The Angel in the House

THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE

1

 
Oh, beating heart of sweet alarm,
   Which stays the lover’s step, when near
His mistress and her awful charm
   Of grace and innocence sincere!
I held the half-shut door, and heard
   The voice of my betrothed wife,
Who sang my verses, every word
   By music taught its latent life;
With interludes of well-touch’d notes,
   That flash’d, surprising and serene,
As meteor after meteor floats
   The soft, autumnal stars between.
There was a passion in her tone,
   A tremor when she touch’d the keys,
Which told me she was there alone,
   And uttering all her soul at ease.
I enter’d; for I did not choose
   To learn how in her heart I throve,
By chance or stealth; beyond her use,
   Her greeting flatter’d me with love.
 

2

 
With true love’s treacherous confidence,
   And ire, at last to laughter won,
She spoke this speech, and mark’d its sense,
   By action, as her Aunt had done.
 

3

 
‘“You, with your looks and catching air,
   To think of Vaughan!  You fool!  You know,
You might, with ordinary care,
   Ev’n yet be Lady Clitheroe.
You’re sure he’ll do great things some day!
   Nonsense, he won’t; he’s dress’d too well.
Dines with the Sterling Club, they say;
   Not commonly respectable!
Half Puritan, half Cavalier!
   His curly hair I think’s a wig;
And, for his fortune, why my Dear,
   ’Tis not enough to keep a gig.
Rich Aunts and Uncles never die;
   And what you bring won’t do for dress:
And so you’ll live on By-and-by,
   Within oaten-cake and water-cress!”
 

4

 
‘I cried, but did not let her see.
   At last she soften’d her dispraise,
On learning you had bought for me
   A carriage and a pair of bays.
But here she comes!  You take her in
   To dinner.  I impose this task
Make her approve my love; and win
   What thanks from me you choose to ask!’
 

5

 
‘My niece has told you every word
   I said of you!  What may I mean?
Of course she has; but you’ve not heard
   How I abused you to the Dean;—
Yes, I’ll take wine; he’s mad, like her;
   And she will have you: there it ends!
And, now I’ve done my duty, Sir,
   And you’ve shown common-sense, we’re friends!’
 

6

 
‘Go, child, and see him out yourself,’
   Aunt Maude said, after tea, ‘and show
The place, upon that upper shelf,
   Where Petrarch stands, lent long ago.’
 

7

 
‘These rose-leaves to my heart be press’d,
   Honoria, while it aches for you!’
(The rose in ruin, from her breast,
   Fell, as I took a fond adieu.)
‘You must go now, Love!’  ‘See, the air
   Is thick with starlight!’  ‘Let me tie
This scarf on.  Oh, your Petrarch!  There!
   I’m coming, Aunt!’  ‘Sweet, Sweet!’  ‘Good-bye!’
‘Ah, Love, to me ’tis death to part,
   Yet you, my sever’d life, smile on!’
These “Good-nights,” Felix, break my heart;
   I’m only gay till you are gone!’
With love’s bright arrows from her eyes,
   And balm on her permissive lips,
She pass’d, and night was a surprise,
   As when the sun at Quito dips.
Her beauties were like sunlit snows,
   Flush’d but not warm’d with my desire.
Oh, how I loved her!  Fiercely glows
   In the pure air of frost the fire.
Who for a year is sure of fate!
   I thought, dishearten’d as I went,
Wroth with the Dean, who bade me wait,
   And vex’d with her, who seem’d content.
Nay, could eternal life afford
   That tyranny should thus deduct
From this fair land, which call’d me lord,
   A year of the sweet usufruct?
It might not and it should not be!
   I’d go back now, and he must own,
At once, my love’s compulsive plea.
   I turn’d, I found the Dean alone.
‘Nonsense, my friend; go back to bed!
   It’s half-past twelve!’  ‘July, then, Sir!’
‘Well, come to-morrow,’ at last he said,
   ‘And you may talk of it with her.’
A light gleam’d as I pass’d the stair.
   A pausing foot, a flash of dress,
And a sweet voice.  ‘Is Felix there?’
   ‘July, Love!’  ‘Says Papa so?’  ‘Yes!’
 

CANTO III
The Country Ball

PRELUDES

I

Love Ceremonious

 
Keep your undrest, familiar style
   For strangers, but respect your friend,
Her most, whose matrimonial smile
   Is and asks honour without end.
’Tis found, and needs it must so be,
   That life from love’s allegiance flags,
When love forgets his majesty
   In sloth’s unceremonious rags.
Let love make home a gracious Court;
   There let the world’s rude, hasty ways
Be fashion’d to a loftier port,
   And learn to bow and stand at gaze;
And let the sweet respective sphere
   Of personal worship there obtain
Circumference for moving clear,
   None treading on another’s train.
This makes that pleasures do not cloy,
   And dignifies our mortal strife
With calmness and considerate joy,
   Befitting our immortal life.
 

