Chapter 3

Give me another draught, The sparkling, and the strong; He who would learn the poet craft-- He who would shine in song-- Should pledge the flowing bowl With warm and generous wine; 'Twas wine that warm'd Anacreon's soul, And made his songs divine.

And e'en in tragedy, Who lives that never knew The honey of the Attic Bee Was gather'd from thy dew? He of the tragic muse, Whose praises bards rehearse: What power but thine could e'er diffuse Such sweetness o'er his verse?

Oh! would that I could raise The magic of that tongue; The spirit of those deathless lays, The Swan of Teios sung! Each song the bard has given, Its beauty and its worth, Sounds sweet as if a voice from heaven Was echoed upon earth.

How mighty--how divine Thy spirit seemeth when The rich draught of the purple vine Dwelt in these godlike men. It made each glowing page, Its eloquence and truth, In the glory of their golden age, Outshine the fire of youth.

Joy to the lone heart--joy To the desolate--oppress'd For wine can every grief destroy That gathers in the breast. The sorrows, and the care, That in our hearts abide, 'Twill chase them from their dwellings there, To drown them in its tide.

And now the heart grows warm, With feelings undefined, Throwing their deep diffusive charm O'er all the realms of mind. The loveliness of truth Flings out its brightest rays, Clothed in the songs of early youth, Or joys of other days.

We think of her, the young The beautiful, the bright; We hear the music of her tongue, Breathing its deep delight. We see again each glance, Each bright and dazzling beam, We feel our throbbing hearts still dance, We live but in a dream.

From darkness, and from woe, A power like lightning darts; A glory cometh down to throw Its shadow o'er our hearts. And dimm'd by falling tears, A spirit seems to rise, That shows the friend of other years Is mirror'd in our eyes.

But sorrow, grief, and care, Had dimm'd his setting star; And we think with tears of those that _were_, To smile on those that _are_. Yet though the grassy mound Sits lightly on his head, We'll pledge, in solemn silence round, THE MEMORY OF THE DEAD!

The sparkling juice now pour, With fond and liberal hand; Oh! raise the laughing rim once more, Here's to our FATHER LAND! Up, every soul that hears, Hurra! with three times three; And shout aloud, with deafening cheers, The "ISLAND OF THE FREE."

Then fill the wine-cup high, The sparkling liquor pour; For we will care and grief defy, They ne'er shall plague us more. And ere the snowy foam From off the wine departs, The precious draught shall find a home-- A dwelling in our hearts.

* * * * *

THE SNOW-WHITE VIRGIN.

(_From a Winter Rhapsody. By Christopher North. Fytte III_.)

There is a charm in the sudden and total disappearance even of the grassy green. All the "old familiar faces" of nature are for awhile out of sight, and out of mind. That white silence shed by heaven over earth carries with it, far and wide, the pure peace of another region--almost another life. No image is there to tell of this restless and noisy world. The cheerfulness of reality kindles up our reverie ere it becomes a dream; and we are glad to feel our whole being complexioned by the passionless repose. If we think at all of human life, it is only of the young, the fair, and the innocent. "Pure as snow" are words then felt to be most holy, as the image of some beautiful and beloved being comes and goes before our eyes--brought from a far distance in this our living world, or from a distance--far, far, farther still--in the world beyond the grave--the image of a virgin growing up sinlessly to womanhood among her parents' prayers, or of some spiritual creature who expired long ago, and carried with her her native innocence unstained to heaven.

Such Spiritual Creature--too spiritual long to sojourn below the skies--wert Thou, whose rising and whose setting--both most starlike--brightened at once all thy native vale, and at once left it in darkness. Thy name has long slept in our heart--and there let it sleep unbreathed--even as, when we are dreaming our way through some solitary place, without speaking, we bless the beauty of some sweet wild-flower, pensively smiling to us through the snow!

