human
Can you write me a poem about rome and lateran?
assistant
Sure, here's a poem about rome and lateran:
  Oh, you are sick of self-love, Malvolio,
And taste with a distempered appetite!
Il doutait de tout, meme de l'amour.
Solvitur ambulando.
Flevit amores
Non elaboratum ad pedem.
Over the great windy waters, and over the clear-crested summits,
Unto the sun and the sky, and unto the perfecter earth,
'Tis but to prove limitation, and measure a cord, that we travel;
'Tis but to change idle fancies for memories wilfully falser;
'Tis but to go and have been.'--Come, little bark! let us go.
Dear Eustatio, I write that you may write me an answer,
Or at the least to put us again en rapport with each other.
Rome disappoints me much,--St Peter's, perhaps, in especial;
Only the Arch of Titus and view from the Lateran please me:
This, however, perhaps is the weather, which truly is horrid.
Greece must be better, surely; and yet I am feeling so spiteful,
Rome disappoints me much; I hardly as yet understand it, but
RUBBISHY seems the word that most exactly would suit it.
All the foolish destructions, and all the sillier savings,
All the incongruous things of past incompatible ages,
Seem to be treasured up here to make fools of present and future.
It is a blessing, no doubt, to be rid, at least for a time, of
What one thinks one is, or thinks that others suppose one;
Yet, in despite of all, we turn like fools to the English.
Rome disappoints me still; but I shrink and adapt myself to it.
Somehow a tyrannous sense of a superincumbent oppression
Still, wherever I go, accompanies ever, and makes me
Feel like a tree (shall I say?) buried under a ruin of brickwork.
Merely a marvellous mass of broken and castaway wine-pots.
Ye gods! what do I want with this rubbish of ages departed,
Yet of solidity much, but of splendour little is extant:
At last, dearest Louisa, I take up my pen to address you.
Here we are, you see, with the seven-and-seventy boxes,
Courier, Papa and Mamma, the children, and Mary and Susan:
Rome is a wonderful place, but Mary shall tell you about it;
Not very gay, however; the English are mostly at Naples;
There are the A.'s, we hear, and most of the W. party.
George, however, is come; did I tell you about his mustachios?
Adieu, dearest Louise,--evermore your faithful Georgina.
Who can a Mr. Claude be whom George has taken to be with?
Very stupid, I think, but George says so VERY clever.
No, the Christian faith, as at any rate I understood it,
With its humiliations and exaltations combining,
Exaltations sublime, and yet diviner abasements,
Aspirations from something most shameful here upon earth and
Is not here, O Rome, in any of these thy churches;
Is not here, but in Freiburg, or Rheims, or Westminster Abbey.
What in thy Dome I find, in all thy recenter efforts,
Is a something, I think, more RATIONAL far, more earthly,
Actual, less ideal, devout not in scorn and refusal,
But in a positive, calm, Stoic-Epicurean acceptance.
This I begin to detect in St. Peter's and some of the churches,
Mostly in all that I see of the sixteenth-century masters;
Overlaid of course with infinite gauds and gewgaws,
Innocent, playful follies, the toys and trinkets of childhood,
Forced on maturer years, as the serious one thing needful,
By the barbarian will of the rigid and ignorant Spaniard.
Curious work, meantime, re-entering society: how we
Walk a livelong day, great Heaven, and watch our shadows!
What our shadows seem, forsooth, we will ourselves be.
Do I look like that? you think me that: then I AM that.
Lo you, for forty days from the windows of heaven it fell; the
Waters prevail on the earth yet more for a hundred and fifty;
Are they abating at last? the doves that are sent to explore are
Wearily fain to return, at the best with a leaflet of promise,--
O my tolerant soul, be still! but you talk of barbarians,
Alaric, Attila, Genseric;--why, they came, they killed, they
Here, with emasculate pupils and gimcrack churches of Gesu,
Pseudo-learning and lies, confessional-boxes and postures,--
Here, with metallic beliefs and regimental devotions,--
Here, overcrusting with slime, perverting, defacing, debasing,
Michael Angelo's Dome, that had hung the Pantheon in heaven,
Raphael's Joys and Graces, and thy clear stars, Galileo!
Which of three Misses Trevellyn it is that Vernon shall marry
So that he trifles with Mary's shawl, ties Susan's bonnet,
Dances with all, but at home is most, they say, with Georgina,
Who is, however, TOO silly in my apprehension for Vernon.
I, as before when I wrote, continue to see them a little;
Not that I like them much or care a bajocco for Vernon,
But I am slow at Italian, have not many English acquaintance,
And I am asked, in short, and am not good at excuses.
Middle-class people these, bankers very likely, not wholly
Neither man's aristocracy this, nor God's, God knoweth!
Grandly among county people to introduce at assemblies
To the unpennied cadets our cousins with excellent fortunes.
Neither man's aristocracy this, nor God's, God knoweth!
Ah, what a shame, indeed, to abuse these most worthy people!
Painfully made, to perform the old ritual service of manners?
