No More Learning

And whither?

'James'. Nay, who knows? he's here and there.
But let him go; his devil goes with him,
As well as with his tenant, Jockey Dawes.

'John'. What's that?

'James-. You saw the man--on Monday, was it? --[3]
There by the hump-back'd willow; half stands up
And bristles; half has fall'n and made a bridge;
And there he caught the younker tickling trout--
Caught in 'flagrante'--what's the Latin word? --
'Delicto'; but his house, for so they say,
Was haunted with a jolly ghost, that shook
The curtains, whined in lobbies, tapt at doors,
And rummaged like a rat: no servant stay'd:
The farmer vext packs up his beds and chairs,
And all his household stuff; and with his boy
Betwixt his knees, his wife upon the tilt,
Sets out, [4] and meets a friend who hails him,
"What! You're flitting! " "Yes, we're flitting," says the ghost
(For they had pack'd the thing among the beds).
"Oh, well," says he, "you flitting with us too--
Jack, turn the horses' heads and home again". [5]

'John'. He left 'his' wife behind; for so I heard.

'James'. He left her, yes. I met my lady once:
A woman like a butt, and harsh as crabs.

'John'. Oh, yet, but I remember, ten years back--
'Tis now at least ten years--and then she was--
You could not light upon a sweeter thing:
A body slight and round and like a pear
In growing, modest eyes, a hand a foot
Lessening in perfect cadence, and a skin
As clean and white as privet when it flowers.

'James'. Ay, ay, the blossom fades and they that loved
At first like dove and dove were cat and dog.
She was the daughter of a cottager,
Out of her sphere. What betwixt shame and pride,
New things and old, himself and her, she sour'd
To what she is: a nature never kind!
Like men, like manners: like breeds like, they say.
Kind nature is the best: those manners next
That fit us like a nature second-hand;
Which are indeed the manners of the great.

'John'. But I had heard it was this bill that past,
And fear of change at home, that drove him hence.

'James'. That was the last drop in the cup of gall.
I once was near him, when his bailiff brought
A Chartist pike. You should have seen him wince
As from a venomous thing: he thought himself
A mark for all, and shudder'd, lest a cry
Should break his sleep by night, and his nice eyes
Should see the raw mechanic's bloody thumbs
Sweat on his blazon'd chairs; but, sir, you know
That these two parties still divide the world--
Of those that want, and those that have: and still
The same old sore breaks out from age to age
With much the same result. Now I myself, [6]
A Tory to the quick, was as a boy
Destructive, when I had not what I would.
I was at school--a college in the South:
There lived a flayflint near; we stole his fruit,
His hens, his eggs; but there was law for 'us';
We paid in person. He had a sow, sir. She,
With meditative grunts of much content, [7]
Lay great with pig, wallowing in sun and mud.
By night we dragg'd her to the college tower
From her warm bed, and up the corkscrew stair
With hand and rope we haled the groaning sow,
And on the leads we kept her till she pigg'd.
Large range of prospect had the mother sow,
And but for daily loss of one she loved,
As one by one we took them--but for this--
As never sow was higher in this world--
Might have been happy: but what lot is pure!
We took them all, till she was left alone
Upon her tower, the Niobe of swine,
And so return'd unfarrowed to her sty.

'John. ' They found you out?

'James. ' Not they.

'John. ' Well--after all--What know we of the secret of a man?
His nerves were wrong. What ails us, who are sound,
That we should mimic this raw fool the world,
Which charts us all in its coarse blacks or whites,
As ruthless as a baby with a worm,
As cruel as a schoolboy ere he grows
To Pity--more from ignorance than will,
But put your best foot forward, or I fear
That we shall miss the mail: and here it comes
With five at top: as quaint a four-in-hand
As you shall see--three pyebalds and a roan.



[Footnote 1: 1842.

'John'. I'm glad I walk'd. How fresh the country looks!
Is yonder planting where this byway joins
The turnpike? ]


[Footnote 2: Thus 1843 to 1850:--

'John'. Whose house is that I see
Beyond the watermills?

'James'. Sir Edward Head's: But he's abroad, etc. ]


[Footnote 3: Thus 1842 to 1851:--

'James'. You saw the man but yesterday:
He pick'd the pebble from your horse's foot.
His house was haunted by a jolly ghost
That rummaged like a rat. ]


[Footnote 4: 1842. Sets forth. Added in 1853. ]

