Then they clung about The old man's neck, and kiss'd him many

times.

And all the man was broken with remorse;
And all his love came back a hundred-fold;
And for three hours he sobb'd o'er William's
child

Thinking of William.

So those four abode Within one house together; and as years Went forward, Mary took another mate; But Dora lived unmarried till her death. 1842.

160

Lord Tennyson.

THE GARDENER'S DAUGHTER

OR, THE PICTURES

THIS morning is the morning of the day,
When I and Eustace from the city went
To see the Gardener's Daughter; I and he,
Brothers in Art; a friendship so complete
Portion'd in halves between us, that we grew
The fable of the city where we dwelt.

My Eustace might have sat for Hercules;
So muscular he spread, so broad of breast.
He, by some law that holds in love, and draws
The greater to the lesser, long desired

A certain miracle of symmetry,
A miniature of loveliness, all grace

10

Summ'd up and closed in little;— Juliet, she So light of foot, so light of spirit-oh, she To me myself, for some three careless moons, The summer pilot of an empty heart Unto the shores of nothing! Know you not Such touches are but embassies of love, To tamper with the feelings, ere he found Empire for life? but Eustace painted her, And said to me, she sitting with us then, "When will you paint like this?" and I replied. (My words were half in earnest, half in jest,) "T is not your work, but Love's. Love, unper

ceived,

A more ideal Artist he than all,

20

Came, drew your pencil from you, made those

eyes

Darker than darkest pansies, and that hair

More black than ashbuds in the front of

March."

And Juliet answer'd laughing, "Go and see The Gardener's Daughter: trust me, after

that,

30

You scarce can fail to match his masterpiece." And up we rose, and on the spur we went.

Not wholly in the busy world, nor quite Beyond it, blooms the garden that I love. News from the humming city comes to it In sound of funeral or of marriage bells; And, sitting muffled in dark leaves, you hear The windy clanging of the minster clock; Although between it and the garden lies A league of grass, wash'd by a slow broad

stream,

40

That, stirr'd with languid pulses of the oar,
Waves all its lazy lilies, and creeps on,,
Barge-laden, to three arches of a bridge.
Crown'd with the minster-towers.

The fields between
Are dewy-fresh, browsed by deep-udder'd ·
kine,
And all about the large lime feathers low,
The lime a summer home of murmurous

wings.

I

In that still place she, hoarded in herself, Grew, seldom seen; not less among us lived Her fame from lip to lip. Who had not

heard

Of Rose, the Gardener's Daughter? Where was he,

So blunt in memory, so old at heart,

At such a distance from his youth in grief,
That, having seen, forgot? The common
mouth,

So gross to express delight, in praise of her
Grew oratory. Such a lord is Love,
And Beauty, such a mistress of the world.

50

60

And if I said that Fancy, led by Love, Would play with flying forms and images, Yet this is also true, that, long before I look'd upon her, when I heard her name My heart was like a prophet to my heart, And told me I should love. A crowd of hopes That sought to sow themselves like winged

seeds,

Born out of everything I heard and saw,
Flutter'd about my senses and my soul;

And vague desires, like fitful blasts of balm To one that travels quickly, made the air Of Life delicious, and all kinds of thought, That verged upon them, sweeter than the

dream

Dream'd by a happy man, when the dark

East,

Unseen, is brightening to his bridal morn.

And sure this orbit of the memory folds For ever in itself the day we went To see her. All the land in flowery squares, Beneath a broad and equal-blowing wind, Smelt of the coming summer, as one large cloud

70

Drew downward: but all else of heaven was

pure

Up to the Sun, and May from verge to verge, And May with me from head to heel. And

now,

As tho' 't were yesterday, as tho' it were The hour just flown, that morn with all its

sound,

(For those old Mays had thrice the life of these,)

80

Rings in mine ears. The steer forgot to graze, And, where the hedge-row cuts the pathway,

stood,

Leaning his horns into the neighbor field, And lowing to his fellows. From the woods Came voices of the well-contented doves.

The lark could scarce get out his notes for joy. But shook his song together as he near'd 90

His happy home, the ground. To left and right,

The cuckoo told his name to all the hills; The mellow ouzel fluted in the elm; The redcap whistled; and the nightingale Sang loud, as tho' he were the bird of day. And Eustace turn'd, and smiling said to me, "Hear how the bushes echo! by my life, These birds have joyful thoughts. Think you they sing

Like poets, from the vanity of song?

Or have they any sense of why they sing? 100 And would they praise the heavens for what they have?"

And I made answer, "Were there nothing

else

For which to praise the heavens but only love,
That only love were cause enough for praise."
Lightly he laugh'd, as one that read my
thought,

And on we went; but ere an hour had pass'd,
We reach'd a meadow slanting to the North;
Down which a well-worn pathway courted us
To one green wicket in a privet hedge;
This, yielding, gave into a grassy walk
Thro' crowded lilac-ambush trimly pruned;
And one warm gust, full-fed with perfume,

blew

Beyond us, as we enter'd in the cool..
The garden stretches southward. In the

midst

110

A cedar spread his dark-green layers of shade.