Chapter 22

_So I grew wise in Love and Hate,_ 205 _From simple that I was of late._ _Once when I loved, I would enlace_ _Breast, eyelids, hands, feet, form, and face_ _Of her I loved, in one embrace--_ _As if by mere love I could love immensely!_ 210 _Once, when I hated, I would plunge_ _My sword, and wipe with the first lunge_ _My foe's whole life out like a sponge--_ _As if by mere hate I could hate intensely!_ _But now I am wiser, know better the fashion_ 215 _How passion seeks aid from its opposite passion;_ _And if I see cause to love more, hate more_ _Than ever man loved, ever hated before--_ _And seek in the Valley of Love,_ _The nest, or the nook in Hate's Grove,_ 220 _Where my soul may surely reach_ _The essence, naught less, of each,_ _The Hate of all Hates, the Love_ _Of all Loves, in the Valley or Grove--_ _I find them the very warders_ 225 _Each of the other's borders._ _When I love most, Love is disguised_ _In Hate; and when Hate is surprised_ _In Love, then I hate most: ask_ _How Love smiles through Hate's iron casque,_ 230 _Hate grins through Love's rose-braided mask--_ _And how, having hated thee,_ _I sought long and painfully_ _To reach thy heart, nor prick_ _The skin but pierce to the quick--_ 235 _Ask this, my Jules, and be answered straight_ _By thy bride--how the painter Lutwyche can hate!_

JULES _interposes_

Lutwyche! Who else? But all of them, no doubt, Hated me: they at Venice--presently Their turn, however! You I shall not meet: 240 If I dreamed, saying this would wake me. Keep What's here, the gold--we cannot meet again, Consider! and the money was but meant For two years' travel, which is over now, All chance or hope or care or need of it. 245 This--and what comes from selling these, my casts And books and medals, except--let them go Together, so the produce keeps you safe Out of Natalia's clutches! If by chance (For all's chance here) I should survive the gang 250 At Venice, root out all fifteen of them, We might meet somewhere, since the world is wide.

[_From without is heard the voice of_ PIPPA, _singing_--

_Give her but a least excuse to love me!_ _When--where--_ _How--can this arm establish her above me,_ 255 _If fortune fixed her as my lady there,_ _There already, to eternally reprove me?_ _("Hist!"--said Kate the Queen;_ _But "Oh!" cried the maiden, binding her tresses,_ _"'Tis only a page that carols unseen,_ 260 _Crumbling your hounds their messes!")_

_Is she wronged?--To the rescue of her honor,_ _My heart!_ _Is she poor?--What costs it to be styled a donor?_ _Merely an earth to cleave, a sea to part_. 265 _But that fortune should have thrust all this upon her!_ _("Nay, list!"--bade Kate the Queen;_ _And still cried the maiden, binding her tresses,_ _"'Tis only a page that carols unseen_ _Fitting your hawks their jesses!")_ 270

[PIPPA _passes._

JULES _resumes_

What name was that the little girl sang forth? Kate? The Cornaro, doubtless, who renounced The crown of Cyprus to be lady here At Asolo, where still her memory stays, And peasants sing how once a certain page 275 Pined for the grace of her so far above His power of doing good to, "Kate the Queen-- She never could be wronged, be poor," he sighed, "Need him to help her!" Yes, a bitter thing To see our lady above all need of us; 280 Yet so we look ere we will love; not I, But the world looks so. If whoever loves Must be, in some sort, god or worshiper, The blessing or the blest-one, queen or page, Why should we always choose the page's part? 285 Here is a woman with utter need of me-- I find myself queen here, it seems! How strange! Look at the woman here with the new soul, Like my own Psyche--fresh upon her lips Alit the visionary butterfly, 290 Waiting my word to enter and make bright, Or flutter off and leave all blank as first. This body had no soul before, but slept Or stirred, was beauteous or ungainly, free From taint or foul with stain, as outward things 295 Fastened their image on its passiveness; Now, it will wake, feel, live--or die again! Shall to produce form out of unshaped stuff Be Art--and further, to evoke a soul From form be nothing? This new soul is mine! 300

Now, to kill Lutwyche, what would that do?--save A wretched dauber, men will hoot to death Without me, from their hooting. Oh, to hear God's voice plain as I heard it first, before They broke in with their laughter! I heard them 305 Henceforth, not God. To Ancona--Greece--some isle! I wanted silence only; there is clay Everywhere. One may do whate'er one likes In Art; the only thing is, to make sure That one does like it--which takes pains to know. 310 Scatter all this, my Phene--this mad dream! Who, what is Lutwyche, what Natalia's friends, What the whole world except our love--my own, Own Phene? But I told you, did I not, Ere night we travel for your land--some isle 315 With the sea's silence on it? Stand aside-- I do but break these paltry models up To begin Art afresh. Meet Lutwyche, I-- And save him from my statue meeting him? Some unsuspected isle in the far seas! 320 Like a god going through his world, there stands One mountain for a moment in the dusk, Whole brotherhoods of cedars on its brow; And you are ever by me while I gaze --Are in my arms as now--as now--as now! 325 Some unsuspected isle in the far seas! Some unsuspected isle in far-off seas!