II

The Rainbow

 
A stately rainbow came and stood,
   When I was young, in High-Hurst Park;
Its bright feet lit the hill and wood
   Beyond, and cloud and sward were dark;
And I, who thought the splendour ours
   Because the place was, t’wards it flew,
And there, amidst the glittering showers,
   Gazed vainly for the glorious view.
With whatsoever’s lovely, know
   It is not ours; stand off to see,
Or beauty’s apparition so
   Puts on invisibility.
 

III

A Paradox

 
To tryst Love blindfold goes, for fear
   He should not see, and eyeless night
He chooses still for breathing near
   Beauty, that lives but in the sight.
 

THE COUNTY BALL

1

 
Well, Heaven be thank’d my first-love fail’d,
   As, Heaven be thank’d, our first-loves do!
Thought I, when Fanny past me sail’d,
   Loved once, for what I never knew,
Unless for colouring in her talk,
   When cheeks and merry mouth would show
Three roses on a single stalk,
   The middle wanting room to blow,
And forward ways, that charm’d the boy
   Whose love-sick mind, misreading fate,
Scarce hoped that any Queen of Joy
   Could ever stoop to be his mate.
 

2

 
But there danced she, who from the leaven
   Of ill preserv’d my heart and wit
All unawares, for she was heaven,
   Others at best but fit for it.
One of those lovely things she was
   In whose least action there can be
Nothing so transient but it has
   An air of immortality.
I mark’d her step, with peace elate,
   Her brow more beautiful than morn,
Her sometime look of girlish state
   Which sweetly waived its right to scorn;
The giddy crowd, she grave the while,
   Although, as ’twere beyond her will,
Around her mouth the baby smile
   That she was born with linger’d still.
Her ball-dress seem’d a breathing mist,
   From the fair form exhaled and shed,
Raised in the dance with arm and wrist
   All warmth and light, unbraceleted.
Her motion, feeling ’twas beloved,
   The pensive soul of tune express’d,
And, oh, what perfume, as she moved,
   Came from the flowers in her breast!
How sweet a tongue the music had!
   ‘Beautiful Girl,’ it seem’d to say,
‘Though all the world were vile and sad,
   Dance on; let innocence be gay.’
Ah, none but I discern’d her looks,
   When in the throng she pass’d me by,
For love is like a ghost, and brooks
   Only the chosen seer’s eye;
And who but she could e’er divine
   The halo and the happy trance,
When her bright arm reposed on mine,
   In all the pauses of the dance!
 

3

 
Whilst so her beauty fed my sight,
   And whilst I lived in what she said,
Accordant airs, like all delight
   Most sweet when noted least, were play’d;
And was it like the Pharisee
   If I in secret bow’d my face
With joyful thanks that I should be,
   Not as were many, but with grace
And fortune of well-nurtured youth,
   And days no sordid pains defile,
And thoughts accustom’d to the truth,
   Made capable of her fair smile?
 

4

 
Charles Barton follow’d down the stair,
   To talk with me about the Ball,
And carp at all the people there.
   The Churchills chiefly stirr’d his gall:
‘Such were the Kriemhilds and Isondes
   You storm’d about at Trinity!
Nothing at heart but handsome Blondes!
   ‘Folk say that you and Fanny Fry—’
‘They err!  Good-night!  Here lies my course,
   Through Wilton.’  Silence blest my ears,
And, weak at heart with vague remorse,
   A passing poignancy of tears
Attack’d mine eyes.  By pale and park
   I rode, and ever seem’d to see,
In the transparent starry dark,
   That splendid brow of chastity,
That soft and yet subduing light,
   At which, as at the sudden moon,
I held my breath, and thought ‘how bright!’
   That guileless beauty in its noon,
Compelling tribute of desires
   Ardent as day when Sirius reigns,
Pure as the permeating fires
   That smoulder in the opal’s veins.
 

CANTO IV
Love in Idleness

PRELUDES

I

Honour and Desert

 
O queen, awake to thy renown,
   Require what ’tis our wealth to give,
And comprehend and wear the crown
   Of thy despised prerogative!
I, who in manhood’s name at length
   With glad songs come to abdicate
The gross regality of strength,
   Must yet in this thy praise abate,
That, through thine erring humbleness
   And disregard of thy degree,
Mainly, has man been so much less
   Than fits his fellowship with thee.
High thoughts had shaped the foolish brow,
   The coward had grasp’d the hero’s sword,
The vilest had been great, hadst thou,
   Just to thyself, been worth’s reward.
But lofty honours undersold
   Seller and buyer both disgrace;
And favours that make folly bold
   Banish the light from virtue’s face.
 