The Sabbath returns on which, in the little kirk among the hills, we saw thee baptized. Then comes a wavering glimmer of seven sweet years, that to Thee, in all their varieties, were but as one delightful season, one blessed life--and, finally, that other Sabbath, on which, at thy own dying request--between services thou wert buried!

How mysterious are all thy ways and workings, O gracious Nature! Thou who art but a name given by our souls, seeing and hearing through the senses, to the Being in whom all things are and have life! Ere two years old, she, whose dream is now with us, all over the small silvan world, that beheld the revelation, how evanescent! of her pure existence, was called the "Holy Child!" The taint of sin--inherited from those who disobeyed in Paradise--seemed from her fair clay to have been washed out at the baptismal font, and by her first infantine tears. So pious people almost believed, looking on her so unlike all other children, in the serenity of that habitual smile that clothed the creature's countenance with a wondrous beauty, at an age when on other infants is but faintly seen the dawn of reason, and their eyes look happy, just like the thoughtless flowers. So unlike all other children--but unlike only because sooner than they--she seemed to have had given to her--even in the communion of the cradle--an intimation of the being and the providence of God. Sooner, surely, than through any other clay that ever enshrouded immortal spirit, dawned the light of reason and of religion on the face of the "Holy Child."

Her lisping language was sprinkled with words alien from common childhood's uncertain speech, that murmurs only when indigent nature prompts;--and her own parents wondered whence they came in her simplicity, when first they looked upon her kneeling in an unbidden prayer. As one mild week of vernal sunshine covers the braes with primroses, so shone with fair and fragrant feelings--unfolded, ere they knew, before her parents' eyes--the divine nature of her who, for a season, was lent to them from the skies. She learned to read out of the Bible--almost without any teaching--they knew not how--just by looking gladly on the words, even as she looked on the pretty daisies on the green--till their meanings stole insensibly into her soul, and the sweet syllables, succeeding each other on the blessed page, were all united by the memories her heart had been treasuring every hour that her father or her mother had read aloud in her hearing from the Book of Life. "Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of Heaven"--how wept her parents, as these the most affecting of our Saviour's words dropt silver-sweet from her lips, and continued in her upward eyes among the swimming tears!

Be not incredulous of this dawn of reason, wonderful as it may seem to you, so soon becoming morn--almost perfect daylight--with the "Holy Child."--Many such miracles are set before us; but we recognise them not, or pass them by, with a word or a smile of short surprise. How leaps the baby in its mother's arms, when the mysterious charm of music thrills through its little brain! And how learns it to modulate its feeble voice, unable yet to articulate, to the melodies that bring forth all round its eyes a delighted smile! Who knows what then may be the thoughts and feelings of the infant awakened to the sense of a new world, alive through all its being to sounds that haply glide past our ears, unmeaning as the breath of the common air! Thus have mere infants sometimes been seen inspired by music, till like small genii they warbled spell-strains of their own, powerful to sadden and subdue our hearts. So, too, have infant eyes been so charmed by the rainbow irradiating the earth, that almost infant hands have been taught, as if by inspiration, the power to paint in finest colours, and to imitate with a wondrous art, the skies so beautiful to the quick-awakened spirit of delight. What knowledge have not some children acquired, and gone down scholars to their small untimely graves! Knowing that such things have been--are--and will be--why art thou incredulous of the divine expansion of soul--so soon understanding the things that are divine--in the "Holy Child?"

Thus grew she in the eye of God, day by day waxing wiser and wiser in the knowledge that tends towards the skies, and as if some angel visitant were nightly with her in her dreams, awakening every morn with a new dream of thought that brought with it a gilt of more comprehensive speech. Yet merry she was at times with her companions among the woods and braes, though while they all were laughing, she only smiled; and the passing traveller, who might pause a moment to bless the sweet creatures in their play, could not but single out one face among the many fair, so pensive in its paleness, a face to be remembered, coming from afar, like a mournful thought upon the hour of joy!

