The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes — Volume 1

SCENE II.—Rooms in Lord Seaford's house. A large company; dancers; gentlemen looking on

 
  1_st Gentleman_.
  Henry, what dark-haired queen is that? She moves
  As if her body were instinct with thought,
  Moulded to motion by the music's waves,
  As floats the swan upon the swelling lake;
  Or as in dreams one sees an angel move,
  Sweeping on slow wings through the buoyant air,
  Then folding them, and turning on his track.
 
 
  2_nd_.
  You seem inspired; nor can I wonder at it;
  She is a glorious woman; and such eyes!
  Think—to be loved by such a woman now!
 
 
  1_st_.
  You have seen her, then, before: what is her name?
 
 
  2_nd_.
  I saw her once; but could not learn her name.
 
 
  3_rd_.
  She is the wife of an Italian count,
  Who for some cause, political I think,
  Took refuge in this country. His estates
  The Church has eaten up, as I have heard:
  Mephisto says the Church has a good stomach.
 
 
  2_nd_.
  How do they live?
 
 
  3_rd_.
                    Poorly, I should suppose;
  For she gives Lady Gertrude music-lessons:
  That's how they know her.—Ah, you should hear her sing!
 
 
  2_nd_.
  If she sings as she looks or as she dances,
  It were as well for me I did not hear.
 
 
  3_rd_.
  If Count Lamballa followed Lady Seaford
  To heaven, I know who'd follow her on earth.
 

SCENE III.—Julian's room. LILY asleep

 
  Julian.
  I wish she would come home. When the child wakes,
  I cannot bear to see her eyes first rest
  On me, then wander searching through the room,
  And then return and rest. And yet, poor Lilia!
  'Tis nothing strange thou shouldst be glad to go
  From this dull place, and for a few short hours
  Have thy lost girlhood given back to thee;
  For thou art very young for such hard things
  As poor men's wives in cities must endure.
 
 
  I am afraid the thought is not at rest,
  But rises still, that she is not my wife—
  Not truly, lawfully. I hoped the child
  Would kill that fancy; but I fear instead,
  She thinks I have begun to think the same—
  Thinks that it lies a heavy weight of sin
  Upon my heart. Alas, my Lilia!
  When every time I pray, I pray that God
  Would look and see that thou and I be one!
 
 
  Lily
  (starting up in her crib).
  Oh, take me! take me!
 
 
  Julian
  (going up to her with a smile).
  What is the matter with my little child?
 
 
  Lily.
  I don't know, father; I was very frightened.
 
 
  Julian.
  'Twas nothing but a dream. Look—I am with you.
 
 
  Lily.
  I am wake now; I know you're there; but then
  I did not know it.
 

[Smiling.]

 
  Julian.
  Lie down now, darling. Go to sleep again.
 
 
  Lily
  (beseechingly).
  Not yet. Don't tell me go to sleep again;
  It makes me so, so frightened! Take me up,
  And let me sit upon your knee.—Where's mother?
  I cannot see her.
 
 
  Julian.
                She's not at home, my child;
  But soon she will be back.
 
 
  Lily.
                               But if she walk
  Out in the dark streets—so dark, it will catch her.
 
 
  Julian.
  She will not walk—but what would catch her, sweet?
 
 
  Lily.
  I don't know. Tell me a story till she comes.
 
 
  Julian
  (taking her, and sitting with her on his knees by the fire).
  Come then, my little Lily, I will tell you
  A story I have read this very night.
 

[She looks in his face.]

 
  There was a man who had a little boy,
  And when the boy grew big, he went and asked
  His father to give him a purse of money.
  His father gave him such a large purse full!
  And then he went away and left his home.
  You see he did not love his father much.
 
 
  Lily.
  Oh! didn't he?—If he had, he wouldn't have gone!
 
 
  Julian.
  Away he went, far far away he went,
  Until he could not even spy the top
  Of the great mountain by his father's house.
  And still he went away, away, as if
  He tried how far his feet could go away;
  Until he came to a city huge and wide,
  Like London here.
 
 
  Lily.
                    Perhaps it was London.
 
 
  Julian.
  Perhaps it was, my child. And there he spent
  All, all his father's money, buying things
  That he had always told him were not worth,
  And not to buy them; but he would and did.
 
