother, who was so gentle and good ? 
 
 Living alone in an empty house. 
 
 Here half hid in the gleaming wood. 
 
 Where I hear the dead at midday moan. 
 
 And the shrieking rush of the wainscot mouse, 
 
 And my own sad name in corners cried. 
 
 When the shiver of dancing leaves is thrown 
 
 About its echoing chambers wide, 
 
 Till a morbid hate and horror have grown 
 
 Of a world in which I have hardly mixt, 
 
 And a morbid eating lichen fixt 
 
 On a heart half turn'd to stone. 
 
 O heart of stone, are you flesh, and caught 
 By that you swore to withstand ? 
 
MAUD. 
 
 For what was it else within me wrought 
 But, I fear, the new strong wine of love, 
 That made my tongue so stammer and trip 
 When I saw the treasured splendor, her hand. 
 Come sliding out of her sacred glove, 
 And the sunlight broke from her lip? 
 
 X. 
 
 I have play'd with her when a child ; 
 
 She remembers it now we meet. 
 
 Ah well, well, well, I may be beguiled 
 
 By some coquettish deceit. 
 
 Yet, if she were not a cheat, 
 
 If Maud were all that she seem'd, 
 
 And her smile had all that I dream'd, 
 
 Then the world were not so bitter 
 
 But a smile could make it sweet. 
 
 VII. 
 
 I. 
 Did I hear it half in a doze 
 
 Long since, I know not where? 
 Did I dream it an hour ago. 
 
 When asleep in this arm-chair ? 
 
 II. 
 Men were drinking together, 
 
 Drinking and talking of me; 
 " Well, if it prove a girl, the boy 
 
 Will have plenty : so let it be." 
 
 27 
 
2^ 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 Is it an echo of something 
 Read with a boy's delight, 
 
 Viziers nodding together 
 In some Arabian niglit? 
 
 Strange, that I hear two men, 
 Somewhere, talking of me ; 
 
 " Well, if it prove a girl, my boy 
 Will have plent}' : so let it be.' 
 
MA VD. 
 
 2^ 
 
 VIII. 
 
 She came to the village church, 
 
 And sat by a pillar alone ; 
 
 An angel watching an urn 
 
 Wept over her, carved in stone ; 
 
 And once, but once, she lifted her eyes. 
 
 And suddenly, sweetly, strangely blush'd 
 
 To find they were met by my own ; 
 
 And suddenly, sweetly, my heart beat stronger 
 
 And thicker, until I heard no longer 
 
 The snowy-banded, dilettante, 
 
 Delicate-handed priest intone ; 
 
 And thought, is it pride, and mused and sigh'd 
 
 " No surely, now it cannot be pride." 
 
30 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 IX. 
 
 I WAS walking a mile, 
 More than a mile from the shore, 
 The sun look'd out with a smile 
 Betwixt the cloud and the moor. 
 
 And riding at set of day 
 Over the dark moor land, 
 Rapidly riding far away, 
 She waved to me with her hand. 
 There were two at her side. 
 Something flash'd in the sun, 
 Down by the hill I saw them ride, 
 In a moment they were gone : 
 Like a sudden spark 
 Struck vainly in the night, 
 Then returns the dark 
 With no more hope of light. 
 
MAUD. 
 
 X. 
 
 I. 
 Sick, am I sick of a jealous dread ? 
 Was not one of the two at her side 
 This new-made lord, whose splendor plucks 
 The slavish hat from the villager's head ; 
 Whose old grandfather has lately died, 
 Gone to a blacker pit, for whom 
 Grimy nakedness dragging his trucks 
 And laying his trams in a poison'd gloom 
 Wrought, till he crept from a gutted mine 
 Master of half a servile shire. 
 And left his coal all turn'd into gold 
 To a grandson, first of his noble line, 
 Rich in the grace all women desire, 
 Strong in the power that all men adore, 
 And simper and set their voices lower, 
 And soften as if to a girl, and hold 
 Awe-stricken breaths at a work divine. 
 Seeing his gewgaw castle shine, 
 New as his title, built last year. 
 There amid perky larches and pine. 
 And over the sullen-purple moor 
 (Look at it) pricking a cockney ear. 
 
 II. 
 What, has he found my jewel out ? 
 For one of the two that rode at her side 
 Bound for the Hall, I am sure was he : 
 Bound for the Hall, and I think for a bride. 
 
32 
 
 A/A UD. 
 
 Blithe would her brother's acceptance be. 
 Maud could be gracious too, no doubt, 
 To a lord, a captain, a padded shape, 
 A bought commission, a waxen face, 
 A rabbit mouth that is ever agape — 
 Bought ? what is it he cannot buy ? 
 And therefore splenetic, personal, base, 
 A wounded thing with a rancorous cry, 
 At war with myself and a wretched race, 
 Sick, sick to the heart of life, am I. 
 
 III. 
 Last week came one to the county town, 
 To preach our poor little army down, 
 And play the game of the despot kings, 
 Tho' the state has done it and thrice as well : 
 This broad-brimm'd hawker of holy things, 
 Whose ear is cramm'd with his cotton, and rings 
 Even in dreams to the chink of his pence, 
 This huckster put down war! can he tell 
 Whether war be a cause or a consequence ? 
 Put down the passions that make earth Hell ! 
 Down with ambition, avarice, pride, 
 Jealousy, down ! cut off from the mind 
 The bitter springs of anger and fear; 
 Down too, down at your own fireside. 
 With the evil tongue and the evil ear. 
 For each is at war with mankind. 
 
MAUD. 23 
 
 IV. 
 I wish I could hear again 
 The chivalrous battle-song 
 That she warbled alone in her joy! 
 I might persuade myself then 
 She would not do herself this great wrong, 
 To take a wanton, dissolute boy 
 For a man and leader of men. 
 
 V. 
 
