Kathrina—A Poem

A REFLECTION.

Oh! not by bread alone is manhood nourished
        To its supreme estate!
By every word of God have lived and flourished
        The good men and the great.
            Ay, not by bread alone!

"Oh! not by bread alone!" the sweet rose, breathing
        In throbs of perfume, speaks;
"But myriad hands, in earth and air, are wreathing
        The blushes for my cheeks.
            Ay, not by bread alone!"

"Oh! not by bread alone!" proclaims in thunder
        The old oak from his crest;
"But suns and storms upon me, and deep under,
        The rocks in which I rest.
            Ay, not by bread alone!"

"Oh! not by bread alone!" The truth flies singing
        In voices of the birds;
And from a thousand pastured hills is ringing
        The answer of the herds:
            "Ay, not by bread alone!"

Oh! not by bread alone! for life and being
        Are finely complex all,
And increment, with element agreeing,
        Must feed them, or they fall.
            Ay, not by bread alone!

Oh! not by love alone, though strongest, purest
        That ever swayed the heart;
For strongest passion evermore the surest
        Defrauds each manly part.
            Ay, not by love alone!

Oh! not by love alone is power engendered.
        Until within the soul
The gift of every motive has been rendered,
        It is not strong and whole.
            Ay, not by love alone!

Oh! not by love alone is manhood nourished
        To its supreme estate:
By every word of God have lived and flourished
        The good men and the great.
            Ay, not by love alone!

PART III.

LABOR.

Ten years of love!—a sleep, a pleasant dream
That passed its culmen in the early half,
Concluding in confusion—a wild scene
Of bargains, auctions, partings, and what not?—
And an awaking!

                                        I was in Broadway,
A unit in a million. Like a bath
In ocean surf, blown in from farthest seas
Under the August ardors, the grand rush
Of crested life assailed me with its waves,
And cooled me while it fired. With sturdy joy
I sought its broadest billows, and resigned
My spirit to their surge and sway; or stood
In sheltered coves, reached only by the spume
And crepitant bubbles of the yesty floods,
Drinking the roar, the sheen, the restlessness,
As inspiration, both of sense and soul.

I saw the waves of life roll up the steps
Of great cathedrals and retire; and break
In charioted grandeur at the feet
Of marble palaces, and toss their spray
Of feathered beauty through the open doors,
To pile the restless foam within; and burst
On crowded caravansaries, to fall
In quick return; and in dark currents glide
Through sinuous alleys and the grimy loops
Of reeking cellars; and with softest plash
Assail the gilded shrines of opulence,
And slide in musical relapse away.

With senses dazed and stunned, and soul o'erfilled
With chaos of new thoughts, I turned away,
And sought my city home. There all was calm,
With wife and daughter waiting my return,
And eager with their welcome. That was life!—
An interest in the great world of life,
A place for toil within a world of toil,
And love for its reward. "Amen!" I said,
"And twice amen! I've found my life at last,
And we will all be happy."

                                                            Day by day—
The while I sought adjustment to the life
Which I had chosen, and with careful thought
Gathered to hand the fair material
Elect by Fancy for the organism
Over whose germ she brooded—I went out,
To bathe again upon the shore of life
My long-enfeebled nature.

                                                            Every day
I met some face I knew. My college friends
Came up in strange disguises. Here was one,
With a white neck-cloth and a saintly face,
Who had been rusticated and disgraced
For lawlessness. Now he administered
A charge which proved that he had been at work,
And made himself a man. And there was one—
A lumpy sort of boy, as memory
Recalled him to me—grown to portliness
And splendid spectacles. He drove a chaise,
And practised surgery,—was on his way
To meet a class of youth, who sought to be
Great surgeons like himself, and took full notes
Of all his stolen wisdom. By his watch—
A gold repeater, with a mighty chain—
He gave me just five minutes; then rolled off—-
Pretension upon wheels. Another grasped
My hand as if I were his bosom friend,
Just in from a long voyage. He was one
Who stole my wood in college, and received
With grace the kick I gave him. He had grown
To be the tail of a portentous firm
Of city lawyers: managed, as he said,
The matter of collections; and had made
In his small way—to use his modest phrase,
Truthful as modest—quite a pretty plum.
He was o'erjoyed to see me in the town:
Hoped I would call upon him at his den:
If I had any business in his line,
Would do it for me promptly; as for price,
No need to talk of that between two friends!