[Footnote 5: This is a folk-lore story which has its variants, Mr.
Alfred Nutt tells me, in almost every country in Europe. The
Lincolnshire version of it is given in Miss Peacock's MS. collection of
Lincolnshire folk-lore, of which she has most kindly sent me a copy, and
it runs thus:--"There is a house in East Halton which is haunted by a
hob-thrush. . . . Some years ago, it is said, a family who had lived in the
house for more than a hundred years were much annoyed by it, and
determined to quit the dwelling. They had placed their goods on a
waggon, and were just on the point of starting when a neighbour asked
the farmer whether he was leaving. On this the hobthrush put his head
out of the splash-churn, which was amongst the household stuff, and
said, 'Ay, we're flitting'. Whereupon the farmer decided to give up the
attempt to escape from it and remain where he was. " The same story is
told of a Cluricaune in Croker's 'Fairy Legends and Traditions' in the
South of Ireland. See 'The Haunted Cellar' in p. 81 of the edition of
1862, and as Tennyson has elsewhere in 'Guinevere' borrowed a passage
from the same story (see 'Illustrations of Tennyson', p. 152) it is
probable that that was the source of the story here, though there the
Cluricaune uses the expression, "Here we go altogether". ]

[Footnote 6: 1842 and 1843. I that am. Now, I that am. ]

[Footnote 7: 1842.

scored upon the part
Which cherubs want. ]







THE EARLY POEMS OF

EDWIN MORRIS;

OR, THE LAKE

This poem first appeared in the seventh edition of the Poems, 1851. It
was written at Llanberis. Several alterations were made in the eighth
edition of 1853, since then none, with the exception of "breath" for
"breaths" in line 66.


O Me, my pleasant rambles by the lake,
My sweet, wild, fresh three-quarters of a year,
My one Oasis in the dust and drouth
Of city life! I was a sketcher then:
See here, my doing: curves of mountain, bridge,
Boat, island, ruins of a castle, built
When men knew how to build, upon a rock,
With turrets lichen-gilded like a rock:
And here, new-comers in an ancient hold,
New-comers from the Mersey, millionaires,
Here lived the Hills--a Tudor-chimnied bulk
Of mellow brickwork on an isle of bowers.
O me, my pleasant rambles by the lake
With Edwin Morris and with Edward Bull
The curate; he was fatter than his cure.

But Edwin Morris, he that knew the names,
Long-learned names of agaric, moss and fern, [1]
Who forged a thousand theories of the rocks,
Who taught me how to skate, to row, to swim,
Who read me rhymes elaborately good,
His own--I call'd him Crichton, for he seem'd
All-perfect, finish'd to the finger nail. [2]
And once I ask'd him of his early life,
And his first passion; and he answer'd me;
And well his words became him: was he not
A full-cell'd honeycomb of eloquence
Stored from all flowers? Poet-like he spoke.

"My love for Nature is as old as I;
But thirty moons, one honeymoon to that,
And three rich sennights more, my love for her.
My love for Nature and my love for her,
Of different ages, like twin-sisters grew, [3]
Twin-sisters differently beautiful.
To some full music rose and sank the sun,
And some full music seem'd to move and change
With all the varied changes of the dark,
And either twilight and the day between;
For daily hope fulfill'd, to rise again
Revolving toward fulfilment, made it sweet
To walk, to sit, to sleep, to wake, to breathe. " [4]

Or this or something like to this he spoke.
Then said the fat-faced curate Edward Bull,
"I take it, God made the woman for the man,
And for the good and increase of the world,
A pretty face is well, and this is well,
To have a dame indoors, that trims us up,
And keeps us tight; but these unreal ways
Seem but the theme of writers, and indeed
Worn threadbare. Man is made of solid stuff.
I say, God made the woman for the man,
And for the good and increase of the world. "

"Parson," said I, "you pitch the pipe too low:
But I have sudden touches, and can run
My faith beyond my practice into his:
Tho' if, in dancing after Letty Hill,
I do not hear the bells upon my cap,
I scarce hear [5] other music: yet say on.
What should one give to light on such a dream? "
I ask'd him half-sardonically.
"Give? Give all thou art," he answer'd, and a light
Of laughter dimpled in his swarthy cheek;
"I would have hid her needle in my heart,
To save her little finger from a scratch
No deeper than the skin: my ears could hear
Her lightest breaths: her least remark was worth
The experience of the wise. I went and came;
Her voice fled always thro' the summer land;
I spoke her name alone. Thrice-happy days!
The flower of each, those moments when we met,
The crown of all, we met to part no more. "

Were not his words delicious, I a beast
To take them as I did? but something jarr'd;
Whether he spoke too largely; that there seem'd
A touch of something false, some self-conceit,
Or over-smoothness: howsoe'er it was,
He scarcely hit my humour, and I said:--

"Friend Edwin, do not think yourself alone
Of all men happy. Shall not Love to me,
As in the Latin song I learnt at school,
Sneeze out a full God-bless-you right and left? [6]
But you can talk: yours is a kindly vein:
I have I think--Heaven knows--as much within;
Have or should have, but for a thought or two,
That like a purple beech [7] among the greens
Looks out of place: 'tis from no want in her:
It is my shyness, or my self-distrust,
Or something of a wayward modern mind
Dissecting passion. Time will set me right. "

