I dread no toil; toil is the true knight's pastime-- Faith fails, the will intense and fixed, so easy To thee, cut off from life and love, whose powers In one close channel must condense their stream: But I, to whom this life blooms rich and busy, Whose heart goes out a-Maying all the year In this new Eden--in my fitful thought What skill is there, to turn my faith to sight-- To pierce blank Heaven, like some trained falconer After his game, beyond all human ken?

Wal. And walk into the bog beneath your feet.

Con. And change it to firm land by magic step!

Build there cloud-cleaving spires, beneath whose shade Great cities rise for va.s.sals; to call forth From plough and loom the rank unlettered hinds, And make them saints and heroes--send them forth To sway with heavenly craft the spirit of princes; Change nations' destinies, and conquer worlds With love, more mighty than the sword; what, Count?

Art thou ambitious? practical? we monks Can teach you somewhat there too.

Lewis. Be it so; But love you have forsworn; and what were life Without that chivalry, which bends man's knees Before G.o.d's image and his glory, best Revealed in woman's beauty?

Con. Ah! poor worldlings!

Little you dream what maddening ecstasies, What rich ideals haunt, by day and night, Alone, and in the crowd, even to the death, The servitors of that celestial court Where peerless Mary, sun-enthroned, reigns, In whom all Eden dreams of womanhood, All grace of form, hue, sound, all beauty strewn Like pearls unstrung, about this ruined world, Have their fulfilment and their archetype.

Why hath the rose its scent, the lily grace?

To mirror forth her loveliness, from whom, Primeval fount of grace, their livery came: Pattern of Seraphs! only worthy ark To bear her G.o.d athwart the floods of time!

Lewis. Who dare aspire to her? Alas, not I!

To me she is a doctrine, and a picture:-- I cannot live on dreams.

Con. She hath her train:-- There thou may'st choose thy love: If world-wide lore Shall please thee, and the Cherub's glance of fire, Let Catharine lift thy soul, and rapt with her Question the mighty dead, until thou float Tranced on the ethereal ocean of her spirit.

If pity father pa.s.sion in thee, hang Above Eulalia's tortured loveliness; And for her sake, and in her strength, go forth To do and suffer greatly. Dost thou long For some rich heart, as deep in love as weakness, Whose wild simplicity sweet heaven-born instincts Alone keep sane?

Lewis. I do, I do. I'd live And die for each and all the three.

Con. Then go-- Entangled in the Magdalen's tresses lie; Dream hours before her picture, till thy lips Dare to approach her feet, and thou shalt start To find the canvas warm with life, and matter A moment transubstantiate to heaven.

Wal. Ay, catch his fever, Sir, and learn to take An indigestion for a troop of angels.

Come, tell him, monk, about your magic gardens, Where not a stringy head of kale is cut But breeds a vision or a revelation.

Lewis. Hush, hush, Count! Speak, strange monk, strange words, and waken Longings more strange than either.

Con. Then, if proved, As I dare vouch thee, loyal in thy love, Even to the Queen herself thy saintlier soul At length may soar: perchance--Oh, bliss too great For thought--yet possible!

Receive some token--smile--or hallowing touch Of that white hand, beneath whose soft caress The raging world is smoothed, and runs its course To shadow forth her glory.

Lewis. Thou dost tempt me-- That were a knightly quest.

Con. Ay, here's true love.

Love's heaven, without its h.e.l.l; the golden fruit Without the foul husk, which at Adam's fall Did crust it o'er with filth and selfishness.

I tempt thee heavenward--from yon azure walls Unearthly beauties beckon--G.o.d's own mother Waits longing for thy choice--

Lewis. Is this a dream?

Wal. Ay, by the Living Lord, who died for you!

Will you be cozened, Sir, by these air-blown fancies, These male hysterics, by starvation bred And huge conceit? Cast off G.o.d's gift of manhood, And, like the dog in the adage, drop the true bone With snapping at the sham one in the water?

What were you born a man for?

Lewis. Ay, I know it:-- I cannot live on dreams. Oh for one friend, Myself, yet not myself; one not so high But she could love me, not too pure to pardon My sloth and meanness! Oh for flesh and blood, Before whose feet I could adore, yet love!

