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Elizabeth Barrett Browning - Aurora Leigh: Book Eighth
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                       "I, an artist—yes:
Because, precisely, I`m an artist, sir,
And woman, if another sat in sight,
I`d whisper,—Soft, my sister! not a word!
By speaking we prove only we can speak,
Which he, the man here, never doubted. What
He doubts is, whether we can do the thing
With decent grace we`ve not yet done at all.
Now, do it; bring your statue,—you have room!
He`ll see it even by the starlight here;
And if `tis e`er so little like the god
Who looks out from the marble silently
Along the track of his own shining dart
Through the dusk of ages, there`s no need to speak;
The universe shall henceforth speak for you,
And witness, `She who did this thing was born
To do it—claims her license in her work.`
And so with more works. Whoso cures the plague,
Though twice a woman, shall be called a leech:
Who rights a land`s finances is excused
For touching coppers, though her hands be white.
But we, we talk!"


                   "It is the age`s mood,"
He said; "we boast, and do not. We put up
Hostelry signs where`er we lodge a day,—
Some red colossal cow with mighty paps
A Cyclops` fingers could not strain to milk,—
Then bring out presently our saucerful
Of curds. We want more quiet in our works,
More knowledge of the bounds in which we work;
More knowledge that each individual man
Remains an Adam to the general race,
Constrained to see, like Adam, that he keep
His personal state`s condition honestly,
Or vain all thoughts of his to help the world,
Which still must be developed from its one 
If bettered in its many. We indeed,
Who think to lay it out new like a park,
We take a work on us which is not man`s,
For God alone sits far enough above
To speculate so largely. None of us
(Not Romney Leigh) is mad enough to say,
We`ll have a grove of oaks upon that slope
And sink the need of acorns. Government,
If veritable and lawful, is not given
By imposition of the foreign hand,
Nor chosen from a pretty pattern-book
Of some domestic idealogue who sits
And coldly chooses empire, where as well
He might republic. Genuine government
Is but the expression of a nation, good
Or less good—even as all society,
Howe`er unequal, monstrous, crazed and cursed,
Is but the expression of men`s single lives,
The loud sum of the silent units. What,
We`d change the aggregate and yet retain
Each separate figure? whom do we cheat by that?
Now, not even Romney."


                        "Cousin, you are sad.
Did all your social labour at Leigh Hall,
And elsewhere, come to nought, then?"


                                         "It was nought,"
He answered mildly. "There is room, indeed,
For statues still in this large world of God`s,
But not for vacuums; so I am not sad—
Not sadder than is good for what I am.
My vain phalanstery dissolved itself;
My men and women of disordered lives
I brought in orderly to dine and sleep,
Broke up those waxen masks I made them wear,
With fierce contortions of the natural face,
And cursed me for my tyrannous constraint
In forcing crooked creatures to live straight;
And set the country hounds upon my back
To bite and tear me for my wicked deed
Of trying to do good without the church
Or even the squires, Aurora. Do you mind
Your ancient neighbours? The great book-club teems
With `sketches,` `summaries,` and `last tracts` but twelve,
On socialistic troublers of close bonds
Betwixt the generous rich and grateful poor.
The vicar preached from `Revelations` (till
The doctor woke), and found me with `the frogs`
On three successive Sundays; ay, and stopped
To weep a little (for he`s getting old)
That such perdition should o`ertake a man
Of such fair acres—in the parish, too!
He printed his discourses `by request,`
And if your book shall sell as his did, then
Your verses are less good than I suppose.
The women of the neighbourhood subscribed,
And sent me a copy, bound in scarlet silk,
Tooled edges, blazoned with the arms of Leigh:
I own that touched me."


                         "What, the pretty ones?
Poor Romney!"


              "Otherwise the effect was small:
I had my windows broken once or twice
By liberal peasants naturally incensed
At such a vexer of Arcadian peace,
Who would not let men call their wives their own
To kick like Britons, and made obstacles
When things went smoothly as a baby drugged,
Toward freedom and starvation—bringing down
The wicked London tavern-thieves and drabs
To affront the blessed hillside drabs and thieves
With mended morals, quotha—fine new lives!—
My windows paid for`t. I was shot at, once,
By an active poacher who had hit a hare
From the other barrel (tired of springeing game
So long upon my acres, undisturbed,
And restless for the country`s virtue—yet
He missed me); ay, and pelted very oft
In riding through the village. `There he goes
`Who`d drive away our Christian gentlefolk,
`To catch us undefended in the trap
`He baits with poisonous cheese, and lock us up
`In that pernicious prison of Leigh Hall
`With all his murderers! Give another name
`And say Leigh Hell, and burn it up with fire.`
And so they did, at last, Aurora."