But these, and all—the meanest and the best—
Were hard at work. They always questioned me
Before we parted, touching my pursuits;
And though they questioned kindly, I grew sore
Under the repetition, and ashamed
To iterate my answer, till I burned
To do some work, so lifted into fame,
That shame should be to him whose ignorance
Compelled a question.

                                                        Simplest foresters
Have learned the trick of woodland broods, that fly
In radiant divergence from the flash
Of death and danger, and, when all is still,
Steal back to where their fellows bit the dust
For rendezvous. And thus society
Follows the brutal instinct. When the friends,
Who from her father's ruin fled amain,
Found out my wife, and learned that it was safe
To gather back to the old feeding-ground,
They came. Her old home had become my own
And they were all delighted. It was sweet
To have her back again; and it was sad
To know that those who once were happy there,
Dispensing happiness, could come no more.

It had its modicum of earnestness,—
This talk of theirs—and she received it all
With hearty courtesy, and yielded it
The unction of her charity, so far
That it was smooth and redolent to her.
The difference—the world-wide difference—
Between my wife and them was obvious;
But she was generous through nature's gift
I fancied—could not well be otherwise;
Although their fawning filled me with disgust.
Oh! fool and blind! not to perceive the Christ
That shone and spoke in her!

                                                        The hour approached—
The predetermined time—when I should close
My study door, and wrap my kindling brain
In the poetic dream which, day by day,
Was gathering consistence in my brain.
The quick, creative instinct in me plumed
Its pinions for the flight, and I could feel
The influx of fresh power; but whence it
I did not question; though it fired my heart
With the assurance of success.

                                                            I told
My dear companion of my hopeful plans
For winning fame, and making for myself
A lofty place; but I could not inspire
Her heart with my ambition, or win o'er
Her judgment to my motive. She adhered
To her old theory, and gave no room
To any motive it did not embrace.
We argued much, but always argued wide,
And ended where we started. Postulates
On which we stood in perfect harmony,
Were points of separation, out from which
We struck divergently, till sympathy,
That only lives by rhythm of thoughts and hearts,
Lay dead between us.

                                    "Man loves praise," I said.
"It is an appetence which He who made
The human soul, made to be satisfied.
It is a tree He planted. If it grow
On that which feeds it, and become at last
Thrifty and fruitful, it is still His own,
With usury. And if, in His intent,
This passion have no place among the powers
Of active life, why is it mighty there
From youngest childhood? Pray you what is fame
But concrete praise?—the universal voice
Which bears, from every quarter of the earth.
Its homage to a name, that grows thereby
To be its own immortal monument
Outlasting all the marble and the bronze
Which cunning fingers, since the world began,
Have shaped or stamped with story? What is fame
But aggregate of praise? And if it be
Legitimate to win, for sake of praise,
The praise of one, why not of multitudes?"

"Ay," she replied; "'tis true that men love praise
And it is true that He who made the soul
Planted therein the love of praise, to be
A motive in its life—all true so far?
And so far we agree. But motives all
Have their appropriate sphere and sway, like men
Who bear them in their breasts. The love of praise
Fills life with fine amenities. Not all
Who live have pleasant tempers, and not all
The gift of gracious manners, or the love
Of nobler motive, higher meed than praise.
The world is full of bears, who smooth their hair,
And glove their paws, and put on manly airs,
And hold our honey sacred, and our lives
Our own, because they hunger for our praise.
'Tis a fine thing for bears—this love of praise—
And those who deal with them; and a good thing
For children, and for parents, teachers—all
Who have them in their keeping. It may hold
A little mind to rectitude, until
It grow, and grow ashamed to yield itself
To such a petty motive. Children all
Like sugar, and it may admit of doubt
Whether our praise or sugar sweetens more
Their petulant sub-acids; but a man
Would choke in swallowing the compliment
Which we should pay him, were we but to say
'Go to! Do some great deed, and you shall have
Your pay in sugar:—maple, mind you, now,
So you shall do it featly.'"

