None e’er could trace its laughter to his eye: | |
Yet there was softness too in his regard, | |
At times, a heart as not by nature hard, | |
305 | But once perceived, his spirit seem’d to chide |
Such weakness, as unworthy of its pride, | |
And steel’d itself, as scorning to redeem | |
One doubt from others’ half withheld esteem; | |
In self-inflicted penance of a breast | |
310 | Which tenderness might once have wrung from rest; |
In vigilance of grief that would compel | |
The soul to hate for having loved too well. | |
XVIII | |
There was in him a vital scorn of all: | |
As if the worst had fall’n which could befall, | |
315 | He stood a stranger in this breathing world, |
An erring spirit from another hurl’d; | |
A thing of dark imaginings, that shaped | |
By choice the perils he by chance escaped; | |
But ’scaped in vain, for in their memory yet | |
320 | His mind would half exult and half regret: |
With more capacity for love than earth | |
Bestows on most of mortal mould and birth, | |
His early dreams of good outstripp’d the truth, | |
And troubled manhood follow’d baffled youth; | |
325 | With thought of years in phantom chase misspent, |
And wasted powers for better purpose lent; | |
And fiery passions that had pour’d their wrath | |
In hurried desolation o’er his path, | |
And left the better feelings all at strife | |
330 | In wild reflection o’er his stormy life; |
But haughty still, and loth himself to blame, | |
He call’d on Nature’s self to share the shame, | |
And charged all faults upon the fleshly form | |
She gave to clog the soul, and feast the worm; | |
335 | Till he at last confounded good and ill, |
And half mistook for fate the acts of will: | |
Too high for common selfishness, he could | |
At times resign his own for others’ good, | |
But not in pity, not because he ought, | |
340 | But in some strange perversity of thought, |
That sway’d him onward with a secret pride | |
To do what few or none would do beside; | |
And this same impulse would, in tempting time, | |
Mislead his spirit equally to crime; | |
345 | So much he soar’d beyond, or sunk beneath, |
The men with whom he felt condemn’d to breathe, | |
And long’d by good or ill to separate | |
Himself from all who shared his mortal state; | |
His mind abhorring this had fix’d her throne | |
350 | Far from the world, in regions of her own: |
Thus coldly passing all that pass’d below, | |
His blood in temperate seeming now would flow: | |
Ah! happier if it ne’er with guilt had glow’d, | |
But ever in that icy smoothness flow’d! | |
355 | ’Tis true, with other men their path he walk’d, |
And like the rest in seeming did and talk’d, | |
Nor outraged Reason’s rules by flaw nor start, | |
His madness was not of the head, but heart; | |
And rarely wander’d in his speech, or drew | |
360 | His thoughts so forth as to offend the view. |
XIX | |
With all that chilling mystery of mien, | |
And seeming gladness to remain unseen, | |
He had (if ’twere not nature’s boon) an art | |
Of fixing memory on another’s heart: | |
365 | It was not love perchance—nor hate—nor aught |
That words can image to express the thought; | |
But they who saw him did not see in vain | |
And once beheld, would ask of him again: | |
And those to whom he spake remembered well, | |
370 | And on the words, however light, would dwell: |
None knew, nor how, nor why, but he entwined | |
Himself perforce around the hearer’s mind; | |
There he was stamp’d, in liking, or in hate, | |
If greeted once; however brief the date | |
375 | That friendship, pity, or aversion knew, |
Still there within the inmost thought he grew. | |
You could not penetrate his soul, but found, | |
Despite your wonder, to your own he wound; | |
His presence haunted still; and from the breast | |
380 | He forced an all unwilling interest: |
Vain was the struggle in that mental net, | |
His spirit seem’d to dare you to forget! | |
XX | |
There is a festival, where knights and dames, | |
And aught that wealth or lofty lineage claims, | |
385 | Appear—a highborn and a welcome guest |
To Otho’s hall came Lara with the rest. | |
The long carousal shakes the illumined hall, | |
Well speeds alike the banquet and the ball; | |
And the gay dance of bounding Beauty’s train | |
390 | Links grace and harmony in happiest chain: |
Blest are the early hearts and gentle hands | |
That mingle there in well according bands; | |
It is a sight the careful brow might smoothe, | |
And make Age smile, and dream itself to youth, | |
395 | And Youth forget such hour was past on earth, |
So springs the exulting bosom to that mirth! | |
XXI | |
And Lara gazed on these, sedately glad, | |
His brow belied him if his soul was sad; | |
And his glance follow’d fast each fluttering fair, | |
400 | Whose steps of lightness woke no echo there: |
He lean’d against the lofty pillar nigh, | |
With folded arms and long attentive eye, | |
Nor mark’d a glance so sternly fix’d on his— | |
Ill brook’d high Lara scrutiny like this: | |
405 | At length he caught it, ’tis a face unknown, |
But seems as searching his, and his alone; | |
Prying and dark, a stranger’s by his mien, | |
Who still till now had gazed on him unseen: | |
At length encountering meets the mutual gaze | |
410 | Of keen enquiry, and of mute amaze; |
On Lara’s glance emotion gathering grew, | |
As if distrusting that the stranger threw; | |
Along the stranger’s aspect, fix’d and stern, | |
Flash’d more than thence the vulgar eye could learn. | |
XXII | |
415 | “Tis he!’ the stranger cried, and those that heard |
Re-echoed fast and far the whisper’d word. | |
‘ ’Tis he! ‘– “Tis who? ‘ ’they question far and near, | |
Till louder accents rung on Lara’s ear; | |
So widely spread, few bosoms well could brook | |
420 | The general marvel, or that single look: |
But Lara stirr’d not, changed not, the surprise | |
That sprung at first to his arrested eyes | |
Seem’d now subsided, neither sunk nor raised | |
Glanced his eye round, though still the stranger gazed; | |
425 | And drawing nigh, exclaim’d, with haughty sneer, |
“Tis he!—how came he thence?—What doth he here?’ | |
XXIII | |
It were too much for Lara to pass by | |
Such questions, so repeated fierce and high; | |
With look collected, but with accent cold, | |
430 | More mildly firm than petulantly bold, |
He turn’d, and met the inquisitorial tone— | |
‘My name is Lara!—when thine own is known, | |
Doubt not my fitting answer to requite | |
The unlook’d for courtesy of such a knight. | |
435 | ’Tis Lara!—further wouldst thou mark or ask? |
I shun no question, and I wear no mask.’ | |
‘Thou shunn’st no question! Ponder—is there none | |
Thy heart must answer, though thine ear would shun? | |
And deem’st thou me unknown too? Gaze again! | |
440 | At least thy memory was not given in vain. |
Oh! never canst thou cancel half her debt, | |
Eternity forbids thee to forget.’ | |
With slow and searching glance upon his face | |
Grew Lara’s eyes, but nothing there could trace | |
445 | They knew, or chose to know—with dubious look |
He deign’d no answer, but his head he shook, | |
And half contemptuous turn’d to pass away; | |
But the stern stranger motion’d him to stay. | |
‘A word!—I charge thee stay, and answer here | |
450 | To one, who, wert thou noble, were thy peer, |
But as thou wast and art—nay, frown not, lord, | |
If false, ’tis easy to disprove the word— | |
But as thou wast and art, on thee looks down, | |
Distrusts thy smiles, but shakes not at thy frown. | |
455 | Art thou not he? whose deeds—’ |