 
  Lily.
  How very naughty of him!
 
 
  Julian.
                             Yes, my child.
  And so when he had spent his last few pence,
  He grew quite hungry. But he had none left
  To buy a piece of bread. And bread was scarce;
  Nobody gave him any. He had been
  Always so idle, that he could not work.
  But at last some one sent him to feed swine.
 
 
  Lily.
  Swine! Oh!
 
 
  Julian.
  Yes, swine: 'twas all that he could do;
  And he was glad to eat some of their food.
 

[She stares at him.]

 
  But at the last, hunger and waking love
  Made him remember his old happy home.
  "How many servants in my father's house
  Have plenty, and to spare!" he said. "I'll go
  And say, 'I have done very wrong, my father;
  I am not worthy to be called your son;
  Put me among your servants, father, please.'"
  Then he rose up and went; but thought the road
  So much, much farther to walk back again,
  When he was tired and hungry. But at last
  He saw the blue top of the great big hill
  That stood beside his father's house; and then
  He walked much faster. But a great way off,
  His father saw him coming, lame and weary
  With his long walk; and very different
  From what he had been. All his clothes were hanging
  In tatters, and his toes stuck through his shoes—
 

[She bursts into tears.]

 
Lily (sobbing). Like that poor beggar I saw yesterday?
 
 
  Julian.
  Yes, my dear child.
 
 
  Lily.
                        And was he dirty too?
 
 
  Julian.
  Yes, very dirty; he had been so long
  Among the swine.
 
 
  Lily.
          Is it all true though, father?
 
 
  Julian.
  Yes, my darling; all true, and truer far
  Than you can think.
 
 
  Lily.
                   What was his father like?
 
 
  Julian.
  A tall, grand, stately man.
 
 
  Lily.
                              Like you, dear father?
 
 
  Julian.
  Like me, only much grander.
 
 
  Lily.
                               I love you
  The best though.
 

[Kissing him.]

 
  Julian.
                      Well, all dirty as he was,
  And thin, and pale, and torn, with staring eyes,
  His father knew him, the first look, far off,
  And ran so fast to meet him! put his arms
  Around his neck and kissed him.
 
 
  Lily.
                           Oh, how dear!
  I love him too;—but not so well as you.
 

[Sound of a carriage drawing up.]

 
  Julian.
  There is your mother.
 
 
  Lily.
                          I am glad, so glad!
 

Enter LILIA, looking pale.

 
  Lilia.
  You naughty child, why are you not in bed?
 
 
  Lily
  (pouting).
  I am not naughty. I am afraid to go,
  Because you don't go with me into sleep;
  And when I see things, and you are not there,
  Nor father, I am so frightened, I cry out,
  And stretch my hands, and so I come awake.
  Come with me into sleep, dear mother; come.
 
 
  Lilia.
  What a strange child it is! There! (kissing her) go to bed.
 

[Lays her down.]

 
  Julian
  (gazing on the child).
  As thou art in thy dreams without thy mother,
  So are we lost in life without our God.
 

SCENE IV.—LILIA in bed. The room lighted from a gas-lamp in the street; the bright shadow of the window on the wall and ceiling

 
  Lilia.
  Oh, it is dreary, dreary! All the time
  My thoughts would wander to my dreary home.
  Through every dance, my soul walked evermore
  In a most dreary dance through this same room.
  I saw these walls, this carpet; and I heard,
  As now, his measured step in the next chamber,
  Go pacing up and down, and I shut out!
  He is too good for me, I weak for him.
  Yet if he put his arms around me once,
  And held me fast as then, kissed me as then,
  My soul, I think, would come again to me,
  And pass from me in trembling love to him.
  But he repels me now. He loves me, true,—
  Because I am his wife: he ought to love me!
  Me, the cold statue, thus he drapes with duty.
  Sometimes he waits upon me like a maid,
  Silent with watchful eyes. Oh, would to Heaven,
  He used me like a slave bought in the market!
  Yes, used me roughly! So, I were his own;
  And words of tenderness would falter in,
  Relenting from the sternness of command.
  But I am not enough for him: he needs
  Some high-entranced maiden, ever pure,
  And thronged with burning thoughts of God and him.
  So, as he loves me not, his deeds for me
  Lie on me like a sepulchre of stones.
  Italian lovers love not so; but he
  Has German blood in those great veins of his.
  He never brings me now a little flower.
  He sings low wandering sweet songs to the child;
  But never sings to me what the voice-bird
  Sings to the silent, sitting on the nest.
  I would I were his child, and not his wife!
  How I should love him then! Yet I have thoughts
  Fit to be women to his mighty men;
  And he would love them, if he saw them once.
 
