Robert Browning - The Ring And The Book - Chapter VI - Giuseppe CaponsacchiRobert Browning - The Ring And The Book - Chapter VI - Giuseppe Caponsacchi
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“O’ the Lamb, who took thy plighted troth, my priest,
“To fold thy warm heart on my heart of stone
“And freeze thee nor unfasten any more?
“This is a fleshly woman,—let the free
“Bestow their life-blood, thou art pulseless now!”
See! Day by day I had risen and left this church
At the signal waved me by some foolish fan,
With half a curse and half a pitying smile
For the monk I stumbled over in my haste,
Prostrate and corpse-like at the altar-foot
Intent on his corona: then the church
Was ready with her quip, if word conduced,
To quicken my pace nor stop for prating—“There!
“Be thankful you are no such ninny, go
“Rather to teach a black-eyed novice cards
“Than gabble Latin and protrude that nose
“Smoothed to a sheep’s through no brains and much faith!”
That sort of incentive! Now the church changed tone—
Now, when I found out first that life and death
Are means to an end, that passion uses both,
Indisputably mistress of the man
Whose form of worship is self-sacrifice—
Now, from the stone lungs sighed the scrannel voice
“Leave that passion, come be dead with me!”
As if, i’ the fabled garden, I had gone
On great adventure, plucked in ignorance
Hedge-fruit, and feasted to satiety,
Laughing at such high fame for hips and haws,
And scorned the achievement: then come all at once
O’ the prize o’ the place, the thing of perfect gold,
The apple’s self: and, scarce my eye on that,
Was ’ware as well o’ the seven-fold dragon’s watch.
Sirs, I obeyed. Obedience was too strange,—
This new thing that had been struck into me
By the look o’ the lady,—to dare disobey
The first authoritative word. ’Twas God’s.
I had been lifted to the level of her,
Could take such sounds into my sense. I said
“We two are cognisant o’ the Master now;
“It is she bids me bow the head: how true,
“I am a priest! I see the function here;
“I thought the other way self-sacrifice:
“This is the true, seals up the perfect sum.
“I pay it, sit down, silently obey.”
So, I went home. Dawn broke, noon broadened, I
I sat stone-still, let time run over me.
The sun slanted into my room, had reached
The west. I opened book,—Aquinas blazed
With one black name only on the white page.
I looked up, saw the sunset: vespers rang:
“She counts the minutes till I keep my word
“And come say all is ready. I am a priest
“Duty to God is duty to her: I think
“God, who created her, will save her too
“Some new way, by one miracle the more,
“Without me. Then, prayer may avail perhaps.”
I went to my own place i’ the Pieve, read
The office: I was back at home again
Sitting i’ the dark. “Could she but know—but know
“That, were there good in this distinct from God’s,
“Really good as it reached her, though procured
“By a sin of mine,—I should sin: God forgives.
“She knows it is no fear withholds me: fear?
“Of what? Suspense here is the terrible thing.
“If she should, as she counts the minutes, come
“On the fantastic notion that I fear
“The world now, fear the Archbishop, fear perhaps
“Count Guido, he who, having forged the lies,
“May wait the work, attend the effect,—I fear
“The sword of Guido! Let God see to that—
“Hating lies, let not her believe a lie!”
Again the morning found me. “I will work,
“Tie down my foolish thoughts. Thank God so far!
“I have saved her from a scandal, stopped the tongues
“Had broken else into a cackle and hiss
“Around the noble name. Duty is still
“Wisdom: I have been wise.” So the day wore.
At evening—“But, achieving victory,
“I must not blink the priest’s peculiar part,
“Nor shrink to counsel, comfort: priest and friend—
“How do we discontinue to be friends?
“I will go minister, advise her seek
“Help at the source,—above all, not despair:
“There may be other happier help at hand.
“I hope it,—wherefore then neglect to say?”
There she stood—leaned there, for the second time,
Over the terrace, looked at me, then spoke:
“Why is it you have suffered me to stay
“Breaking my heart two days more than was need?
“Why delay help, your own heart yearns to give?
“You are again here, in the self-same mind,
“I see here, steadfast in the face of you,—
“You grudge to do no one thing that I ask.
“Why then is nothing done? You know my need.
“Still, through God’s pity on me, there is time
“And one day more: shall I be saved or no?”
I answered—“Lady, waste no thought, no word
“Even to forgive me! Care for what I care—
“Only! Now follow me as I were fate!
“Leave this house in the dark to-morrow night,
“Just before daybreak:—there’s new moon this eve—
“It sets, and then begins the solid black.
“Descend, proceed to the Torrione, step
“Over the low dilapidated wall,
“Take San Clemente, there’s no other gate
“Unguarded at the hour: some paces thence
“An inn stands; cross to it; I shall be there.”
She answered, “If I can but find the way.
“But I shall find it. Go now!”
I did go,
Took rapidly the route myself prescribed,
Stopped at Torrione, climbed the ruined place,
Proved that the gate was practicable, reached
The inn, no eye, despite the dark, could miss,
Knocked there and entered, made the host secure:
“With Caponsacchi it is ask and have;
“I know my betters. Are you bound for Rome?