II

Love and Honour

 
What man with baseness so content,
   Or sick with false conceit of right,
As not to know that the element
   And inmost warmth of love’s delight
Is honour?  Who’d not rather kiss
   A duchess than a milkmaid, prank
The two in equal grace, which is
   Precedent Nature’s obvious rank?
Much rather, then, a woman deck’d
   With saintly honours, chaste and good,
Whose thoughts celestial things affect,
   Whose eyes express her heavenly mood!
Those lesser vaunts are dimm’d or lost
   Which plume her name or paint her lip,
Extinct in the deep-glowing boast
   Of her angelic fellowship.
 

III

Valour Misdirected

 
I’ll hunt for dangers North and South,
   To prove my love, which sloth maligns!’
What seems to say her rosy mouth?
   ‘I’m not convinced by proofs but signs.’
 

LOVE IN IDLENESS

1

 
What should I do?  In such a wife
   Fortune had lavish’d all her store,
And nothing now seem’d left for life
   But to deserve her more and more.
To this I vow’d my life’s whole scope;
   And Love said, ‘I forewarn you now,
The Maiden will fulfill your hope
   Only as you fulfil your vow.’
 

2

 
A promised service, (task for days),
   Was done this morning while she slept,
With that full heart which thinks no praise
   Of vows which are not more than kept;
But loftier work did love impose.
   And studious hours.  Alas, for these,
While she from all my thoughts arose
   Like Venus from the restless seas!
 

3

 
I conn’d a scheme, within mind elate:
   My Uncle’s land would fall to me,
My skill was much in school debate,
   My friends were strong in Salisbury;
A place in Parliament once gain’d,
   Thro’ saps first labour’d out of sight,
Far loftier peaks were then attain’d
   With easy leaps from height to height;
And that o’erwhelming honour paid,
   Or recognised, at least, in life,
Which this most sweet and noble Maid
   Should yield to him who call’d her Wife.
 

4

 
I fix’d this rule: in Sarum Close
   To make two visits every week,
The first, to-day; and, save on those,
   I nought would do, think, read, or speak,
Which did not help my settled will
   To earn the Statesman’s proud applause.
And now, forthwith, to mend my skill
   In ethics, politics, and laws,
The Statesman’s learning!  Flush’d with power
   And pride of freshly-form’d resolve,
I read Helvetius half-an-hour;
   But, halting in attempts to solve
Why, more than all things else that be,
   A lady’s grace hath force to move
That sensitive appetency
   Of intellectual good, call’d love,
Took Blackstone down, only to draw
   My swift-deriving thoughts ere long
To love, which is the source of law,
   And, like a king, can do no wrong;
Then open’d Hyde, where loyal hearts,
   With faith unpropp’d by precedent,
Began to play rebellious parts.
   O, mighty stir that little meant!
How dull the crude, plough’d fields of fact
   To me who trod the Elysian grove!
How idle all heroic act
   By the least suffering of love!
I could not read; so took my pen,
   And thus commenced, in form of notes,
A Lecture for the Salisbury men,
   With due regard to Tory votes:
‘A road’s a road, though worn to ruts;
   They speed who travel straight therein;
But he who tacks and tries short cuts
   Gets fools’ praise and a broken shin—’
And here I stopp’d in sheer despair;
   But, what to-day was thus begun,
I vow’d, up starting from my chair,
   To-morrow should indeed be done;
So loosed my chafing thoughts from school,
   To play with fancy as they chose,
And then, according to my rule,
   I dress’d, and came to Sarum Close.
 

5

 
Ah, that sweet laugh!  Diviner sense
   Did Nature, forming her, inspire
To omit the grosser elements,
   And make her all of air and fire!
 

6

 
To-morrow, Cowes’ Regatta fell:
   The Dean would like his girls to go,
If I went too.  ‘Most gladly.’  Well,
   I did but break a foolish vow!
Unless Love’s toil has love for prize,
   (And then he’s Hercules), above
All other contrarieties
   Is labour contrary to love.
No fault of Love’s, but nature’s laws!
   And Love, in idleness, lies quick;
For as the worm whose powers make pause,
   And swoon, through alteration sick,
The soul, its wingless state dissolved,
   Awaits its nuptial life complete,
All indolently self-convolved,
   Cocoon’d in silken fancies sweet.
 