 Ah God, for a man with heart, head, hand, 
 Like some of the simple great ones gone 
 For ever and ever by, 
 One still strong man in a blatant land. 
 Whatever they call him, what care I, 
 Aristocrat, democrat, autocrat, — one 
 Who can rule and dare not lie. 
 
 VI. 
 
 And ah for a man to arise in me, 
 That the man I am may cease to be ! 
 
 XI. 
 
 I. 
 
 O LET the solid ground 
 
 Not fail beneath my feet 
 Before my life has found 
 
 What some have found so sweet ; 
 
34 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 Then let come what conic may, 
 What matter if I go mad, 
 I shall have had my day. 
 
 11. 
 Let the sweet heavens endure. 
 
 Not close and darken above me 
 Before I am quite quite sure 
 
 That there is one to love me ; 
 Then let come what come ma)- 
 To a life that has been so sad, 
 I shall have had my da)-. 
 
A/A UD. 
 
 XII. 
 
 I. 
 
 Birds in the high Hall-garden 
 When twihght was falling, 
 
 Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud, 
 They were crying and calling. 
 
 II. 
 Where was Maud? in our wood 
 
 And I, who else, was with her, 
 Gathering woodland lilies, 
 
 Myriads blow together. 
 
 111. 
 Birds in our wood sang 
 
 Ringing thro' the valleys, 
 Maud is here, here, here 
 
 In among the lilies. 
 
 IV, 
 I kiss'd her slender hand. 
 
 She took the kiss sedately ; 
 Maud is not seventeen, 
 
 But she is tall and stately. 
 
 V. 
 
 T to cry out on pride 
 
 Who have won her favor ! 
 
 O Maud were sure of Heaven 
 If lowliness could save her. 
 
 35 
 
36 
 
 MA LI). 
 
 I know the way she went 
 
 Home with lier maiden posy, 
 
 For her feet have touch'd the meadows 
 And left the daisies rosy. 
 
 Birds in the high Hall-garden 
 Were crying and calling to her, 
 
 Where is Maud, Maud, Maud, 
 One is come to woo her. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Look, a horse at the door, 
 
 And little King Charley snarling, 
 Go back, my lord, across the moor, 
 
 Vou arc not her darling. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Scorn'd, to be scorn'd by one that I scorn, 
 Is that a matter to make me fret ? 
 
MA UD. 
 
 That a calamity hard to be borne ? 
 
 Well, he may live to hate me yet. 
 
 Fool that I am to be vext with his pride ! 
 
 I past him, I was crossing his lands; 
 
 He stood on the path a little aside ; 
 
 His face, as I grant, in spite of spite. 
 
 Has a broad-blown comeliness, red and white, 
 
 And six feet two, as I think, he stands ; 
 
 But his essences turn'd the live air sick. 
 
 And barbarous opulence jewel-thick 
 
 Sunn'd itself on his breast and his hands. 
 
 II. 
 Who shall call me ungentle, unfair, 
 I long'd so heartily then and there 
 To give him the grasp of fellowship; 
 But while I past he was humming an air, 
 Stopt, and then with a riding whip 
 Leisurely tapping a glossy boot, 
 And curving a contumelious lip, 
 Gorgonized me from head to foot 
 With a stony British stare. 
 
 III. 
 Why sits he here in his father's chair? 
 That old man never comes to his place : 
 Shall I believe him ashamed to be seen ? 
 For only once, in the village street. 
 Last year, I caught a glimpse of his face, 
 A gray old wolf and a lean. 
 
 n 
 
38 
 
 J/A CD. 
 
 Scarcely, now, would I call him a cheat 
 For then, perhaps, as a child of deceit, 
 She might by a true descent be untrue ; 
 And Maud is as true as Maud is sweet : 
 Tho' I fancy her sweetness only due 
 To the sweeter blood by the other side ; 
 Her mother has been a thin^ complete, 
 However she came to be so allied. 
 And fair without, faithful within, 
 Maud to him is nothing akin : 
 Some peculiar mystic grace 
 Made her only the child of her mother, 
 And heap'd the whole inherited sin 
 On that huge scapegoat of the race. 
 All, all upon the brother. 
 
 Peace, angry spirit, and let him be ! 
 Has not his sister smiled on me? 
 
 XIV. 
 
 I. 
 Maud has a garden of roses 
 And lilies fair on a lawn ; 
 There she walks in her state 
 And tends upon bed and bower, 
 And thither I climb'd at dawn 
 And stood by her garden-gate ; 
 A lion ramps at the top. 
 He is claspt by a passion-flower. 
 
A/A on. 
 
 II. 
 
 39 
 
 Maud's own little oak-room 
 (Which Maud, like a precious stone 
 Set in the heart of the carven gloom, 
 Lights with herself, when alone 
 
 She sits by her music and books, 
 
 And her brother lingers late 
 
 With a roystering company) looks 
 
 Upon Maud's own garden-gate: 
 
 And I thought as I stood, if a hand, as white 
 
 As ocean-foam in the moon, were laid 
 
 On the hasp of the window, and my Delight 
 
 Had a sudden desire, like a glorious ghost, to glide, 
 
 Like a beam of the seventh Heaven, down to my side. 
 
 There were but a step to be made. 
 
40 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 The fancy flatter'd my mind, 
 
 And again seem'd overbold ; 
 
 Now I thought that she cared for me, 
 
 Now I thought she was kind 
 
 Only because she was cold. 
 
 I heard no sound where I stood 
 But the rivulet on from the lawn 
 Running down to my own dark wood 
 
 Or the voice of the long sea-wave as it swell'd 
 
 Now and then in the dim-gray dawn ; 
 
 But I look'd, and round, all round the house I beheld 
 
 The death-white curtain drawn ; 
 
 Felt a horror over me creep, 
 
 Prickle my skin and catch my breath, 
 
 Knew that the death-white curtain meant but sleep, 
 
 Yet I shudder'd and thought like a fool of the sleep of death. 
 
J/.4 UD. 
 