Dear, dear, what do I say? but, alas! just now, like Iago,
I can be nothing at all, if it is not critical wholly;
So in fantastic height, in coxcomb exaltation,
Here in the garden I walk, can freely concede to the Maker
That the works of His hand are all very good: His creatures,
But for Adam there is not found an help-meet for him.
No, great Dome of Agrippa, thou art not Christian! canst not,
Here as I walk, do I dream of the Christian belfries above them?
And I recite to myself, how
Eager for battle here
Stood Vulcan, here matronal Juno,
And with the bow to his shoulder faithful
He who with pure dew laveth of Castaly
His flowing locks, who holdeth of Lycia
The oak forest and the wood that bore him,
Delos' and Patara's own Apollo. [*]
*      Hic avidus stetit
Vulcanus, hic matrona Juno, et
Nunquam humeris positurus arcum;
Qui rore puro Castaliae lavit
Crines solutos, qui Lyciae tenet
Dumeta natalemque silvam,
Yet it is pleasant, I own it, to be in their company; pleasant,
Whatever else it may be, to abide in the feminine presence.
Meat and drink and life, and music, filling with sweetness,
Thrilling with melody sweet, with harmonies strange overwhelming,
This were enough, I could think; and truly with glad resignation
Nephews and nieces! alas, for as yet I have none! and, moreover,
No sort of proper provision is made for that most patriotic,
Most meritorious subject, the childless and bachelor uncle.
Ye, too, marvellous Twain, that erect on the Monte Cavallo
Stand as instinct with life in the might of immutable manhood,--
O ye mighty and strange, ye ancient divine ones of Hellas.
Are ye Christian too? to convert and redeem and renew you,
And ye, silent, supreme in serene and victorious marble,
Ye that encircle the walls of the stately Vatican chambers,
Ye unto whom far and near come posting the Christian pilgrims,
Ye that are ranged in the halls of the mystic Christian Pontiff,
Are ye also baptized? are ye of the kingdom of Heaven?
These are the facts.  The uncle, the elder brother, the squire (a
Cornwall, of course; 'Papa is in business,' Mary informs me;
He's a good sensible man, whatever his trade is.  The mother
Is it contemptible, Eustace--I'm perfectly ready to think so,--
Is it,--the horrible pleasure of pleasing inferior people?
I am ashamed of my own self; and yet true it is, if disgraceful,
I, who have always failed,--I, trust me, can suit the Trevellyns;
And I am glad to be liked, and like in return very kindly.
Higher and manners more perfect than Susan or Mary Trevellyn.
Well, I know, after all, it is only juxtaposition,--
Juxtaposition, in short; and what is juxtaposition?
But I have made the step, have quitted the ship of Ulysses;
Quitted the sea and the shore, passed into the magical island;
Yet on my lips is the moly, medicinal, offered of Hermes.
I have come into the precinct, the labyrinth closes around me,
Path into path rounding slyly; I pace slowly on, and the fancy,
Still, wheresoever I swing, wherever to shore, or to shelf, or
Floor of cavern untrodden, shell sprinkled, enchanting, I know I
Yet shall one time feel the strong cord tighten about me,--
Yet shall plant firm foot on the broad lofty spaces I quit, shall
Dearest Louisa,--Inquire, if you please, about Mr. Claude ----.
He has been once at R., and remembers meeting the H.'s.
Harriet L., perhaps, may be able to tell you about him.
It is an awkward youth, but still with very good manners;
Certainly once he spoke of a daily service he went to.
Adieu again,--evermore, my dearest, your loving Georgina.
He is what people call, I suppose, a superior man, and
Certainly seems so to me; but I think he is terribly selfish.
Alba, thou findest me still, and, Alba, thou findest me ever,
Now from the Capitol steps, now over Titus's Arch,
Or from a Vatican window, or bridge, or the high Coliseum,
Clear by the garlanded line cut of the Flavian ring.
Is it religion?  I ask me; or is it a vain superstition?
Slavery abject and gross? service, too feeble, of truth?
Is it an idol I bow to, or is it a god that I worship?
Do I sink back on the old, or do I soar from the mean?
So through the city I wander and question, unsatisfied ever,
Reverent so I accept, doubtful because I revere.
Is it illusion? or does there a spirit from perfecter ages,
Here, even yet, amid loss, change, and corruption abide?
Lives in the exquisite grace of the column disjointed and single,
Is it illusion or not that attracteth the pilgrim transalpine,
Brings him a dullard and dunce hither to pry and to stare?
Is it illusion or not that allures the barbarian stranger,
What do the people say, and what does the government do?--you
I, who nor meddle nor make in politics,--I who sincerely
Put not my trust in leagues nor any suffrage by ballot,
Never predicted Parisian millenniums, never beheld a
New Jerusalem coming down dressed like a bride out of heaven
What, with the German restored, with Sicily safe to the Bourbon,
Not leave one poor corner for native Italian exertion?
