EXTRACT IX.
Venice.
_The English to be met with everywhere.--Alps and Threadneedle Street.--The Simplon and the Stocks.--Rage for travelling.--Blue Stockings among the Wahabees.--Parasols and Pyramids.--Mrs. Hopkins and the Wall of China_.
And is there then no earthly place, Where we can rest in dream Elysian, Without some curst, round English face, Popping up near to break the vision?
Mid northern lakes, mid southern vines, Unholy cits we"re doomed to meet; Nor highest Alps nor Apennines Are sacred from Threadneedle Street!
If up the Simplon"s path we wind, Fancying we leave this world behind, Such pleasant sounds salute one"s ear As--"Baddish news from "Change, my dear-- "The funds--(phew I curse this ugly hill)-- "Are lowering fast--(what, higher still?)-- "And--(zooks, we"re mounting up to heaven!)-- "Will soon be down to sixty-seven."
Go where we may--rest where we will.
Eternal London haunts us still.
The trash of Almack"s or Fleet Ditch-- And scarce a pin"s head difference _which_-- Mixes, tho" even to Greece we run, With every rill from Helicon!
And if this rage for travelling lasts, If c.o.c.kneys of all sects and castes, Old maidens, aldermen, and squires, _Will_ leave their puddings and coal fires, To gape at things in foreign lands No soul among them understands; If Blues desert their coteries, To show off "mong the Wahabees; If neither s.e.x nor age controls, Nor fear of Mamelukes forbids Young ladies with pink parasols To glide among the Pyramids--
Why, then, farewell all hope to find A spot that"s free from London-kind!
Who knows, if to the West we roam, But we may find some _Blue_ "at home"
Among the Blacks of Carolina-- Or flying to the Eastward see Some Mrs. HOPKINS taking tea And toast upon the Wall of China!
EXTRACT X.
Mantua.
_Verses of Hippolyta to her Husband_.
They tell me thou"rt the favored guest Of every fair and brilliant throng; No wit like thine to wake the jest, No voice like thine to breathe the song.
And none could guess, so gay thou art, That thou and I are far apart.
Alas, alas! how different flows, With thee and me the time away!
Not that I wish thee sad, heaven knows-- Still if thou canst, be light and gay; I only know that without thee The sun himself is dark for me.
Do I put on the jewels rare Thou"st always loved to see me wear?
Do I perfume the locks that thou So oft hast braided o"er my brow, Thus deckt thro" festive crowds to run, And all the a.s.sembled world to see,-- All but the one, the absent one, Worth more than present worlds to me!
No, nothing cheers this widowed heart-- My only joy from thee apart, From thee thyself, is sitting hours And days before thy pictured form-- That dream of thee, which Raphael"s powers Have made with all but life-breath warm!
And as I smile to it, and say The words I speak to thee in play, I fancy from their silent frame, Those eyes and lips give back the same: And still I gaze, and still they keep Smiling thus on me--till I weep!
Our little boy too knows it well, For there I lead him every day And teach his lisping lips to tell The name of one that"s far away.
Forgive me, love, but thus alone My time is cheered while thou art gone.
EXTRACT XI.
Florence.
No--"tis not the region where Love"s to be found-- They have bosoms that sigh, they have glances that rove, They have language a Sappho"s own lip might resound, When she warbled her best--but they"ve nothing like Love.
Nor is"t that pure _sentiment_ only they want, Which Heaven for the mild and the tranquil hath made-- Calm, wedded affection, that home-rooted plant Which sweetens seclusion and smiles in the shade;
That feeling which, after long years have gone by, Remains like a portrait we"ve sat for in youth, Where, even tho" the flush of the colors may fly, The features still live in their first smiling truth;
That union where all that in Woman is kind, With all that in Man most enn.o.blingly towers, Grow wreathed into one--like the column, combined Of the _strength_ of the shaft and the capital"s _flowers_.
Of this--bear ye witness, ye wives, everywhere, By the ARNO, the PO, by all ITALY"S streams-- Of this heart-wedded love, so delicious to share, Not a husband hath even one glimpse in his dreams.
But it _is_ not this only;--born full of the light Of a sun from whose fount the luxuriant festoons Of these beautiful valleys drink l.u.s.tre so bright That beside him our suns of the north are but moons,--
We might fancy at least, like their climate they burned; And that Love tho" unused in this region of spring To be thus to a tame Household Deity turned, Would yet be all soul when abroad on the wing.
And there _may_ be, there _are_ those explosions of heart Which burst when the senses have first caught the flame; Such fits of the blood as those climates impart, Where Love is a sun-stroke that maddens the frame.
But that Pa.s.sion which springs in the depth of the soul; Whose beginnings are virginly pure as the source Of some small mountain rivulet destined to roll As a torrent ere long, losing peace in its course--
A course to which Modesty"s struggle but lends A more headlong descent without chance of recall; But which Modesty even to the last edge attends, And then throws a halo of tears round its fall!
This exquisite Pa.s.sion--ay, exquisite, even Mid the ruin its madness too often hath made, As it keeps even then a bright trace of the heaven, That heaven of Virtue from which it has strayed--
This entireness of love which can only be found, Where Woman like something that"s holy, watched over, And fenced from her childhood with purity round, Comes body and soul fresh as Spring to a lover!
Where not an eye answers, where not a hand presses, Till spirit with spirit in sympathy move; And the Senses asleep in their sacred recesses Can only be reached thro" the temple of Love!--
This perfection of Pa.s.sion-how can it be found, Where the mystery Nature hath hung round the tie By which souls are together attracted and bound, Is laid open for ever to heart, ear and eye;--
Where naught of that innocent doubt can exist, That ignorance even than knowledge more bright, Which circles the young like the morn"s sunny mist, And curtains them round in their own native light;--
Where Experience leaves nothing for Love to reveal, Or for Fancy in visions to gleam o"er the thought: But the truths which alone we would die to conceal From the maiden"s young heart are the only ones taught.
No, no, "tis not here, howsoever we sigh, Whether purely to Hymen"s one planet we pray, Or adore, like Sabaeans, each light of Love"s sky, Here is not the region to fix or to stray.
For faithless in wedlock, in gallantry gross, Without honor to guard, to reserve, to restrain, What have they a husband can mourn as a loss?
What have they a lover can prize as a gain?