“I get swift horse and trusty man,” said he.
Then I retraced my steps, was found once more
In my own house for the last time: there lay
The broad pale opened Summa. “Shut his book,
“There’s other showing! ’Twas a Thomas too
“Obtained,—more favoured than his namesake here,—
“A gift, tied faith fast, foiled the tug of doubt,—
“Our Lady’s girdle; down he saw it drop
“As she ascended into heaven, they say:
“He kept that safe and bade all doubt adieu.
“I too have seen a lady and hold a grace.”
I know not how the night passed: morning broke:
Presently came my servant. “Sir, this eve—
“Do you forget?” I started.—“How forget?
“What is it you know?”—“With due submission, Sir,
“This being last Monday in the month but one
“And a vigil, since to-morrow is Saint George,
“And feast day, and moreover day for copes,
“And Canon Conti now away a month,
“And Canon Crispi sour because, forsooth,
“You let him sulk in stall and bear the brunt
“Of the octave. . . . Well, Sir, ’tis important!”
“True!”
“Hearken, I have to start for Rome this night.
“No word, lest Crispi overboil and burst!
“Provide me with a laic dress! Throw dust
“I’ the Canon’s eye, stop his tongue’s scandal so!
“See there’s a sword in case of accident.”
I knew the knave, the knave knew me.
And thus
Through each familiar hindrance of the day
Did I make steadily for its hour and end,—
Felt time’s old barrier-growth of right and fit
Give way through all its twines and let me go;
Use and wont recognised the excepted man,
Let speed the special service,—and I sped
Till, at the dead between midnight and morn,
There was I at the goal, before the gate,
With a tune in the ears, low leading up to loud,
A light in the eyes, faint that would soon be flare,
Ever some spiritual witness new and new
In faster frequence, crowding solitude
To watch the way o’ the warfare,—till, at last,
When the ecstatic minute must bring birth,
Began a whiteness in the distance, waxed
Whiter and whiter, near grew and more near,
Till it was she: there did Pompilia come:
The white I saw shine through her was her soul’s,
Certainly, for the body was one black,
Black from head down to foot. She did not speak,
Glided into the carriage,—so a cloud
Gathers the moon up. “By San Spirito,
“To Rome, as if the road burned underneath!
“Reach Rome, then hold my head in pledge, I pay
“The run and the risk to heart’s content!” Just that,
I said,—then, in another tick of time,
Sprang, was beside her, she and I alone.
So it began, our flight thro’ dusk to clear,
Through day and night and day again to night
Once more, and to last dreadful dawn of all.
Sirs, how should I lie quiet in my grave
Unless you suffer me wring, drop by drop,
My brain dry, make a riddance of the drench
Of minutes with a memory in each,
Recorded motion, breath or look of hers,
Which poured forth would present you one pure glass,
Mirror you plain,—as God’s sea, glassed in gold,
His saints,—the perfect soul Pompilia? Men,
You must know that a man gets drunk with truth
Stagnant inside him! Oh, they’ve killed her, Sirs!
Can I be calm?
Calmly! Each incident
Proves, I maintain, that action of the flight
For the true thing it was. The first faint scratch
O’ the stone will test its nature, teach its worth
To idiots who name Parian, coprolite.
After all, I shall give no glare—at best
Only display you certain scattered lights
Lamping the rush and roll of the abyss—
Nothing but here and there a fire-point pricks
Wavelet from wavelet: well!
For the first hour
We both were silent in the night, I know:
Sometimes I did not see nor understand.
Blackness engulphed me,—partial stupor, say—
Then I would break way, breathe through the surprise,
And be aware again, and see who sat
In the dark vest with the white face and hands.
I said to myself—“I have caught it, I conceive
“The mind o’ the mystery: ’tis the way they wake
“And wait, two martyrs somewhere in a tomb
“Each by each as their blessing was to die;
“Some signal they are promised and expect,
“When to arise before the trumpet scares:
“So, through the whole course of the world they wait
“The last day, but so fearless and so safe!
“No otherwise, in safety and not fear,
“I lie, because she lies too by my side.”
You know this is not love, Sirs,—it is faith,
The feeling that there’s God, he reigns and rules
Out of this low world: that is all; no harm!
At times she drew a soft sigh—music seemed
Always to hover just above her lips
Not settle,—break a silence music too.
In the determined morning, I first found
Her head erect, her face turned full to me,
Her soul intent on mine through two wide eyes.
I answered them. “You are saved hitherto.
“We have passed Perugia,—gone round by the wood,
“Not through, I seem to think,—and opposite
“I know Assisi; this is holy ground.”
Then she resumed. “How long since we both left
“Arezzo?”—“Years—and certain hours beside.”
It was at . . . ah, but I forget the names!
’Tis a mere post-house and a hovel or two,—
I left the carriage and got bread and wine
And brought it her.—“Does it detain to eat?”
“—They stay perforce, change horses,—therefore eat!
We lose no minute: we arrive, be sure!”