Sister or brother of her own had she none--and often both her parents--who lived in a hut by itself up among the mossy stumps of the old decayed forest--had to leave her alone--sometimes even all the day long, from morning till night. But she no more wearied in her solitariness than does the wren in the wood. All the flowers were her friends--all the birds. The linnet ceased not his song for her, though her footsteps wandered into the green glade among the yellow broom, almost within reach of the spray from which he poured his melody--the quiet eyes of his mate feared her not when her garments almost touched the bush where she brooded on her young. Shyest of the winged silvans, the cushat clapped not her wings away on the soft approach of her harmless footsteps to the pine that concealed her slender nest. As if blown from heaven, descended round her path the showers of the painted butterflies, to feed, sleep, or die--undisturbed by her--upon the wild flowers--with wings, when motionless, undistinguishable from the blossoms. And well she loved the brown, busy, blameless bees, come thither for the honey-dews from a hundred cots sprinkled all over the parish, and all high over-head sailing away at evening, laden and wearied, to their straw-roofed skeps in many a hamlet-garden. The leal of every tree, shrub, and plant, she knew familiarly and lovingly in its own characteristic beauty; and was loath to shake one dew-drop from the sweetbriar-rose. And well she knew that all nature loved her in return--that they were dear to each other in their innocence--and that the very sunshine, in motion or in rest, was ready to come at the bidding of her smiles. Skilful those small white hands of hers among the reeds, and rushes, and osiers--and many a pretty flower-basket grew beneath their touch, her parents wondering on their return home to see the handiwork of one who was never idle in her happiness. Thus, early--ere yet but five years old--did she earn her mite for the sustenance of her own beautiful life! The russet garb she wore she herself had won--and thus Poverty, at the door of that hut, became even like a Guardian Angel, with the lineaments of heaven on her brow, and the quietude of heaven beneath her feet.

But these were but her lonely pastimes, or gentle task-work self-imposed among her pastimes; and itself, the sweetest of them all, inspired by a sense of duty, that still brings with it its own delight--and hallowed by religion, that even in the most adverse lot changes slavery into freedom--till the heart, insensible to the bonds of necessity, sings aloud for joy. The life within the life of the "Holy Child," apart from even such innocent employments as these, and from such recreations as innocent, among the shadows and the sunshine of those silvan haunts, was passed, let us fear not to say the truth, wondrous as such worship was in one so very young--was passed in the worship of God; and her parents--though sometimes even saddened to see such piety in a small creature like her, and afraid, in their exceeding love, that it betokened an early removal from this world of one too perfectly pure ever to be touched by its sins and sorrows--forbore, in an awful pity, ever to remove the Bible from her knees, as she would sit with it there, not at morning and at evening only, or all the Sabbath long as soon as they returned from the kirk, but often through all the hours of the longest and sunniest week-days, when there was nothing to hinder her from going up to the hillside, or down to the little village, to play with the other children, always too happy when she appeared--nothing to hinder her but the voice she heard speaking to her in that Book, and the hallelujahs that, at the turning over of each blessed page, came upon the ear of the "Holy Child" from white-robed saints all kneeling before His throne in heaven!

* * * * *

THE SELECTOR; AND LITERARY NOTICES OF _NEW WORKS_.

* * * * *

ROMANCE OF HISTORY.

_France. By Leitch Ritchie_.

The design of moulding the romantic annals of different countries into so many series of Tales--is one of unquestionable beauty. It originated, we believe, with the late Mr. Henry Neele, who was in every sense well qualified for so poetical an exercise of ingenuity. He commenced with "England;" but, unfortunately, did not live to complete a Second Series; neither had he the gratification of seeing his design fully appreciated by the public. The "Romantic Annals of England," on their first appearance, made but slow progress in popularity: the author trusted, and the publisher hoped, and, to use a publishing phrase, the work gradually made its way--slow but sure--if we may judge from the wished-for "new editions." How unlike is this course of favour to the blaze of fashionable annals, or novels of high life, that are born and die in a day, or with one reading circle of a subscription library. They strut and fume in the publisher's newspaper puffs; but their light is put out within a few brief hours, and they are laid to sleep on the capacious shelves of the publisher's warehouse. Not so with the Tales of Historical Romance: they have fancy enough to embellish sober fact.