France, it is foully done! and you, poor foolish England,--
Dulce it is, and decorum, no doubt, for the country to fall,--to
Precious creature, himself.  Nature sent him here to abide here;
Else why send him at all?  Nature wants him still, it is likely;
On the whole, we are meant to look after ourselves; it is certain
Care for his own dear life, and see to his own preservation;
Over and under and round us; we open our shells to imbibe our
He is passed from Monterone, at Santa Severa
He hath laid up his guns.  But the Virgin, the Daughter of Roma,
Will they fight?  I believe it.  Alas! 'tis ephemeral folly,
Vain and ephemeral folly, of course, compared with pictures,
Statues, and antique gems!--Indeed: and yet indeed too,
Terre en produit de nouveaux contre vous tous prets a se battre;
Dreamt of great indignations and angers transcendental,
Dreamt of a sword at my side and a battle-horse underneath me.
Now supposing the French or the Neapolitan soldier
Should by some evil chance come exploring the Maison Serny
(Where the family English are all to assemble for safety),
Am I prepared to lay down my life for the British female?
No, if it should be at all, it should be on the barricades there;
Sooner far should it be for this vapour of Italy's freedom,
Sooner far by the side of the d----d and dirty plebeians.
And to appear, I suppose, were but common civility.  Yes, and
Truly I do not desire they should either be killed or offended.
What I cannot feel now, am I to suppose that I shall feel?
Am I not free to attend for the ripe and indubious instinct?
Am I forbidden to wait for the clear and lawful perception?
Is it the calling of man to surrender his knowledge and insight,
Some plain visible task shall yet for our hands be assigned us,--
Quit our own fireside hopes at the alien call of a neighbour,
To the mere possible shadow of Deity offer the victim?
And is all this, my friend, but a weak and ignoble refining,
Wholly unworthy the head or the heart of Your Own Correspondent?
Yes, we are fighting at last, it appears.  This morning as usual,
And, for to-day is their day, of the Campidoglio Marbles;
Caffe-latte! I call to the waiter,--and Non c'e latte,
This is the answer he makes me, and this is the sign of a battle.
Worthy than me of attention.  I wait for my milkless nero,
Free to observe undistracted all sorts and sizes of persons,
Something is really afloat.  Ere I leave, the Caffe is empty,
Empty too the streets, in all its length the Corso
Empty, and empty I see to my right and left the Condotti.
Twelve o'clock, on the Pincian Hill, with lots of English,
Germans, Americans, French,--the Frenchmen, too, are protected,--
So we stand and stare, and see, to the left of St. Peter's,
Smoke, from the cannon, white,--but that is at intervals only,--
Black, from a burning house, we suppose, by the Cavalleggieri;
And we believe we discern some lines of men descending
Down through the vineyard-slopes, and catch a bayonet gleaming.
Every ten minutes, however,--in this there is no misconception,--
So we watch and sit, and, indeed, it begins to be tiresome.--
All this smoke is outside; when it has come to the inside,
It will be time, perhaps, to descend and retreat to our houses.
Half-past one, or two.  The report of small arms frequent,
Sharp and savage indeed; that cannot all be for nothing:
So we watch and wonder; but guessing is tiresome, very.
Weary of wondering, watching, and guessing, and gossiping idly,
Down I go, and pass through the quiet streets with the knots of
National Guards patrolling, and flags hanging out at the windows,
Irish family moving en masse to the Maison Serny,
After endeavouring idly to minister balm to the trembling
Quinquagenarian fears of two lone British spinsters,
Go to make sure of my dinner before the enemy enter.
But by this there are signs of stragglers returning; and voices
Talk, though you don't believe it, of guns and prisoners taken;
And on the walls you read the first bulletin of the morning.--
This is all that I saw, and all that I know of the battle.
Victory!  Victory!--Yes! ah, yes, thou republican Zion,
Truly the kings of the earth are gathered and gone by together;
Easier, easier far, to intone the chant of the martyr
Than to indite any paean of any victory.  Death may
Why, it is over.  The smoke of the sacrifice rises to heaven,
Of a sweet savour, no doubt, to Somebody; but on the altar,
Lo, there is nothing remaining but ashes and dirt and ill odour.
So it stands, you perceive; the labial muscles that swelled with
Vehement evolution of yesterday Marseillaises,
Articulations sublime of defiance and scorning, to-day col-
Lapse and languidly mumble, while men and women and papers
So, I have seen a man killed!  An experience that, among others!
Yes, I suppose I have; although I can hardly be certain,
And in a court of justice could never declare I had seen it.
But a man was killed, I am told, in a place where I saw
Something; a man was killed, I am told, and I saw something.
I was returning home from St. Peter's; Murray, as usual,
Under my arm, I remember; had crossed the St. Angelo bridge; and
Moving towards the Condotti, had got to the first barricade, when
Of a sensation of movement opposing me,--tendency this way
So I turned, and, before I turned, caught sight of stragglers
Heading a crowd, it is plain, that is coming behind that corner.