She said—I know not where—there’s a great hill
Close over, and the stream has lost its bridge,
One fords it. She began—“I have heard say
“Of some sick body that my mother knew,
“’Twas no good sign when in a limb diseased
“All the pain suddenly departs,—as if
“The guardian angel discontinued pain
“Because the hope of cure was gone at last:
“The limb will not again exert itself,
“It needs be pained no longer: so with me,
“—My soul whence all the pain is past at once:
“All pain must be to work some good in the end.
“True, this I feel now, this may be that good,
“Pain was because of,—otherwise, I fear!”
She said,—a long while later in the day,
When I had let the silence be,—abrupt—
“Have you a mother?”—“She died, I was born.”
“A sister then?”—“No sister.”—“Who was it—
“What woman were you used to serve this way,
“Be kind to, till I called you and you came?”
I did not like that word. Soon afterward—
“Tell me, are men unhappy, in some kind
“Of mere unhappiness at being men,
“As women suffer, being womanish?
“Have you, now, some unhappiness, I mean,
“Born of what may be man’s strength overmuch,
“To match the undue susceptibility,
“The sense at every pore when hate is close?
“It hurts us if a baby hides its face
“Or child strikes at us punily, calls names
“Or makes a mouth,—much more if stranger men
“Laugh or frown,—just as that were much to bear!
“Yet rocks split,—and the blow-ball does no more,
“Quivers to feathery nothing at a touch;
“And strength may have its drawback, weakness scapes.”
Once she asked, “What is it that made you smile,
“At the great gate with the eagles and the snakes,
“Where the company entered, ’tis a long time since?”
“—Forgive—I think you would not understand:
“Ah, but you ask me,—therefore, it was this.
“That was a certain bishop’s villa-gate,
“I knew it by the eagles,—and at once
“Remembered this same bishop was just he
“People of old were wont to bid me please
“If I would catch preferment: so, I smiled
“Because an impulse came to me, a whim—
“What if I prayed the prelate leave to speak,
“Began upon him in his presence-hall
“—‘What, still at work so grey and obsolete?
“‘Still rocheted and mitred more or less?
“‘Don’t you feel all that out of fashion now?
“‘I find out when the day of things is done!’ ”
At eve we heard the angelus: she turned—
“I told you I can neither read nor write.
“My life stopped with the play-time; I will learn,
“If I begin to live again: but you—
“Who are a priest—wherefore do you not read
“The service at this hour? Read Gabriel’s song,
“The lesson, and then read the little prayer
“To Raphael, proper for us travellers!”
I did not like that, neither, but I read.
When we stopped at Foligno it was dark.
The people of the post came out with lights:
The driver said, “This time to-morrow, may
“Saints only help, relays continue good,
“Nor robbers hinder, we arrive at Rome.”
I urged,—“Why tax your strength a second night?
“Trust me, alight here and take brief repose!
“We are out of harm’s reach, past pursuit: go sleep
“If but an hour! I keep watch, guard the while
“Here in the doorway.” But her whole face changed,
The misery grew again about her mouth,
The eyes burned up from faintness, like the fawn’s
Tired to death in the thicket, when she feels
The probing spear o’ the huntsman. “Oh, no stay!”
She cried, in the fawn’s cry, “On to Rome, on, on—
“Unless ’tis you who fear,—which cannot be!”
We did go on all night; but at its close
She was troubled, restless, moaned low, talked at whiles
To herself, her brow on quiver with the dream:
Once, wide awake, she menaced, at arms’ length
Waved away something—“Never again with you!
“My soul is mine, my body is my soul’s:
“You and I are divided ever more
“In soul and body: get you gone!” Then I—
“Why, in my whole life I have never prayed!
“Oh, if the God, that only can, would help!
“Am I his priest with power to cast out fiends?
“Let God arise and all his enemies
“Be scattered!” By morn, there was peace, no sigh
Out of the deep sleep.
When she woke at last,
I answered the first look—“Scarce twelve hours more,
“Then, Rome! There probably was no pursuit,
“There cannot now be peril: bear up brave!
“Just some twelve hours to press through to the prize—
“Then, no more of the terrible journey!” “Then,
“No more o’ the journey: if it might but last!
“Always, my life-long, thus to journey still!
“It is the interruption that I dread,—
“With no dread, ever to be here and thus!
“Never to see a face nor hear a voice!
“Yours is no voice; you speak when you are dumb;
“Nor face, I see it in the dark. I want
“No face nor voice that change and grow unkind.”
That I liked, that was the best thing she said.
In the broad day, I dared entreat, “Descend!”
I told a woman, at the garden-gate
By the post-house, white and pleasant in the sun,
“It is my sister,—talk with her apart!
“She is married and unhappy, you perceive;
“I take her home because her head is hurt;
“Comfort her as you women understand!”
So, there I left them by the garden-wall,
Paced the road, then bade put the horses to,
Came back, and there she sat: close to her knee,
A black-eyed child still held the bowl of milk,
Wondered to see how little she could drink,
And in her arms the woman’s infant lay.
She smiled at me “How much good this has done!
“This is a whole night’s rest and how much more!