How easy then were duty! From her lips To learn my daily task;--in her pure eyes To see the living type of those heaven-glories I dare not look on;--let her work her will Of love and wisdom on these straining hinds;-- To squire a saint around her labour field, And she and it both mine:--That were possession!

Con. The flesh, fair youth--

Wal. Avaunt, bald snake, avaunt!

We are past your burrow now. Come, come, Lord Landgrave, Look round, and find your saint.

Lewis. Alas! one such-- One such, I know, who upward from one cradle Beside me like a sister--No, thank G.o.d! no sister!-- Has grown and grown, and with her mellow shade Has blanched my thornless thoughts to her own hue, And even now is budding into blossom, Which never shall bear fruit, but inward still Resorb its vital nectar, self-contained, And leave no living copies of its beauty To after ages. Ah! be less, sweet maid, Less than thyself! Yet no--my wife thou might'st be, If less than thus--but not the saint thou art.

What! shall my selfish longings drag thee down From maid to wife? degrade the soul I worship?

That were a caitiff deed! Oh, misery!

Is wedlock treason to that purity, Which is the jewel and the soul of wedlock?

Elizabeth! my saint! [Exit Conrad.]

Wal. What, Sir? the Princess?

Ye saints in heaven, I thank you!

Lewis. Oh, who else, Who else the minutest lineament fulfils Of this my cherished portrait?

Wal. So--'tis well.

Hear me, my Lord.--You think this dainty princess Too perfect for you, eh? That's well again; For that whose price after fruition falls May well too high be rated ere enjoyed-- In plain words,--if she looks an angel now, you will be better mated than you expected, when you find her--a woman. For flesh and blood she is, and that young blood,--whom her childish misusage and your brotherly love; her loneliness and your protection; her springing fancy and (for I may speak to you as a son) your beauty and knightly grace, have so bewitched, and as some say, degraded, that briefly, she loves you, and briefly, better, her few friends fear, than you love her.

Lewis. Loves me! My Count, that word is quickly spoken; And yet, if it be true, it thrusts me forth Upon a sh.o.r.eless sea of untried pa.s.sion, From whence is no return.

Wal. By Siegfried's sword, My words are true, and I came here to say them, To thee, my son in all but blood.

Ma.s.s, I'm no gossip. Why? What ails the boy?

Lewis. Loves me! Henceforth let no man, peering down Through the dim glittering mine of future years, Say to himself 'Too much! this cannot be!'

To-day, and custom, wall up our horizon: Before the hourly miracle of life Blindfold we stand, and sigh, as though G.o.d were not.

I have wandered in the mountains, mist-bewildered, And now a breeze comes, and the veil is lifted, And priceless flowers, o'er which I trod unheeding, Gleam ready for my grasp. She loves me then!

She who to me was as a nightingale That sings in magic gardens, rock-beleaguered, To pa.s.sing angels melancholy music-- Whose dark eyes hung, like far-off evening stars, Through rosy-cushioned windows coldly shining Down from the cloud-world of her unknown fancy-- She, for whom holiest touch of holiest knight Seemed all too gross--who might have been a saint And companied with angels--thus to pluck The spotless rose of her own maidenhood To give it unto me!

Wal. You love her then?

Lewis. Look! if yon solid mountain were all gold, And each particular tree a band of jewels, And from its womb the Niebelungen h.o.a.rd With elfin wardens called me, 'Leave thy love And be our Master'--I would turn away-- And know no wealth but her.

Wal. Shall I say this to her?

I am no carrier pigeon, Sir, by breed, But now, between her friends and persecutors, My life's a burden.

Lewis. Persecutors! Who?

Alas! I guess it--I had known my mother Too light for that fair saint,--but who else dare wink When she is by? My knights?

Wal. To a man, my Lord.

Lewis. Here's chivalry! Well, that's soon brought to bar.

The quarrel's mine; my lance shall clear that stain.

Wal. Quarrel with your knights? Cut your own chair-legs off!

They do but sail with the stream. Her pa.s.sion, Sir, Broke sh.e.l.l and ran out twittering before yours did, And unrequited love is mortal sin With this chaste world. My boy, my boy, I tell you, The fault lies nearer home.

Lewis. I have played the coward-- And in the sloth of false humility, Cast by the pearl I dared not to deserve.

How laggard I must seem to her, though she love me; Playing with hawks and hounds, while she sits weeping!

'Tis not too late.

Wal. Too late, my royal eyas?