Looking up, I see windows filled with heads; the Piazza,
Into which you remember the Ponte St. Angelo enters,
Since I passed, has thickened with curious groups; and now the
Crowd is coming, has turned, has crossed that last barricade, is
The Neapolitan army,'--and thus explains the proceeding.
You didn't see the dead man?  No;--I began to be doubtful;
I was in black myself, and didn't know what mightn't happen,--
But a National Guard close by me, outside of the hubbub,
Broke his sword with slashing a broad hat covered with dust,--and
If I rightly remember, it happened on that afternoon when
Word of the nearer approach of a new Neapolitan army
First was spread.  I began to bethink me of Paris Septembers,
Say they were only escaping; a Priest, it is currently stated,
Stabbed a National Guard on the very Piazza Colonna:
History, Rumour of Rumours, I leave to thee to determine!
But I am thankful to say the government seems to have strength to
So by the narrow streets to the Ponte Rotto, and onwards
Thence by the Temple of Vesta, away to the great Coliseum,
Which at the full of the moon is an object worthy a visit.
This is a man, you know, who came from America with him,
Out of the woods, I suppose, and uses a lasso in fighting,
Which is, I don't quite know, but a sort of noose, I imagine;
This he throws on the heads of the enemy's men in a battle,
Pulls them into his reach, and then most cruelly kills them:
Mary does not believe, but we heard it from an Italian.
Mary allows she was wrong about Mr. Claude BEING SELFISH;
He was MOST useful and kind on the terrible thirtieth of April.
Mary has seen thus far.--I am really so angry, Louisa,--
It is most curious to see what a power a few calm words (in
Merely a brief proclamation) appear to possess on the people.
Order is perfect, and peace; the city is utterly tranquil;
And one cannot conceive that this easy and nonchalant crowd, that
Could in a moment be changed to a flood as of molten lava,
Boil into deadly wrath and wild homicidal delusion.
Ah, 'tis an excellent race,--and even in old degradation,
Under a rule that enforces to flattery, lying, and cheating,
E'en under Pope and Priest, a nice and natural people.
I am in love, meantime, you think; no doubt you would think so.
Never, however you urge it, however you tempt her, consents to
Step from ideas and fancies and loving sensations to those vain
Conscious understandings that vex the minds of mankind.
I am in love, you say; I do not think so, exactly.
There are two different kinds, I believe, of human attraction:
One which simply disturbs, unsettles, and makes you uneasy,
And another that poises, retains, and fixes and holds you.
I have no doubt, for myself, in giving my voice for the latter.
I do not wish to be moved, but growing where I was growing,
There more truly to grow, to live where as yet I had languished.
I do not like being moved: for the will is excited; and action
Is a most dangerous thing; I tremble for something factitious,
Some malpractice of heart and illegitimate process;
Wherefore and how I am certain, I hardly can tell; but it IS so.
She doesn't like me, Eustace; I think she never will like me.
Is it my fault, as it is my misfortune, my ways are not her ways?
Wherefore should they, either?  I am sure I do not desire it.
(Care about me, indeed! and do I really expect it?)
But my manner offends; my ways are wholly repugnant;
Every word that I utter estranges, hurts, and repels her;
Every moment of bliss that I gain, in her exquisite presence,
Folly, to which I am prone, of loving where it is easy.
Not that I mind very much!  Why should I?  I am not in love, and
Am prepared, I think, if not by previous habit,
Yet in the spirit beforehand for this and all that is like it;
It is an easier matter for us contemplative creatures,
Us upon whom the pressure of action is laid so lightly;
We, discontented indeed with things in particular, idle,
Seizing the nearest arm to comfort, help, and support us.
Yet, after all, my Eustace, I know but little about it.
All I can say for myself, for present alike and for past, is,
Mary Trevellyn, Eustace, is certainly worth your acquaintance.
You couldn't come, I suppose, as far as Florence to see her?
......  To-morrow we're starting for Florence,
Truly rejoiced, you may guess, to escape from republican terrors;
Through Siena, and Georgy to follow and join us by Leghorn.
Dearest Louise, indeed it is very alarming; but, trust me
Ever, whatever may change, to remain your loving Georgina.
All I can say for myself is, alas! that he rather repels me.
There! I think him agreeable, but also a little repulsive.
So be content, dear Louisa; for one satisfactory marriage
Surely will do in one year for the family you would establish
Neither Susan nor I shall afford you the joy of a second.
Mr. Claude, you must know, is behaving a little bit better;
I shall, however, get George, before he goes, to say something.
Dearest Louise, how delightful to bring young people together!
Is it Florence we follow, or are we to tarry yet longer,
E'en amid clamour of arms, here in the city of old,
Canto III.
Yet to the wondrous St. Peter's, and yet to the solemn Rotunda,
Mingling with heroes and gods, yet to the Vatican Walls,
Where, under mulberry-branches, the diligent rivulet sparkles,
Or amid cotton and maize peasants their water-works ply,
Where, over fig-tree and orange in tier upon tier still repeated,
Why doesn't Mr. Claude come with us? you ask.--We don't know,
He was so ready before, when we asked him to come and escort us.