“I can proceed now, though I wish to stay.
“How do you call that tree with the thick top
“That holds in all its leafy green and gold
“The sun now like an immense egg of fire?”
(It was a million-leaved mimosa.) “Take
“The babe away from me and let me go!”
And in the carriage, “Still a day, my friend;
“And perhaps half a night, the woman fears.
“I pray it finish since it cannot last.
“There may be more misfortune at the close,
“And where will you be? God suffice me then!”
And presently—for there was a roadside-shrine—
“When I was taken first to my own church
“Lorenzo in Lucina, being a girl,
“And bid confess my faults, I interposed,
“‘But teach me what fault to confess and know!’
“So, the priest said—‘You should bethink yourself:
“‘Each human being needs must have done wrong!’
“Now, be you candid and no priest but friend—
“Were I surprised and killed here on the spot,
“A runaway from husband and his home,
“Do you account it were in sin I died?
“My husband used to seem to harm me, not . . .
“Not on pretence he punished sin of mine,
“Nor for sin’s sake and lust of cruelty,
“But as I heard him bid a farming-man
“At the villa take a lamb once to the wood
“And there ill-treat it, meaning that the wolf
“Should hear its cries, and so come, quick be caught,
“Enticed to the trap: he practised thus with me
“That so, whatever were his gain thereby,
“Others that I might become prey and spoil.
“Had it been only between our two selves,—
“His pleasure and my pain,—why, pleasure him
“By dying, nor such need to make a coil!
“But this was worth an effort, that my pain
“Should not become a snare, prove pain threefold
“To other people—strangers—or unborn—
“How should I know? I sought release from that—
“I think, or else from,—dare I say, some cause
“Such as is put into a tree, which turns
“Away from the northwind with what nest it holds,—
“The woman said that trees so turn: now, friend,
“Tell me, because I cannot trust myself!
“You are a man: what have I done amiss?”
You must conceive my answer,—I forget—
Taken up wholly with the thought, perhaps,
This time she might have said,—might, did not say—
“You are a priest.” She said, “my friend.”
Day wore,
We passed the places, somehow the calm went,
Again the restless eyes began to rove
In new fear of the foe mine could not see:
She wandered in her mind,—addressed me once
“Gaetano!”—that is not my name: whose name?
I grew alarmed, my head seemed turning too:
I quickened pace with promise now, now threat:
Bade drive and drive, nor any stopping more.
“Too deep i’ the thick of the struggle, struggle through!
“Then drench her in repose though death’s self pour
“The plenitude of quiet,—help us, God,
“Whom the winds carry!”
Suddenly I saw
The old tower, and the little white-walled clump
Of buildings and the cypress-tree or two,—
“Already Castelnuovo—Rome!” I cried,
“As good as Rome,—Rome is the next stage, think!
“This is where travellers’ hearts are wont to beat.
“Say you are saved, sweet lady!” Up she woke.
The sky was fierce with colour from the sun
Setting. She screamed out “No, I must not die!
“Take me no farther, I should die: stay here!
“I have more life to save than mine!”
She swooned.
We seemed safe: what was it foreboded so?
Out of the coach into the inn I bore
The motionless and breathless pure and pale
Pompilia,—bore her through a pitying group
And laid her on a couch, still calm and cured
By deep sleep of all woes at once. The host
Was urgent “Let her stay an hour or two!
“Leave her to us, all will be right by morn!”
Oh, my foreboding! But I could not choose.
I paced the passage, kept watch all night long.
I listened,—not one movement, not one sigh.
“Fear not: she sleeps so sound!” they said—but I
Feared, all the same, kept fearing more and more,
Found myself throb with fear from head to foot,
Filled with a sense of such impending woe,
That, at first pause of night, pretence of grey,
I made my mind up it was morn.—“Reach Rome,
“Lest hell reach her! A dozen miles to make,
“Another long breath, and we emerge!” I stood
I’ the court-yard, roused the sleepy grooms. “Have out
“Carriage and horse, give haste, take gold!”—said I.
While they made ready in the doubtful morn,—
’Twas the last minute,—needs must I ascend
And break her sleep; I turned to go.
And there
Faced me Count Guido, there posed the mean man
As master,—took the field, encamped his rights,
Challenged the world: there leered new triumph, there
Scowled the old malice in the visage bad
And black o’ the scamp. Soon triumph suppled the tongue
A little, malice glued to his dry throat,
And he part howled, part hissed . . . oh, how he kept
Well out o’ the way, at arm’s length and to spare!—
“My salutation to your priestship! What?
“Matutinal, busy with book so soon
“Of an April day that’s damp as tears that now
“Deluge Arezzo at its darling’s flight?—
“’Tis unfair, wrongs feminity at large,
“To let a single dame monopolize
“A heart the whole sex claims, should share alike:
“Therefore I overtake you, Canon! Come!
“The lady,—could you leave her side so soon?
“You have not yet experienced at her hands
“My treatment, you lay down undrugged, I see!
“Hence this alertness—hence no death-in-life
“Like what held arms fast when she stole from mine.
