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Read Ebook: A Day with Browning by Browning Robert Contributor Flint W Russell William Russell Illustrator Haslehust E W Illustrator Neatby William James Illustrator
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Ebook has 69 lines and 12562 words, and 2 pages
Oh, Galuppi, Baldassaro, this is very sad to find! I can hardly misconceive you; it would prove me deaf and blind; But although I take your meaning, 'tis with such a heavy mind! Here you come with your old music, and here's all the good it brings. What, they lived thus at Venice, where the merchants were the kings, Where St. Mark's is, where the Doges used to wed the sea with rings?
Did young people take their pleasure when the sea was warm in May? Balls and masks begun at midnight, burning ever to mid-day, When they made up fresh adventures for the morrow, do you say?
Well they'd break talk off and afford-- --She to bite her mask's black velvet, he to finger on his sword, While you sat and played Toccatas, stately at the clavichord?
What? Those lesser thirds so plaintive, sixths diminished, sigh on sigh, Told them something? Those suspensions, those solutions--"Must we die?" Those commiserating sevenths--"Life might last! we can but try!"
"Were you happy?"--"Yes."--"And are you still as happy?"--"Yes. And you?" --"Then, more kisses!"--"Did I stop them, when a million seemed so few?" Hark! the dominant's persistence, till it must be answered to!
So an octave struck the answer. Oh, they praised you, I dare say! "Brave Galuppi! that was music! good alike at grave and gay! I can always leave off talking when I hear a master play!"
Then they left you for your pleasure: till in due time, one by one, Some with lives that came to nothing, some with deeds as well undone, Death came tacitly and took them where they never see the sun.
The afternoon wore by quickly, and it was soon time to dress for dinner: for Browning was precise in adhering to the customs of civilised life: and he liked to see his sister seated opposite him, clad in beautiful gowns of sombre richness, and wearing quaint old jewelry. Browning accepted his meals with frank pleasure; he was no ascetic, and "his optimism and his belief in direct Providence led him to make a direct virtue of happiness," and to welcome it in its simplest form. Any guest who might be present was privileged to enjoy that sparkling and many-faceted eloquence to which reference has been made already. But the host was always careful to avoid deep or solemn topics--doubtless because he felt them far too keenly, to use them as mere texts for dinner-table discussion. "If such were broached in his presence, he dismissed them with one strong convincing sentence, and adroitly turned the current of conversation into a shallower channel."
Later on, he would probably visit the Goldoni Theatre, where he had a large box: or, if remaining at home, he was often prevailed upon to read aloud. His delivery was forcible and dramatic,--he would strongly emphasise all the light and shade of a poem, and the touches of character in the dialogue. Especially was this the case when reading his own compositions. But often he would say with a smile, "No R. B. to-night!--let us have some real poetry," and would take down a volume of Shelley, Keats or Coleridge.
At last, another of the "divine sunsets" which Browning adored had faded over the Lido; the "quiet-coloured end of evening" had darkened into dusk and stars. Even that alert and indefatigable frame grew weary with the day's long doings, and a natural desire for rest descended upon "the brain which too much thought expands." The vision of Guercino's picture, "fraught with a pathos so magnificent," returned upon him from that sultry day in which he had beheld the "Guardian Angel" at Fano, "my angel with me, too," and he longed for the touch of those divinely-healing hands.
Dear and great Angel, would'st thou only leave That child, when thou hast done with him, for me! Let me sit all the day here, that when eve Shall find performed thy special ministry And time come for departure, thou, suspending Thy flight, may'st see another child for tending, Another still, to quiet and retrieve.
Dear and great Angel, wouldst thou only leave That child, when thou hast done with him, for me! Let me sit all the day here, that when eve Shall find performed thy special ministry And time come for departure, thou, suspending Thy flight, mayst see another child for tending, Another still, to quiet and retrieve.
Then I shall feel thee step one step, no more, From where thou standest now, to where I gaze, --And suddenly my head is covered o'er With those wings, white above the child who prays Now on that tomb--and I shall feel thee guarding Me, out of all the world; for me, discarding Yon Heaven thy home, that waits and opes its door!
I would not look up thither past thy head Because the door opes, like that child, I know, For I should have thy gracious face instead,
Thou bird of God! And wilt thou bend me low Like him, and lay, like his, my hands together, And lift them up to pray, and gently tether Me, as thy lamb there, with thy garments spread?...
How soon all worldly wrong would be repaired! I think how I should view the earth and skies And sea, when once again my brow was bared After thy healing, with such different eyes. O world, as God has made it! all is beauty: And knowing this, is love, and love is duty. What further may be sought for or declared?
Yet it was not to a celestial visitant that Browning's thoughts turned most, now or at any other time. It was towards the one love of his life,--towards that re-union, that restoration, that infrangible joy of retrieval, which was the goal of his whole desire. And, characteristically of the man who was "ever a fighter," he did not expect to reach his haven by a calm and prosperous passage. It had to be fought for--struggled for from strength to strength,--attained through incessant and arduous combat. For those do not "mount, and that hardly, to eternal life," who remain content upon terrestrial planes;
"Surely they see not God, I know, Nor all that chivalry of His, The soldier-saints, who, row on row, Burn upwards each to his point of bliss, Since, the end of life being manifest, He had cut his way through the world to this."
Fear death?--to feel the fog in my throat, The mist in my face, When the snows begin, and the blasts denote I am nearing the place, The power of the night, the press of the storm, The post of the foe; Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form, Yet the strong man must go: For the journey is done and the summit attained, And the barriers fall, Though a battle's to fight ere the guerdon be gained, The reward of it all. I was ever a fighter, so--one fight more, The best and the last! I would hate that death bandaged my eyes, and forbore, And bade me creep past. No! let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers The heroes of old, Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's arrears Of pain, darkness and cold. For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave, The black minute's at end, And the elements' rage, the fiend-voices that rave, Shall dwindle, shall blend, Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, Then a light, then thy breast, O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, And with God be the rest!
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