So spoke I knowing not the things that were.
Then said the fat-faced curate, Edward Bull:
"God made the woman for the use of man,
And for the good and increase of the world".
And I and Edwin laugh'd; and now we paused
About the windings of the marge to hear
The soft wind blowing over meadowy holms
And alders, garden-isles [8]; and now we left
The clerk behind us, I and he, and ran
By ripply shallows of the lisping lake,
Delighted with the freshness and the sound.
But, when the bracken rusted on their crags,
My suit had wither'd, nipt to death by him
That was a God, and is a lawyer's clerk,
The rentroll Cupid of our rainy isles. [9]

'Tis true, we met; one hour I had, no more:
She sent a note, the seal an _Elle vous suit_, [10]
The close "Your Letty, only yours"; and this
Thrice underscored. The friendly mist of morn
Clung to the lake. I boated over, ran
My craft aground, and heard with beating heart
The Sweet-Gale rustle round the shelving keel;
And out I stept, and up I crept: she moved,
Like Proserpine in Enna, gathering flowers: [11]
Then low and sweet I whistled thrice; and she,
She turn'd, we closed, we kiss'd, swore faith, I breathed
In some new planet: a silent cousin stole
Upon us and departed: "Leave," she cried,
"O leave me! " "Never, dearest, never: here
I brave the worst:" and while we stood like fools
Embracing, all at once a score of pugs
And poodles yell'd within, and out they came
Trustees and Aunts and Uncles. "What, with him!
"Go" (shrill'd the cottonspinning chorus) "him! "
I choked. Again they shriek'd the burthen "Him! "
Again with hands of wild rejection "Go! --
Girl, get you in! " She went--and in one month [12]
They wedded her to sixty thousand pounds,
To lands in Kent and messuages in York,
And slight Sir Robert with his watery smile
And educated whisker. But for me,
They set an ancient creditor to work:
It seems I broke a close with force and arms:
There came a mystic token from the king
To greet the sheriff, needless courtesy!
I read, and fled by night, and flying turn'd:
Her taper glimmer'd in the lake below:
I turn'd once more, close-button'd to the storm;
So left the place, [13] left Edwin, nor have seen
Him since, nor heard of her, nor cared to hear.
Nor cared to hear? perhaps; yet long ago
I have pardon'd little Letty; not indeed,
It may be, for her own dear sake but this,
She seems a part of those fresh days to me;
For in the dust and drouth of London life
She moves among my visions of the lake,
While the prime swallow dips his wing, or then
While the gold-lily blows, and overhead
The light cloud smoulders on the summer crag.


[Footnote 1: Agaric (some varieties are deadly) is properly the fungus
on the larch; it then came to mean fungus generally. Minshew calls it "a
white soft mushroom". See Halliwell, 'Dict. of Archaic and Provincial
Words, sub vocent'. ]

[Footnote 2: The Latin factus 'ad unguem'. For Crichton, a half-mythical
figure, see Tytler's 'Life' of him. ]

[Footnote 3: 1851. Of different ages, like twin-sisters throve. ]

[Footnote 4: 1853. To breathe, to wake. ]

[Footnote 5: 1872. Have. ]

[Footnote 6: The reference is to the 'Acme' and 'Septimius' of Catullus,
xliv. --

Hoc ut dixit,
Amor, sinistram, ut ante,
Dextram sternuit approbationem. ]


[Footnote 7: 1851. That like a copper beech. ]

[Footnote 8: 1851.

garden-isles; and now we ran
By ripply shallows. ]


[Footnote 9: 1851. The rainy isles. ]

[Footnote 10: Cf. Byron, 'Don Juan', i. , xcvii. :--

The seal a sunflower--'elle vous suit partout'. ]


[Footnote 11: 'Cf'. Milton, 'Par. Lost', iv. , 268-9:--

Not that fair field
Of Enna where Proserpine gathering flowers
. . .
Was gather'd. ]


[Footnote 12: 1851.

"Go Sir! " Again they shrieked the burthen "Him! "
Again with hands of wild rejection "Go!
Girl, get you in" to her--and in one month, etc. ]


[Footnote 13: 1851.

I read and wish'd to crush the race of man,
And fled by night; turn'd once upon the hills;
Her taper glimmer'd in the lake; and then
I left the place, etc. ]




ST. SIMEON STYLITES

First published in 1842, reprinted in all the subsequent editions of the
poems but with no alterations in the text, except that in eighth line
from the end "my" was substituted for "mine" in 1846. Tennyson informed
a friend that it was not from the 'Acta Sanctorum', but from Hone's
'Every-Day Book', vol. i. , pp. 35-36, that he got the material for this
poem, and a comparison with the narrative in Hone and the poem seems to
show that this was the case.