 
  Ah! there they come, the visions of my land!
  The long sweep of a bay, white sands, and cliffs
  Purple above the blue waves at their feet!
  Down the full river comes a light-blue sail;
  And down the near hill-side come country girls,
  Brown, rosy, laden light with glowing fruits;
  Down to the sands come ladies, young, and clad
  For holiday; in whose hearts wonderment
  At manhood is the upmost, deepest thought;
  And to their side come stately, youthful forms,
  Italy's youth, with burning eyes and hearts:—
  Triumphant Love is lord of the bright day.
  Yet one heart, under that blue sail, would look
  With pity on their poor contentedness;
  For he sits at the helm, I at his feet.
  He sung a song, and I replied to him.
  His song was of the wind that blew us down
  From sheltered hills to the unsheltered sea.
  Ah, little thought my heart that the wide sea,
  Where I should cry for comforting in vain,
  Was the expanse of his wide awful soul,
  To which that wind was helpless drifting me!
  I would he were less great, and loved me more.
  I sung to him a song, broken with sighs,
  For even then I feared the time to come:
  "O will thine eyes shine always, love, as now?
  And will thy lips for aye be sweetly curved?"
  Said my song, flowing unrhymed from my heart.
  "And will thy forehead ever, sunlike bend,
  And suck my soul in vapours up to thee?
  Ah love! I need love, beauty, and sweet odours.
  Thou livest on the hoary mountains; I
  In the warm valley, with the lily pale,
  Shadowed with mountains and its own great leaves;
  Where odours are the sole invisible clouds,
  Making the heart weep for deliciousness.
  Will thy eternal mountain always bear
  Blue flowers upspringing at the glacier's foot?
  Alas! I fear the storms, the blinding snow,
  The vapours which thou gatherest round thy head,
  Wherewith thou shuttest up thy chamber-door,
  And goest from me into loneliness."
  Ah me, my song! it is a song no more!
  He is alone amid his windy rocks;
  I wandering on a low and dreary plain!
 

[She weeps herself asleep.]

SCENE V.—LORD SEAFORD, alternately writing at a table and composing at his pianoforte

SONG

 
      Eyes of beauty, eyes of light,
        Sweetly, softly, sadly bright!
      Draw not, ever, o'er my eye,
        Radiant mists of ecstasy.
 
 
      Be not proud, O glorious orbs!
        Not your mystery absorbs;
      But the starry soul that lies
        Looking through your night of eyes.
 
 
      One moment, be less perfect, sweet;
        Sin once in something small;
      One fault to lift me on my feet
        From love's too perfect thrall!
 
 
      For now I have no soul; a sea
        Fills up my caverned brain,
      Heaving in silent waves to thee,
        The mistress of that main.
 
 
      O angel! take my hand in thine;
        Unfold thy shining silver wings;
      Spread them around thy face and mine,
        Close curtained in their murmurings.
 
 
      But I should faint with too much bliss
        To be alone in space with thee;
      Except, O dread! one angel-kiss
        In sweetest death should set me free.
 
 
      O beauteous devil, tempt me, tempt me on,
        Till thou hast won my soul in sighs;
      I'll smile with thee upon thy flaming throne,
        If thou wilt keep those eyes.
 
 
      And if the meanings of untold desires
        Should charm thy pain of one faint sting,
      I will arise amid the scorching fires,
        I will arise and sing.
 
 
      O what is God to me? He sits apart
        Amid the clear stars, passionless and cold.
      Divine! thou art enough to fill my heart;
        O fold me in thy heaven, sweet love, infold.
 
 
      With too much life, I fall before thee dead.
        With holding thee, my sense consumes in storm.
      Thou art too keen a flame, too hallowed
        For any temple but thy holy form.
 

