E381020A. Findens’ Tableaux (1839).
The Athenæum, 20 October 1838, pp. 757–758.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 4, 400–402.
The plates of this volume, though still overcharged with sentiment and prettiness, in place of that feeling which pervades legitimate works of art,—appear to us more carefully finished than those of last year. Among the best groups are, “The Greek Wife,” and “The Novice,” both from Mr. Perring’s designs. As regards the letterpress, Miss Mitford has acted wisely in giving the poetical portion of her book a greater prominence and space than has hitherto been customary. There are few capable of writing such stories as “The Buccaneer,” and “The Cartel,” who would have been content to exhibit so self-denying a good taste. We must, however, rest content with a general acknowledgment of the literary merit of the volume, as we wish to make some extracts from Miss Barrett’s “Romaunt of the Page.” Thus it begins:—
A knight upon a battle-steed,
And a page on a steed beside,
From the holy war in Palestine
As slow and thoughtful ride,
As each were a palmer, and told for bead
The dew of the eventide.
“O young Page,” said the knight,
“A noble page art thou;
And fearing not to steep in blood
The curls upon thy brow
Anon in the tent, and anon in the fight,
Didst ward me a mortal blow?”
“O brave Knight,” said the page,
“A while since talkëd we
In tent and field; and then we talked
Of the deadly chivalry;—
But I have not a breath of that battle-rage
To breathe betwixt grass and tree! [p. 758→]
“Our friends are far behind;
The calm is very new;
Our steeds, with slow grass-muffled hoofs,
Tread deep the shadows through;
And from leaf to leaf the soul o’ the wind
Is sliding with the dew.
“Twice, when a pause was won,
I heard my mother pray!
I heard, Sir Knight, the prayer for me,
Wherein she passed away:
And I know the Heavens are leaning down,
To hear what I shall say!”
The page spake calm and high
As of no mean degree;
Perhaps he felt in nature’s broad
Full heart, his own was free!
And the knight looked up to his lifted eye,
Then answered smilingly:—
“Sir Page, I pray your grace;
Certes, I meant not so
To cross your pastoral mood, Sir Page,
With the crook of the battle-bow:
But a knight may speak of a lady’s face,
If the grasses die or grow!
“And this I meant to say,—
My ladye’s face shall shine,
As ladyes’ faces use, to see
My page from Palestine;
Or, speak she fair or prank she gay,
She is no lady of mine!
“And this I meant to fear—
Her bower may suit thee ill;
For, sooth, in that same field and tent,
Thy talk was very still;
And fitter thine hand for my knightly spear,
Than thy tongue for my ladye’s will.”
Slowly and thankfully
The young page bowed his head;
His large eyes seemed to muse a smile,
Until he blushed instead:
And I ween no lady in her bower
Could blush more sudden-red!
“Sir Knight, the bower of thy ladye
Will suit me well,” he said.
Beati, beati, mortui!
From the convent on the sea,
Which they pass not very nigh,
Swells the dirge as clear and high,
As over brake and over lea
Bodily the wind did carry
The great altar of St. Mary,
And the fifty tapers burning o’er it,
And the Lady Abbess dead before it,
And the nuns she yester-week did bless,
Chanting with their steady breath,
Palely chanting,—because less
They think upon the dead than death!
Beati, beati, mortui!
Now they wander back—away—
The uplands will not let them stay
To dark the western sun—
Mortui!—away at last,
Or ere the page’s blush is past!
And the knight heard all, and the page heard none.
The page then tremulously questions his master as to the history of his marriage, and the latter replies but coldly. He had been compelled to wed from a sense of honour—he had wedded his bride in a dark chamber, and parted from her at the altar’s foot, without seeing her face. Then the ballad continues:—
“My Page, my Page, what grieves thee so,
That the tears run down thy face?”
“Alas! what if my own sister
Was in thy ladye’s case!
But she lay down the silks she wore,
And followed him she wed before,
Disguised as his true servitor,
To the very battle-place.”
And wept the page, and laughed the knight,
A gay laugh laughëd he:
“Well done it were for thy sistèr,
But not for my ladyè!
No woman bright, my loves requite,
Unwomaned if she be.”