It is not easy to identify the St. Simeon Stylites of Hone's narrative
and Tennyson's poem, whether he is to be identified with St. Simeon the
Elder, of whom there are three memoirs given in the 'Acta Sanctorum',
tom. i. , 5th January, 261-286, or with St. Simeon Stylites, Junior, of
whom there is an elaborate biography in Greek by Nicephorus printed with
a Latin translation and notes in the 'Acta Sanctorum', tom. v. , 24th
May, 298-401. It seems clear that whoever compiled the account
popularised by Hone had read both and amalgamated them. The main lines
in the story of both saints are exactly the same. Both stood on columns,
both tortured themselves in the same ways, both wrought miracles, and
both died at their posts of penance. St. Simeon the Elder was born at
Sisan in Syria about A. D. 390, and was buried at Antioch in A. D. 459 or
460. The Simeon the Younger was born at Antioch A. D. 521 and died in
A. D. 592. His life, which is of singular interest, is much more
elaborately related.

This poem is not simply a dramatic study. It bears very directly on
Tennyson's philosophy of life.
In these early poems he has given us four
studies in the morbid anatomy of character: 'The Palace of Art', which
illustrates the abuse of aesthetic and intellectual enjoyment of self;
'The Vision of Sin', which illustrates the effects of similar indulgence
in the grosser pleasures of the senses; 'The Two Voices', which
illustrates the mischief of despondent self-absorption, while the
present poem illustrates the equally pernicious indulgence in an
opposite extreme, asceticism affected for the mere gratification of
personal vanity.


Altho' I be the basest of mankind,
From scalp to sole one slough and crust of sin,
Unfit for earth, unfit for heaven, scarce meet
For troops of devils, mad with blasphemy,
I will not cease to grasp the hope I hold
Of saintdom, and to clamour, morn and sob,
Battering the gates of heaven with storms of prayer,
Have mercy, Lord, and take away my sin.
Let this avail, just, dreadful, mighty God,
This not be all in vain that thrice ten years,
Thrice multiplied by superhuman pangs,
In hungers and in thirsts, fevers and cold,
In coughs, aches, stitches, ulcerous throes and cramps,
A sign betwixt the meadow and the cloud,
Patient on this tall pillar I have borne
Rain, wind, frost, heat, hail, damp, and sleet, and snow;
And I had hoped that ere this period closed
Thou wouldst have caught me up into Thy rest,
Denying not these weather-beaten limbs
The meed of saints, the white robe and the palm.
O take the meaning, Lord: I do not breathe,
Not whisper, any murmur of complaint.
Pain heap'd ten-hundred-fold to this, were still
Less burthen, by ten-hundred-fold, to bear,
Than were those lead-like tons of sin, that crush'd
My spirit flat before thee. O Lord, Lord,
Thou knowest I bore this better at the first,
For I was strong and hale of body then;
And tho' my teeth, which now are dropt away,
Would chatter with the cold, and all my beard
Was tagg'd with icy fringes in the moon,
I drown'd the whoopings of the owl with sound
Of pious hymns and psalms, and sometimes saw
An angel stand and watch me, as I sang.
Now am I feeble grown; my end draws nigh;
I hope my end draws nigh: half deaf I am,
So that I scarce can hear the people hum
About the column's base, and almost blind,
And scarce can recognise the fields I know;
And both my thighs are rotted with the dew;
Yet cease I not to clamour and to cry,
While my stiff spine can hold my weary head,
Till all my limbs drop piecemeal from the stone,
Have mercy, mercy: take away my sin.
O Jesus, if thou wilt not save my soul,
Who may be saved? who is it may be saved?
Who may be made a saint, if I fail here?
Show me the man hath suffered more than I.
For did not all thy martyrs die one death?
For either they were stoned, or crucified,
Or burn'd in fire, or boil'd in oil, or sawn
In twain beneath the ribs; but I die here
To-day, and whole years long, a life of death.
Bear witness, if I could have found a way
(And heedfully I sifted all my thought)
More slowly-painful to subdue this home
Of sin, my flesh, which I despise and hate,
I had not stinted practice, O my God.
For not alone this pillar-punishment, [1]
Not this alone I bore: but while I lived
In the white convent down the valley there,
For many weeks about my loins I wore
The rope that haled the buckets from the well,
Twisted as tight as I could knot the noose;
And spake not of it to a single soul,
Until the ulcer, eating thro' my skin,
Betray'd my secret penance, so that all
My brethren marvell'd greatly. More than this
I bore, whereof, O God, thou knowest all. [2]
Three winters, that my soul might grow to thee,
I lived up there on yonder mountain side.
My right leg chain'd into the crag, I lay
Pent in a roofless close of ragged stones;
Inswathed sometimes in wandering mist, and twice
Black'd with thy branding thunder, and sometimes
Sucking the damps for drink, and eating not,
Except the spare chance-gift of those that came
To touch my body and be heal'd, and live:
And they say then that I work'd miracles,
Whereof my fame is loud amongst mankind,
Cured lameness, palsies, cancers. Thou, O God,
Knowest alone whether this was or no.
Have mercy, mercy; cover all my sin.