                                                            "Very good!"
I answered, "very good, indeed! if we
Engage in talk for sport; but argument
On themes like these must have the element
Of candor. Highest truth, in certain lights,
May be ridiculous, and yet be truth.
Women are angels: just a little weak
And just a little wicked, it may be,
Yet still the sweetest beings in the world;
But when one stands with apprehensive gasp
At verge of sternutation, or leaps off,
Projecting all her being in a sneeze,
Or snores with lips wide-parted, or essays
The 'double-quick,' we turn our eyes away
In sadness, that a creature so divine
Can be so shockingly ridiculous;
Yet who shall say she's not an angel still?
Now you present to me the meanest face
Of a most noble truth. I laugh with you
Over its sorry semblance; but the truth
Is still divine, and claims our reverence.
The great King Solomon—and you believe
In Solomon—has said that a good name
Is more to be desired than much fine gold.
If a good name be matter of desire
Beyond all wealth—and you will pardon me
For holding to the record—it may stand
As a grand motive in the life of man,
To grand endeavor. I have yet to learn
That Solomon addressed his words to bears,
Or little children. I am forced to think
That you and I, and all who read his words,
Are those for whom he wrote."

                                                          Rejoining she:
"A good may be the subject of desire,
And not be motive to achievement. Life,
If I may speak the riddle, is a scheme
Of indirections. My own happiness
Is something to desire; and yet, I know
That I must win it by forgetting it
In ministry to others. If I make
My happiness the motive of my work,
I spoil it by the taint of selfishness.
But are you sure that you do not presume
Somewhat too much, in claiming the desire
For a good name as motive of your life?
Greatness, not goodness, is the end you seek,
If I mistake you not; and these are held,
In the world's thought, as two, and most distinct.
King Solomon was wise, but wiser He
Who said to those who loved and followed him,
'Who would be great among you, let him serve.'
The greatest men and artists should be such,
For they are God's nobility and man's
Should work from greatest motives. Selfishness
Is never great, and moves to no great deeds.
To honor God, to benefit mankind,
To serve with lofty gifts the lowly needs
Of the poor race for which the God-man died,
And do it all for love—oh! this is great!
And he who does this will achieve a name
Not only great but good."

                                                    "Not in this world,"
I answered her. "I know too much of it.
The world is selfish; and it never gives
Due credit to a motive which assumes
To be above its own. If a man write,
It takes for granted that he writes for fame,
And judges him accordingly. It holds
Of no account all other aims and ends;
And visits with contempt the man who bears
A mission to his kind. The critic pens
That twiddle with his work, or play with it
As cats with mice, are not remarkable
For gentle instincts; and my name must live
By pens like these. I choose to take the world
Just as I find it, and I pitch my tune
To the world's key, that it may sing my tune.
And sing for me. Ay, and I take myself
Just as I find myself. I do not love
The human race enough to work for it.
Having no motive of philanthropy,
I'll make pretence to none. The love of praise
I count legitimate and laudable.
'Tis not the noblest motive in the world,
But it is good; and it has won more fames
Than any other. Surely, my good wife,
You would not shut me from it, and deprive
My power of its sole impulse."