_Talk by the way, while_ PIPPA _is passing from Orcana to the Turret. Two or three of the Austrian Police loitering with_ BLUPHOCKS, _an English vagabond, just in view of the Turret._

_Bluphocks._ So, that is your Pippa, the little girl who passed us singing? Well, your Bishop's Intendant's money shall be honestly earned:--now, don't make me that sour face because I bring the Bishop's name into the business; we know he can have nothing to do with such 5 horrors; we know that he is a saint and all that a bishop should be, who is a great man beside. _Oh, were but every worm a maggot, Every fly a grig, Every bough a Christmas faggot, Every tune a jig!_ In fact, I have abjured all religions; but the last I inclined to was the Armenian: for 10 I have traveled, do you see, and at Koenigsberg, Prussia Improper (so styled because there's a sort of bleak hungry sun there), you might remark over a venerable house-porch a certain Chaldee inscription; and brief as it is, a mere glance at it used absolutely to change the mood of 15 every bearded passenger. In they turned, one and all; the young and lightsome, with no irreverent pause, the aged and decrepit, with a sensible alacrity: 'twas the Grand Rabbi's abode, in short. Struck with curiosity, I lost no time in learning Syriac--(these are vowels, you dogs--follow 20 my stick's end in the mud--_Celarent, Darii, Ferio!_) and one morning presented myself, spelling-book in hand, a, b, c--I picked it out letter by letter, and what was the purport of this miraculous posy? Some cherished legend of the past, you'll say--"_How Moses hocus-pocussed_ 25 _Egypt's land with fly and locust_"--or, "_How to Jonah sounded harshish, Get thee up and go to Tarshish_"--or, "_How the angel meeting Balaam, Straight his ass returned a salaam._" In no wise! "_Shackabrack--Boach--somebody or other--Isaach, Re-cei-ver, Pur-cha-ser, and_ 30 _Ex-chan-ger of--Stolen Goods!_" So, talk to me of the religion of a bishop! I have renounced all bishops save Bishop Beveridge--mean to live so--and die--_As some Greek dog-sage, dead and merry, Hellward bound in Charon's wherry with food for both worlds, under and_ 35 _upper, Lupine-seed and Hecate's supper, and never an obolus._ (Though thanks to you, or this Intendant through you, or this Bishop through his Intendant--I possess a burning pocketful of _zwanzigers_) _To pay Stygian Ferry!_

_1st Policeman._ There is the girl, then; go and deserve 40 them the moment you have pointed out to us Signor Luigi and his mother. [_To the rest._] I have been noticing a house yonder, this long while--not a shutter unclosed since morning!

_2nd Policeman._ Old Luca Gaddi's, that owns the silk-mills 45 here: he dozes by the hour, wakes up, sighs deeply, says he should like to be Prince Metternich, and then dozes again, after having bidden young Sebald, the foreigner, set his wife to playing draughts. Never molest such a household; they mean well. 50

_Bluphocks._ Only, cannot you tell me something of this little Pippa I must have to do with? One could make something of that name. Pippa--that is, short for Felippa--rhyming to _Panurge consults Hertrippa--Believest thou, King Agrippa?_ Something might be done 55 with that name.

_2nd Policeman._ Put into rhyme that your head and a ripe muskmelon would not be dear at half a _zwanziger_! Leave this fooling, and look out; the afternoon 's over or nearly so. 60

_3rd Policeman._ Where in this passport of Signor Luigi does our Principal instruct you to watch him so narrowly? There? What's there beside a simple signature? (That English fool's busy watching.)

_2nd Policeman._ Flourish all round--"Put all possible 65 obstacles in his way"; oblong dot at the end--"Detain him till further advices reach you"; scratch at bottom--"Send him back on pretense of some informality in the above"; ink-spirt on right-hand side (which is the case here)--"Arrest him at once." Why and wherefore, I 70 don't concern myself, but my instructions amount to this: if Signor Luigi leaves home tonight for Vienna--well and good, the passport deposed with us for our visa is really for his own use, they have misinformed the Office, and he means well; but let him stay over tonight--there 75 has been the pretense we suspect, the accounts of his corresponding and holding intelligence with the Carbonari are correct, we arrest him at once, tomorrow comes Venice, and presently Spielberg. Bluphocks makes the signal, sure enough! That is he, entering the 80 turret with his mother, no doubt.