The _second_ series--_Spain_--is from a Spanish hand of some pretension, but less power than that of Mr. Neele.

The _third_ series--_France_--by another hand, is now before us. In his advertisement, the author says, when he undertook the present series, "he proposed to himself to fulfil what 'the Romance of History' seemed to require, by presenting a succession of romantic pictures illustrative of the historical manners of the French Nation." We incline to his conception of the task. He further notes that "he has taken pains to go for information to the original sources of French History. These he found in reasonable abundance, in the old Collegiate Library of Caen, and in the British Museum." There are in the Series nineteen Tales, with historical summaries where requisite for their elucidation. The titles are irresistible invitations--as Bertha, or the Court of Charlemagne--Adventures of Eriland--the Man-Wolf--the Phantom Fight--the Magic Wand--the Dream Girl, &c. Their style may be called spirit-stirring, while it has much of the graceful prettiness of love-romance.--The author, too, has caught the very air of chivalric times, and his pages glitter with the points of their glories;--not unseasonably mixed with the delightful quaintnesses and descriptive minuteness of the old chroniclers.

To condense either of the stories would be neither advantageous to the author nor reader. We therefore extract a scene or two from "the Bondsman's Feast," and an exquisite portrait of "the Dream Girl:"--

_The Bondsman's Feast._

Arthault's only child was a son, who owed nothing to his father but the prospect of a fair inheritance, for he was little like him in form, and not at all in mind: he was a fine, manly, generous, and high-spirited youth--such as would have been thought too early born, had his appearance been made before the hereditary servility of his family was forgotten. The knight, too, had an only child, a daughter; who, in personal appearance and moral qualities, contrasted in as remarkable a manner with her father. She was little almost to a fault, in the standard of beauty, if there be such a thing; her form was moulded with a delicacy, which gave the idea of one of those aërial shapes that dance in the beam of poesy: and there was that gentle and refined playfulness of expression in her fair countenance, which artists have loved to picture in the nymphs of some silvan goddess, whose rudest employment is to chase one another on the green bank, or sport in the transparent wave.

Guillaume loved the beautiful bourgeoise before he knew that such love was a condescension; and Amable, when, on being desired by her father to refuse her heart to Guillaume, she thought of inquiring whether she possessed such a thing at all, started with surprise to find that she had given it away to the knight's son long ago. But where was the use of repining? Guillaume was young, and handsome, and generous, and brave; and what harm could befall her heart in such keeping? Amable turned away from her father with a light laugh, and a light step, and stealing skippingly round the garden wall--for already the paternal prohibitions had gone forth--bounded towards a grove of wild shrubs at the farther end.

The trees were bathed in sunlight; the air was filled with the song of birds; the face of heaven was undimmed by a single spot of shade, and the earth was green, and sparkling, and beautiful beneath. Such was the scene around her; but in Amable's mind, a warmer and brighter sun shed its light upon her maiden dreams, and the voice of the sweet, rich singer Hope drowned the melody of the woods. "Away!" she thought; "it cannot be that this strange, unkindly mood can endure; my father loves his friend in spite of all, and the noble and generous knight could not hate if he would. They shall not be a week apart when they will both regret what has passed; and when they meet again, I will laugh them into a confession that they have done so. Then the two friends will embrace; and then Guillaume and I will sing, and dance, and read together again--and then--and then--and then--" It seemed as if her thoughts had run her out of breath; for at this point of the reverie she paused, and hung back for a moment, while a sudden blush rose to her very eyes. Soon, however, she recovered; she threw back her head gaily, and yet proudly; legends of happy love crowded upon her memory, and minstrel songs echoed in her ear; she bounded lightly into the wood, and as some one, darting from behind a tree, caught her while she passed, Amable, with the stifled scream of alarm, which maidens are wont to give when they wish it unheard by all save one, found herself in the arms of Guillaume. * * * *