                                                            "No; oh! no,"
She answered quickly. "I am only sad
That it should be the captain of your host.
All creatures of the brain are the result
Of many motives and of many powers.
All life is such, indeed. The power that leads—
The motive dominant—this stamps the work
With its own likeness. Throughout all the world
Are careful souls, with careful consciences,
That pierce themselves with questionings and fears
Because that, with the motives which are good,
And which alone they seek, a hundred come
They do not seek, and aye sophisticate
Their finest action. They are wrong in this:
All motives bowing to one leadership,
And aiding its emprise, are one with it—
The same in trend, the same in terminus.
All the low motives that obey the law,
And aid the work, of one above them all,
Do holy service, and fulfil the end
For which they were designed. The love of praise
Is not the lowest motive which can move
The human soul. Nay, it may do good work
As a subordinate, and leave no soil
On whitest fabric, at whose selvage shines
The Master's broidered signature. Although
You write for fame, think not you will escape
The press of other motives. You love me;
You love your child; you love your pleasant home;
You love the memory of one long dead.
These, joined with all those qualities of heart
Which make you dear to me, will throng around
The leader you appoint, and come and go
Under his banner; and the work of God
Will thrive through these, the while your own goes on
God will not be defrauded, nor yet man;
And you, who like the Pharisees make prayer
At corners of the streets, for praise of men,
Will have reward you seek."

                                                        "Ay, verily!"
Responded I with laughter. "Verily!
Though not a saint, I'll do a saintly work
For my own profit, and in spite of all
The selfishness that moves me. Better, this,
Than I suspected. My sweet casuist—
My gentle, learned, lovely casuist—
I thank you; and I'll pay you more than thanks.
I'll promise that when these fine motives come,
And volunteer their service, they shall find
Welcome and entertainment, and a place
Within the rank and file, with privilege
Of quick promotion, so they show themselves
Motives of mettle."

                                        This the type of talk
That passed between us. I was not a fool
To count her wisdom worthless; nor a God,
To work regeneration in myself.
That something which I longed for, to fill up
The measure of my good, was human praise;
Yet I could see that she was wholly right,
And that she held within herself resource
Of satisfaction better than my own.
But I was quite content—content to know
I trod the average altitude of those
Within the paths of art, and had no aims
To be misconstrued or misunderstood
By Pride and Selfishness—that these, in truth,
Expected of me what I had to give.

Strange, how a man may carry in his heart,
From year to year—through all his life, indeed—
A truth, or a conviction, which shall be
No more a part of it, and no more worth
Than to his flask the cork that slips within!
Of this he learns by sourness of his wine,
Of muddle of its color; by the bits
That vex his lips while drinking; but he feels
No impulse in his hand to draw it forth,
And bid it crown and keep the draught it spoils.

I write this, here, not for its relevance
To this one passage of my story, but
Because there slipped into my consciousness
Just at this juncture, and would not depart,
A truth I carried there for many years,
Each minute seeing, feeling, tasting it,
Yet never touching it with an attempt
To draw it forth, and put it to its place.

One evening, when our usual theme was up,
I asked my wife in playful earnestness
How she became so wise. "You talk," I said,
"Like one who has survived a thousand years,
And drunk the wisdom of a thousand lives."

"Who lacketh wisdom, let him ask of God,
Who giveth freely and upbraideth not,"
Was her reply.

                                        "I never ask of God,"
I said. "So, while you take at second hand
His breathings to the artist, I will take
At second hand the wisdom that he gives
To you his teacher."

                                                "Do you never pray?"

"Never," I answered her. "I cannot pray:
You know the reason. Never since the day
God shut his heart against my mother's prayer
Have I raised one petition, or been moved
To reverence."

                                Her long, dark lashes fell,
And from her eyes there dropped two precious tears
That bathed her folded hands. She pitied me,
With tenderness beyond the reach of words.
I did not seek her pity. I was proud,
And asked her if she blamed me.

                                                                    "No," she said;
"I have no right to blame you, and no wish.
I marvel only that a man like you
Can hold so long the errors of a boy.
I've looked—with how much longing, words of mine
Can never tell—for reason to restore
That priceless thing which passion stole from you,
And looked in vain."

Though piqued by the reproach
Her words conveyed (unwittingly I knew),
I wished to learn where, in her theory
Of human life, my case had found a place;
So, bidding pride aback, I questioned her.
"You are so wise in other things," I said,
"And read so well God's dealings with his own,
Perhaps you can explain this mystery
That clouds my life."