III.--EVENING

SCENE.--_Inside the Turret on the Hill above Asolo._ LUIGI _and his_ Mother _entering._

_Mother._ If there blew wind, you'd hear a long sigh, easing The utmost heaviness of music's heart.

_Luigi._ Here in the archway?

_Mother._ Oh, no, no--in farther, Where the echo is made, on the ridge.

_Luigi._ Here surely, then. How plain the tap of my heel as I leaped up! 5 Hark--"Lucius Junius!" The very ghost of a voice Whose body is caught and kept by--what are those? Mere withered wall flowers, waving overhead? They seem an elvish group with thin bleached hair That lean out of their topmost fortress--look 10 And listen, mountain men, to what we say, Hand under chin of each grave earthy face. Up and show faces all of you!--"All of you!" That's the king dwarf with the scarlet comb; old Franz, Come down and meet your fate? Hark--"Meet your fate!" 15

_Mother._ Let him not meet it, my Luigi--do not Go to his City! Putting crime aside, Half of these ills of Italy are feigned: Your Pellicos and writers for effect, Write for effect. 20

_Luigi._ Hush! Say A writes, and B.

_Mother._ These A's and B's write for effect, I say. Then, evil is in its nature loud, while good Is silent; you hear each petty injury, None of his virtues; he is old beside, Quiet and kind, and densely stupid. Why 25 Do A and B not kill him themselves?

_Luigi._ They teach Others to kill him--me--and, if I fail, Others to succeed; now, if A tried and failed, I could not teach that: mine's the lesser task. Mother, they visit night by night--

_Mother._ --You, Luigi? 30 Ah, will you let me tell you what you are?

_Luigi._ Why not? Oh, the one thing you fear to hint, You may assure yourself I say and say Ever to myself! At times--nay, even as now We sit--I think my mind is touched, suspect 35 All is not sound; but is not knowing that What constitutes one sane or otherwise? I know I am thus--so, all is right again. I laugh at myself as through the town I walk, And see men merry as if no Italy 40 Were suffering; then I ponder--"I am rich, Young, healthy; why should this fact trouble me, More than it troubles these?" But it does trouble. No, trouble's a bad word; for as I walk There's springing and melody and giddiness, 45 And old quaint turns and passages of my youth, Dreams long forgotten, little in themselves, Return to me--whatever may amuse me, And earth seems in a truce with me, and heaven Accords with me, all things suspend their strife, 50 The very cicala laughs, "There goes he, and there! Feast him, the time is short; he is on his way For the world's sake: feast him this once, our friend!" And in return for all this, I can trip Cheerfully up the scaffold-steps. I go 55 This evening, mother!

_Mother._ But mistrust yourself-- Mistrust the judgment you pronounce on him!

_Luigi._ Oh, there I feel--am sure that I am right!

_Mother._ Mistrust your judgment, then, of the mere means To this wild enterprise. Say you are right-- 60 How should one in your state e'er bring to pass What would require a cool head, a cold heart, And a calm hand? You never will escape.

_Luigi._ Escape? To even wish that would spoil all. The dying is best part of it. Too much 65 Have I enjoyed these fifteen years of mine, To leave myself excuse for longer life: Was not life pressed down, running o'er with joy, That I might finish with it ere my fellows Who, sparelier feasted, make a longer stay? 70 I was put at the board-head, helped to all At first; I rise up happy and content. God must be glad one loves his world so much. I can give news of earth to all the dead Who ask me:--last year's sunsets, and great stars 75 Which had a right to come first and see ebb The crimson wave that drifts the sun away-- Those crescent moons with notched and burning rims That strengthened into sharp fire, and there stood, Impatient of the azure--and that day 80 In March, a double rainbow stopped the storm-- May's warm, slow, yellow moonlit summer nights-- Gone are they, but I have them in my soul!

_Mother._ (He will not go!)

_Luigi._ You smile at me? 'Tis true-- Voluptuousness, grotesqueness, ghastliness, 85 Environ my devotedness as quaintly As round about some antique altar wreathe The rose festoons, goats' horns, and oxen's skulls.

_Mother._ See now: you reach the city, you must cross His threshold--how?