Then, that I might be more alone with thee, [3]
Three years I lived upon a pillar, high
Six cubits, and three years on one of twelve;
And twice three years I crouch'd on one that rose
Twenty by measure; last of all, I grew
Twice ten long weary weary years to this,
That numbers forty cubits from the soil.
I think that I have borne as much as this--
Or else I dream--and for so long a time,
If I may measure time by yon slow light,
And this high dial, which my sorrow crowns--
So much--even so. And yet I know not well,
For that the evil ones comes here, and say,
"Fall down, O Simeon: thou hast suffer'd long
For ages and for ages! " then they prate
Of penances I cannot have gone thro',
Perplexing me with lies; and oft I fall,
Maybe for months, in such blind lethargies,
That Heaven, and Earth, and Time are choked. But yet
Bethink thee, Lord, while thou and all the saints
Enjoy themselves in Heaven, and men on earth
House in the shade of comfortable roofs,
Sit with their wives by fires, eat wholesome food,
And wear warm clothes, and even beasts have stalls,
I, 'tween the spring and downfall of the light,
Bow down one thousand and two hundred times,
To Christ, the Virgin Mother, and the Saints;
Or in the night, after a little sleep,
I wake: the chill stars sparkle; I am wet
With drenching dews, or stiff with crackling frost.
I wear an undress'd goatskin on my back;
A grazing iron collar grinds my neck;
And in my weak, lean arms I lift the cross,
And strive and wrestle with thee till I die:
O mercy, mercy! wash away my sin.
O Lord, thou knowest what a man I am;
A sinful man, conceived and born in sin:
'Tis their own doing; this is none of mine;
Lay it not to me. Am I to blame for this,
That here come those that worship me? Ha! ha!
They think that I am somewhat. What am I?
The silly people take me for a saint,
And bring me offerings of fruit and flowers:
And I, in truth (thou wilt bear witness here)
Have all in all endured as much, and more
Than many just and holy men, whose names
Are register'd and calendar'd for saints.
Good people, you do ill to kneel to me.
What is it I can have done to merit this?
I am a sinner viler than you all.
It may be I have wrought some miracles, [4]
And cured some halt and maim'd; but what of that?
It may be, no one, even among the saints,
May match his pains with mine; but what of that?
Yet do not rise: for you may look on me,
And in your looking you may kneel to God.
Speak! is there any of you halt or maim'd?
I think you know I have some power with Heaven
From my long penance: let him speak his wish.
Yes, I can heal. Power goes forth from me.
They say that they are heal'd. Ah, hark! they shout
"St. Simeon Stylites". Why, if so,
God reaps a harvest in me. O my soul,
God reaps a harvest in thee. If this be,
Can I work miracles and not be saved?
This is not told of any. They were saints.
It cannot be but that I shall be saved;
Yea, crown'd a saint. They shout, "Behold a saint! "
And lower voices saint me from above.
Courage, St. Simeon! This dull chrysalis
Cracks into shining wings, and hope ere death
Spreads more and more and more, that God hath now
Sponged and made blank of crimeful record all
My mortal archives. O my sons, my sons,
I, Simeon of the pillar, by surname Stylites, among men;
I, Simeon, The watcher on the column till the end;
I, Simeon, whose brain the sunshine bakes;
I, whose bald brows in silent hours become
Unnaturally hoar with rime, do now
From my high nest of penance here proclaim
That Pontius and Iscariot by my side
Show'd like fair seraphs. On the coals I lay,
A vessel full of sin: all hell beneath
Made me boil over. Devils pluck'd my sleeve; [5]
Abaddon and Asmodeus caught at me.
I smote them with the cross; they swarm'd again.
In bed like monstrous apes they crush'd my chest:
They flapp'd my light out as I read: I saw
Their faces grow between me and my book:
With colt-like whinny and with hoggish whine
They burst my prayer. Yet this way was left,
And by this way I'scaped them. Mortify
Your flesh, like me, with scourges and with thorns;
Smite, shrink not, spare not. If it may be, fast
Whole Lents, and pray. I hardly, with slow steps,
With slow, faint steps, and much exceeding pain,
Have scrambled past those pits of fire, that still
Sing in mine ears. But yield not me the praise:
God only thro' his bounty hath thought fit,
Among the powers and princes of this world,
To make me an example to mankind,
Which few can reach to. Yet I do not say
But that a time may come--yea, even now,
Now, now, his footsteps smite the threshold stairs
Of life--I say, that time is at the doors
When you may worship me without reproach;
For I will leave my relics in your land,
And you may carve a shrine about my dust,
And burn a fragrant lamp before my bones,
When I am gather'd to the glorious saints.
While I spake then, a sting of shrewdest pain
Ran shrivelling thro' me, and a cloudlike change,
In passing, with a grosser film made thick
These heavy, horny eyes. The end! the end!
Surely the end! What's here? a shape, a shade,
A flash of light. Is that the angel there
That holds a crown? Come, blessed brother, come,
I know thy glittering face. I waited long;
My brows are ready. What! deny it now?
Nay, draw, draw, draw nigh. So I clutch it. Christ!
'Tis gone: 'tis here again; the crown! the crown! [6]
So now 'tis fitted on and grows to me,
And from it melt the dews of Paradise,
Sweet! sweet! spikenard, and balm, and frankincense.
Ah! let me not be fool'd, sweet saints: I trust
That I am whole, and clean, and meet for Heaven.
Speak, if there be a priest, a man of God,
Among you there, and let him presently
Approach, and lean a ladder on the shaft,
And climbing up into my airy home,
Deliver me the blessed sacrament;
For by the warning of the Holy Ghost,
I prophesy that I shall die to-night,
A quarter before twelve. [7] But thou, O Lord,
Aid all this foolish people; let them take
Example, pattern: lead them to thy light.

