She was the daughter of a Dean,
Rich, fat, and rather apoplectic;
She had one brother, just thirteen.
Whose colour was extremely hectic;
Her grandmother for many a year
Had fed the parish with her bounty;
Her second cousin was a peer,
And Lord Lieutenant of the County.
But titles, and the three per cents,
And mortgages, and great relations,
And India bonds, and tithes, and rents,
Oh, what are they to love's sensations?
Black eyes, fair forehead, clustering locks -
Such wealth, such honours, Cupid chooses;
He cares as little for the Stocks,
As Baron Rothschild for the Muses.
She sketched; the vale, the wood, the beach, Grew lovelier from her pencil's shading: She botanised; I envied each
Young blossom in her boudoir fading: She warbled Handel; it was grand;
But lo! where Laura, with a frenzied air,
Seeks her kind cousin in her pony chair,
And, in a mournful voice, by thick sobs broke
Cries, "Yes, dear Anne! the favours are bespoke,
I am to have him; - so my friends decided;
The stars knew quite as much of it as I did!
You know him, love; he is so like a mummy:—
I wonder whether diamonds will become me!
He talks of nothing but the price of stocks;
However, I'm to have my opera box
That pert thing, Ellen, thought she could secure him,
I wish she had, I'm sure I can't endure him! 50 The cakes are ordered; - how my lips will falter
When I stand fainting at the marriage altar!
But I'm to have him! - Oh, the vile baboon!"
Strange Prologue this for Laura's Honeymoon!
Enough of prologues; surely I should say
One word, before I go, about the play.
Instead of hurrying madly after marriage
To some lord's villa in a travelling carriage,
Instead of seeking earth's remotest ends
To hide their blushes and avoid their friends, 60
Instead of haunting lonely lanes and brooks
With no companions but the doves and rooks, —
Our Duke and Duchess open wide their Hall,
And bid you warmly welcome, one and all,
Who come with hearts of kindness, eyes of
light,
To see, and share, their Honeymoon to-night.
Nor ever shall he be, in praise, by wise or good
PERPLEXED MUSIC
Experience, like a pale musician holds
A dulcimer of patience in his hand
Whence harmonies we cannot understand,
Of God's will in His worlds, the strain unfolds
In sad perplexèd minors. Deathly colds
Fall on us while we hear and countermand
Our sanguine heart back from the fancy-land
With nightingales in visionary wolds.
We murmur, "Where is any certain tune
Of measured music, in such notes as these?"
But angels, leaning from the golden seat,
Are not so minded: their fine ear hath won
The issue of completed cadences;
And, smiling down the stars, they whisper
What are we set on earth for? Say, to toil
Nor seek to leave thy tending of the vines,
For all the heat o' the day, till it declines,
And Death's mild curfew shall from work assoil.
God did anoint thee with His odorous oil,
To wrestle, not to reign; and He assigns
All thy tears over, like pure crystallines,
For younger fellow-workers of the soil
To wear for amulets. So others shall
Take patience, labour, to their heart and hand 10
From thy hand, and thy heart, and thy brave cheer,
And God's grace fructify through thee to all.
The least flower, with a brimming cup, may stand
And share its dew-drop with another near.
True genius, but true woman! dost deny
Thy woman's nature with a manly scorn,
And break away the gauds and armlets worn
By weaker women in captivity?
Ah, vain denial! that revolted cry
Is sobbed in by a woman's voice forlorn:
Thy woman's hair, my sister, all unshorn,
Floats back dishevelled strength in agony,
Disproving thy man's name: and while before
The world thou burnest in a poet fire,
We see thy woman's heart beat evermore
Through the large flame. Beat purer, heart, and
higher,
Till God unsex thee on the heavenly shore,
Where unincarnate spirits purely aspire!
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