The page wept not—he smilëd cold—
“Some wisdoms may declare
That womanhood is provëd best
By golden brooch and glossy vest,
The mincing ladies wear.
Yet almost is it proved as well,
By truth,—or by despair.”
No more he smiled, no more he wept,
But passionate he spake,—
“Oh womanly she prayed in tent,
When none beside did wake!
Oh womanly she paled in fight,
For one belovëd’s sake!
And her little hand defiled with blood,
Her tender tears of womanhood,
Most woman-pure did make!
“Well done it were for thy sistèr,—
Thou tellest well her tale;
But for my lady she shall pray
I’ the kirk of Nydersdale—
No dread for me, but love for me
Shall make my lady pale—
No casque shall hide her woman’s tear—
It shall have room to trickle clear
Behind her woman’s veil.”
“But what if she mistook thy mind,
And followed thee to strife;
Then kneeling askëd thee for love,
As Paynims ask for life?”
“I would forgive; and evermore
Would love her as my servitor,
But little as my wife.
“Look up—there is a small bright cloud
Alone amid the skies!
So high, so pure, and so apart
A woman’s glory lies.”
The page looked up,—the cloud was sheen—
A sadder cloud did rush, I ween,
Betwixt it and his eyes.
The lord and his disguised page, ride onward, till the latter perceiving an enemy near at hand, whom his master does not see, finds an excuse, and loiters behind. Thus closes the ballad:—
He clenched his hands, as if to hold
His soul’s great agony—
“Have I renounced my womanhood,
For wifehood unto thee—
And is this the last last look of thine
That ever I shall see?—
“Yet God thee save,—and mayst thou have
A ladye to thy mind—
More woman-proud, not faithfuller,
Than one thou leav’st behind!
And God me take with Him to dwell,—
For Him I cannot love too well,
As I have loved my kind.”
She looketh up in earth’s despair,
The hopeful Heavens to seek—
There floateth still the little cloud,
Whereof her loved did speak!
How bright the little cloud appears!
Her eyelids fall upon the tears,
And the tears fall down her cheek.
* * * * *
The stroke of hoof, the flash of steel—
The Paynims round her coming!
The sound and sight have made her calm,
False page, but truthful woman:
She stands amid them all unmoved—
The heart once broken by the loved,
Is strong toward the foeman.
“Ho! Christian Page! art keeping sheep,
From pouring wine cups, resting?”
“I keep my maser’s noble name,
For warring, not for feasting.
And if that here Sir Hubert were,
My master brave, my master dear,
Ye would not stay to question.”
“Where is thy master, scornful Page,
That we may seize and bind him?”
“Now search the lea, and search the wood,
And see if ye can find him!
Nathless, as hath been often tried,
Your Paynim heroes faster ride
Before him than behind him.”
“Give smoother answers, lying Page,
Or perish in the lying.”
“I trow, an if the warrior brand
Beside my feet, were in my hand,
’Twere better at replying.”—
They cursed her deep, they smote her low,
They cleft her golden ringlets through,—
The loving is the dying!
She felt the scimetar gleam down,
And met it from beneath
With smile more bright in victory
Than any steel from sheath,—
Which glanced across her lip serene,
Most like the spirit-flash between
The darks of life and death!
Ingemisco ingemisco!
From the convent on the sea!
As over wood and over lea,
Bodily the wind did carry
The great altar of St. Mary,
And the fifty tapers paling o’er it,
And the Lady Abbess stark before it,
And the weary nuns with hearts that faintly
Beat along their voices saintly.
Ingemisco ingemisco!
That dirge for Abbess laid in shroud,
Sweepeth o’er the shroudless dead
With the dews upon her head,
All as sad, if not as loud.
Ingemisco ingemisco!
Is ever a lament begun
By mourner underneath the sun,
Which, ere it end, will suit but one?
Besides this, which seems to us one of the most beautiful things from a woman’s hand which has appeared for many a day, there are poems by Mr. John R. Chorley, Mr. Kenyon, and the author of “Provence and the Rhone.” We can only further add, that Miss Mitford’s prose is pleasantly varied by a contribution from one who has been some time missing from the world of fact or fiction—we mean, Amelia Opie.
Reviewed:
Findens’ Tableaux, ed. M.R. Mitford, London: 1839.
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