 XV. 
 
 So dark a mind within me dwells, 
 And I make myself such evil cheer, 
 
 That if / be dear to some one else. 
 
 Then some one else may have much to fear ; 
 
 But if/ be dear to some one else. 
 
 Then I should be to myself more dear. 
 
 Shall I not take care of all that I think, 
 
 Yea ev'n of wretched meat and drink, 
 
 If I be dear, 
 
 If I be dear to some one else ? 
 
 XVI. 
 
 I. 
 This lump of earth has left his estate 
 The lighter by the loss of his weight ; 
 And so that he find what he went to seek, 
 And fulsome Pleasure clog him, and drown 
 His heart in the gross mud-honey of town. 
 He may stay for a year who has gone for a week 
 But this is the day when I must speak, 
 And I see my Oread coming down. 
 O this is the day ! 
 O beautiful creature, what am I 
 That I dare to look her way ; 
 Think I may hold dominion sweet, 
 Lord of the pulse that is lord of her breast. 
 And dream of her beauty with tender dread. 
 From the delicate Arab arch of her feet 
 To the grace that, bright and light as the crest 
 
 41 
 
42 
 
 A/A UD. 
 
 Of a peacock, sits on her shining head, 
 And she knows it not: O, if she knew it. 
 To know her beauty might half undo it. 
 I know it the one bright thing to save 
 My yet young life in the wilds of Time, 
 Perhaps from madness, perhaps from crime. 
 Perhaps from a selfish grave. 
 
 II. 
 
 What if she be fasten'd to this fool lord, 
 
 Dare I bid her abide by her word ? 
 
 Should I love her so well if she 
 
 Had given her word to a thing so low ? 
 
 Shall I love her as well if she 
 
 Can break her word were it even for me ? 
 
 I trust that it is not so. 
 
 Catch not my breath, O clamorous heart, 
 Let not my tongue be a thrall to my eye. 
 For I must tell her before we part, 
 I must tell her, or die. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 Go not, happy day, 
 
 From the shining fields, 
 Go not, happy day, 
 
 Till the maiden yields. 
 
M.l UD. 
 
 Rosy is the West, 
 Rosy is the South, 
 
 Roses are her cheeks, 
 And a rose her mouth. 
 
 43 
 
 When the happy Yes 
 
 Falters from her lips, 
 Pass and blush the news 
 
 O'er the blowing ships. 
 Over blowing seas. 
 
 Over seas at rest, 
 Pass the happy news, 
 
 Blush it thro' the West; 
 Till the red man dance 
 
 By his red cedar tree. 
 And the red man's babe 
 
 Leap, beyond the sea. 
 Blush from West to East. 
 
 Blush from East to West, 
 Till the West is East, 
 
 Blush it thro' the We.st. 
 
44 
 
 A/A UD. 
 
 Rosy is the West, 
 
 Rosy is the South, 
 Roses are her cheeks. 
 
 And a rose lier mouth. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 I. 
 I HAVE led her home, my love, my onl\' friend. 
 There is none like her, none. 
 And never yet so warmly ran my blood 
 And sweetly, on and on 
 Calming itself to the long-wish'd-for end, 
 Full to the banks, close on the promised'»good. 
 
 None like her, none. 
 
 Just now the dry-tongued laurels' pattering talk 
 
 Seem'd her light foot along the garden walk, 
 
 And shook my heart to think she comes once more 
 
 But even then I heard her close the door, 
 
 The gates of Heaven are closed, and she is gone. 
 
J/A VD. 
 
 45 
 
 There is none like her, none. 
 
 Nor will be when our summers have deceased. 
 
 O, art thou sighing for Lebanon 
 
 In the long breeze that streams to thy delicious East, 
 
 Sighing for Lebanon, 
 
 Dark cedar, tho' thy limbs have here increased, 
 
 Upon a pastoral slope as fair, 
 
 And looking to the South, and fed 
 
 With honey'd rain and delicate air. 
 
 And haunted by the starry head 
 
 Of her whose gentle will has changed my fate, 
 
 And made my life a perfumed altar-flame; 
 
 And over whom thy darkness must have spread 
 
 With such delight as theirs of old, thy great 
 
 Forefathers of the thornless garden, there 
 
 Shadowine the snow-limb'd Eve from whom she came. 
 
46 MAUD. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Here will I lie, while these long branches sway, 
 
 And you fair stars that crown a happy day 
 
 Go in and out as if at merry pla)', 
 
 Who am no more so all forlorn, 
 
 As when it seem'd far better to be born 
 
 To labor and the mattock-harden'd hand, 
 
 Than nursed at ease and brought to understand 
 
 A sad astrology, the boundless plan 
 
 That makes you tyrants in your iron skies, 
 
 Innumerable, pitiless, passionless eyes, 
 
 Cold fires, yet with power to burn and brand 
 
 His nothingness into man. 
 
 V. 
 But now shine on, and what care I, 
 Who in this stormy gulf haxe found a pearl 
 The countercharm of space and hollow sk)', 
 And do accept my madness, and would die 
 To save from some slight shame one simple girl. 
 
 VI. 
 Would die; for sullen-seeming Death may give 
 More life to Love than is or ever was 
 In our low world, where yet 'tis sweet to live. 
 Let no one ask me how it came to pass ; 
 It seems that I am happy, that to me 
 A livelier emerald twinkles in the grass, 
 A purer sapphire melts into the sea. 
 
J/A C I). 
 
 47 
 
 Not die; but live a life of truest breath, 
 
 And teach true life to fight with mortal wrongs. 
 
 O, wh)' should Love, like men in drinking-songs, 
 
 Spice his fair banquet with the dust of death ? 
 
 Make answer, Maud my bliss, 
 
 Maud made my Maud by that long lover's kiss, 
 
 Life of my life, wilt thou not answer this ? 
 
 " The dusky strand of Death inwoven here 
 
 With dear Love's tie, makes Love himself more dear." 
 