This was a proud and a happy day for Arthault. His head was in the clouds; he scarcely seemed to touch the earth with his feet; but yet, with the strong control which worldly men are wont to exercise over their feelings, he schooled his aspect into the bland and lowly expression of grateful humility. When, in the early part of the morning, the echoes of Nogent (the chateau) were awakened by a flourish of trumpets, which proclaimed the approach of the Count, instead of waiting to receive him in the arcade under the belfry, according to the common usage of lords at that period,[4] he walked bare-headed to the gate of the outer court, and, kneeling, held the prince's stirrup as he dismounted.

The breakfast was served in cups and porringers of silver, set on a magnificent gold tray, and consisted chiefly of milk made thick with honey, peeled barley, cherries dried in the sun, and preserved barberries. The bread was of the _mias_ cakes, composed of rye-flour, cream, orange-water, and new-laid eggs;[5] and the whole was distributed among the guests by Guillaume; the host himself having been compelled to take his seat at table by the Count.

The morning was spent in viewing the improvements of the place, and riding about the neighbourhood; and at ten o'clock the company partook of a dinner served in the same style of tasteful magnificence. The viands included, among other things, a lamb roasted whole, the head of a wild boar covered with flowers, fried trouts, and poached eggs, which were eaten with boiled radishes, and peas in their shells.[6]

A profusion of the precious metals graced the table, more especially in drinking cups; those of horn, which were formerly in general use, having about this period gone out of vogue. The luxury of forks, it is true, had not yet been invented; but when it is remembered that the hands were washed publicly, before and after meals, not as a fashionable form, but in absolute earnest, it will not be feared that any indelicacy in the feasters contrasted with the taste and splendour of the feast.[7]

The wines filled by Guillaume, who waited particularly on the Count, besides the fashionable vin d'Aï of the district,[8] included the vin de Beaume of Burgundy, the vin d'Orleans, so much prized by Louis le Jeune, and the powerful vin de Rebrechien (another Orleans wine) which used formerly to be carried to the field by Henry I. to animate his courage.[9]

After dinner the guests partook of the amusement of the chase, which afforded Arthault an opportunity of exhibiting, in all its extent, his newly-acquired estates--and which, indeed, comprehended a great part of the family property of Sansavoir; although the Count did not observe, and therefore no one else was so ill-bred as to do so, an old blackened building mouldering near the garden-wall, which Sir Launcelot had still preserved, and where he continued to reside in a kind of dogged defiance of his enemy.

The festivities of the day were closed by a splendid supper, attended by music and minstrel songs; and when the sleeping cup had passed round, the Count Henri retired to the chamber prepared for him, which he found to be not at all inferior to his own in luxury and magnificence. Vessels of gold, filled with rose-water, were placed on his dressing-table; the curtains of the ample bed were ornamented with partridge plumes, supposed to ensure to the sleeper a long and peaceful life; and, in short, nothing was wanting that might have been deemed pleasing either to the taste or superstition of the age.

We halt for the present with this foretaste of the gratification we may calculate on receiving from nearly every page of the whole Series. By the way, "the references to authorities for manners, &c. have been introduced throughout the work, and occasionally, illustrative and literary notes," at the request of the publisher; and we must not lose this opportunity of complimenting the sense and good taste of the suggestion.

[4] Gerard de Rousillon, MS. cited in Tristan le Voyageur.

[5] The paste formed of these materials was spread upon broad cabbage leaves, which came out of the oven covered with a slight golden crust, composing the mias cakes.--Tristan le Voyageur.

[6] Tristan le Voyageur. Boiled radishes, it may be important to know, are an excellent substitute for asparagus!