Certainly he is odd, my dear Miss Roper.  To change so
Suddenly, just for a whim, was not quite fair to the party,--
Not quite right.  I declare, I really almost am offended:
I, his great friend, as you say, have doubtless a title to be so.
Yes, my dear Miss Roper, I certainly called him repulsive;
So I think him, but cannot be sure I have used the expression
Quite as your pupil should; yet he does most truly repel me.
Was it to you I made use of the word? or who was it told you?
Yes, repulsive; observe, it is but when he talks of ideas
That he is quite unaffected, and free, and expansive, and easy;
I could pronounce him simply a cold intellectual being.--
When does he make advances?--He thinks that women should woo him;
That mere common and may-be indifferent soil it is set in?
Would it have force to develop and open its young cotyledons,
Were it endowed with a sense of the general scheme of existence?
While from Marseilles in the steamer we voyage to Civita Vecchia,
Standing, uplifted, alone on the heaving poop of the vessel,
Looking around on the waste of the rushing incurious billows,
Lo, it looked at me there from the face of a Triton in marble.
It is the simpler thought, and I can believe it the truer.
Let us not talk of growth; we are still in our Aqueous Ages.
Farewell, Politics, utterly!  What can I do?  I cannot
Fight, you know; and to talk I am wholly ashamed.  And although I
No, whatever befalls, I will hide, will ignore or forget it.
In the third, just at present I'm studying ancient marbles;
In the fourth, I consider I owe my life to my country;
In the fifth--I forget, but four good reasons are ample.
Sanguis martyrum semen Ecclesiae; though it would seem this
Church is indeed of the purely Invisible, Kingdom-come kind:
Militant here on earth!  Triumphant, of course, then, elsewhere!
Ah, good Heaven, but I would I were out far away from the pother!
Not, as we read in the words of the olden-time inspiration,
Are there two several trees in the place we are set to abide in;
But on the apex most high of the Tree of Life in the Garden,
Budding, unfolding, and falling, decaying and flowering ever,
Rose sympathetic in grief to his love-lorn Laodamia,
Ye over stormy seas leading long and dreary processions,
Let us not talk of growth; we are still in our Aqueous Ages.
Dearest Miss Roper,--Alas! we are all at Florence quite safe, and
Only I hope and trust without any fight in the city.
Do you see Mr. Claude?--I thought he might do something for you.
I am quite sure on occasion he really would wish to be useful.
What is he doing? I wonder;--still studying Vatican marbles?
Letters, I hope, pass through.  We trust your brother is better.
Juxtaposition, in fine; and what is juxtaposition?
Look you, we travel along in the railway-carriage or steamer,
And, pour passer le temps, till the tedious journey be ended,
Lay aside paper or book, to talk with the girl that is next one;
And, pour passer le temps, with the terminus all but in prospect,
Ah, did we really accept with a perfect heart the illusion!
Ah, did we really believe that the Present indeed is the Only!
Whose great tranquil depths unconscious the wind-tost surface
Think you we men could submit to live and move as we do here?
Scarcely can hope to attain upon earth to an Actual Abstract,
Leaving to God contemplation, to His hands knowledge confiding,
Sure that in us if it perish, in Him it abideth and dies not,
Let us in His sight accomplish our petty particular doings,--
Yes, and contented sit down to the victual that He has provided.
Allah is great, no doubt, and Juxtaposition his prophet.
Ah, but the women, alas! they don't look at it that way.
Juxtaposition is great;--but, my friend, I fear me, the maiden
That she is but for a space, an ad-interim solace and pleasure,--
Since we cannot escape, must we even submit to deceive you?
Since, so cruel is truth, sincerity shocks and revolts you,
Juxtaposition is great,--but, you tell me, affinity greater.
Ah, my friend, there are many affinities, greater and lesser,
Stronger and weaker; and each, by the favour of juxtaposition,
Vir sum, nihil faeminei,--and e'en to the uttermost circle,
All that is Nature's is I, and I all things that are Nature's.
Yes, as I walk, I behold, in a luminous, large intuition,
That I can be and become anything that I meet with or look at:
I am the ox in the dray, the ass with the garden-stuff panniers;
I am the dog in the doorway, the kitten that plays in the window,
Swallow above me that twitters, and fly that is buzzing about me;
And as I walk on my way, I behold them consorting and coupling;
Faithful it seemeth, and fond, very fond, very probably faithful,
Life is beautiful, Eustace, entrancing, enchanting to look at;
Even so beautiful Earth; and could we eliminate only
This vile hungering impulse, this demon within us of craving,
Life were beatitude, living a perfect divine satisfaction.
Mild monastic faces in quiet collegiate cloisters:
So let me offer a single and celibatarian phrase, a
Tribute to those whom perhaps you do not believe I can honour.