 Is that enchanted moan onl}' the swell 
 
 Of the long waves that roll in yonder bay ? 
 
 And hark the clock within, the silver knell 
 Of twelve sweet hours that past in bridal white, 
 And died to live, long as my pulses play; 
 But now by this my love has closed her sight 
 And given false death her hand, and stol'n away 
 To dreamful wastes where footless fancies dwell 
 
48 
 
 MA CD. 
 
 Among the fragments of the golden day. 
 
 May nothing there her maiden grace affright! 
 
 Dear heart, I feel with thee the drowsy spell. 
 
 My bride to be, my evermore delight, 
 
 My own heart's heart and ownest own, farewell ; 
 
 It is but for a little space I go : 
 
 And ye meanwhile far over moor and fell 
 
 Beat to the noiseless music of the night ! 
 
 Has our whole earth gone nearer to the glow 
 
 Of your soft splendors that you look so bright? 
 
 / have climb'd nearer out of lonely Hell. 
 
 Beat, happy stars, timing with things below, 
 Beat with my heart more blest than heart can tell. 
 Blest, but for some dark undercurrent woe 
 That seems to draw — but it shall not be so : 
 Let all be well, be well. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 I. 
 Her brother is coming back to-night, 
 Breaking up my dream of delight. 
 
MA UD. 
 
 II. 
 My dream ? do I dream of bliss ? 
 I have walk'd awake with Truth. 
 
 when did a morning shine 
 So rich in atonement as this 
 For my dark-dawning youth, 
 Darken'd watching a mother dechne 
 And that dead man at her heart and mine : 
 For who was left to watch her but I ? 
 
 Yet so did I let my freshness die. 
 
 III. 
 
 1 trust that I did not talk 
 To gentle Maud in our walk 
 (For often in lonely wanderings 
 
 I have cursed him even to lifeless things) 
 
 But I trust that I did not talk, 
 
 Not touch on her father's sin : 
 
 I'm sure I did but speak 
 
 Of my mother's faded cheek 
 
 When it slowly grew so thin, 
 
 That I felt she was slowly dying 
 
 Vext with lawyers and harass'd with debt: 
 
 For how often I caught her with eyes all wet. 
 
 Shaking her head at her son and sighing 
 
 A world of trouble within ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 And Maud too, Maud was moved 
 To speak of the mother she loved 
 As one scarce less forlorn 
 4 
 
 49 
 
50 
 
 J/A UD. 
 
 Dying abroad and it seems apart 
 
 From him who had ceased to share her heart, 
 
 And ever mourning over the feud, 
 
 The household F"ury sprinkled with blood 
 
 By which our houses are torn : 
 
 How strange was what she said. 
 
 When only Maud and the brother 
 
 Hung over her dying bed — 
 
 That Maud's dark father and mine 
 
 Had bound us one to the other, 
 
 ]5etrothVl us o\'cr their wine, 
 
 On the day when Maud was born ; 
 
 Seal'd her mine from her first sweet breath. 
 
 Mine, mnie by a right, from birth till death, 
 
 Mine, mine — our fathers have sworn. 
 
 But the true blood spilt had in it a heat 
 To dissolve the precious seal on a bond, 
 That, if left uncancell'd, had been so sweet; 
 
AfA UD. r I 
 
 And none of us thought of a something beyond, 
 
 A desire that awoke in the heart of the child, 
 
 As it were a duty done to the tomb, 
 
 To be friends for her sake, to be reconciled ; 
 
 And I was cursing them and my doom, 
 
 And letting a dangerous thought run wild 
 
 While often abroad in the fragrant gloom 
 
 Of foreign churches — I see her there, 
 
 Bright English lily, breathing a prayer 
 
 To be friends, to be reconciled ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 But then what a flint is he ! 
 
 iVbroad, at Florence, at Rome, 
 
 I find whenever she touch'd on me 
 
 This brother had laugh'd her down, 
 
 And at last, when each came home, 
 
 He had darken'd into a frown, 
 
 Chid her, and forbid her to speak 
 
 To me, her friend of the years before ; 
 
 And this was what had redden 'd her cheek 
 
 When I bow'd to her on the moor. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Yet Maud, altho' not blind 
 To the faults of his heart and mind, 
 I see she cannot but love him, 
 And says he is rough but kind. 
 And wishes me to approve him, 
 And tells me, when she lay 
 
52 
 
 A/A UD. 
 
 Sick once, with a fear of worse, 
 
 That he left his wine and horses and play, 
 
 Sat with her, read to her, night and day, 
 And tended her like a nurse. 
 
 Kind ? but the death-bed desire 
 Spurn'd by this heir of the liar — 
 Rough but kind ? yet I know 
 He has plotted against me in this. 
 That he plots against me still. 
 Kind to Maud ? that were not amiss. 
 Well, rough but kind ; why, let it be so 
 For shall not Maud have her will ? 
 
 For, Maud, so tender and true, 
 As long as my life endures 
 I feel I shall owe you a debt. 
 That I never can hope to pay ; 
 
MA UD. 
 
 And if ever I should forget 
 That I owe this debt to you 
 And for your sweet sake to yours ; 
 
 then, what then shall I say ? — 
 If ever I sJiould forget, 
 
 May God make me more wretclied 
 Than ever I have been yet ! 
 
 X. 
 
 So now I have sworn to bury 
 All this dead body of hate, 
 
 1 feel so free and so clear 
 
 By the loss of that dead weight, 
 That I shall grow hght-headed, I fear, 
 Fantastically merry ; 
 
 But that her brother comes, like a blight 
 On my fresh hope, to the Hall to-night. 
 
 XX. 
 
 Strange, that I felt so gay. 
 Strange, that / tried to-day 
 To beguile her melancholy ; 
 The Sultan, as we name him, — 
 She did not wish to blame him — 
 But he vext her and perplext her 
 With his worldly talk and folly : 
 Was it gentle to reprove her 
 For stealing out of view 
 
 53 
 
54 
 
 .l/A UD. 
 