“To be sure, you took the solace and repose
“That first night at Foligno!—news abound
“O’ the road by this time,—men regaled me much,
“As past them I came halting after you,
“Vulcan pursuing Mars, as poets sing,—
“Still at the last here pant I, but arrive,
“Vulcan—and not without my Cyclops too,
“The Commissary and the unpoisoned arm
“O’ the Civil Force, should Mars turn mutineer.
“Enough of fooling: capture the culprits, friend!
“Here is the lover in the smart disguise
“With the sword,—he is a priest, so mine lies still:
“There upstairs hides my wife the runaway,
“His leman: the two plotted, poisoned first,
“Plundered me after, and eloped thus far
“Where now you find them. Do your duty quick!
“Arrest and hold him! That’s done: now catch her!”
During this speech of that man,—well, I stood
Away, as he managed,—still, I stood as near
The throat of him,—with these two hands, my own,—
As now I stand near yours, Sir,—one quick spring,
One great good satisfying gripe, and lo!
There had he lain abolished with his lie,
Creation purged o’ the miscreate, man redeemed,
A spittle wiped off from the face of God!
I, in some measure, seek a poor excuse
For what I left undone, in just this fact
That my first feeling at the speech I quote
Was—not of what a blasphemy was dared,
Not what a bag of venomed purulence
Was split and noisome,—but how splendidly
Mirthful, what ludicrous a lie was launched!
Would Molière’s self wish more than hear such man
Call, claim such woman for his own, his wife,
Even though, in due amazement at the boast,
He had stammered, she moreover was divine?
She to be his,—were hardly less absurd
Than that he took her name into his mouth,
Licked, and then let it go again, the beast,
Signed with his slaver. Oh, she poisoned him,
Plundered him, and the rest! Well, what I wished
Was, that he would but go on, say once more
So to the world, and get his meed of men,
The fist’s reply to the filth. And while I mused,
The minute, oh the misery, was gone!
On either idle hand of me there stood
Really an officer, nor laughed i’ the least.
They rendered justice to his reason, laid
Logic to heart, as ’twere submitted them
“Twice two makes four.”
“And now, catch her!”—he cried.
That sobered me. “Let myself lead the way—
“Ere you arrest me, who am somebody,
“And, as you hear, a priest and privileged,—
“To the lady’s chamber! I presume you—men
“Expert, instructed how to find out truth,
“Familiar with the guise of guilt. Detect
“Guilt on her face when it meets mine, then judge
“Between us and the mad dog howling there!”
Up we all went together, in they broke
O’ the chamber late my chapel. There she lay,
Composed as when I laid her, that last eve,
O’ the couch, still breathless, motionless, sleep’s self,
Wax-white, seraphic, saturate with the sun
O’ the morning that now flooded from the front
And filled the window with a light like blood.
“Behold the poisoner, the adulteress,
“—And feigning sleep too! Seize, bind!”—Guido hissed.
She started up, stood erect, face to face
With the husband: back he fell, was buttressed there
By the window all a-flame with morning-red,
He the black figure, the opprobrious blur
Against all peace and joy and light and life.
“Away from between me and hell!”—she cried:
“Hell for me, no embracing any more!
“I am God’s, I love God, God—whose knees I clasp,
“Whose utterly most just award I take,
“But bear no more love-making devils: hence!”
I may have made an effort to reach her side
From where I stood i’ the door-way,—anyhow
I found the arms, I wanted, pinioned fast,
Was powerless in the clutch to left and right
O’ the rabble pouring in, rascality
Enlisted, rampant on the side of hearth,
Home, and the husband,—pay in prospect too!
They heaped themselves upon me.—“Ha!—and him
“Also you outrage? Him, too, my sole friend,
“Guardian, and saviour? That I baulk you of,
“Since—see how God can help at last and worst!”
She sprung at the sword that hung beside him, seized,
Drew, brandished it, the sunrise burned for joy
O’ the blade, “Die,” cried she, “devil, in God’s name!”
Ah, but they all closed round her, twelve to one,
—The unmanly men, no woman-mother made,
Spawned somehow! Dead-white and disarmed she lay.
No matter for the sword, her word sufficed
To spike the coward through and through: he shook,
Could only spit between the teeth—“You see?
“You hear? Bear witness, then! Write down . . . but, no—
“Carry these criminals to the prison-house,
“For first thing! I begin my search meanwhile
“After the stolen effects, gold, jewels, plate,
“Money, and clothes, they robbed me of and fled:
“With no few amorous pieces, verse and prose,
“I have much reason to expect to find.”
When I saw, that,—no more than the first mad speech,
Made out the speaker mad and a laughing-stock,
So neither did this next device explode
One listener’s indignation,—that a scribe
Did sit down, set himself to write indeed,
And sundry knaves began to peer and pry
In corner and hole,—that Guido, wiping brow
And getting him a countenance, was fast
Losing his fear, beginning to strut free
O’ the stage of his exploit, snuff here, sniff there,—
I took the truth in, guessed sufficiently
The service for the moment—“What I say,
“Slight at your peril! We are aliens here,
“My adversary and I, called noble both;
“I am the nobler, and a name men know.