[Footnote 1: For this incident 'cf. Acta', v. , 317:

"Petit aliquando ab aliquo ad se invisente funem, acceptumque circa
corpus convolvit constringitque tarn arete ut, exesa carne, quae istuc
mollis admodum ac tenera est, nudae costae exstarent".

The same is told also of the younger Stylites, where the incident of
concealing the torture is added, 'Acta', i. , 265. ]


[Footnote 2: For this retirement to a mountain see 'Acta', i. , 270, and
it is referred to in the other lives:

"Post haec egressus occulte perrexit in montem non longe a monasterio,
ibique sibi clausulam de sicca petra fecit, et stetit sic annos
tres. "]


[Footnote 3: In accurate accordance with the third life, 'Acta',
i. , 277:

"Primum quidem columna ad sex erecta cubitos est, deinde ad duodecim,
post ad vigenti extensa est";

but for the thirty-six cubits which is assigned as the height of the
last column Tennyson's authority, drawing on another account ('Id'. ,
271), substitutes forty:

"Fecerunt illi columnam habentem cubitos quadraginta". ]


[Footnote 4: For the miracles wrought by him see all the lives. ]

[Footnote 5: These details seem taken from the well-known stories about
Luther and Bunyan. All that the 'Acta' say about St. Simeon is that
he was pestered by devils. ]

[Footnote 6: The 'Acta' say nothing about the crown, but dwell on the
supernatural fragrance which exhaled from the saint. ]

[Footnote 7: Tennyson has given a very poor substitute for the
beautifully pathetic account given of the death of St. Simeon in 'Acta',
i. , 168, and again in the ninth chapter of the second Life, 'Ibid'. ,
273. But this is to be explained perhaps by the moral purpose of the
poem. ]







THE TALKING OAK

First published in 1842, and republished in all subsequent editions with
only two slight alterations: in line 113 a mere variant in spelling, and
in line 185, where in place of the present reading the editions between
1842 and 1848 read, "For, ah! the Dryad-days were brief".

Tennyson told Mr. Aubrey de Vere that the poem was an experiment meant
to test the degree in which it is in the power of poetry to humanise
external nature. Tennyson might have remembered that Ovid had made the
same experiment nearly two thousand years ago, while Goethe had
immediately anticipated him in his charming 'Der Junggesett und der
Muhlbach'. There was certainly no novelty in such an attempt. The poem
is in parts charmingly written, but the oak is certainly "garrulously
given," and comes perilously near to tediousness.


Once more the gate behind me falls;
Once more before my face
I see the moulder'd Abbey-walls,
That stand within the chace.

Beyond the lodge the city lies,
Beneath its drift of smoke;
And ah! with what delighted eyes
I turn to yonder oak.

For when my passion first began,
Ere that, which in me burn'd,
The love, that makes me thrice a man,
Could hope itself return'd;

To yonder oak within the field
I spoke without restraint,
And with a larger faith appeal'd
Than Papist unto Saint.

For oft I talk'd with him apart,
And told him of my choice,
Until he plagiarised a heart,
And answer'd with a voice.