_Luigi._ Oh, that's if we conspired! 90 Then would come pains in plenty, as you guess-- But guess not how the qualities most fit For such an office, qualities I have, Would little stead me, otherwise employed, Yet prove of rarest merit only here. 95 Everyone knows for what his excellence Will serve, but no one ever will consider For what his worst defect might serve; and yet Have you not seen me range our coppice yonder In search of a distorted ash?--I find 100 The wry spoilt branch a natural perfect bow. Fancy the thrice-sage, thrice-precautioned man Arriving at the palace on my errand! No, no! I have a handsome dress packed up-- White satin here, to set off my black hair; 105 In I shall march--for you may watch your life out Behind thick walls, make friends there to betray you; More than one man spoils everything. March straight-- Only, no clumsy knife to fumble for. Take the great gate, and walk (not saunter) on 110 Through guards and guards--I have rehearsed it all Inside the turret here a hundred times Don't ask the way of whom you meet, observe! But where they cluster thickliest is the door Of doors; they'll let you pass--they'll never blab 115 Each to the other, he knows not the favorite, Whence he is bound and what's his business now. Walk in--straight up to him; you have no knife: Be prompt, how should he scream? Then, out with you! Italy, Italy, my Italy! 120 You're free, you're free! Oh, mother, I could dream They got about me--Andrea from his exile, Pier from his dungeon, Gualtier from his grave!

_Mother._ Well, you shall go. Yet seems this patriotism The easiest virtue for a selfish man 125 To acquire: he loves himself--and next, the world-- If he must love beyond--but naught between: As a short-sighted man sees naught midway His body and the sun above. But you Are my adored Luigi, ever obedient 130 To my least wish, and running o'er with love; I could not call you cruel or unkind. Once more, your ground for killing him!--then go!

_Luigi._ Now do you try me, or make sport of me? How first the Austrians got these provinces-- 135 (If that is all, I'll satisfy you soon) --Never by conquest but by cunning, for That treaty whereby--

_Mother._ Well?

_Luigi._ (Sure, he's arrived, The telltale cuckoo; spring's his confidant, And he lets out her April purposes!) 140 Or--better go at once to modern time, He has--they have--in fact, I understand But can't restate the matter; that's my boast: Others could reason it out to you, and prove Things they have made me feel.

_Mother._ Why go tonight? 145 Morn's for adventure. Jupiter is now A morning-star. I cannot hear you, Luigi!

_Luigi._ "I am the bright and morning-star," saith God-- And, "to such an one I give the morning-star." The gift of the morning-star! Have I God's gift 150 Of the morning-star?

_Mother._ Chiara will love to see That Jupiter an evening-star next June.

_Luigi._ True, mother. Well for those who live through June! Great noontides, thunder-storms, all glaring pomps That triumph at the heels of June the god 155 Leading his revel through our leafy world. Yes, Chiara will be here.

_Mother._ In June: remember, Yourself appointed that month for her coming.

_Luigi._ Was that low noise the echo?

_Mother._ The night-wind. She must be grown--with her blue eyes upturned 160 As if life were one long and sweet surprise: In June she comes.

_Luigi._ We were to see together The Titian at Treviso. There, again!

[_From without is heard the voice of_ PIPPA, _singing_--

_A king lived long ago,_ _In the morning of the world,_ 165 _When earth was nigher heaven than now._ _And the king's locks curled,_ _Disparting o'er a forehead full_ _As the milk-white space 'twixt horn and horn_ _Of some sacrificial bull--_ 170 _Only calm as a babe new-born:_ _For he was got to a sleepy mood,_ _So safe from all decrepitude,_ _Age with its bane, so sure gone by,_ _(The gods so loved him while he dreamed)_ 175 _That, having lived thus long, there seemed_ _No need the king should ever die._

_Luigi._ No need that sort of king should ever die!

_Among the rocks his city was:_ _Before his palace, in the sun,_ 180 _He sat to see his people pass,_ _And judge them every one_ _From its threshold of smooth stone._ _They haled him many a valley-thief_ _Caught in the sheep-pens, robber-chief_ 185 _Swarthy and shameless, beggar-cheat,_ _Spy-prowler, or rough pirate found_ _On the sea-sand left aground;_ _And sometimes clung about his feet,_ _With bleeding lid and burning cheek,_ 190 _A woman, bitterest wrong to speak_ _Of one with sullen thickset brows:_ _And sometimes from the prison-house_ _The angry priests a pale wretch brought,_ _Who through some chink had pushed and pressed_ 195 _On knees and elbows, belly and breast,_ _Worm-like into the temple--caught_ _He was by the very god,_ _Whoever in the darkness strode_ _Backward and forward, keeping watch_ 200 _O'er his brazen bowls, such rogues to catch!_ _These, all and everyone,_ _The king judged, sitting in the sun._

_Luigi._ That king should still judge sitting in the sun!