Part 20

‘There were facts to tell,— To smooth with eye and accent. Howe supposed ... Well, well, no matter! there was dubious need; You heard the news from Vincent Carrington. And yet perhaps you had been startled less To see me, dear Aurora, if you had read That letter.’ —Now he sets me down as vexed. I think I’ve draped myself in woman’s pride To a perfect purpose. Oh, I’m vexed, it seems! My friend Lord Howe deputes his friend Sir Blaise, To break as softly as a sparrow’s egg That lets a bird out tenderly, the news Of Romney’s marriage to a certain saint; To _smooth with eye and accent_,—indicate His possible presence. Excellently well You’ve played your part, my Lady Waldemar,— As I’ve played mine. ‘Dear Romney,’ I began, ‘You did not use, of old, to be so like A Greek king coming from a taken Troy, ’Twas needful that precursors spread your path With three-piled carpets, to receive your foot And dull the sound of’t. For myself, be sure, Although it frankly ground the gravel here, I still could bear it. Yet I’m sorry, too, To lose this famous letter, which Sir Blaise Has twisted to a lighter absently To fire some holy taper with: Lord Howe Writes letters good for all things but to lose; And many a flower of London gossipry Has dropt wherever such a stem broke off,— Of course I know that, lonely among my vines, Where nothing’s talked of, save the blight again, And no more Chianti! Still the letter’s use As preparation ... Did I start indeed? Last night I started at a cockchafer, And shook a half-hour after. Have you learnt No more of women, ’spite of privilege, Than still to take account too seriously Of such weak flutterings? Why, we like it, sir,— We get our powers and our effects that way. The trees stand stiff and still at time of frost, If no wind tears them; but, let summer come, When trees are happy,—and a breath avails To set them trembling through a million leaves In luxury of emotion. Something less It takes to move a woman: let her start And shake at pleasure,—nor conclude at yours, The winter’s bitter,—but the summer’s green.’

He answered, ‘Be the summer ever green With you, Aurora!—though you sweep your sex With somewhat bitter gusts from where you live Above them,—whirling downward from your heights Your very own pine-cones, in a grand disdain Of the lowland burrs with which you scatter them. So high and cold to others and yourself, A little less to Romney, were unjust, And thus, I would not have you. Let it pass: I feel content, so. You can bear indeed My sudden step beside you: but for me, ’Twould move me sore to hear your softened voice,— Aurora’s voice,—if softened unaware In pity of what I am.’ Ah friend, I thought, As husband of the Lady Waldemar You’re granted very sorely pitiable! And yet Aurora Leigh must guard her voice From softening in the pity of your case, As if from lie or licence. Certainly We’ll soak up all the slush and soil of life With softened voices, ere we come to _you_.

At which I interrupted my own thought And spoke out calmly. ‘Let us ponder, friend, Whate’er our state, we must have made it first; And though the thing displease us, ay, perhaps Displease us warrantably, never doubt That other states, thought possible once, and then Rejected by the instinct of our lives,— If then adopted, had displeased us more Than this, in which the choice, the will, the love, Has stamped the honour of a patent act From henceforth. What we choose, may not be good; But, that we choose it, proves it good for _us_ Potentially, fantastically, now Or last year, rather than a thing we saw, And saw no need for choosing. Moths will burn Their wings,—which proves that light is good for moths, Or else they had flown not, where they agonise,’

‘Ay, light is good,’ he echoed, and there paused. And then abruptly, ... ‘Marian. Marian’s well?’

I bowed my head, but found no word. ’Twas hard To speak of _her_ to Lady Waldemar’s New husband. How much did he know, at last? How much? how little?—— He would take no sign, But straight repeated,—‘Marian. Is she well?’

‘She’s well,’ I answered.

She was there in sight An hour back, but the night had drawn her home; Where still I heard her in an upper room, Her low voice singing to the child in bed, Who restless with the summer-heat and play And slumber snatched at noon, was long sometimes At falling off, and took a score of songs And mother-hushes, ere she saw him sound.

‘She’s well,’ I answered.

‘Here?’ he asked. ‘Yes, here.’

He stopped and sighed. ‘That shall be presently, But now this must be. I have words to say, And would be alone to say them, I with you, And no third troubling.’

‘Speak then,’ I returned, ‘She will not vex you.’

At which, suddenly He turned his face upon me with its smile, As if to crush me. ‘I have read your book, Aurora.’ ‘You have read it,’ I replied, ‘And I have writ it,—we have done with it. And now the rest?’ ‘The rest is like the first,’ He answered,—‘for the book is in my heart, Lives in me, wakes in me, and dreams in me: My daily bread tastes of it,—and my wine Which has no smack of it, I pour it out; It seems unnatural drinking.’ Bitterly I took the word up; ‘Never waste your wine. The book lived in me ere it lived in you; I know it closer than another does, And that it’s foolish, feeble, and afraid, And all unworthy so much compliment. Beseech you, keep your wine,—and, when you drink, Still wish some happier fortune to your friend, Than even to have written a far better book.’