                                                "I know that God is good,"
She answered, "and, although my reason fail
To explicate the mystery that wraps
His providence, it does not shake my faith.
But this sad case of yours has seemed so plain,
That Reason well may spare the staff of Faith
To climb to its conclusions. You are loved,
My husband: can you tell your wife for what?"

"Oh! modesty! my dear; hem! modesty!
Spare me these blushes! I have not at hand
The printed catalogue of qualities
Which give you inspiration, and decline
The personal rehearsal."

                                                    "You mistake,"
She answered, smiling. "Not for modesty;
And as for blushes, they're not patent yet.
But frankly, soberly, I ask you this:
Have you a quality of heart or brain
Which makes you lovable, and in my eyes
A man to be admired, that was not born
Quick in your blood? Pray, have you anything
Which you did not inherit? Who to me
Furnished my husband? By what happy law
Was all that was the finest, noblest, best
In those who gave you life, bestowed on you?
You have your father's form, your father's brain:
You have your mother's eyes, your mother's heart.
Those twain produced a man for me to love,
Out of themselves. I am obliged to them
For the most precious good the round earth holds,
Transmitted by a law that slew them both.
It was not sin, or shame, for them to die
Just as they died. They passed with whiter hands
Up to The Throne than he who wantonly
Murders a sparrow. When your mother prayed
She prayed for the suspension of the law
By which from Eve, the mother of the race,
She had received the grace and loveliness
Which made her precious to your heart—the law
By which alone she could convey these gifts
To others of her blood. Your daughter's face
Is beautiful, her soul is pure and sweet,
By largess of this law. Could God subvert,
To meet her wish, though shaped in agony,
The law which, since the life of man began
In life of God, has kept the channel clear
For His own blood, that it might bless the last
Of all the generations as the first?
What could He more than give her liberty—
When reason lay in torture or in wreck,
And life was death—to part with stainless hand
The tie that held her from his loving breast?"

If God himself had dropped her words from heaven.
They had not reached with surer plummet-plunge
The depths of my conviction. I was dumb;
I opened not my mouth; but left her side,
And sought the crowded street. I felt that all
Delusions, subterfuges, self-deceits,
By which my soul had shut itself from God,
Were stripped away, and that no barrier
Was interposed between us which was not
My own hand's building. Never, nevermore,
Could I hold God in blame, or deem myself
A guiltless, injured creature. I could see
That I was hard, implacable, unjust;
And that by force of wilful choice I held
Myself from God; for no impulsion came
To seek his face and favor. Nay, I feared
And fought such incidence, as enemy
Of all my plans.

                            So it became thenceforth
A problem with me how to separate
My new conviction from my life—to hold
A revolutionizing truth within,
And hold it yet so loosely, it should be
Like a dumb alien in a mural town—
No guest, but an intruder, who might bide,
By law or grace, but win no domicile,
And hold no power.

                                            When I returned, that night
My course was chosen, with such sense of guilt
I blushed before the calm, inquiring eyes
That met me at my threshhold; but the theme
Was dropped just there. My gentle mentor read
The secret of the struggle and the sin,
And left me to myself.

                                                At the set time,
I entered on my task. The discipline
Of early years told feebly on my work,
For dissipation and disuse of power
Had brought me back to infancy again.
My will was weak, my patience was at fault,
And in my fretful helplessness, I stormed
And sighed by turns; yet still I held in force
Determination, as reserve of will;
And when I flinched or faltered, always fell
Back upon that, and saved my powers from rout.
Casting, recasting, till I found the germ
Of my conception putting forth its whorls
In orderly succession round the stem
Of my design, that straight and strong shot up
Toward inflorescence, my long work went on,
Till I was filled with satisfying joy.
This lasted for a little time, and then
There came reaction. I grew tired of it.
My verses were as meaningless and stale
As doggrel of the stalls. I marvelled much
That they could ever have beguiled my pride
Into self-gratulation, or done aught
But overwhelm me with contempt for them,
And the dull pen that wrote them.

