Selected Poems (140 page)

MYRRHA
: And pure as is my love to thee, shall they,

Purged from the dross of earth, and earthly passion,

Mix pale with thine. A single thought yet irks me.

475

SARDANAPALUS
: Say it.

MYRRHA
:It is that no kind hand will gather

The dust of both into one urn.

SARDANAPALUS
:The better:

Rather let them be borne abroad upon

The winds of heaven, and scatter’d into air,

Than be polluted more by human hands

480

Of slaves and traitors. In this blazing palace,

And its enormous walls of reeking ruin,

We leave a nobler monument than Egypt

Hath piled in her brick mountains, o’er dead kings,

Or
kine
, for none know whether those proud piles

485

Be for their monarch, or their ox-god Apis:

So much for monuments that have forgotten

Their very record!

MYRRHA
:Then farewell, thou earth!

And loveliest spot of earth! farewell, Ionia!

Be thou still free and beautiful, and far

490

Aloof from desolation! My last prayer

Was for thee, my last thoughts, save one, were of thee!

SARDANAPALUS
: And that?

MYRRHA
:Is yours.

[
The trumpet of
PANIA
sounds without
.]

SARDANAPALUS
:Hark!

MYRRHA
:
Now
!

SARDANAPALUS
:Adieu, Assyria!

I loved thee well, my own, my fathers’ land,

And better as my country than my kingdom.

495

I sated thee with peace and joys; and this

Is my reward! and now I owe thee nothing,

Not even a grave.

[
He mounts the pile
.]

Now, Myrrha!

MYRRHA
:Art thou ready?

SARDANAPALUS
: As the torch in thy grasp.

[
MYRRHA
fires the pile
.]

MYRRHA
:’Tis fired! I come.

[
As
MYRRHA
springs forward to throw herself into the flames, the Curtain falls
.]

Who kill’d John Keats?

Are you aware that Shelley has written an Elegy on Keats, and accuses the Quarterly of killing him?

’Who kill’d John Keats?’

‘I,’ says the Quarterly,

‘So savage and Tartarly;

’Twas one of my feats.’

5

‘Who shot the arrow?’

‘The poet-priest Milman

(So ready to kill man),

Or Southey or Barrow.’

THE BLUES
A Literary Eclogue

‘Nimium ne crede colorí.’ — V
IRGIL
.

O trust not, ye beautiful creatures, to hue, Though your
hair were as red, as your stockings are blue
.

Eclogue First

London – Before the Door of a Lecture Room.

[
Enter
TRACY
,
meeting
INKEL
.]

INKEL
: You’re too late.

TRACY
:Is it over?

INKEL
: Nor will be this hour. But the benches are cramm’d, like a garden in flower, With the pride of our belles, who have made it the fashion;

So, instead of ‘beaux arts,’ we may say ‘la
belle
passion’

5

For learning, which lately has taken the lead in The world, and set all the fine gentlemen reading.

TRACY
: I know it too well, and have worn out my patience With studying to study your new publications.

There’s Vamp, Scamp, and Mouthy, and Wordswords and Co.

10

With their damnable –

INKEL
:Hold, my good friend, do you know Whom you speak to?

TRACY
:Right well, boy, and so does ‘the Row:’ You’re an author – a poet –

INKEL
: And think you that I Can stand tamely in silence, to hear you decry The Muses?

TRACY
: Excuse me: I meant no offence

15

To the Nine; though the number who make some pretence To their favours is such — but the subject to drop, I am just piping hot from a publisher’s shop, (Next door to the pastry-cook’s; so that when I Cannot find the new volume I wanted to buy

20

On the bibliopole’s shelves, it is only two paces, As one finds every author in one of those places;) Where I just had been skimming a charming critique, So studded with wit, and so sprinkled with Greek! Where your friend — you know who — has just got such a threshing,

25

That it is, as the phrase goes, extremely ‘
refreshing
.’ What a beautiful word!

INKEL
: Very true; ’tis so soft And so cooling – they use it a little too oft; And the papers have got it at last – but no matter. So they’ve cut up our friend then?

TRACY
: Not left him a tatter –

30

Not a rag of his present or past reputation, Which they call a disgrace to the age and the nation.

INKEL
: I’m sorry to hear this! for friendship, you know – Our poor friend! – but I thought it would terminate so. Our friendship is such, I’ll read nothing to shock it.

35

You don’t happen to have the Review in your pocket?

TRACY
: No; I left a round dozen of authors and others (Very sorry, no doubt, since the cause is a brother’s) All scrambling and jostling, like so many imps, And on fire with impatience to get the next glimpse.

40

INKEL
: Let us join them.

TRACY
:What, won’t you return to the lecture?

INKEL
: Why, the place is so cramm’d, there’s not room for a spectre.

Besides, our friend Scamp is to-day so absurd –

TRACY
: How can you know that till you hear him?

INKEL
: I heard Quite enough; and, to tell you the truth, my retreat

45

Was from his vile nonsense, no less than the heat.

TRACY
: I have had no great loss then?

