If I were master of all wealthiness, Much gold and silver should be thine, sweetheart! If I were master of the house of hell, I'd bar the brazen gates in thy sweet face; I'd quit my place to give it thee, my fair!" Sometimes, but very rarely, weird images are sought to clothe passion, as in the following (p. 136): "Down into hell I went and thence returned: Or again in this (p. 232) : "Methinks I hear, I hear a voice that cries: I say, If I am fain forthwith toward heaven to fare. Till we together go to paradise, I'll stay on earth and love your beauteous eyes." But it is not with such remote and eery thoughts that the rustic muse of Italy can deal successfully. Far better is the following half-playful description of lovesadness (p. 71):— 66 Ah me, alas! who knew not how to sigh! Of sighs I now full well have learned the art: Sighing within my little room apart, Sighing when jests and laughter round me fly, The next two rispetti, delicious in their naiveté, might seem to have been extracted from the libretto of an opera, but that they lack the sympathising chorus, who should have stood at hand, ready to chime in with "he," "she," and "they," to the "I," "you," and "we" of the lovers (p. 123): "Ah, when will dawn that glorious day "Ah, when will dawn that blissful day Hitherto the songs have told only of happy love, or of love returned. Some of the best, however, are unhappy. Here is one, for instance, steeped in gloom (p. 142): "They have this custom in fair Naples town; The mother weeps when she a son gives suck The following contains a fine wild image, wrought out with strange passion in detail (p. 300):— "I'll spread a table brave for revelry, Nor is the next a whit less in the vein of mad Jeronimo (p. 304) “High up, high up, a house I'll rear, With treason, to betray the night; With treason, to betray the stars, With treason, to betray the day, Since Love betrayed me, well away!" The vengeance of an Italian reveals itself in the energetic song which I quote next (p. 303): "I have a sword; 'twould cut a brazen bell, By masters mighty in the mystic rede : I've had it tempered by the light of stars; Then let him come whose skin is stout as Mars; I've had it tempered to a trenchant blade; Then let him come who stole from me my maid.” More mild, but brimful of the bitterness of a soul to whom the whole world has become but ashes in the death of love, is the following lament (p. 143): "Call me the lovely Golden Locks no more, What have I done, dear Lord, the world to cross? How have I made, dear Lord, dame Fortune wroth? Here is pathos (p. 172):— "The wood-dove who hath lost her mate, She lives a dolorous life, I ween; She seeks a stream and bathes in it, Nor haunt, I wis, the flowery treen ; And here is fanciful despair (p. 168) :— "I'll build a house of sobs and sighs, With tears the lime I'll slack; And there I'll stay with eyes that burn The house of love has been deserted, and the lover comes to moan beneath its silent eaves (p. 171):— "Dark house and window desolate ! Where is the sun which shone so fair? They weep, and feel a grievous chill: Dark house and widowed window-sill! " And what can be more piteous than this prayer? (p. 309) "Love, if you love me, delve a tomb, The simpler expression of sorrow to the death is, as usual, more impressive. A girl speaks thus within sight of the grave (p. 308): "Yes, I shall die: what wilt thou gain? The cross before my bier will go; And thou wilt hear the bells complain, The Misereres loud and low. Midmost the church thou 'lt see me lie With folded hands and frozen eye; Then say at last, I do repent!— Nought else remains when fires are spent." Here is a rustic Enone (p. 307) :— "Fell death, that fliest fraught with woe! |