 From a little lazy lover 
 
 Who but claims her as his due ? 
 
 Or for chilling his caresses 
 
 By the coldness of her manners, 
 
 Nay, the plainness of her dresses ? 
 
 Now I know her but in two. 
 
 Nor can pronounce upon it 
 
 If one should ask me whether 
 
 The habit, hat, and feather, 
 
 Or the frock and gypsy bonnet 
 
 Be the neater and completer; 
 
 For nothing can be sweeter 
 
 Than maiden Maud in either, 
 
 II. 
 
 But to-morrow, if we live, 
 Our ponderous squire will give 
 A grand political dinner 
 To half the squirelings near; 
 And Maud will wear her jewels, 
 And the bird of prey will hover. 
 And the titmouse hope to win her, 
 With his chirrup at her ear. 
 
 III. 
 A grand political dinner 
 To the men of many acres, 
 A gathering of the Tory, 
 A dinner and then a dance 
 For the maids and marriage-makers, 
 
A/A VD. 
 
 And every eye but mine will glance 
 At Maud in all her glory. 
 
 55 
 
 For I am not invited, 
 
 But, with the Sultan's pardon, 
 
 I am all as well delighted. 
 
 For I know her own rose-garden, 
 
 And mean to linger in it 
 Till the dancing will be over; 
 And then, O then, come out to me 
 For a minute, but for a minute, 
 Come out to your own true lover, 
 That your true lover may see 
 Your glory also, and render 
 
56 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 All homage to his own darling, 
 Queen Maud in all her splendor. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 Rivulet crossing my ground, 
 
 And bringing me down from the Hall 
 
 This garden-rose that I found, 
 
 Forgetful of Maud and me. 
 
 And lost in trouble and moving round 
 
 Here at the head of a tinkling fall, 
 
 And trying to pass to the sea ; 
 
 Rivulet, born at the Hall, 
 My Maud has sent it by thee 
 (If I read her sweet will right) 
 On a blushing mission to me, 
 Saying in odor and color, " Ah, he 
 Among the roses to-night." 
 
 XXII. 
 
 I. 
 Come into the garden, Maud, 
 
 For the black bat, night, has flown. 
 Come into the garden, Maud, 
 
 1 am here at the gate alone ; 
 
 And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad. 
 And the musk of the roses blown. 
 
 II. 
 For a breeze of morning moves. 
 And the planet of Love is on high. 
 
MA UD. 
 
 57 
 
 Beginning to faint in the light that she loves 
 
 On a bed of daffodil sky, 
 To faint in the light of the sun she loves, 
 
 To faint in his light, and to die. 
 
 III. 
 
 All night have the roses heard 
 The flute, violin, bassoon ; 
 
58 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 All night has the casement jessamine stirr'd 
 To the dancers dancing in tune ; 
 
 Till a silence fell with the waking bird, 
 And a hush with the setting moon. 
 
MAUD. 
 
 IV. 
 I said to the lily, " There is but one 
 
 With whom she has heart to be gay. 
 When will the dancers leave her alone ? 
 
 She is weary of dance and play." 
 Now half to the setting moon are gone, 
 
 And half to the rising day ; 
 Low on the sand and loud on the stone 
 
 The last wheel echoes away. 
 
 V. 
 
 I said to the rose, " The brief night goes 
 
 In babble and revel and wine. 
 O young lord-lover, what sighs are those, 
 
 For one that will never be thine? 
 But mine, but mine," so I sware to the rose, 
 
 " For ever and ever, mine." 
 
 VI. 
 
 And the soul of the rose went into my blood. 
 
 As the music clash'd in the hall ; 
 And long by the garden lake I stood, 
 
 For I heard your rivulet fall 
 From the lake to the meadow and on to the wood. 
 
 Our wood, that is dearer than all ; 
 
 VII. 
 
 From the meadow your walks have left so sweet 
 That whenever a March-wind sighs 
 
 59 
 
6o ^'/^^ UD. 
 
 He sets the jewel-print of your feet 
 
 In violets blue as your eyes, 
 To the woody hollows in which we meet 
 
 And the valleys of Paradise. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 The slender acacia would not shake 
 
 One long milk-bloom on the tree; 
 The white lake -blossom fell into the lake 
 
 As the pimpernel dozed on the lea ; 
 But the rose was awake all night for your sake, 
 
 Knowing your promise to me; 
 The lilies and roses were all awake, 
 
 They sigh'd for the dawn and thee. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Queen rose of the rosebud garden of girls, 
 Come hither, the dances are done, 
 
 In gloss of satin and glimmer of pearls, 
 Queen lily and rose in one; 
 
 Shine out, little head, sunning over with curls, 
 To the flowers, and be their sun. 
 
 X. 
 
 There has fallen a splendid tear 
 
 From the passion-flower at the gate. 
 She is coming, my dove, my dear ; 
 
 She is coming, my life, my fate; 
 The red rose cries, " She is near, she is near;" 
 
 And the white rose weeps, " She is late;" 
 The larkspur listens, " I hear, I hear ;" 
 
 And the lily whispers, " I wait." 
 
A/A UD. 
 
 61 
 
 She is coming, my own, my sweet ; 
 
 Were it ever so airy a tread, 
 My heart would hear her and beat, 
 
 Were it earth in an earthy bed ; 
 My dust would hear her and beat. 
 
 Had I lain for a century dead ; 
 Would start and tremble under her feet. 
 
 And blossom in purple and red. 
 
PART II, 
 
 (63) 
 
A/A UD. 
 