“I could refer our cause to our own court
“In our own country, but prefer appeal
“To the nearer jurisdiction. Being a priest,
“Though in a secular garb,—for reasons good
“I shall adduce in due time to my peers,—
“I demand that the Church I serve, decide
“Between us, right the slandered lady there.
“A Tuscan noble, I might claim the Duke:
“A priest, I rather choose the Church,—bid Rome
“Cover the wronged with her inviolate shield.”
There was no refusing this: they bore me off,
They bore her off, to separate cells o’ the same
Ignoble prison, and, separate, thence to Rome.
Pompilia’s face, then and thus, looked on me
The last time in this life: not one sight since,
Never another sight to be! And yet
I thought I had saved her. I appealed to Rome:
It seems I simply sent her to her death.
You tell me she is dying now, or dead;
I cannot bring myself to quite believe
This is a place you torture people in:
What if this your intelligence were just
A subtlety, an honest wile to work
On a man at unawares? ’Twere worthy you.
No, Sirs, I cannot have the lady dead!
That erect form, flashing brow, fulgurant eye,
That voice immortal (oh, that voice of hers!)
That vision in the blood-red day-break—that
Leap to life of the pale electric sword
Angels go armed with,—that was not the last
O’ the lady! Come, I see through it, you find—
Know the manœuvre! Also herself said
I had saved her: do you dare say she spoke false?
Let me see for myself if it be so!
Though she were dying, a priest might be of use,
The more when he’s a friend too,—she called me
Far beyond “friend.” Come, let me see her—indeed
It is my duty, being a priest: I hope
I stand confessed, established, proved a priest?
My punishment had motive that, a priest
I, in a laic garb, a mundane mode,
Did what were harmlessly done otherwise.
I never touched her with my finger-tip
Except to carry her to the couch, that eve,
Against my heart, beneath my head, bowed low,
As we priests carry the paten: that is why
—To get leave and go see her of your grace—
I have told you this whole story over again.
Do I deserve grace? For I might lock lips,
Laugh at your jurisdiction: what have you
To do with me in the matter? I suppose
You hardly think I donned a bravo’s dress
To have a hand in the new crime; on the old,
Judgment’s delivered, penalty imposed,
I was chained fast at Civita hand and foot—
She had only you to trust to, you and Rome,
Rome and the Church, and no pert meddling priest
Two days ago, when Guido, with the right,
Hacked her to pieces. One might well be wroth;
I have been patient, done my best to help:
I come from Civita and punishment
As a friend of the court—and for pure friendship’s sake
Have told my tale to the end,—nay, not the end—
For, wait—I’ll end—not leave you that excuse!
When we were parted,—shall I go on there?
I was presently brought to Rome—yes, here I stood
Opposite yonder very crucifix—
And there sat you and you, Sirs, quite the same,
I heard charge, and bore question, and told tale
Noted down in the book there,—turn and see
If, by one jot or tittle, I vary now!
I’ the colour the tale takes, there’s change perhaps;
’Tis natural, since the sky is different,
Eclipse in the air now; still, the outline stays.
I showed you how it came to be my part
To save the lady. Then your clerk produced
Papers, a pack of stupid and impure
Banalities called letters about love—
Love, indeed,—I could teach who styled them so.
Better, I think, though priest and loveless both!
“—How was it that a wife, young, innocent,
“And stranger to your person, wrote this page?”—
“—She wrote it when the Holy Father wrote
“The bestiality that posts thro’ Rome,
“Put in his mouth by Pasquin.”—“Nor perhaps
“Did you return these answers, verse, and prose,
“Signed, sealed and sent the lady? There’s your hand!”
“—This precious piece of verse, I really judge
“Is meant to copy my own character,
“A clumsy mimic; and this other prose,
“Not so much even; both rank forgery:
“Verse, quotha? Bembo’s verse! When Saint John wrote
“The tract ‘De Tribus,’ I wrote this to match.”
“—How came it, then, the documents were found
“At the inn on your departure?”—“I opine,
“Because there were no documents to find
“In my presence,—you must hide before you find.
“Who forged them, hardly practised in my view;
“Who found them, waited till I turned my back.”
“—And what of the clandestine visits paid,
“Nocturnal passage in and out the house
“With its lord absent? ’Tis alleged you climbed . . . ”
“—Flew on a broomstick to the man i’ the moon!
“Who witnessed or will testify this trash?”
“—The trusty servant, Margherita’s self,
“Even she who brought you letters, you confess,
“And, you confess, took letters in reply:
“Forget not we have knowledge of the facts!”
“—Sirs, who have knowledge of the facts, defray
“The expenditure of wit, I waste in vain,
“Trying to find out just one fact of all!
“She who brought letters from who could not write,
“And took back letters to who could not read,—
“Who was that messenger, of your charity?”
“—Well, so far favours you the circumstance
“That this same messenger . . . how shall we say? . . .
“Sub imputatione meretricis
“Laborat,—which makes accusation null:
“We waive this woman’s:—nought makes void the next.
