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SONG FROM ZAPOLYA

COLERIDGE

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VERSE, a breeze mid blossoms straying, Where Hope clung feeding, like a beeBoth were mine! Life went a-maying With Nature, Hope, and Poesy,

When I was young!

When I was young ?—Ah, woeful When ! Ah! for the change 'twixt Now and Then!

This breathing house not built with hands,

This body that does me grievous wrong,
O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands,
How lightly then it flashed along :-
Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore,
On winding lakes and rivers wide,
That ask no aid of sail or oar,
That fear no spite of wind or tide!
Nought cared this body for wind or
weather

When Youth and I lived in't together.
Flowers are lovely; Love is flower-like;'
Friendship is a sheltering tree;

O! the joys, that came down shower-like, Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty,

Ere I was old!

Ere I was old? Ah woeful Ere,
Which tells me, Youth's no longer here!
O, Youth for years so many and sweet,
'Tis known, that Thou and I were one,
I'll think it but a fond conceit-
It cannot be that Thou art gone!
Thy vesper-bell hath not yet toll'd:-
And thou wert aye a masker bold !
What strange disguise hast now put on,
To make believe, that thou art gone?
I see these locks in silvery slips,

This drooping gait, this altered size:
But Spring-tide blossoms on thy lips,
And tears take sunshine from thine eyes!
Life is but thought: so think I will
That Youth and I are house-mates still.
Dew-drops are the gems of morning,
But the tears of mournful eve!
Where no hope is, life 's a warning
That only serves to make us grieve,
When we are old:

That only serves to make us grieve
With oft and tedious taking-leave
Like some poor nigh-related guest,
That may not rudely be dismist;
Yet hath out-stay'd his welcome while,
And tells the jest without the smile.

1823-April, 1832. 1828-June, 1832.

WORK WITHOUT HOPE

ALL Nature seems at work. Slugs leave their lair

The bees are stirring-birds are on the wing

And Winter slumbering in the open air, Wears on his smiling face a dream of Spring!

And I the while, the sole unbusy thing, Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, nor sing.

Yet well I ken the banks where ama

ranths blow,

Have traced the fount whence streams of nectar flow.

Bloom, O ye amaranths! bloom for whom ye may,

For me ye bloom not! Glide, rich streams, away!

With lips unbrightened, wreathless brow, I stroll:

And would you learn the spells that drowse my soul?

Work without Hope draws nectar in a sieve,

And Hope without an object cannot live. February, 1827. 1828.

THE GARDEN OF BOCCACCIO Of late, in one of those most weary hours,

When life seems emptied of all genial powers,

A dreary mood, which he who ne'er has known

May bless his happy lot, I sate alone; And, from the numbing spell to win relief, [grief. Call'd on the Past for thought of glee or

In vain bereft alike of grief and glee,
I sate and cow'r'd o'er my own vacancy!
And as I watched the dull continuous
ache,

Which, all else slumbering, seem'd alone to wake;

O Friend! long wont to notice yet conceal,

And soothe by silence what words cannot heal,

I but half saw that quiet hand of thine
Place on my desk this exquisite design,
Boccaccio's Garden and its faery,
The love, the joyaunce, and the gal-
lantry!

An Idyll, with Boccaccio's spirit warm,
Framed in the silent poesy of form.
Like flocks a-down a newly-bathed steep
Emerging from a mist; or like a stream
Of music soft, that not dispels the sleep,
But casts in happier moulds the
slumberer's dream,

Gazed by an idle eye with silent might The picture stole upon my inward

sight.

A tremulous warmth crept gradual o'er my chest,

As though an infant's finger touch'd my breast.

And one by one (I know not whence) were brought

All spirits of power that most had stirr'd my thought

In selfless boyhood, on a new world tost Of wonder, and in its own fancies lost; Or charm'd my youth, that, kindled from above,

Loved ere it loved, and sought a form for love;

Or lent a lustre to the earnest scan
Of manhood, musing what and whence

is man!

Wild strain of Scalds, that in the sea

worn caves

Rehearsed their war-spell to the winds and waves;

Or fateful hymn of those prophetic maids,

That call'd on Hertha in deep forest glades;

Or minstrel lay, that cheer'd the baron's

feast;

Or rhyme of city pomp, of monk and priest,

Judge, mayor, and many a guild in long array,

To high-church pacing on the great saint's day.

And many a verse which to myself I sang,

That woke the tear yet stole away the pang.