                                                                I had hoped
To form and finish my projected work
Within, and by, myself,—to tease no ear
With fragmentary snatches of my song,
And call for no support from friendly praise
To reinforce my courage; but the stress
Of my disgust and my despair—the need,
Imperative and absolute, to brace myself
By some opinion borrowed for the nonce,
And bathe my spirit in the sympathy
Of some strong nature—mastered my intent,
And sent me for resource to her whose heart
Was ever open to my call.

                                                        She sat
Through the long hour in which I read to her,
Absorbed, entranced, as one who sits alone
Within a dim cathedral, and resigns
His spirit to the organ-theme, that mounts,
Or sinks in tremulous pauses, or sweeps out
On mighty pinions and with trumpet voice
Through labyrinthine harmonies, at last
Emerging, and through silver clouds of sound
Receding and receding, till it melts
In the abysses of the upper sky.
It was not needful she should say a word;
For in her glowing eyes and kindling face,
I caught the full assurance that my heart
Had yearned for; but she spoke her hearty praise
And when I asked her for her criticism,
Bestowed it with such modest deference
To my opinion, as to spare my pride;
Yet, with such subtle sense of harmony,
And insight of proportion, that I saw
That I should find no critic in the world
More competent or more severe. I said,
Gulping my pride: "Better this ordeal
In friendly hands, before the time of types,
Than afterward, in hands of enemies!"

So, from that reading, it was understood
Between us that, whenever I essayed
Revising and retouching, I should know
Her intimate impressions, and receive
Her frank suggestions. In this oversight
And constant interest of one whose mind
Was excellent and pure, and raised above
All motive to beguile me, I secured
New inspiration.

                                        Weeks and months passed by
With gradient hopefulness, and strength renewed
At each renewal of the confidence
I had reposed in her; till I perceived
That I was living on her praise—that she
Held God's place in me and the multitude's.
And now, as I look back upon those days
Of difficult endeavor, I confess
That had she not been with me, I had failed—
Ay, foundered in mid-sea—my hope, my life,
The spoil of deep oblivion.

                                                                At last
The work was done—the labored volume closed.
"I cannot make it better," I exclaimed.
"I can write better, but, before I write,
I must have recognition in the voice
Of public praise. A good paymaster pays
When work is finished. Let him pay for this,
And I will work again; but, till he pay,
My leisure is my own, and I will wait."

"And if he grudge your wage?" suggested she
To whom I spoke.

                                        "I shall be finished too."

Came then the proofs and latest polishing
Of words and phrases—work I shared with her
To whom I owed so much; and then the fear,
The deathly heart-fall, and the haunting dread
That go before exposure to the world
Of inmost life, and utmost reach of power
Toward revelation;—then the shrinking spell,
When morbid love of self awaits in pain
The verdict it has courted.

                                                            But at last
The book was out. My daughter's hand in mine—
Her careless feet, that thrilled with springing life,
Skipping the pavement—I walked down Broadway,
To ease the restlessness and cool the heat
That vexed my idle waiting. As we passed
A showy window, filled with costly books,
My little girl exclaimed: "Oh, father! See!
There is your name!"

                                            Straight all the bravery
Within my veins, at one wild heart-thump, dropped,
And I was limp as water; but I paused,
And read the placard. It announced my book
In characters of flame, with adjectives
My daring publisher had filched, I think
From an old circus broadside.

                                                    "Well!" thought I—
Biting my lip—"I'm in the market now!
How much—O! rattling, roaring multitude!
O! selfish, cheating, lying multitude!
O! hawking, trading, delving multitude!—
How much for one man's hope, for one man's life?
What for his toil and pain?—his heart's red blood?
What for his brains and breeding? Oh, how much
For one who craves your praises with your pence,
And dies with your denial?"