                                     "Did?"


"You never heard it, cousin? Vincent`s news
Came stinted, then."


                      "They did? they burnt Leigh Hall?"


"You`re sorry, dear Aurora? Yes, indeed,
They did it perfectly: a thorough work,
And not a failure, this time. Let us grant
`Tis somewhat easier, though, to burn a house
Than build a system; yet that`s easy too
In a dream. Books, pictures—ay, the pictures! What,
You think your dear Vandykes would give them pause?
Our proud ancestral Leighs, with those peaked beards,
Or bosoms white as foam thrown up on rocks
From the old-spent wave. Such calm defiant looks
They flared up with! now nevermore to twit
The bones in the family vault with ugly death.
Not one was rescued, save the Lady Maud,
Who threw you down, that morning you were born,
The undeniable lineal mouth and chin
To wear for ever for her gracious sake,
For which good deed I saved her; the rest went:
And you, you`re sorry, cousin. Well, for me,
With all my phalansterians safely out
(Poor hearts, they helped the burners, it was said,
And certainly a few clapped hands and yelled),
The ruin did not hurt me as it might—
As when for instance I was hurt one day
A certain letter being destroyed. In fact,
To see the great house flare so . . . oaken floors
Our fathers made so fine with rushes once
Before our mothers furbished them with trains,
Carved wainscots, panelled walls, the favourite slide
For draining off a martyr (or a rogue),
The echoing galleries, half a half-mile long,
And all the various stairs that took you up
And took you down, and took you round about
Upon their slippery darkness, recollect,
All helping to keep up one blazing jest!
The flames through all the casements pushing forth,
Like red-hot devils crinkled into snakes,
All signifying `Look you, Romney Leigh,
`We save the people from your saving, here,
`Yet so as by fire! we make a pretty show
`Besides—and that`s the best you`ve ever done.`
—To see this, almost moved myself to clap!
The `vale et plaude` came too with effect
When in the roof fell, and the fire that paused,
Stunned momently beneath the stroke of slates
And tumbling rafters, rose at once and roared,
And wrapping the whole house (which disappeared
In a mounting whirlwind of dilated flame),
Blew upward, straight, its drift of fiery chaff
In the face of Heaven, which blenched, and ran up higher."


"Poor Romney!"


               "Sometimes when I dream," he said,
"I hear the silence after, `twas so still.
For all those wild beasts, yelling, cursing round,
Were suddenly silent, while you counted five,
So silent, that you heard a young bird fall
From the top nest in the neighbouring rookery,
Through edging over-rashly toward the light.
The old rooks had already fled too far
To hear the screech they fled with, though you saw
Some flying still, like scatterings of dead leaves
In autumn-gusts, seen dark against the sky,—
All flying,—ousted, like the House of Leigh."


"Dear Romney!"


               "Evidently `twould have been
A fine sight for a poet, sweet, like you,
To make the verse blaze after. I myself,
Even I, felt something in the grand old trees,
Which stood that moment like brute Druid gods
Amazed upon the rim of ruin, where,
As into a blackened socket, the great fire
Had dropped, still throwing up splinters now and then
To show them grey with all their centuries,
Left there to witness that on such a day
The House went out."


                      "Ah!"


                            "While you counted five,
I seemed to feel a little like a Leigh,—
But then it passed, Aurora. A child cried,
And I had enough to think of what to do
With all those houseless wretches in the dark,
And ponder where they`d dance the next time, they
Who had burnt the viol."


                          "Did you think of that?
Who burns his viol will not dance, I know,
To cymbals, Romney."


                      "O my sweet, sad voice!"
He cried,—"O voice that speaks and overcomes!
The sun is silent, but Aurora speaks."


"Alas," I said, "I speak I know not what:
I`m back in childhood, thinking as a child,
A foolish fancy—will it make you smile?
I shall not from the window of my room
Catch sight of those old chimneys any more."


"No more," he answered. "If you pushed one day
Through all the green hills to our fathers` house,
You`d come upon a great charred circle, where
The patient earth was singed an acre round;
With one stone stair, symbolic of my life,
Ascending, winding, leading up to nought!
`Tis worth a poet`s seeing. Will you go?"