Of hopes which in lamenting I renew'd. And last, a matron now, of sober mien, Yet radiant still and with no earthly sheen,

Whom as a faery child my childhood woo'd

Even in my dawn of thought—Philosophy;

Though then unconscious of herself, pardie,

She bore no other name than Poesy: And, like a gift from heaven, in lifeful glee,

That had but newly left a mother's knee, Prattled and play'd with bird and flower,

and stone,

As if with elfin playfellows well known, And life reveal'd to innocence alone.

Thanks, gentle artist! now I can descry Thy fair creation with a mastering eye, And all awake! And now in fix'd gaze stand,

Now wander through the Eden of thy hand:

Praise the green arches, on the fountain clear

See fragment shadows of the crossing deer;

And with that serviceable nymph I stoop The crystal from its restless pool to scoop.

I see no longer! I myself am there,
Sit

on the ground-sward, and the
banquet share.

'Tis I, that sweep that lute's love-echoing strings,

And gaze upon the maid who gazing

sings;

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O all-enjoying and all-blending sage, Long be it mine to con thy mazy page, Where half conceal'd, the eye of fancy views

Fauns, nymphs, and winged saints, all

gracious to thy muse!

1 I know few more striking or more interesting proofs of the overwhelming influence which the study of the Greek and Roman classics exercised on the judgments, feelings, and imaginations of the literati of Europe at the commencement of the restoration of literature, than the passage in the Filocopo of Boccaccio, where the sage in structor, Racheo, as soon as the young prince and the beautiful girl Biancofiore had learned their letters, sets them to study the Holy Book, Ovid's Art of Love. "Incominciò Racheo a mettere il suo officio in esecuzione con intera sollecitudine. E loro, in breve tempo, insegnato a conoscer le lettere, fece leggere il santo libro d'Ovvidio, nel quale il sommo poeta mostra, come i santi fuochi di Venere si debbano ne' freddi cuori accendere." — (Coleridge.)

Still in thy garden let me watch their pranks,

And see in Dian's vest between the ranks

Of the trim vines, some maid that half believes

The vestal fires, of which her lover grieves,

With that sly satyr peeping through the leaves ! 1828. 1829.

PHANTOM OR FACT

A DIALOGUE IN VERSE

AUTHOR

A LOVELY form there sate beside my bed,

And such a feeling calm its presence shed,

A tender love so pure from earthly leaven,

That I unnethe the fancy might control,

'Twas my own spirit newly come from heaven,

Wooing its gentle way into my soul! But ah! the change-It had not stirr'd, and yet

Alas! that change how fain would I forget!

That shrinking back, like one that had mistook!

That weary, wandering, disavowing look!

'Twas all another, feature, look, and frame,

And still, methought, I knew, it was the same!

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SCOTT

LIST OF REFERENCES

-

EDITIONS

POETICAL WORKS, edited by William Minto, 2 volumes, Edinburgh, 1887-88. POETICAL WORKS, 1 volume, edited, with revision of text, by W. J. Rolfe, Boston, 1888. POETICAL WORKS, edited by Andrew Lang, 6 volumes, 1902. POETICAL WORKS, 1 volume, edited by F. T. Palgrave, The Macmillan Co., 1866 (Globe Edition; not complete). * COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS, 1 volume, edited by H. E. Scudder, The Houghton, Mifflin Co., 1900 (Cambridge Edition). - POEMS, 1 volume, edited by J. Logie Robertson, Clarendon Press, 1906 (Oxford Edition). - JOURNAL, 1825-1832, 2 volumes, edited by David Douglas, Edinburgh, 1890. FAMILIAR LETTERS, 2 volumes, edited by David Douglas, Edinburgh, 1894. BIOGRAPHY

** LOCKHART (J. G.), Life of Sir Walter Scott, 1837.-*HUTTON (R. H.), Scott, 1878 (English Men of Letters Series). (Containing two chapters of excellent criticism on Scott as a poet.) YONGE (C. D.), Scott, 1888 (Great Writers Series). SAINTSBURY (George), Sir Walter Scott, 1897 (Famous Scots Series). HUDSON (W. H.), Sir Walter Scott, 1901 (Scots Epoch Makers). HUGHES (Mary A. W.), Letters and Recollections of Scott, Smith, Elder & Co., 1904. NORGATE (G. Le G.), Life of Sir Walter Scott, Methuen, 1906. JENKS (T.), In the Days of Scott, A. S. Barnes, 1906.*LANG (A.), Sir Walter Scott, 1906 (Literary Lives Series).