He answered gently, ‘That is consequent: The poet looks beyond the book he has made, Or else he had not made it. If a man Could make a man, he’d henceforth be a god In feeling what a little thing is man: It is not my case. And this special book, I did not make it, to make light of it: It stands above my knowledge, draws me up; ’Tis high to me. It may be that the book Is not so high, but I so low, instead; Still high to me. I mean no compliment: I will not say there are not, young or old, Male writers, ay, or female,—let it pass, Who’ll write us richer and completer books. A man may love a woman perfectly, And yet by no means ignorantly maintain A thousand women have not larger eyes: Enough that she alone has looked at him With eyes that, large or small, have won his soul. And so, this book, Aurora,—so, your book.’

‘Alas,’ I answered, ‘is it so, indeed?’ And then was silent.

‘Is it so, indeed,’ He echoed, ‘that _alas_ is all your word?’ I said,—‘I’m thinking of a far-off June, When you and I, upon my birthday once, Discoursed of life and art, with both untried. I’m thinking, Romney, how ’twas morning then, And now ’tis night.’

‘And now,’ he said, ‘’tis night.’

‘I’m thinking,’ I resumed, ‘’tis somewhat sad That if I had known, that morning in the dew, My cousin Romney would have said such words On such a night, at close of many years, In speaking of a future book of mine, It would have pleased me better as a hope, Than as an actual grace it can at all. That’s sad, I’m thinking.’ ‘Ay,’ he said, ‘’tis night.’

‘And there,’ I added lightly, ‘are the stars! And here, we’ll talk of stars, and not of books.’

‘You have the stars,’ he murmured,—‘it is well: Be like them! shine, Aurora, on my dark, Though high and cold and only like a star, And for this short night only,—you, who keep The same Aurora of the bright June day That withered up the flowers before my face, And turned me from the garden evermore Because I was not worthy. Oh, deserved, Deserved! That I, who verily had not learnt God’s lesson half, attaining as a dunce To obliterate good words with fractious thumbs And cheat myself of the context,—_I_ should push Aside, with male ferocious impudence, The world’s Aurora who had conned her part On the other side the leaf! ignore her so, Because she was a woman and a queen, And had no beard to bristle through her song,— My teacher, who has taught me with a book, My Miriam, whose sweet mouth, when nearly drowned I still heard singing on the shore! Deserved, That here I should look up unto the stars And miss the glory’ ... ‘Can I understand?’ I broke in. ‘You speak wildly, Romney Leigh, Or I hear wildly. In that morning-time We recollect, the roses were too red, The trees too green, reproach too natural If one should see not what the other saw: And now, it’s night, remember; we have shades In place of colours; we are now grown cold, And old, my cousin Romney. Pardon me,— I’m very happy that you like my book, And very sorry that I quoted back A ten years’ birthday; ’twas so mad a thing In any woman, I scarce marvel much You took it for a venturous piece of spite, Provoking such excuses, as indeed I cannot call you slack in.’ ‘Understand,’ He answered sadly, ‘something, if but so. This night is softer than an English day, And men may well come hither when they’re sick, To draw in easier breath from larger air. ’Tis thus with me; I’ve come to you,—to you, My Italy of women, just to breathe My soul out once before you, ere I go, As humble as God makes me at the last, (I thank Him) quite out of the way of men, And yours, Aurora,—like a punished child, His cheeks all blurred with tears and naughtiness, To silence in a corner. I am come To speak, beloved’.... ‘Wisely, cousin Leigh, And worthily of us both!’ ‘Yes, worthily; For this time I must speak out and confess That I, so truculent in assumption once, So absolute in dogma, proud in aim, And fierce in expectation,—I, who felt The whole world tugging at my skirts for help, As if no other man than I, could pull, Nor woman, but I led her by the hand, Nor cloth hold, but I had it in my coat,— Do know myself to-night for what I was On that June-day, Aurora. Poor bright day, Which meant the best ... a woman and a rose, ... And which I smote upon the cheek with words, Until it turned and rent me! Young you were, That birthday, poet, but you talked the right: While I, ... I built up follies like a wall To intercept the sunshine and your face. Your face! that’s worse.’ ‘Speak wisely, cousin Leigh.’