CANTO V
The Queen’s Room

PRELUDES

I

Rejected

 
‘Perhaps she’s dancing somewhere now!’
   The thoughts of light and music wake
Sharp jealousies, that grow and grow
   Till silence and the darkness ache.
He sees her step, so proud and gay,
   Which, ere he spake, foretold despair:
Thus did she look, on such a day,
   And such the fashion of her hair;
And thus she stood, when, kneeling low,
   He took the bramble from her dress,
And thus she laugh’d and talk’d, whose ‘No’
   Was sweeter than another’s ‘Yes.’
He feeds on thoughts that most deject;
   He impudently feigns her charms,
So reverenced in his own respect,
   Dreadfully clasp’d by other arms;
And turns, and puts his brows, that ache,
   Against the pillow where ’tis cold.
If, only now his heart would break!
   But, oh, how much a heart can hold.
 

II

Rachel

 
You loved her, and would lie all night
   Thinking how beautiful she was,
And what to do for her delight.
   Now both are bound with alien laws!
Be patient; put your heart to school;
   Weep if you will, but not despair;
The trust that nought goes wrong by rule
   Should ease this load the many bear.
Love, if there’s heav’n, shall meet his dues,
   Though here unmatch’d, or match’d amiss;
Meanwhile, the gentle cannot choose
   But learn to love the lips they kiss.
Ne’er hurt the homely sister’s ears
   With Rachel’s beauties; secret be
The lofty mind whose lonely tears
   Protest against mortality.
 

III

The Heart’s Prophecies

 
Be not amazed at life; ’tis still
   The mode of God with his elect
Their hopes exactly to fulfil,
   In times and ways they least expect.
 

THE QUEEN’S ROOM

1

 
There’s nothing happier than the days
   In which young Love makes every thought
Pure as a bride’s blush, when she says
   ‘I will’ unto she knows not what;
And lovers, on the love-lit globe,
   For love’s sweet sake, walk yet aloof,
And hear Time weave the marriage-robe,
   Attraction warp and reverence woof.
 

2

 
My Housekeeper, my Nurse of yore,
   Cried, as the latest carriage went,
‘Well, Mr, Felix, Sir, I’m sure
   The morning’s gone off excellent!
I never saw the show to pass
   The ladies, in their fine fresh gowns,
So sweetly dancing on the grass,
   To music with its ups and downs.
We’d such work, Sir, to clean the plate;
   ’Twas just the busy times of old.
The Queen’s Room, Sir, look’d quite like state.
   Miss Smythe, when she went up, made bold
To peep into the Rose Boudoir,
   And cried, “How charming! all quite new;”
And wonder’d who it could be for.
   All but Miss Honor look’d in too.
But she’s too proud to peep and pry.
   None’s like that sweet Miss Honor, Sir!
Excuse my humbleness, but I
   Pray Heav’n you’ll get a wife like her!
The Poor love dear Miss Honor’s ways
   Better than money.  Mrs. Rouse,
Who ought to know a lady, says
   No finer goes to Wilton House.
Miss Bagshaw thought that dreary room
   Had kill’d old Mrs. Vaughan with fright;
She would not sleep in such a tomb
   For all her host was worth a night!
Miss Fry, Sir, laugh’d; they talk’d the rest
   In French; and French Sir’s Greek to me;
But, though they smiled, and seem’d to jest,
   No love was lost, for I could see
How serious-like Miss Honor was—’
   ‘Well, Nurse, this is not my affair.
The ladies talk’d in French with cause.
   Good-day; and thank you for your prayer.’
 

3

 
I loiter’d through the vacant house,
   Soon to be her’s; in one room stay’d,
Of old my mother’s.  Here my vows
   Of endless thanks were oftenest paid.
This room its first condition kept;
   For, on her road to Sarum Town,
Therein an English Queen had slept,
   Before the Hurst was half pull’d down.
The pictured walls the place became:
   Here ran the Brook Anaurus, where
Stout Jason bore the wrinkled dame
   Whom serving changed to Juno; there,
Ixion’s selfish hope, instead
   Of the nuptial goddess, clasp’d a cloud;
And, here, translated Psyche fed
   Her gaze on Love, not disallow’d.
 

4

 
And in this chamber had she been,
   And into that she would not look,
My Joy, my Vanity, my Queen,
   At whose dear name my pulses shook!
To others how express at all
   My worship in that joyful shrine?
I scarcely can myself recall
   What peace and ardour then were mine;
And how more sweet than aught below,
   The daylight and its duties done,
It felt to fold the hands, and so
   Relinquish all regards but one;
To see her features in the dark,
   To lie and meditate once more
The grace I did not fully mark,
   The tone I had not heard before;
And from my pillow then to take
   Her notes, her picture, and her glove,
Put there for joy when I should wake,
   And press them to the heart of love;
And then to whisper ‘Wife!’ and pray
   To live so long as not to miss
That unimaginable day
   Which farther seems the nearer ’tis;
And still from joy’s unfathom’d well
   To drink, in dreams, while on her brows
Of innocence ineffable
   Blossom’d the laughing bridal rose.