I made no answer. Had I any right
To weep with this man, that I dared to speak?
A woman stood between his soul and mine,
And waved us off from touching evermore,
With those unclean white hands of hers. Enough.
We had burnt our viols, and were silent.


                                            So,
The silence lengthened till it pressed. I spoke,
To breathe: "I think you were ill afterward."


"More ill," he answered, "had been scarcely ill.
I hoped this feeble fumbling at life`s knot
Might end concisely,—but I failed to die,
As formerly I failed to live,—and thus
Grew willing, having tried all other ways,
To try just God`s. Humility`s so good,
When pride`s impossible. Mark us, how we make
Our virtues, cousin, from our worn-out sins,
Which smack of them from henceforth. Is it right,
For instance, to wed here while you love there?
And yet because a man sins once, the sin
Cleaves to him, in necessity to sin,
That if he sin not so to damn himself,
He sins so, to damn others with himself:
And thus, to wed here, loving there, becomes
A duty. Virtue buds a dubious leaf
Round mortal brows; your ivy`s better, dear.
—Yet she, `tis certain, is my very wife,
The very lamb left mangled by the wolves
Through my own bad shepherding: and could I choose
But take her on my shoulder past this stretch
Of rough, uneasy wilderness, poor lamb,
Poor child, poor child?—Aurora, my beloved,
I will not vex you any more to-night,
But, having spoken what I came to say,
The rest shall please you. What she can, in me—
Protection, tender liking, freedom, ease—
She shall have surely, liberally, for her
And hers, Aurora. Small amends they`ll make
For hideous evils which she had not known
Except by me, and for this imminent loss,
This forfeit presence of a gracious friend,
Which also she must forfeit for my sake,
Since, . . . drop your hand in mine a moment, sweet,
We`re parting!—Ah, my snowdrop, what a touch,
As if the wind had swept it off! You grudge
Your gelid sweetness on my palm but so,
A moment? Angry, that I could not bear
You . . . speaking, breathing, living, side by side
With some one called my wife . . . and live, myself?
Nay, be not cruel—you must understand!
Your lightest footfall on a floor of mine
Would shake the house, my lintel being uncrossed
`Gainst angels: henceforth it is night with me,
And so, henceforth, I put the shutters up:
Auroras must not come to spoil my dark."


He smiled so feebly, with an empty hand
Stretched sideway from me—as indeed he looked
To any one but me to give him help;
And, while the moon came suddenly out full,
The double-rose of our Italian moons,
Sufficient plainly for the heaven and earth
(The stars struck dumb and washed away in dews
Of golden glory, and the mountains steeped
In divine languor), he, the man, appeared
So pale and patient, like the marble man
A sculptor puts his personal sadness in
To join his grandeur of ideal thought,
As if his mallet struck me from my height
Of passionate indignation, I who had risen
Pale, doubting paused . . . Was Romney mad indeed?
Had all this wrong of heart made sick the brain?
Then quiet, with a sort of tremulous pride,
"Go, cousin," I said coldly; "a farewell
Was sooner spoken `twixt a pair of friends
In those old days, than seems to suit you now.
Howbeit, since then, I`ve writ a book or two,
I`m somewhat dull still in the manly art
Of phrase and metaphrase. Why, any man
Can carve a score of white Loves out of snow,
As Buonarroti in my Florence there,
And set them on the wall in some safe shade,
As safe, sir, as your marriage! very good;
Though if a woman took one from the ledge
To put it on the table by her flowers
And let it mind her of a certain friend,
`Twould drop at once (so better), would not bear
Her nail-mark even, where she took it up
A little tenderly,—so best, I say:
For me, I would not touch the fragile thing
And risk to spoil it half an hour before
The sun shall shine to melt it: leave it there.
I`m plain at speech, direct in purpose: when
I speak, you`ll take the meaning as it is,
And not allow for puckerings in the silk
By clever stitches. I`m a woman, sir—
I use the woman`s figures naturally,
As you the male license. So, I wish you well.
I`m simply sorry for the griefs you`ve had,
And not for your sake only, but mankind`s.
This race is never grateful: from the first,
One fills their cup at supper with pure wine,
Which back they give at cross-time on a sponge,
In vinegar and gall."


                       "If gratefuller,"
He murmured, "by so much less pitiable!
God`s self would never have come down to die,
Could man have thanked Him for it."