“Borsi, called Venerino, he who drove,
“O’ the first night when you fled away, at length
“Deposes to your kissings in the coach,
“—Frequent, frenetic . . . ” “When deposed he so?”
“After some weeks of sharp imprisonment . . . ”
“—Granted by friend the Governor, I engage—”
“—For his participation in your flight!
“At length his obduracy melting made
“The avowal mentioned . . . ” “Was dismissed forthwith
“To liberty, poor knave, for recompense.
“Sirs, give what credit to the lie you can!
“For me, no word in my defence I speak,
“And God shall argue for the lady!”
So
Did I stand question, and make answer, still
With the same result of smiling disbelief,
Polite impossibility of faith
In such affected virtue in a priest;
But a showing fair play, an indulgence, even,
To one no worse than others after all—
Who had not brought disgrace to the order, played
Discreetly, ruffled gown nor ripped the cloth
In a bungling game at romps: I have told you, Sirs—
If I pretended simply to be pure,
Honest, and Christian in the case,—absurd!
As well go boast myself above the needs
O’ the human nature, careless how meat smells,
Wine tastes,—a saint above the smack! But once
Abate my crest, own flaws i’ the flesh, agree
To go with the herd, be hog no more nor less,
Why, hogs in common herd have common rights—
I must not be unduly borne upon,
Who had just romanced a little, sown wild oats,
But ’scaped without a scandal, flagrant fault.
My name helped to a mirthful circumstance:
“Joseph” would do well to amend his plea:
Undoubtedly—some toying with the wife,
But as for ruffian violence and rape,
Potiphar pressed too much on the other side!
The intrigue, the elopement, the disguise,—well charged!
The letters and verse looked hardly like the truth.
Your apprehension was—of guilt enough
To be compatible with innocence,
So, punished best a little and not too much.
Had I struck Guido Franceschini’s face,
You had counselled me withdraw for my own sake,
Baulk him of bravo-hiring. Friends came round,
Congratulated, “Nobody mistakes!
“The pettiness o’ the forfeiture defines
“The peccadillo: Guido gets his share:
“His wife is free of husband and hook-nose,
“The mouldy viands and the mother-in-law.
“To Civita with you and amuse the time,
“Travesty us ‘De Raptu Helenœ!”
“A funny figure must the husband cut
“When the wife makes him skip,—too ticklish, eh?
“Do it in Latin, not the Vulgar, then!
“Scazons—we’ll copy and send his Eminence!
“Mind—one iambus in the final foot!
“He’ll rectify it, be your friend for life!”
Oh, Sirs, depend on me for much new light
Thrown on the justice and religion here
By this proceeding, much fresh food for thought!
And I was just set down to study these
In relegation, two short days ago,
Admiring how you read the rules, when, clap,
A thunder comes into my solitude—
I am caught up in a whirlwind and cast here,
Told of a sudden, in this room where so late
You dealt out law adroitly, that those scales,
I meekly bowed to, took my allotment from,
Guido has snatched at, broken in your hands,
Metes to himself the murder of his wife,
Full measure, pressed down, running over now!
Can I assist to an explanation?—Yes,
I rise in your esteem, sagacious Sirs,
Stand up a renderer of reasons, not
The officious priest would personate Saint George
For a mock Princess in undragoned days,
What, the blood startles you? What, after all
The priest who needs must carry sword on thigh
May find imperative use for it? Then, there was
A princess, was a dragon belching flame,
And should have been a Saint George also? Then,
There might be worse schemes than to break the bonds
At Arezzo, lead her by the little hand,
Till she reached Rome, and let her try to live?
But you were the law and the gospel,—would one please
Stand back, allow your faculty elbow-room?
You blind guides who must needs lead eyes that see!
Fools, alike ignorant of man and God!
What was there here should have perplexed your wit
For a wink of the owl-eyes of you? How miss, then,
What’s now forced on you by this flare of fact—
As if Saint Peter failed to recognise
Nero as no apostle, John or James,
Till someone burned a martyr, make a torch
O’ the blood and fat to show his features by!
Could you fail read this cartulary aright
On head and front of Franceschini there,
Large-lettered like hell’s masterpiece of print,—
That he, from the beginning pricked at heart
By some lust, letch of hate against his wife,
Plotted to plague her into overt sin
And shame, would slay Pompilia body and soul,
And save his mean self—miserably caught
I’ the quagmire of his own tricks, cheats, and lies?
—That himself wrote those papers,—from himself
To himself,—which, i’ the name of me and her,
His mistress-messenger gave her and me,
Touching us with such pustules of the soul
That she and I might take the taint, be shown
To the world and shuddered over, speckled so?
—That the agent put her sense into my words,
Made substitution of the thing she hoped,
For the thing she had and held, its opposite,
While the husband in the background bit his lips
At each fresh failure of his precious plot?
—That when at the last we did rush each on each,
By no chance but because God willed it so—
The spark of truth was struck from out our souls—
Made all of me, descried in the first glance,
Seem fair and honest and permissible love
O’ the good and true—as the first glance told me
There was no duty patent in the world
Like daring try be good and true myself,
Leaving the shows of things to the Lord of Show
And prince o’ the Power of the Air. Our very flight,
Even to its most ambiguous circumstance,
Irrefragably proved how futile, false . . .