SCENE VI.—Julian's room next morning; no fire. JULIAN stands at the window, looking into a London fog

 
  Julian.
  And there are mountains on the earth, far-off;
  Steep precipices laved at morn in wind
  From the blue glaciers fresh; and falls that leap,
  Springing from rock to pool abandonedly;
  And all the spirit of the earth breathed out,
  Bearing the soul, as on an altar-flame,
  Aloft to God! And there is woman-love—
  Far off, ah me!
 

[Sitting down wearily.]

 
                  —the heart of earth's delight
  Withered from mine! O for a desert sea,
  The cold sun flashing on the sailing icebergs!
  Where I might cry aloud on God, until
  My soul burst forth upon the wings of pain,
  And fled to him. A numbness as of death
  Infolds me. As in sleep I walk. I live,
  But my dull soul can hardly keep awake.
  Yet God is here as on the mountain-top,
  Or on the desert sea, or lonely isle;
  And I should know him here, if Lilia loved me,
  As once I thought she did. But can I blame her?
  The change has been too much for her to bear.
  Can poverty make one of two hearts cold,
  And warm the other with the love of God?
  But then I have been silent, often moody,
  Drowned in much questioning; and she has thought
  That I was tired of her, while more than all
  I pondered how to wake her living soul.
  She cannot think why I should haunt my chamber,
  Except a goaded conscience were my grief;
  Thinks not of aught to gain, but all to shun.
  Deeming, poor child, that I repent me thus
  Of that which makes her mine for evermore,
  It is no wonder if her love grow less.
  Then I am older much than she; and this
  Fever, I think, has made me old indeed
  Before my fortieth year; although, within,
  I seem as young as ever to myself.
  O my poor Lilia! thou art not to blame;
  I'll love thee more than ever; I will be
  So gentle to thy heart where love lies dead!
  For carefully men ope the door, and walk
  With silent footfall through the room where lies,
  Exhausted, sleeping, with its travail sore,
  The body that erewhile hath borne a spirit.
  Alas, my Lilia! where is dead Love's child?
 
 
  I must go forth and do my daily work.
  I thank thee, God, that it is hard sometimes
  To do my daily labour; for, of old,
  When men were poor, and could not bring thee much,
  A turtle-dove was all that thou didst ask;
  And so in poverty, and with a heart
  Oppressed with heaviness, I try to do
  My day's work well to thee,—my offering:
  That he has taught me, who one day sat weary
  At Sychar's well. Then home when I return,
  I come without upbraiding thoughts to thee.
  Ah! well I see man need not seek for penance—
  Thou wilt provide the lamb for sacrifice;
  Thou only wise enough to teach the soul,
  Measuring out the labour and the grief,
  Which it must bear for thy sake, not its own.
  He neither chose his glory, nor devised
  The burden he should bear; left all to God;
  And of them both God gave to him enough.
  And see the sun looks faintly through the mist;
  It cometh as a messenger to me.
  My soul is heavy, but I will go forth;
  My days seem perishing, but God yet lives
  And loves. I cannot feel, but will believe.
 

[He rises and is going. LILIA enters, looking weary.]

 
Look, my dear Lilia, how the sun shines out!
 
 
  Lilia.
  Shines out indeed! Yet 'tis not bad for England.
  I would I were in Italy, my own!
 

[Weeps.]

 
  Julian.
  'Tis the same sun that shines in Italy.
 
 
  Lilia.
  But never more will shine upon us there!
  It is too late; all wishing is in vain;
  But would that we had not so ill deserved
  As to be banished from fair Italy!
 
 
  Julian.
  Ah! my dear Lilia, do not, do not think
  That God is angry when we suffer ill.
  'Twere terrible indeed, if 'twere in anger.
 
 
  Lilia.
  Julian, I cannot feel as you. I wish
  I felt as you feel.
 
 
  Julian.
  God will hear you, child,
  If you will speak to him. But I must go.
  Kiss me, my Lilia.
 

[She kisses him mechanically. He goes with a sigh.]

 
  Lilia.
  It is plain to see
  He tries to love me, but is weary of me.
 

[She weeps.]

Enter LILY.

 
Lily. Mother, have you been naughty? Mother, dear!
 

[Pulling her hand from her face.]