 65 
 
 ' ^ I ^HE fault was mine, the fault was mine" — 
 
 -*■ Why am I sitting here so stunn'd and still, 
 Plucking the harmless wild-flower on the hill? — 
 It is this guilty hand ! — 
 And there rises ever a passionate cry 
 From underneath in the darkening land — 
 What is it, that has been done ? 
 O dawn of Eden bright over earth and sky, 
 The fires of Hell brake out of thy rising sun, 
 The fires of Hell and of Hate ; 
 For she, sweet soul, had hardl)' spoken a word. 
 When her brother ran in his rage to the gate, 
 He came with a babe-faced lord ; 
 Heap'd on her terms of disgrace, 
 And while she wept, and I strove to be cool. 
 He fiercely gave me the lie. 
 Till I with as fierce an anger spoke, 
 And he struck me, madman, over the fice. 
 Struck me before the languid fool. 
 Who was gaping and grinning by: 
 Struck for himself an evil stroke ; 
 Wrought for his house an irredeemable woe; 
 For front to front in an hour we stood, 
 And a million horrible bellowing echoes broke 
 From the red-ribb'd hollow behind the wood. 
 And thunder'd up into Heaven the Christless code, 
 5 
 
66 MA UD. 
 
 That must have Hfe for a blow. 
 
 Ever and ever afresh they seem'd to grow. 
 
 Was it he lay there with a fading eye ? 
 
 "The fault was mine," he whisper'd, " fl)- !" 
 
 Then glided out of the joyous wood 
 
 The ghastly Wraith of one that I know ; 
 
 And there rang on a sudden a passionate cry, 
 
 A cry for a brother's blood : 
 
 It will ring in my heart and my ears, till I die, till I die. 
 
 II. 
 Is it gone ? my pulses beat — 
 What was it? a lying trick of the brain ? 
 Yet I thought I saw her stand, 
 A shadow there at my feet, 
 High over the shadowy land. 
 It is gone; and the heavens fall in a gentle rain, 
 When they should burst and drown with deluging storm> 
 The feeble vassals of wine and anger and lust. 
 The little hearts that know not how to forgive : 
 Arise, my God, and strike, for we hold Thee just. 
 Strike dead the whole weak race of venomous worms. 
 That sting each other here in the dust; 
 We are not worth}' to live. 
 
 II. 
 
 I. 
 See what a lovely shell, 
 Small and pure as a pearl. 
 Lying close to ni)' foot. 
 Frail, but a work divine, 
 
A/A UD. 
 
 Made so fairily well 
 With delicate spire and whorl, 
 How exquisitely minute, 
 A miracle of design ! 
 
 6; 
 
 What is it ? a learned man 
 Could give it a clumsy name. 
 Let him name it who can, 
 The beauty would be the same. 
 
 The tin\- cell is forlorn. 
 Void of the little living will 
 That made it stir on the shore. 
 Did he stand at the diamond door 
 Of his house in a rainbow frill ? 
 Did he push, when he was uncurl'd, 
 A golden foot or a fairy horn 
 Thro' his dim water- world? 
 
68 ^JA UD. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Slight, to be crush'd with a tap 
 Of my finger-nail on the sand, 
 Small, but a work divine, 
 Frail, but of force to withstand, 
 Year upon year, the shock 
 Of cataract seas that snap 
 The three-decker's oaken spine 
 Athwart the ledges of rock, 
 Here on the Breton strand ! 
 
 V. 
 Breton, not Briton ; here 
 Like a shipwreck'd man on a coast 
 Of ancient fable and fear — 
 Plagued with a flitting to and fro, 
 A disease, a hard mechanic ghost 
 That never came from on high 
 Nor ever arose from below, 
 But only moves with the moving eye, 
 Flying along the land and the main — 
 Why should it look like Maud ? 
 Am I to be overawed 
 By what I cannot but know 
 Is a juggle born of the brain ? 
 
 VI. 
 
 Back from the Breton coast, 
 Sick of a nameless fear, 
 Back to the dark sea-line 
 
A/A un. 69 
 
 Looking, thinking of all I have lost 
 An old song vexes my ear ; 
 But that of Lamecli is mine. 
 
 VII. 
 
 For years, a measureless ill, 
 For years, forever, to part — 
 But she, she would love me still ; 
 And as long, O God, as she 
 Have a grain of love for me, 
 So long, no doubt, no doubt. 
 Shall I nurse in my dark heart. 
 However weary, a spark of will 
 Not to be trampled out. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Strange, that the mind, when fraught 
 
 With a passion so intense 
 
 One would think that it well 
 
 Might drown all life in the eye, — 
 
 That it should, by being so overwrought. 
 
 Suddenly strike on a sharper sense 
 
 For a shell, or a flower, little things 
 
 Which else would have been past by! 
 
 And now I remember, I, 
 
 When he lay dying there, 
 
 I noticed one of his many rings 
 
 (For he had many, poor worm) and thought 
 
 It is his mother's hair. 
 
70 
 
 JL4 on. 
 
 IX. 
 Who knows if he be dead ? 
 Whether I need liave fled ? 
 Am I guilty of blood ? 
 However this may be, 
 Comfort her, comfort i 
 While I am over the .sea! 
 Let me and my passionate love go by. 
 But speak to her all things holy and high, 
 Whatever happen to me ! 
 Me and my harmful love go b\' ; 
 But come to her waking, find her asleep, 
 Powers of the height, Powers of the deep, 
 And comfort her tho' I die. 
 
 III. 
 
 Courage, poor heart of stone ! 
 
 I will not ask thee why 
 
 Thou canst not understand 
 
 That thou art left forever alone : 
 
 Courage, poor stupid heart of stone.— 
 
 Or if I ask thee why, 
 
 Care not thou to reply : 
 
 She is but dead, and the time is at hand 
 
 When thou shalt more than die. 
 
 IV. 
 
 I. 
 
 O THAT 'twere possible 
 
 After long grief and pain 
 
 To find the arms of my true love 
 
 Round me once again ! 
 
MA UD. 
 
 When I was wont to meet her 
 
 In the silent woody places 
 
 By the home that gave me birth, 
 
 We stood tranced in long embraces 
 Mixt with kisses sweeter sweeter 
 Than an\'thing on earth. 
 