Every debt in this kind, disclaim every claim, and dishonour,
When to shuffle I came, to compromise, not meet, engagements,
Lo, with her calm eyes there she met me and knew nothing of it,--
Knew not of debt--ah, no, I believe you, for excellent reasons.
HANG this thinking, at last! what good is it? oh, and what evil!
Oh, what mischief and pain! like a clock in a sick man's chamber,
Tibur is beautiful, too, and the orchard slopes, and the Anio
Falling, falling yet, to the ancient lyrical cadence;
Tibur and Anio's tide; and cool from Lucretilis ever,
With the Digentian stream, and with the Bandusian fountain,
Folded in Sabine recesses, the valley and villa of Horace:--
So not seeing I sang; so seeing and listening say I,
Here as I sit by the stream, as I gaze at the cell of the Sibyl,
Here with Albunea's home and the grove of Tiburnus beside me; [*]
Dashing from mountain to plain, thy parted impetuous waters,
Tivoli's waters and rocks; and fair unto Monte Gennaro
Folded in Sabine recesses the valley and villa of Horace:--
So not seeing I sang; so now--Nor seeing, nor hearing,
Neither by waterfall lulled, nor folded in sylvan embraces,
Neither by cell of the Sibyl, nor stepping the Monte Gennaro,
Seated on Anio's bank, nor sipping Bandusian waters,
But on Montorio's height, with these weary soldiers by me,
Waiting till Oudinot enter, to reinstate Pope and Tourist.
*   -- domus Albuneae resonantis,
Et praeceps Anio, et Tibuni lucus, et uda
Mobilibus pomaria rivis
It would extremely relieve--Your ever affectionate Mary.
Here is your letter arrived this moment, just as I wanted.
Ah, my dearest Miss Roper, do just as you fancy about it.
If you think it sincerer to tell him I know of it, do so.
Though I should most extremely dislike it, I know I could manage.
Do as you please; you know I trust implicitly to you.
Say whatever is right and needful for ending the matter.
Only don't tell Mr. Claude, what I will tell you as a secret,
That I should like very well to show him myself I forget it.
I am to say that the wedding is finally settled for Tuesday.
Ah, my dear Miss Roper, you surely, surely can manage
Not to let it appear that I know of that odious matter.
It would be pleasanter far for myself to treat it exactly
As if it had not occurred: and I do not think he would like it.
I must remember to add, that as soon as the wedding is over
We shall be off, I believe, in a hurry, and travel to Milan;
There to meet friends of Papa's, I am told, at the Croce di Malta
Yes, on Montorio's height for a last farewell of the city,--
So it appears; though then I was quite uncertain about it.
So, however, it was.  And now to explain the proceeding.
I was to go, as I told you, I think, with the people to Florence.
Made some uneasy remarks, as we walked to our lodging together,
As to intentions forsooth, and so forth.  I was astounded,
Why, I made this a pretence, and wrote that they must excuse me.
How could I go?  Great Heavens! to conduct a permitted flirtation
Well, but I now, by a series of fine diplomatic inquiries,
Find from a sort of relation, a good and sensible woman,
Who is remaining at Rome with a brother too ill for removal,
Tibur I have not seen, nor the lakes that of old I had dreamt of;
Folded in Sabine recesses the valley and villa of Horace;
Tibur I shall not see;--but something better I shall see.
Twice I have tried before, and failed in getting the horses;
Therefore farewell, ye hills, and ye, ye envineyarded ruins!
Therefore farewell, ye walls, palaces, pillars, and domes!
Therefore farewell, far seen, ye peaks of the mythic Albano,
Seen from Montorio's height, Tibur and Aesula's hills!
Eastward, or Northward, or West?  I wander and ask as I wander;
Weary, yet eager and sure, Where shall I come to my love?
Whitherward hasten to seek her?  Ye daughters of Italy, tell me,
Graceful and tender and dark, is she consorting with you?
Italy, farewell I bid thee! for whither she leads me, I follow.
Farewell the vineyard! for I, where I but guess her, must go;
Weariness welcome, and labour, wherever it be, if at last it
Bring me in mountain or plain into the sight of my love.
Gone from Florence; indeed! and that is truly provoking;--
Gone to Milan, it seems; then I go also to Milan.
Five days now departed; but they can travel but slowly;--
Off go we to-night,--and the Venus go to the Devil!
Gone to Como, they said; and I have posted to Como.
There was a letter left; but the cameriere had lost it.
Could it have been for me?  They came, however, to Como,
And from Como went by the boat,--perhaps to the Spluegen,--
Or to the Stelvio, say, and the Tyrol; also it might be
By Porlezza across to Lugano, and so to the Simplon
Possibly, or the St. Gothard,--or possibly, too, to Baveno,
Orta, Turin, and elsewhere.  Indeed, I am greatly bewildered.
I have been up the Spluegen, and on the Stelvio also:
There is a tide, at least, in the LOVE affairs of mortals,
Which, when taken at flood, leads on to the happiest fortune,--
Leads to the marriage-morn and the orange-flowers and the altar,
Pitiful fool that I was, to stand fiddle-faddling in that way!
