Outside the Western Straits, and unbent sails

There, where down cloudy cliffs, through sheets of foam, Shy traffickers, the dark Iberians come;

And on the beach undid his corded bales.

Matthew Arnold [1822-1888]

JUGGLING JERRY

PITCH here the tent, while the old horse grazes:
By the old hedge-side we'll halt a stage.

It's nigh my last above the daisies:

My next leaf'll be man's blank page.
Yes, my old girl! and it's no use crying:
Juggler, constable, king, must bow.
One that outjuggles all's been spying
Long to have me, and he has me now.

We've traveled times to this old common
Often we've hung our pots in the gorse.
We've had a stirring life, old woman!
You, and I, and the old gray horse.
Races, and fairs, and royal occasions,
Found us coming to their call:
Now they'll miss us at our stations:
There's a Juggler outjuggles all!

Up goes the lark, as if all were jolly!

Over the duck-pond the willow shakes.

Easy to think that grieving's folly,

When the hand's firm as driven stakes!

Ay, when we're strong, and braced, and manful,
Life's a sweet fiddle: but we're a batch

Born to become the Great Juggler's han'ful:
Balls he shies up, and is safe to catch.

Here's where the lads of the village cricket:
I was a lad not wide from here:

Couldn't I whip off the bale from the wicket?
Like an old world those days appear!

Donkey, sheep, geese, and thatched ale-house-I know

them!

They are old friends of my halts, and seem,
Somehow, as if kind thanks I owe them:
Juggling don't hinder the heart's esteem.

Juggling's no sin, for we must have victual:
Nature allows us to bait for the fool.

Holding one's own makes us juggle no little;
But, to increase it, hard juggling's the rule.
You that are sneering at my profession,

Haven't you juggled a vast amount?
There's the Prime Minister, in one Session,
Juggles more games than my sins'll count.

I've murdered insects with mock thunder:

Conscience, for that, in men don't quail. I've made bread from the bump of wonder:

That's my business, and there's my tale. Fashion and rank all praised the professor:

Ay! and I've had my smile from the Queen: Bravo, Jerry! she meant: God bless her!

Ain't this a sermon on that scene?

I've studied men from my topsy-turvy
Close, and, I reckon, rather true.
Some are fine fellows: some, right scurvy:
Most, a dash between the two.

But it's a woman, old girl, that makes me
Think more kindly of the race:

And it's a woman, old girl, that shakes me
When the Great Juggler I must face.

We two were married, due and legal:
Honest we've lived since we've been one.
Lord! I could then jump like an eagle:
You danced bright as a bit o' the sun.
Birds in a May-bush we were! right merry!
All night we kissed, we juggled all day.
Joy was the heart of Juggling Jerry!

Now from his old girl he's juggled away.

It's past parsons to console us:

No, nor no doctor fetch for me: I can die without my bolus;

Two of a trade, lass, never agree!

Parson and Doctor!-don't they love rarely,
Fighting the devil in other men's fields!
Stand up yourself and match him fairly:
Then see how the rascal yields!

I, lass, have lived no gipsy, flaunting

Finery while his poor helpmate grubs: Coin I've stored, and you won't be wanting:

You shan't beg from the troughs and tubs. Nobly you've stuck to me, though in his kitchen Many a Marquis would hail you Cook! Palaces you could have ruled and grown rich in, But your old Jerry you never forsook.

Hand up the chirper! ripe ale winks in it;
Let's have comfort and be at peace.
Once a stout draught made me light as a linnet.
Cheer up! the Lord must have his lease.
May be for none see in that black hollow-
It's just a place where we're held in pawn,
And, when the Great Juggler makes as to swallow,
It's just the sword-trick-I ain't quite gone!

Yonder came smells of the gorse, so nutty,
Gold-like and warm: it's the prime of May.
Better than mortar, brick and putty,

Is God's house on a blowing day.

Lean me more up the mound; now I feel it:
All the old heath-smells! Ain't it strange?
There's the world laughing, as if to conceal it,
But He's by us, juggling the change.

I mind it well, by the sea-beach lying,

Once-it's long gone-when two gulls we beheld,

Which, as the moon got up, were flying

Down a big wave that sparked and swelled.

Crack, went a gun: one fell; the second

Wheeled round him twice, and was off for new luck: There in the dark her white wing beckoned:

Drop me a kiss-I'm the bird dead-struck!

George Meredith [1828-1909]

A COURT LADY

HER hair was tawny with gold, her eyes with purple were dark,

Her cheeks' pale opal burnt with a red and restless spark.

Never was lady of Milan nobler in name and in race;
Never was lady of Italy fairer to see in the face.

Never was lady on earth more true as woman and wife, Larger in judgment and instinct, prouder in manners and life.

She stood in the early morning, and said to her maidens,

"Bring

That silken robe made ready to wear at the Court of the King.

"Bring me the clasps of diamond, lucid, clear of the mote, Clasp me the large at the waist, and clasp me the small at the throat.

"Diamonds to fasten the hair, and diamonds to fasten the sleeves,

Laces to drop from their rays, like a powder of snow from the eaves."

Gorgeous she entered the sunlight which gathered her up in a flame,

While, straight in her open carriage, she to the hospital came.

In she went at the door, and gazing from end to end, "Many and low are the pallets, but each is the place of a friend."

Up she passed through the wards, and stood at a young man's bed:

Bloody the band on his brow, and livid the droop of his head.

"Art thou a Lombard, my brother? Happy art thou," she cried,

And smiled like Italy on him: he dreamed in her face and died.

Pale with his passing soul, she went on still to a second:

He was a grave hard man, whose years by dungeons were reckoned.

Wounds in his body were sore, wounds in his life were sorer. "Art thou a Romagnole?" Her eyes drove lightnings before her.

"Austrian and priest had joined to double and tighten the cord

Able to bind thee, O strong one,-free by the stroke of a sword.

"Now be grave for the rest of us, using the life overcast To ripen our wine of the present, (too new) in glooms of the past."

Down she stepped to a pallet where lay a face like a girl's, Young, and pathetic with dying, a deep black hole in the curls.

"Art thou from Tuscany, brother? and seest thou, dreaming

in pain,

Thy mother stand in the piazza, searching the list of the slain?"

Kind as a mother herself, she touched his cheeks with her

hands:

"Blessed is she who has borne thee, although she should weep as she stands."