INKEL
:Loss! – such a palaver! I’d inoculate sooner my wife with the slaver Of a dog when gone rabid, than listen two hours To the torrent of trash which around him he pours,

50

Pump’d up with such effort, disgorged with such labour, That—come — do not make me speak ill of one’s neighbour.

TRACY
:
I
make you!

INKEL
: Yes, you! I said nothing until You compell’d me, by speaking the truth —

TRACY
:
To speak ill
? Is that your deduction?

INKEL
:When speaking of Scamp ill,

55

I certainly
follow, not set
an example. The fellow’s a fool, an impostor, a zany.

TRACY
: And the crowd of to-day shows that one fool makes many.

But we two will be wise.

INKEL:Pray, then, let us retire.

TRACY: I would, but —

INKEL: There must be attraction much higher

60

Than Scamp, or the Jews’ harp he nicknames his lyre, To call
you
to this hotbed.

TRACY:I own it – tis true A fair lady –

INKEL
:A spinster?

TRACY
:Miss Lilac!

INKEL
:The Blue! The heiress?

TRACY
:The angel!

INKEL
:The devil! why, man!

Pray get out of this hobble as fast as you can.

65

You
wed with Miss Lilac! ’twould be your perdition:

She’s a poet, a chymist, a mathematician.

TRACY
: I say she’s an angel.

INKEL:
Say rather an
angle
.

If you and she marry, you’ll certainly wrangle.

I say she’s a Blue, man, as blue as the ether.

70

TRACY: And is that any cause for not coming together?

INKEL
: Humph! I can’t say I know any happy alliance Which has lately sprung up from a wedlock with science.

She’s so learned in all things, and fond of concerning

Herself in all matters connected with learning,

75

That -

TRACY
: What?

INKEL
:I perhaps may as well hold my tongue; But there’s five hundred people can tell you you’re wrong.

TRACY
: You forget Lady Lilac’s as rich as a Jew.

INKEL
: Is it miss or the cash of mamma you pursue?

TRACY
: Why, Jack, I’ll be frank with you – something of both.

80

The girl’s a fine girl.

INKEL
:And you feel nothing loth To her good lady-mother’s reversion; and yet Her life is as good as your own, I will bet.

TRACY
: Let her live, and as long as she likes; I demand Nothing more than the heart of her daughter and hand.

85

INKEL: Why, that heart’s in the inkstand – that hand on the pen;

TRACY: A propos – Will you write me a song now and then?

INKEL
: To what purpose?

TRACY
: You know, my dear friend, that in prose My talent is decent, as far as it goes; But in rhyme—

INKEL
:You’re a terrible stick, to be sure.

90

TRACY
: I own it; and yet, in these times, there’s no lure For the heart of the fair like a stanza or two; And so, as I can’t, will you furnish a few?

INKEL
: In your name?

TRACY
:In my name. I will copy them out, To slip into her hand at the very next rout.

95

INKEL:
Are you so far advanced as to hazard this?

TRACY
:Why, Do you think me subdued by a Blue-stocking’s eye, So far as to tremble to tell her in rhyme

What I’ve told her in prose, at the least, as sublime?

INKEL
:
As sublime
! – If it be so, no need of my Muse.

100

TRACY
: But consider, dear Inkel, she’s one of the ‘Blues.’

INKEL
: As sublime! — Mr Tracy — I’ve nothing to say. Stick to prose — As sublime!! — but I wish you good day.

TRACY
: Nay, stay, my dear fellow – consider – I’m wrong; I own it; but, prithee, compose me the song.

105

INKEL
:
As
sublime!!

TRACY
:I but used the expression in haste.

INKEL
: That may be, Mr Tracy, but shows damn’d bad taste.

TRACY
: I own it – I know it – acknowledge it – what Can I say to you more?

INKEL
:I see what you’d be at: You disparage my parts with insidious abuse,

110

Till you think you can turn them best to your own use.

TRACY
: And is that not a sign I respect them?

INKEL
:Why that

To be sure makes a difference.

TRACY
: I know what is what: And you, who’re a man of the gay world, no less Than a poet of t’other, may easily guess

115

That I never could mean, by a word, to offend A genius like you, and moreover my friend.

INKEL
: No doubt; you by this time should know what is due. To a man of— but come — let us shake hands.

TRACY
:You knew, And you
know
, my dear fellow, how heartily I,

20

Whatever you publish, am ready to buy.

INKEL
: That’s my bookseller’s business; I care not for sale; Indeed the best poems at first rather fail. There were Renegade’s epics, and Botherby’s plays, And my own grand romance —

125

TRACY
:Had its full share of praise. I myself saw it puff’d in the ‘Old Girl’s Review.’

INKEL
: What Review?

TRACY
: ’Tis the English ‘Journal de Trevoux;’ A clerical work of our jesuits at home. Have you never yet seen it?

INKEL
:That pleasure’s to come.

TRACY
: Make haste then.

INKEL
:Why so?

TRACY
:I have heard people say

130

That it threaten’d to give up the
ghost
t’other day.
INKEL
: Well, that is a sign of some
spirit
.
TRACY
: No doubt.

Shall you be at the Countess of Fiddlecome’s rout? INKEL: I’ve a card, and shall go: but at present, as soon