72 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 III. 
 
 A shadow flits before me, 
 
 Not thou, but like to thee ; 
 
 Ah Christ, that it were possible 
 
 For one short hour to see 
 
 The souls we loved, that they might tell us 
 
 What and where they be. 
 
 rv. 
 
 It leads me forth at evening, 
 
 It lightly winds and steals 
 
 In a cold white robe before me, 
 
 When all my spirit reels 
 
 At the shouts, the leagues of lights, 
 
 And the roaring of the wheels. 
 
 V. 
 
 Half the night I waste in sighs. 
 Half in dreams I sorrow after 
 The delight of early skies ; 
 In a wakeful doze I sorrow 
 For the hand, the lips, the eyes. 
 For the meeting of the morrow, 
 The delight of happy laughter. 
 The delight of low replies. 
 
 VI. 
 
 'Tis a morning pure and sweet. 
 And a dewy splendor falls 
 On the little flower that clings 
 To the turrets and the walls; 
 
J/^ VD. 
 
 'Tis a morning pure and sweet, 
 And the light and shadow fleet; 
 
 n 
 
 She is walking in the meadow, 
 And the woodland echo rings ; 
 In a moment we shall meet ; 
 She is singing in the meadow. 
 And the rivulet at her feet 
 Ripples on in light and shadow 
 To the ballad that she sings. 
 
 Do T hear her sing as of old. 
 
 My bird with the shining head, 
 
 My own dove with the tender eye ? 
 
 But there rings on a sudden a passionate cry 
 
74 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 There is some one dying or dead, 
 And a sullen thunder is roU'd ; 
 For a tumult shakes the city, 
 And I wake, my dream is fled ; 
 In the shuddering dawn, behold, 
 Without knowledge, without pit\ 
 
 Wy the curtains of ni\' bed 
 That abiding phantom cold. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Get thee hence, nor come again, 
 Mix not memory with doubt, 
 Pass, thou deathlike type of pain. 
 Pass, and cea.se to move about ! 
 'Tis the blot upon the brain 
 That ivill show itself without. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Then T rise, the eavedrops fall, 
 And the yellow vapors choke 
 The great city sounding wide; 
 
AfA UD. 
 
 75 
 
 The day comes, a dull red ball 
 Wrapt in drifts of lurid smoke 
 On the misty river-tide. 
 
 Thro' the hubbub of the market 
 
 I steal, a wasted frame, 
 
 It crosses here, it crosses there. 
 
 Thro' all that crowd confused and loud. 
 
7^ 
 
 MA UP. 
 
 The shadow still the same ; 
 And on my heavy eyehds 
 My anguish hangs Hke shame. 
 
 Alas for her that met me, 
 
 That heard me softly call, 
 
 Came glimmering thro' the laurels 
 
 At the quiet evenfall, 
 
 In the garden by the turrets 
 
 Of the old manorial hall. 
 
 Would the happy spirit descend, 
 From the realms of light and sonj 
 In the chamber or the street, 
 As she looks among the blest. 
 Should I fear to greet my friend 
 Or to say " forgive the wrong," 
 Or to ask her, " take me, sweet, 
 To the regions of thy rest" ? 
 
 But the broad light glares and beats, 
 And the shadow flits and fleets 
 And will not let me be ; 
 And I loathe the squares and streets, 
 And the faces that one meets, 
 Hearts with no love for me: 
 
A/A UD. 
 
 Always I long to creep 
 Into some still cavern deep, 
 There to weep, and weep, and weep 
 My whole soul out to thee. 
 
 V. 
 
 I. 
 Dead, long dead, 
 Long dead ! 
 
 And my heart is a handful of dust, 
 And the wheels go over my head. 
 And my bones are shaken with pain. 
 For into a shallow grave they are thrust, 
 Only a yard beneath the street, 
 And the hoofs of the horses beat, beat. 
 The hoofs of the horses beat. 
 Beat into my scalp and my brain. 
 With never an end to the stream of passing feet. 
 Driving, hurrying, marrying, burying, 
 Clamor and rumble, and ringing and clatter. 
 And here beneath it is all as bad. 
 For I thought the dead had peace, but it is not so 
 To have no peace in the grave, is that not sad ? 
 But up and down and to and fro. 
 Ever about me the dead men go ; 
 And then to hear a dead man chatter 
 Is enough to drive one mad. 
 
 II. 
 Wretchedest age, since Time began. 
 They cannot even bury a man ; 
 
 17 
 
yg MA UD. 
 
 And tbo' we paid our tithes in the days that are gone, 
 
 Not a bell was rung, not a prayer was read ; 
 
 It is that which makes us loud in the world of the dead 
 
 There is none that does his work, not one ; 
 
 A touch of their office might have sufficed. 
 
 But the churchmen fain would kill their church. 
 
 As the churches have kill'd their Christ. 
 
 III. 
 See, there is one of us sobbing. 
 No limit to his distress; 
 And another, a lord of all things, praying 
 To his own great self, as I guess ; 
 And another, a statesman there, betraying 
 His party-secret, fool, to the press; 
 And yonder a vile physician, blabbing 
 The case of his patient — all for what ? 
 To tickle the maggot born in an empty head, 
 And wheedle a world that loves him not. 
 For it is but a world of the dead. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Nothing but idiot gabble ! 
 
 For the prophecy given of old, 
 
 And then not understood. 
 
 Has come to pass as foretold ; 
 
 Not let any man think for the public good, 
 
 But babble, merely for babble. 
 
 For I never whisper'd a private affair 
 
 Within the hearing of cat or mouse. 
 
A/A UD. 79 
 
 No. not to myself in the closet alone. 
 
 But I heard it shouted at once from the top of the house ; 
 
 Everything came to be known : 
 
 Who told him we were there? 
 