Why, men—men and not boys—boys and not babes—
Babes and not beasts—beasts and not stocks and stones!—
Had the liar’s lie been true one pin-point speck,
Were I the accepted suitor, free o’ the place,
Disposer of the time, to come at a call
And go at a wink as who should say me nay,—
What need of flight, what were the gain therefrom
But just damnation, failure or success?
Damnation pure and simple to her the wife
And me the priest—who bartered private bliss
For public reprobation, the safe shade
For the sunshine which men see to pelt me by:
What other advantage,—we who led the days
And nights alone i’ the house,—was flight to find?
In our whole journey did we stop an hour,
Diverge a foot from strait road till we reached
Or would have reached—but for that fate of ours—
The father and mother, in the eye of Rome,
The eye of yourselves we made aware of us
At the first fall of misfortune? And indeed
You did so far give sanction to our flight,
Confirm its purpose, as lend helping hand,
Deliver up Pompilia not to him
She fled, but those the flight was ventured for.
Why then could you, who stopped short, not go on
One poor step more, and justify the means,
Having allowed the end?—not see and say,
“Here’s the exceptional conduct that should claim
“To be exceptionally judged on rules
“Which, understood, make no exception here”—
Why play instead into the devil’s hands
By dealing so ambiguously as gave
Guido the power to intervene like me,
Prove one exception more? I saved his wife
Against law: against law he slays her now:
Deal with him!
I have done with being judged.
I stand here guiltless in thought, word and deed,
To the point that I apprise you,—in contempt
For all misapprehending ignorance
O’ the human heart, much more the mind of Christ,—
That I assuredly did bow, was blessed
By the revelation of Pompilia. There!
Such is the final fact I fling you, Sirs,
To mouth and mumble and misinterpret: there!
“The priest’s in love,” have it the vulgar way!
Unpriest me, rend the rags o’ the vestment, do—
Degrade deep, disenfranchise all you dare—
Remove me from the midst, no longer priest
And fit companion for the like of you—
Your gay Abati with the well-turned leg
And rose i’ the hat-rim, Canons, cross at neck
And silk mask in the pocket of the gown,
Brisk bishops with the world’s musk still unbrushed
From the rochet; I’ll no more of these good things:
There’s a crack somewhere, something that’s unsound
I’ the rattle!
For Pompilia—be advised,
Build churches, go pray! You will find me there,
I know, if you come,—and you will come, I know.
Why, there’s a Judge weeping! Did not I say
You were good and true at bottom? You see the truth—
I am glad I helped you: she helped me just so.
But for Count Guido,—you must counsel there!
I bow my head, bend to the very dust,
Break myself up in shame of faultiness.
I had him one whole moment, as I said—
As I remember, as will never out
O’ the thoughts of me,—I had him in arm’s reach
There,—as you stand, Sir, now you cease to sit,—
I could have killed him ere he killed his wife,
And did not: he went off alive and well
And then effected this last feat—through me!
Me—not through you—dismiss that fear! ’Twas you
Hindered me staying here to save her,—not
From leaving you and going back to him
And doing service in Arezzo. Come,
Instruct me in procedure! I conceive—
In all due self-abasement might I speak—
How you will deal with Guido: oh, not death!
Death, if it let her life be: otherwise
Not death,—your lights will teach you clearer! I
Certainly have an instinct of my own
I’ the matter: bear with me and weigh its worth!
Let us go away—leave Guido all alone
Back on the world again that knows him now!
I think he will be found (indulge so far!)
Not to die so much as slide out of life,
Pushed by the general horror and common hate
Low, lower,—left o’ the very ledge of things,
I seem to see him catch convulsively
One by one at all honest forms of life,
At reason, order, decency, and use—
To cramp him and get foothold by at least;
And still they disengage them from his clutch.
“What, you are he, then, had Pompilia once
“And so forwent her? Take not up with us!”
And thus I see him slowly and surely edged
Off all the table-land whence life upsprings
Aspiring to be immortality,
As the snake, hatched on hill-top by mischance,
Despite his wriggling, slips, slides, slidders down
Hill-side, lies low and prostrate on the smooth
Level of the outer place, lapsed in the vale:
So I lose Guido in the loneliness,
Silence and dusk, till at the doleful end,
At the horizontal line, creation’s verge,
From what just is to absolute nothingness—
Lo, what is this he meets, strains onward still?
What other man deep further in the fate,
Who, turning at the prize of a footfall
To flatter him and promise fellowship,
Discovers in the act a frightful face—
Judas, made monstrous by much solitude!
The two are at one now! Let them love their love
That bites and claws like hate, or hate their hate
That mops and mows and makes as it were love!
There, let them each tear each in devil’s-fun,
Or fondle this the other while malice aches—
Both teach, both learn detestability!
Kiss him the kiss, Iscariot! Pay that back,
That snatch o’ the slaver blistering on your lip—
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