CRITICISM

BALL (Margaret), Sir Walter Scott as a Critic, 1907. BEERS (H. A.), English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century, 1901. *BROOKE (Stopford A.), Studies in Poetry, 1907. - *CARLYLE (T.), Miscellanies, Vol. IV; from the London and Westminster Review, 1838. - CROCKETT (S. R.), The Scott Country, 1902. EMERSON (R. W.), Miscellanies. - HAY (John), Addresses: Speech at the Unveiling of the Bust of Scott in Westminster Abbey, 1897. HOWELLS (W. D.), My Literary Passions, 1895. - HUGO (Victor), Littérature et Philosophie, 1834. -HUTTON (R. H.), Brief Literary Criticisms, 1906.-JEFFREY (Francis), Edinburgh Review, No. 23 (April, 1808), Art. 1, Marmion; No. 32, Art. 1, Lady of the Lake; No. 36. Art. 6, Vision of Don Roderick; No. 48, Art. 1, Lord of the Isles. Also in his Critical Essays. KER (W. P.), Scott, in Chambers's Cyclopædia of English Literature, Vol. III, new edition, 1904. *LANG (A.), Letters to Dead Authors, 1886. LANG (A.). Essays in Little, 1891. - LANG (A.), Poets' Country, 1907.- PRESCOTT (W. H.), Biographical and Critical Miscellanies, 1845. *PALGRAVE (F. T.), Introduction to the Globe Edition, 1866. - *RUSKIN (John), Modern Painters, Part IV, Chap. 16 (especially sections 22– 45) and 17. *RUSKIN (John), Fors Clavigera, Letters 31-34, 92. - SAINTSBURY (G.), Essays on English Literature, Second Series, 1895. *SHAIRP (J. C.), Aspects of Poetry: Homeric Spirit of Scott, 1881. SMITH (Goldwin), Scott's Poetry again; in the Atlantic, March, 1905. STEPHEN (Leslie), Hours in a Library, Vol. I, 1874, 1892. — SWINBURNE (A. C.), Studies in Prose and Poetry, 1894. SYMONS (Arthur), Was Sir Walter Scott a Poet; in the Atlantic, Nov., 1904. SYMONS (Arthur), Romantic Movement in English Poetry, 1909. WOODBERRY (G. E.), Great Writers, 1907; from McClure's Magazine, June, 1905.

WILLIAM AND HELEN

SCOTT

Imitated from Bürger's Lenore. See Lockhart's Life of Scott, Volume I, Chap. 7.

FROM heavy dreams fair Helen rose,
And eyed the dawning red:
"Alas, my love, thou tarriest long!
O art thou false or dead?”

With gallant Frederick's princely power
He sought the bold crusade,
But not a word from Judah's wars
Told Helen how he sped.

With Paynim and with Saracen

At length a truce was made,
And every knight returned to dry
The tears his love had shed.

Our gallant host was homeward bound
With many a song of joy;
Green waved the laurel in each plume,
The badge of victory.

And old and young, and sire and son,
To meet them crowd the way,
With shouts and mirth and melody,
The debt of love to pay.

Full many a maid her true-love met,
And sobbed in his embrace,
And fluttering joy in tears and smiles
Arrayed full many a face.

Nor joy nor smile for Helen sad,
She sought the host in vain ;
For none could tell her William's fate,
If faithless or if slain.

The martial band is past and gone;
She rends her raven hair,

And in distraction's bitter mood
She weeps with wild despair.

"O, rise, my child," her mother said, "Nor sorrow thus in vain ;

A perjured lover's fleeting heart
No tears recall again."

"O, Mother, what is gone is gone,
What's lost forever lorn:

Death, death alone can comfort me;
O had I ne'er been born!

"O, break, my heart, O, break at once!
Drink my life-blood, Despair!
No joy remains on earth for me,
For me in heaven no share.”

"O, enter not in judgment, Lord!”
The pious mother prays:

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Impute not guilt to thy frail child!
She knows not what she says.

"O, say thy pater-noster, child !
O, turn to God and grace!
His will, that turned thy bliss to bale,
Can change thy bale to bliss."

"O mother, mother, what is bliss?
O mother, what is bale ?

My William's love was heaven on earth,
Without it earth is hell.

"Why should I pray to ruthless Heaven,
Since my loved William's slain?
I only prayed for William's sake,
And all my prayers were vain.”
"O, take the sacrament, my child,
And check these tears that flow;
By resignation's humble prayer,
O, hallowed be thy woe!"

"No sacrament can quench this fire,
Or slake this scorching pain;
No sacrament can bid the dead
Arise and live again.

"O, break, my heart, O, break at once! Be thou my god, Despair!

Heaven's heaviest blow has fallen on me, And vain each fruitless prayer."

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