‘Yes, wisely, dear Aurora, though too late: But then, not wisely. I was heavy then, And stupid, and distracted with the cries Of tortured prisoners in the polished brass Of that Phalarian bull, society,— Which seems to bellow bravely like ten bulls, But, if you listen, moans and cries instead Despairingly, like victims tossed and gored And trampled by their hoofs. I heard the cries Too close: I could not hear the angels lift A fold of rustling air, nor what they said To help my pity. I beheld the world As one great famishing carnivorous mouth,— A huge, deserted, callow, black, bird Thing, With piteous open beak that hurt my heart, Till down upon the filthy ground I dropped, And tore the violets up to get the worms. Worms, worms, was all my cry: an open mouth, A gross want, bread to fill it to the lips, No more! That poor men narrowed their demands To such an end, was virtue, I supposed, Adjudicating that to see it so Was reason. Oh, I did not push the case Up higher, and ponder how it answers, when The rich take up the same cry for themselves, Professing equally,—‘an open mouth A gross want, food to fill us, and no more!’ Why that’s so far from virtue, only vice Finds reason for it! That makes libertines: That slurs our cruel streets from end to end With eighty thousand women in one smile, Who only smile at night beneath the gas: The body’s satisfaction and no more, Being used for argument against the soul’s, Here too! the want, here too, implying the right. —How dark I stood that morning in the sun, My best Aurora, though I saw your eyes,— When first you told me ... oh, I recollect The words ... and how you lifted your white hand, And how your white dress and your burnished curls Went greatening round you in the still blue air, As if an inspiration from within Had blown them all out when you spoke the same, Even these,—‘You will not compass your poor ends Of barley-feeding and material ease, Without the poet’s individualism To work your universal. It takes a soul, To move a body,—it takes a high-souled man, To move the masses ... even to a cleaner stye: It takes the ideal, to blow an inch inside The dust of the actual: and your Fouriers failed, Because not poets enough to understand That life develops from within.’ I say Your words,—I could say other words of yours; For none of all your words has been more lost Than sweet verbena, which, being brushed against, Will hold you three hours after by the smell, In spite of long walks on the windy hills. But these words dealt in sharper perfume,—these Were ever on me, stinging through my dreams, And saying themselves for ever o’er my acts Like some unhappy verdict. That I failed, Is certain. Stye or no stye, to contrive The swine’s propulsion toward the precipice, Proved easy and plain. I subtly organised And ordered, built the cards up high and higher, Till, some one breathing, all fell flat again; In setting right society’s wide wrong, Mere life’s so fatal! So I failed indeed Once, twice, and oftener,—hearing through the rents Of obstinate purpose, still those words of yours, ‘_You will not compass your poor ends, not you!_’ But harder than you said them; every time Still farther from your voice, until they came To overcrow me with triumphant scorn Which vexed me to resistance. Set down this For condemnation,—I was guilty here: I stood upon my deed and fought my doubt, As men will,—for I doubted,—till at last My deed gave way beneath me suddenly, And left me what I am. The curtain dropped, My part quite ended, all the footlights quenched, My own soul hissing at me through the dark, I, ready for confession,—I was wrong, I’ve sorely failed; I’ve slipped the ends of life, I yield; you have conquered.’ ‘Stay,’ I answered him; ‘I’ve something for your hearing, also. I Have failed too.’ ‘You!’ he said, ‘you’re very great; The sadness of your greatness fits you well: As if the plume upon a hero’s casque Should nod a shadow upon his victor face.’

I took him up austerely,—‘You have read My book, but not my heart; for recollect, ’Tis writ in Sanscrit, which you bungle at. I’ve surely failed, I know; if failure means To look back sadly on work gladly done,— To wander on my mountains of Delight, So called, (I can remember a friend’s words As well as you, sir,) weary and in want Of even a sheep-path, thinking bitterly.... Well, well! no matter. I but say so much, To keep you, Romney Leigh, from saying more, And let you feel I am not so high indeed, That I can bear to have you at my foot,— Or safe, that I can help you. That June-day, Too deeply sunk in craterous sunsets now For you or me to dig it up alive; To pluck it out all bleeding with spent flame At the roots, before those moralising stars We have got instead,—that poor lost day, you said Some words as truthful as the thing of mine You care to keep in memory: and I hold If I, that day, and, being the girl I was, Had shown a gentler spirit, less arrogance, It had not hurt me. Ah, you’ll not mistake The point here. I but only think, you see, More justly, that’s more humbly, of myself, Than when I tried a crown on and supposed.... Nay, laugh, sir,—I’ll laugh with you!—pray you, laugh. I’ve had so many birthdays since that day, I’ve learnt to prize mirth’s opportunities, Which come too seldom. Was it you who said I was not changed? the same Aurora? Ah, We could laugh there, too! Why, Ulysses’ dog Knew _him_, and wagged his tail and died: but if I had owned a dog, I too, before my Troy, And, if you brought him here, ... I warrant you He’d look into my face, bark lustily, And live on stoutly, as the creatures will Whose spirits are not troubled by long loves. A dog would never know me, I’m so changed; Much less a friend ... except that you’re misled By the colour of the hair, the trick of the voice, Like that Aurora Leigh’s.’ ‘Sweet trick of voice! I would be a dog for this, to know it at last, And die upon the falls of it. O love, O best Aurora! are you then so sad, You scarcely had been sadder as my wife?’