Tho' what he whisper'd, under Heaven
None else could understand;
I found him garrulously given,
A babbler in the land.

But since I heard him make reply
Is many a weary hour;
'Twere well to question him, and try
If yet he keeps the power.

Hail, hidden to the knees in fern,
Broad Oak of Sumner-chace,
Whose topmost branches can discern
The roofs of Sumner-place!

Say thou, whereon I carved her name,
If ever maid or spouse,
As fair as my Olivia, came
To rest beneath thy boughs. --

"O Walter, I have shelter'd here
Whatever maiden grace
The good old Summers, year by year,
Made ripe in Sumner-chace:

"Old Summers, when the monk was fat,
And, issuing shorn and sleek,
Would twist his girdle tight, and pat
The girls upon the cheek.

"Ere yet, in scorn of Peter's-pence,
And number'd bead, and shrift,
Bluff Harry broke into the spence, [1]
And turn'd the cowls adrift:

"And I have seen some score of those
Fresh faces, that would thrive
When his man-minded offset rose
To chase the deer at five;

"And all that from the town would stroll,
Till that wild wind made work
In which the gloomy brewer's soul
Went by me, like a stork:

"The slight she-slips of loyal blood,
And others, passing praise,
Strait-laced, but all too full in bud
For puritanic stays: [2]

"And I have shadow'd many a group
Of beauties, that were born
In teacup-times of hood and hoop,
Or while the patch was worn;

"And, leg and arm with love-knots gay,
About me leap'd and laugh'd
The Modish Cupid of the day,
And shrill'd his tinsel shaft.

"I swear (and else may insects prick
Each leaf into a gall)
This girl, for whom your heart is sick,
Is three times worth them all;

"For those and theirs, by Nature's law,
Have faded long ago;
But in these latter springs I saw
Your own Olivia blow,

"From when she gamboll'd on the greens,
A baby-germ, to when
The maiden blossoms of her teens
Could number five from ten.

"I swear, by leaf, and wind, and rain
(And hear me with thine ears),
That, tho' I circle in the grain
Five hundred rings of years--

"Yet, since I first could cast a shade,
Did never creature pass
So slightly, musically made,
So light upon the grass:

"For as to fairies, that will flit
To make the greensward fresh,
I hold them exquisitely knit,
But far too spare of flesh. "

Oh, hide thy knotted knees in fern,
And overlook the chace;
And from thy topmost branch discern
The roofs of Sumner-place.

But thou, whereon I carved her name,
That oft hast heard my vows,
Declare when last Olivia came
To sport beneath thy boughs.

"O yesterday, you know, the fair
Was holden at the town;
Her father left his good arm-chair,
And rode his hunter down.

"And with him Albert came on his.
I look'd at him with joy:
As cowslip unto oxlip is,
So seems she to the boy.

"An hour had past--and, sitting straight
Within the low-wheel'd chaise,
Her mother trundled to the gate
Behind the dappled grays.

"But, as for her, she stay'd [3] at home,
And on the roof she went,
And down the way you use to come,
She look'd with discontent.

"She left the novel half-uncut
Upon the rosewood shelf;
She left the new piano shut:
She could not please herself.

"Then ran she, gamesome as the colt,
And livelier than a lark
She sent her voice thro' all the holt
Before her, and the park.

"A light wind chased her on the wing,
And in the chase grew wild,
As close as might be would he cling
About the darling child:

"But light as any wind that blows
So fleetly did she stir,
The flower she touch'd on dipt and rose,
And turn'd to look at her.

"And here she came, and round me play'd,
And sang to me the whole
Of those three stanzas that you made
About my 'giant bole';

"And in a fit of frolic mirth
She strove to span my waist:
Alas, I was so broad of girth,
I could not be embraced.

"I wish'd myself the fair young beech
That here beside me stands,
That round me, clasping each in each,
She might have lock'd her hands.

"Yet seem'd the pressure thrice as sweet
As woodbine's fragile hold,
Or when I feel about my feet
The berried briony fold. "

O muffle round thy knees with fern,
And shadow Sumner-chace!
Long may thy topmost branch discern
The roofs of Sumner-place!

But tell me, did she read the name
I carved with many vows
When last with throbbing heart I came
To rest beneath thy boughs?

"O yes, she wander'd round and round
These knotted knees of mine,
And found, and kiss'd the name she found,
And sweetly murmur'd thine.

"A teardrop trembled from its source,
And down my surface crept.
My sense of touch is something coarse,
But I believe she wept.

"Then flush'd her cheek with rosy light,
She glanced across the plain;
But not a creature was in sight:
She kiss'd me once again.

"Her kisses were so close and kind,
That, trust me on my word,
Hard wood I am, and wrinkled rind,
But yet my sap was stirr'd:

"And even into my inmost ring
A pleasure I discern'd
Like those blind motions of the Spring,
That show the year is turn'd.