                                                            I went in,
And bought my book—not doubting I was first
To give response to my apostrophe.
The smug old clerk, who found his length of ear
Convenient as a pencil-rack, and thus
Made nature's wrath proclaim the praise of trade,
Wrapped my dear bantling well; and, as he dropped
My dollar in his till, smiled languidly
Upon my little girl, and said to me—
To cheer me in my purchase—that the book
Was thought to be a deuced clever thing.
He never read such books; he had no time;
Indeed, he had no interest in them.
Still, other people had, and it was well,
For it helped trade along.

                                                        It was for him—
A vulgar fraction of the integral
We speak of as "the people," and "the world"—
I had been writing! Had he read my book,
And given it his praise, I should have been
Delighted, though I knew that his applause
Was worthless as his brooch. I was a fool
Undoubtedly; yet I could understand,
Better than e'er before, how separate
The artist is from such a soul as his—
What need of teachers and interpreters
To crumble in his pewter porringer
The rounded loaf, whose crust was adamant
To his weak fingers.

                                            The next morning's press
Was purchased early, though I read in vain
To find my reputation. But at night,
My door-bell rang; and I received a note
From one who edited an evening print,
(I had dined with him at my publisher's),
Inclosing a review, and venturing
The hope that I should like it.

                                                                    Cunning man!
He knew the tricks of trade, and was adroit.
My poem was "a revelation." I had "burst
Like thunder from a calm and cloudless sky."
Well, not to quote his language, this the drift:
A man of fortune, living at his ease,
But fond of manly effort, had sat down,
And turned his culture to supreme account;
And he—the editor—took on himself
To thank him on the world's behalf. Withal,
The poet had betrayed the continence
Of genius. He had held, undoubtedly,
The consciousness of power from early youth;
But, yielding never to the itch for print,
Had nursed and chastened and developed it,
Until his hand was strong, and swept his lyre
With magic of a master.

                                                Followed here
Sage comments on the rathe and puny brood
Of poet-sucklings, who had rushed to type
Before their time—pale stems that spun their flowers
In the first sunshine, but, when Autumn came,
Were fruitless. It was pleasant, too, to see,
In such an age of sentimental cant,
One man who dared to hold up to the world
A creature of his brain, and say: "Look you!
This is my thought; and it shall stand alone.
It has no moral, bears no ministry
Of pious teaching, and makes no appeal
To sufferance or suffrage of the muffs
Who, in the pulpit or the press, prepare
The nation's pap. The fiery-footed barb
That pounds the pampas, and the lily-bells
That hang above the brooks, present the world
With no apology for being there,
And no attempt to justify themselves
In uselessness. It is enough for God
That they are beautiful, and hold his thought
In fine embodiment; and it shall be
Enough for me that, in this book of mine,
I have created somewhat that is strong
And beautiful, which, if it profit,—well:
If not, 'tis no less strong and beautiful,
And holds its being by no feebler right."

Ay, it was glorious to find one man
Who piled no packs upon his Pegasus,
Nor chained him to a rag-cart, loaded down
With moral frippery, and strings of bells
To call the people to their windows.

                                                                                Then
There followed extracts, with a change of type
To mark the places where the editor
Had caught a fancy hiding, which he feared
Might slip detection under slower eyes
Than those he carried; or to emphasize
Felicities of diction that were stiff
In Roman verticals, but grew divine
At the Italic angle; then apology,
Profoundly humble, to his patrons all
For quoting at such length, and one to me
For quoting anything, and deep regrets,
In quite a general way, that lack of space
Forbade a reproduction of the book
From title-page to tail-piece, winding up
With counsel to all lovers of pure art,
Patrons of genius, all Americans,
All friends of cis-Atlantic literature,
To buy the book, and read it for themselves.

I drank the whole, at one long, luscious draught;
Tipping the tankard high, that I might see
My features at the bottom, and regale
My pride, after my palate. Then I tossed
The paper to my wife, and bade her read.
I watched her while she read, but failed to find
The sympathy of pleasure in her face
I had expected. Finishing at last,
She raised her eyes, and, fixing them on me,
Said thoughtfully: "You like this, I suspect."