I have returned and found their names in the book at Como.
Certain it is I was right, and yet I am also in error.
Added in feminine hand, I read, By the boat to Bellaggio.--
So to Bellaggio again, with the words of he writing to aid me.
Yet at Bellaggio I find no trace, no sort of remembrance.
So I am here, and wait, and know every hour will remove them.
I have but one chance left,--and that is going to Florence.
But it is cruel to turn.  The mountains seem to demand me,--
Peak and valley from far to beckon and motion me onward.
Somewhere amid their folds she passes whom fain I would follow;
Somewhere amid those heights she haply calls me to seek her.
For the sense of the thing is simply to hurry to Florence,
Dear Miss Roper,--By this you are safely away, we are hoping,
Many a league from Rome; ere long we trust we shall see you.
How have you travelled? I wonder;--was Mr. Claude your companion?
So by the Mount St. Gothard; we meant to go by Porlezza,
After we left the hotel, on the very way to the steamer.
So we have seen, I fear, not one of the lakes in perfection.
Well, he is not come, and now, I suppose, he will not come.
Went from Milan to Como, three days before we expected.
But I thought, if he came all the way to Milan, he really
Ought not to be disappointed: and so I wrote three lines to
Say I had heard he was coming, desirous of joining our party;--
If so, then I said, we had started for Como, and meant to
Did he not think it worth while to come to Milan?  He knew (you
There is a home on the shore of the Alpine sea, that upswelling
High up the mountain-sides spreads in the hollow between;
Italy, utter the word, and the olive and vine will allure not,--
Wilderness, forest, and snow will not the passage impede;
Italy, unto thy cities receding, the clue to recover,
Hither, recovered the clue, shall not the traveller haste?
There is a city, upbuilt on the quays of the turbulent Arno,
Under Fiesole's heights,--thither are we to return?
There is a city that fringes the curve of the inflowing waters,
Under the perilous hill fringes the beautiful bay,--
Parthenope, do they call thee?--the Siren, Neapolis, seated
Under Vesevus's hill,--are we receding to thee?--
Sicily, Greece, will invite, and the Orient;--or are we turn to
England, which may after all be for its children the best?
So you are really free, and living in quiet at Florence;
That is delightful news; you travelled slowly and safely;
Mr. Claude got you out; took rooms at Florence before you;
Wrote from Milan to say so; had left directly for Milan,
You are quite sure, you say, he asked you about our intentions;
You had not heard as yet of Lucerne, but told him of Como.--
Well, perhaps he will come; however, I will not expect it.
What one wants, I suppose, is to predetermine the action,
So as to make it entail, not a chance belief, but the true one.
Eustace, the Ropers are gone, and no one can tell me about them.
Pisa, they say they think, and so I follow to Pisa,
Hither and thither inquiring.  I weary of making inquiries.
I am ashamed, I declare, of asking people about it.--
But it is idle, moping, and thinking, and trying to fix her
I have settled to stay at Florence to wait for your answer.
You are at Lucca baths, you tell me, to stay for the summer;
Florence was quite too hot; you can't move further at present.
Will you not come, do you think, before the summer is over?
Mr. C. got you out with very considerable trouble;
And he was useful and kind, and seemed so happy to serve you.
Didn't stay with you long, but talked very openly to you;
Made you almost his confessor, without appearing to know it,--
What about?--and you say you didn't need his confessions.
O my dear Miss Roper, I dare not trust what you tell me!
Will he come, do you think?  I am really so sorry for him.
They didn't give him my letter at Milan, I feel pretty certain.
You had told him Bellaggio.  We didn't go to Bellaggio;
So he would miss our track, and perhaps never come to Lugano,
Where we were written in full, To Lucerne across the St. Gothard.
I will walk on my way, accept the chances that meet me,
Freely encounter the world, imbibe these alien airs, and
Never ask if new feelings and thoughts are of her or of others.
Is she not changing herself?--the old image would only delude me.
I shall be doing, I think, somehow, what she will be doing;--
Utterly vain is, alas! this attempt at the Absolute,--wholly!
I, who believed not in her, because I would fain believe nothing,
I, who refused to enfasten the roots of my floating existence
Worthy a nobler heart than a fool such as I could have given her.
Whether One really exist to hear or do anything for them,--
Simply impelled by the need of the moment to turn to a Being
In a conception of whom there is freedom from all limitation,--
So in your image I turn to an ens rationis of friendship,
Even so write in your name I know not to whom nor in what wise.
There was a time, methought it was but lately departed,
When, if a thing was denied me, I felt I was bound to attempt it;
There was a time, indeed, when I had not retired thus early,
Languidly thus, from pursuit of a purpose I once had adopted,
It is over, all that!  I am a coward, and know it.
Courage in me could be only factitious, unnatural, useless.
Comfort has come to me here in the dreary streets of the city,
Comfort--how do you think?--with a barrel-organ to bring it.