 V. 
 Not that gray old wolf, for he came not back 
 From the wilderness, full of wolves, where he used to lie ; 
 He has gather'd the bones for his o'ergrown whelp to crack 
 Crack them now for yourself, and howl, and die. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Prophet, curse me the blabbing lip, 
 
 And curse me the British vermin, the rat; 
 
 I know not whether he came in the Hanover ship. 
 
 But I know that he lies and listens mute 
 
 In an ancient mansion's crannies and holes: 
 
 Arsenic, arsenic, sure, would do it, 
 
 Except that now we poi.son our babes, poor souls ! 
 
 It is all used up for that. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Tell him now : she is .standing here at my head ; 
 
 Not beautiful now, not even kind; 
 
 He may take her now ; for she never speaks her mmd, 
 
 But is ever the one thing silent here. 
 
 She is not of us, as I divine ; 
 
 She comes from another stiller world of the dead. 
 
 Stiller, not fairer than mine. 
 
8o 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 But I know where a garden grows, 
 
 Fairer than aught in the world beside, 
 
 All made up of the lily and rose 
 
 That blow by night, when the season is good, 
 
 To the sound of dancing music and flutes : 
 
 It is only flowers, they had no fruits. 
 
 And I almost fear they are not roses, but blood 
 
 For the keeper was one, so full of pride, 
 
 He linkt a dead man there to a spectral bride; 
 
 For he, if he had not been a Sultan of brutes, 
 
 Would he have that hole in his side ? 
 
 But what will the old man say ? 
 
 He laid a cruel snare in a pit 
 
 To catch a friend of mine one stormy day; 
 
 Yet now I could even weep to think of it ; 
 
 For what will the old man say 
 
 When he comes to the second corpse in the pit? 
 
 Friend, to be struck by the public foe. 
 Then to strike him and lay him low. 
 That were a public merit, far, 
 Whatever the Quaker holds, from sin ; 
 But the red life spilt for a private blow- 
 I swear to you, lawful and lawless war 
 Are scarcely even akin. 
 
A/A CD. 
 
 me, why have they not buried me deep enough ? 
 Is it kind to have made me a grave so rough, 
 
 Me, that was never a quiet sleeper? 
 Maybe still I am but half-dead ; 
 Then I cannot be wholly dumb ; 
 
 1 will cry to the steps above my head, 
 
 And somebody, surely, some kind heart will come 
 To bury me, bury me 
 Deeper, ever so little deeper. 
 
PART III. 
 
 (83) 
 
A/A UD. 
 
 85 
 
 "]\ /r Y life has crept so long on a broken wing 
 
 ''■'-■- Thro' cells of madness, haunts of horror and fear, 
 
 That I come to be grateful at last for a little thing : 
 
 My mood is changed, for it fell at a time of year 
 
 When the face of night is fair on the dewy downs, 
 
 And the shining daffodil dies, and the Charioteer 
 
 And starry Gemini hang like glorious crowns 
 
 Over Orion's grave low down in the west. 
 
 That like a silent lightning under the stars 
 
 She seem'd to divide in a dream from a band of the blest, 
 
 And spoke of a hope for the world in the coming wars — 
 
 "And in that hope, dear soul, let trouble have rest, 
 
 Knowing I tarry for thee," and pointed to Mars 
 
 As he glow'd like a ruddy shield on the Lion's breast, 
 
 II. 
 
 And it was but a dream, yet it yielded a dear delight 
 
 To have look'd, tho' but in a dream, upon eyes so fair, 
 
 That had been in a weary world my one thing bright; 
 
 And it was but a dream, yet it lighten'd my despair 
 
 When I thought that a war would arise in defence of the right. 
 
 That an iron tyranny now should bend or cease. 
 
 The glory of manhood stand on his ancient height, 
 
 Nor Britain's one sole God be the millionnaire : 
 
 No more shall commerce be all in all, and Peace 
 
 Pipe on her pastoral hillock a languid note, 
 
 And watch her harvest ripen, her herd increase. 
 
 Nor the cannon-bullet rust on a slothful shore, 
 
86 
 
 MA UD. 
 
 And the cobweb woven across the cannon's throat 
 Shall shake its threaded tears in the wind no more. 
 
 And as months ran on and rumor of battle grew, 
 
 " It is time, it is time, O passionate heart," said I 
 
 (For I cleaved to a cause that I felt to be pure and true), 
 
 " It is time, O passionate heart and morbid eye. 
 
 That old hysterical mock-disease should die." 
 
 And I stood on a giant deck and mix'd my breath 
 
 With a loyal people shouting a battle-cry, 
 
 Till I saw the dreary phantom arise and fly 
 
 Far into the North, and battle, and seas of death. 
 
 Let it go or stay, so I wake to the higher aims 
 
 Of a land that has lost for a little her lust of gold, 
 
 And love of a peace that was full of wrongs and shames, 
 
 Horrible, hateful, monstrous, not to be told ; 
 
 And hail once more to the banner of battle unroU'd ! 
 
MA UD. 87 
 
 Tho' many a light shall darken, and many shall weep 
 For those that are crush'd in the clash of jarring claims, 
 Yet God's just wrath shall be wreak'd on a giant liar; 
 And many a darkness into the light shall leap, 
 And shine in the sudden making of splendid names, 
 And noble thought be freer under the sun, 
 And the heart of a people beat with one desire ; 
 For the peace, that I deem'd no peace, is over and done, 
 And now by the side of the Black and the Baltic deep. 
 And deathful-grinning mouths of the fortress, flames 
 The blood-red blossom of war with a heart of fire. 
 
 V. 
 
 Let it flame or fade, and the war roll down like a wind. 
 We have proved we have hearts in a cause, we are noble still, 
 And myself have awaked, as it seems, to the better mind; 
 It is better to fight for the good, than to rail at the ill ; 
 I have felt with my native land, I am one with my kind : 
 I embrace the purpose of God and the doom assign'd. 
 
^i. 
 
 
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