"Thrice-happy he that may caress
The ringlet's waving balm
The cushions of whose touch may press
The maiden's tender palm.

"I, rooted here among the groves,
But languidly adjust
My vapid vegetable loves [4]
With anthers and with dust:

"For, ah! my friend, the days were brief [5]
Whereof the poets talk,
When that, which breathes within the leaf,
Could slip its bark and walk.

"But could I, as in times foregone,
From spray, and branch, and stem,
Have suck'd and gather'd into one
The life that spreads in them,

"She had not found me so remiss;
But lightly issuing thro',
I would have paid her kiss for kiss
With usury thereto. "

O flourish high, with leafy towers,
And overlook the lea,
Pursue thy loves among the bowers,
But leave thou mine to me.

O flourish, hidden deep in fern,
Old oak, I love thee well;
A thousand thanks for what I learn
And what remains to tell.

"'Tis little more: the day was warm;
At last, tired out with play,
She sank her head upon her arm,
And at my feet she lay.

"Her eyelids dropp'd their silken eaves.
I breathed upon her eyes
Thro' all the summer of my leaves
A welcome mix'd with sighs.

"I took the swarming sound of life--
The music from the town--
The murmurs of the drum and fife
And lull'd them in my own.

"Sometimes I let a sunbeam slip,
To light her shaded eye;
A second flutter'd round her lip
Like a golden butterfly;

"A third would glimmer on her neck
To make the necklace shine;
Another slid, a sunny fleck,
From head to ancle fine.

"Then close and dark my arms I spread,
And shadow'd all her rest--
Dropt dews upon her golden head,
An acorn in her breast.

"But in a pet she started up,
And pluck'd it out, and drew
My little oakling from the cup,
And flung him in the dew.

"And yet it was a graceful gift--
I felt a pang within
As when I see the woodman lift
His axe to slay my kin.

"I shook him down because he was
The finest on the tree.
He lies beside thee on the grass.
O kiss him once for me.

"O kiss him twice and thrice for me,
That have no lips to kiss,
For never yet was oak on lea
Shall grow so fair as this. "

Step deeper yet in herb and fern,
Look further thro' the chace,
Spread upward till thy boughs discern
The front of Sumner-place.

This fruit of thine by Love is blest,
That but a moment lay
Where fairer fruit of Love may rest
Some happy future day.

I kiss it twice, I kiss it thrice,
The warmth it thence shall win
To riper life may magnetise
The baby-oak within.

But thou, while kingdoms overset,
Or lapse from hand to hand,
Thy leaf shall never fail, nor yet
Thine acorn in the land.

May never saw dismember thee,
Nor wielded axe disjoint,
That art the fairest-spoken tree
From here to Lizard-point.

O rock upon thy towery top
All throats that gurgle sweet!
All starry culmination drop
Balm-dews to bathe thy feet!

All grass of silky feather grow--
And while he sinks or swells
The full south-breeze around thee blow
The sound of minster bells.

The fat earth feed thy branchy root,
That under deeply strikes!
The northern morning o'er thee shoot
High up, in silver spikes!

Nor ever lightning char thy grain,
But, rolling as in sleep,
Low thunders bring the mellow rain,
That makes thee broad and deep!

And hear me swear a solemn oath,
That only by thy side
Will I to Olive plight my troth,
And gain her for my bride.

And when my marriage morn may fall,
She, Dryad-like, shall wear
Alternate leaf and acorn-ball
In wreath about her hair.

And I will work in prose and rhyme,
And praise thee more in both
Than bard has honour'd beech or lime,
Or that Thessalian growth, [6]

In which the swarthy ringdove sat,
And mystic sentence spoke;
And more than England honours that,
Thy famous brother-oak,

Wherein the younger Charles abode
Till all the paths were dim,
And far below the Roundhead rode,
And humm'd a surly hymn.

[Footnote 1: Spence is a larder and buttery. In the 'Promptorium
Parverum it is defined as "cellarium promptuarium". ]

[Footnote 2: Cf. Burns' "godly laces," 'To the Unco Righteous'. ]

[Footnote 3: All editions previous to 1853 have 'staid'. ]

[Footnote 4: The phrase is Marvell's. 'Cf. To his Coy Mistress' (a
favourite poem of Tennyson's), "my vegetable loves should grow". ]

[Footnote 5: 1842 to 1850. "For, ah! the Dryad-days were brief. ]

[Footnote 6: A reference to the oracular oaks of Dodona which was, of
course, in Epirus, but the Ancients believed, no doubt erroneously, that
there was another Dodona in Thessaly. See the article "Dodona" in
Smith's 'Dict. of Greek and Roman Geography'.