Moping along the streets, and cursing my day as I wandered,
All of a sudden my ear met the sound of an English psalm-tune,
Comfort me it did, till indeed I was very near crying.
Ah, there is some great truth, partial, very likely, but needful,
Comfort, however it come, in the dreary streets of the city.
What with trusting myself and seeking support from within me,
Almost I could believe I had gained a religious assurance,
Formed in my own poor soul a great moral basis to rest on.
Ah, but indeed I see, I feel it factitious entirely;
I refuse, reject, and put it utterly from me;
I will look straight out, see things, not try to evade them;
Fact shall be fact for me, and the Truth the Truth as ever,
Flexible, changeable, vague, and multiform, and doubtful.-
Off, and depart to the void, thou subtle, fanatical tempter!
I shall behold thee again (is it so?) at a new visitation,
O ill genius thou!  I shall at my life's dissolution
(When the pulses are weak, and the feeble light of the reason
Flickers, an unfed flame retiring slow from the socket),
Low on a sick-bed laid, hear one, as it were, at the doorway,
And, looking up, see thee standing by, looking emptily at me;
I shall entreat thee then, though now I dare to refuse thee,--
Pale and pitiful now, but terrible then to the dying.--
Well, I will see thee again, and while I can, will repel thee.
Rome is fallen, I hear, the gallant Medici taken,
Noble Manara slain, and Garibaldi has lost il Moro;--
Rome is fallen; and fallen, or falling, heroical Venice.
I, meanwhile, for the loss of a single small chit of a girl, sit
Moping and mourning here,--for her, and myself much smaller.
Whither depart the souls of the brave that die in the battle,
Italy; feebly and faintly, and but with the lips, can lament the
Wreck of the Lombard youth, and the victory of the oppressor.
Whither depart the brave?--God knows; I certainly do not.
He has not come as yet; and now I must not expect it.
You have written, you say, to friends at Florence, to see him,
If he perhaps should return;--but that is surely unlikely.
Has he not written to you?--he did not know your direction.
Oh, how strange never once to have told him where you were going!
If what you say he said was true, why has he not done so?
Is he gone back to Rome, do you think, to his Vatican marbles?--
O my dear Miss Roper, forgive me! do not be angry!--
I shall expect nothing more.--Ever yours, your affectionate Mary.
I cannot stay at Florence, not even to wait for a letter.
Galleries only oppress me.  Remembrance of hope I had cherished
Oh, I knew it of old, and knew it, I thought, to perfection,
If there is any one thing in the world to preclude all kindness
It is the need of it,--it is this sad, self-defeating dependence.
Is not I WILL, but I MUST.  I must,--I must,--and I do it.
After all, do I know that I really cared so about her?
Do whatever I will, I cannot call up her image;
For when I close my eyes, I see, very likely, St. Peter's,
Or the Pantheon facade, or Michel Angelo's figures,
Or, at a wish, when I please, the Alban hills and the Forum,--
But that face, those eyes,--ah, no, never anything like them;
Only, try as I will, a sort of featureless outline,
And a pale blank orb, which no recollection will add to.
After all, perhaps there was something factitious about it;
I have had pain, it is true: I have wept; and so have the actors.
At the last moment I have your letter, for which I was waiting;
I have taken my place, and see no good in inquiries.
Do nothing more, good Eustace, I pray you.  It only will vex me.
Great is Fate, and is best.  I believe in Providence partly.
What is ordained is right, and all that happens is ordered.
Ah, no, that isn't it.  But yet I retain my conclusion.
I will go where I am led, and will not dictate to the chances.
Do nothing more, I beg.  If you love me, forbear interfering.
Shall we come out of it all, some day, as one does from a tunnel?
We shall behold clear day, the trees and meadows about us,
And the faces of friends, and the eyes we loved looking at us?
Who knows?  Who can say?  It will not do to suppose it.
Rome will be here, and the Pope the custode of Vatican marbles.
I have no heart, however, for any marble or fresco;
I have essayed it in vain; 'tis in vain as yet to essay it:
But I may haply resume some day my studies in this kind;
Let us seek Knowledge;--the rest may come and go as it happens.
Knowledge is hard to seek, and harder yet to adhere to.
Knowledge is painful often; and yet when we know we are happy.
Seek it, and leave mere Faith and Love to come with the chances.
As for Hope,--to-morrow I hope to be starting for Naples.
Rome will not do, I see, for many very good reasons.
Oh, and you see I know so exactly how he would take it:
I myself could not help, perhaps, thinking only too much of;
He would resign himself, and go.  I see it exactly.
So I also submit, although in a different manner.
Can you not really come?  We go very shortly to England.
So go forth to the world, to the good report and the evil!
Go, little book! thy tale, is it not evil and good?
Go, and if strangers revile, pass quietly by without answer.
Go, and if curious friends ask of thy rearing and age,
Say, 'I am flitting about many years from brain unto brain of
Feeble and restless youths born to inglorious days:
But,' so finish the word, 'I was writ in a Roman chamber,
When from Janiculan heights thundered the cannon of France.'