                                       "Happily
`Tis patent that, whatever," I resumed,
"You suffered from this thanklessness of men,
You sink no more than Moses` bulrush-boat
When once relieved of Moses,—for you`re light,
You`re light, my cousin! which is well for you,
And manly. For myself, now mark me, sir,
They burnt Leigh Hall; but if, consummated
To devils, heightened beyond Lucifers,
They had burnt, instead, a star or two of those
We saw above there just a moment back,
Before the moon abolished them,—destroyed
And riddled them in ashes through a sieve
On the head of the foundering universe—what then?
If you and I remained still you and I,
It could not shift our places as mere friends,
Nor render decent you should toss a phrase
Beyond the point of actual feeling! Nay,
You shall not interrupt me: as you said,
We`re parting. Certainly, not once nor twice
To-night you`ve mocked me somewhat, or yourself,
And I, at least, have not deserved it so
That I should meet it unsurprised. But now,
Enough: we`re parting . . . parting. Cousin Leigh,
I wish you well through all the acts of life
And life`s relations, wedlock not the least,
And it shall `please me,` in your words, to know
You yield your wife, protection, freedom, ease,
And very tender liking. May you live
So happy with her, Romney, that your friends
Shall praise her for it! Meantime some of us
Are wholly dull in keeping ignorant
Of what she has suffered by you, and what debt
Of sorrow your rich love sits down to pay:
But if `tis sweet for love to pay its debt,
`Tis sweeter still for love to give its gift,
And you, be liberal in the sweeter way,
You can, I think. At least, as touches me,
You owe her, cousin Romney, no amends:
She is not used to hold my gown so fast,
You need entreat her now to let it go;
The lady never was a friend of mine,
Nor capable,—I thought you knew as much,—
Of losing for your sake so poor a prize
As such a worthless friendship. Be content,
Good cousin, therefore, both for her and you!
I`ll never spoil your dark, nor dull your noon,
Nor vex you when you`re merry, or at rest:
You shall not need to put a shutter up
To keep out this Aurora,—though your north
Can make Auroras which vex nobody,
Scarce known from night, I fancied! let me add,
My larks fly higher than some windows. Well,
You`ve read your Leighs. Indeed, `twould shake a house,
If such as I came in with outstretched hand,
Still warm and thrilling from the clasp of one . . .
Of one we know, . . . to acknowledge, palm to palm,
As mistress there, the Lady Waldemar."
"Now God be with us" . . . with a sudden clash
Of voice he interrupted. "What name`s that?
You spoke a name, Aurora."


                             "Pardon me;
I would that, Romney, I could name your wife
Nor wound you, yet be worthy."


                                 "Are we mad?"
He echoed. "Wife! mine! Lady Waldemar!
I think you said my wife." He sprang to his feet,
And threw his noble head back toward the moon
As one who swims against a stormy sea,
Then laughed with such a helpless, hopeless scorn,
I stood and trembled.


                       "May God judge me so,"
He said at last,—"I came convicted here,
And humbled sorely if not enough. I came,
Because this woman from her crystal soul
Had shown me something which a man calls light:
Because too, formerly, I sinned by her
As then and ever since I have, by God,
Through arrogance of nature,—though I loved . . .
Whom best, I need not say, since that is writ
Too plainly in the book of my misdeeds:
And thus I came here to abase myself,
And fasten, kneeling, on her regent brows
A garland which I startled thence one day
Of her beautiful June-youth. But here again
I`m baffled,—fail in my abasement as
My aggrandisement: there`s no room left for me
At any woman`s foot who misconceives
My nature, purpose, possible actions. What!
Are you the Aurora who made large my dreams
To frame your greatness? you conceive so small?
You stand so less than woman through being more,
And lose your natural instinct (like a beast)
Through intellectual culture? since indeed
I do not think that any common she
Would dare adopt such monstrous forgeries
For the legible life signature of such
As I, with all my blots—with all my blots!
At last, then, peerless cousin, we are peers—
At last we`re even. Ay, you`ve left your height,
And here upon my level we take hands,
And here I reach you to forgive you, sweet,
And that`s a fall, Aurora. Long ago
You seldom understood me,—but before,
I could not blame you. Then, you only seemed
So high above, you could not see below;
But now I breathe,—but now I pardon!—nay,
We`re parting. Dearest, men have burnt my house,
Maligned my motives; but not one, I swear,
Has wronged my soul as this Aurora has
Who called the Lady Waldemar my wife."


"Not married to her! yet you said" . . .


                                            "Again?
Nay, read the lines" (he held a letter out)
"She sent you through me."


                             By the moonlight there
I tore the meaning out with passionate haste
Much rather than I read it. Thus it ran.
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