"Well, truly!" I responded, "since it seems
To be the first instalment of the wage
Which you suggested might come grudgingly.
Ay, it is sweet to me. I know it fails
In nice discrimination,—that it slurs
Defects which I perceive as well as you;
But it is kind, and places in best light
Such excellences as we both may find—
May claim, indeed."

                                            "And yet, it is a lie,
Or what the editor would call 'a puff,'
From first to last. The 'continence,' my dear,
'Of genius!' What of that? And what about
The 'manly effort,' for whose exercise
He thanked you on the world's behalf? And so
Your nursing, chastening and developing
Of power!—Pray what of these?"

                                                            "Oh! wife!" I said,
"Don't spoil it all! Be pitiful, my love!
I am a baby—granted: so I need
The touch of tender hands, and something sweet
To keep me happy."

                                                "Babies take a bath,
Sometimes, from which the hand of warmest love
Filches the chill, and you must have one dash,"
She answered me, "to close your complement.
The weakest spot in all your book, he found
With a quick instinct; and on that he spent
His sharpest force and finest rhetoric,
Shoring and bracing it on every side
With bold assumptions and affirmatives,
To blind the eyes of novices, and scare
With fierce forestalment all the critic-quills
Now bristling for their chance. He saw at once
Your poem had no mission, save, perhaps,
The tickle of the taste, and that it bore
Upon its glowing gold small food for life.
He saw just there the point to be attacked;
And there threw up his earth-works, and spread out
His thorned abattis. He was very kind
Undoubtedly, and very cunning, too;
For well he knew that there are earnest souls
In the broad world, who claim that highest art
Is highest ministry to human need;
And that the artist has no Christian right
To prostitute his art to selfish ends,
Or make it vehicle alone of plums
For the world's pudding."

                                        "These will speak in time,"
Responded I; "but they have not the ear
Of the broad world, I think. The Christian right
Of which you speak is hardly recognized
Among the multitude, or by the guild
In which I claim a place. The sectaries
Who furnish folios, quartos, magazines,
To the religious few, are limited
In influence; and these, my wife, are all
I have to fear;—nay, could I but arouse
Their bitter enmity, I might receive
Such superflux of praise and patronage
As would o'erwhelm my sweetly Christian wife
With shame and misery. But we shall see;
And, in the meantime, let us be content
That, if one man shall praise me overmuch,
Ten, at the least, will fail to render me
Befitting justice."

                                        As the days went on,
Reviews and notices came pouring in.
I was notorious, at least; and fame,
I whispered comfortably to myself,
Is only notoriety turned gray,
With less of fire, if more of steadiness.
The adverse verdicts were not numerous;
And these were rendered, as I fancied then,
By sanctimonious fools who deemed profane
All verse outside their thumb-worn hymnodies.
My book received the rattling fusilade
Of all the dailies: then the artillery
Of the hebdomadals, whose noisy shells,
Though timed by fuse to burst on Saturday,
Exploded at the middle of the week;
At last, a hundred-pounder quarterly
Gave it a single missive from its mask
Of far and dark impersonality.
The smoke cleared up, and still my colors
And still my book stood proudly in the sun,
Nor breached nor battered.

                                                        I had won a place
That I was sure of. All had said of me
That I was "brilliant:" was not that enough?
The petty pesterers, with card and stamp,
Who hunt for autographs, were after me,
In packages by post; and idle men
Held me at corners by the button-hole,
And introduced me to their friends. I dined
With meek-eyed men, whose literary wives
Were dying all to know me, as they said;
And the lyceums, quick at scent and sight—
Watching the jungles for a lion—all
Courted the delectation of my roar
Upon their platforms, pledging to my hand
(With city reference to stanchest names),
Such honoraria as would have been
The lion's share of profits. These were straws;
But they had surer fingers for the wind
Than withes or weathercocks.