The Angel in the House

Mine is no horse with wings, to gain
   The region of the spheral chime;
He does but drag a rumbling wain,
   Cheerd by the coupled bells of rhyme;
And if at Fames bewitching note
   My homely Pegasus pricks an ear,
The worlds cart-collar hugs his throat,
   And hes too wise to prance or rear.

Thus ever answerd Vaughan his Wife,
   Who, more than he, desired his fame;
But, in his heart, his thoughts were rife
   How for her sake to earn a name.
With bays poetic three times crownd,
   And other college honours won,
He, if he chose, might be renownd,
   He had but little doubt, she none;
And in a loftier phrase he talkd
   With her, upon their Wedding-Day,
(The eighth), while through the fields they walkd,
   Their children shouting by the way.

Not careless of the gift of song,
   Nor out of love with noble fame,
I, meditating much and long
   What I should sing, how win a name,
Considering well what theme unsung,
   What reason worth the cost of rhyme,
Remains to loose the poets tongue
   In these last days, the dregs of time,
Learn that to me, though born so late,
   There does, beyond desert, befall
(May my great fortune make me great!)
   The first of themes, sung last of all.
In green and undiscoverd ground,
   Yet near where many others sing,
I have the very well-head found
   Whence gushes the Pierian Spring.

Then she: What is it, Dear?  The Life
   Of Arthur, or Jerusalems Fall?
Neither: your gentle self, my Wife,
   And love, that grows from one to all.
And if I faithfully proclaim
   Of these the exceeding worthiness,
Surely the sweetest wreath of Fame
   Shall, to your hope, my brows caress;
And if, by virtue of my choice
   Of this, the most heart-touching theme
That ever tuned a poets voice,
   I live, as I am bold to dream,
To be delight to many days,
   And into silence only cease
When those are still, who shared their bays
   With Laura and with Beatrice,
Imagine, Love, how learned men
   Will deep-conceivd devices find,
Beyond my purpose and my ken,
   An ancient bard of simple mind.
You, Sweet, his Mistress, Wife, and Muse,
   Were you for mortal woman meant?
Your praises give a hundred clues
   To mythological intent!
And, severing thus the truth from trope,
   In you the Commentators see
Outlines occult of abstract scope,
   A future for philosophy!
Your arms on mine! these are the meads
   In which we pass our living days;
There Avon runs, now hid with reeds,
   Now brightly brimming pebbly bays;
Those are our childrens songs that come
   With bells and bleatings of the sheep;
And there, in yonder English home,
   We thrive on mortal food and sleep!
She laughd.  How proud she always was
   To feel how proud he was of her!
But he had grown distraught, because
   The Muses mood began to stir.

His purpose with performance crownd,
   He to his well-pleased Wife rehearsd,
When next their Wedding-Day came round,
   His leisures labour, Book the First.

Lo, loves obeyd by all.  Tis right
   That all should know what they obey,
Lest erring conscience damp delight,
   And folly laugh our joys away.
Thou Primal Love, who grantest wings
   And voices to the woodland birds,
Grant me the power of saying things
   Too simple and too sweet for words!

I walk, I trust, with open eyes;
   Ive travelld half my worldly course;
And in the way behind me lies
   Much vanity and some remorse;
Ive lived to feel how pride may part
   Spirits, tho matchd like hand and glove;
Ive blushd for loves abode, the heart;
   But have not disbelieved in love;
Nor unto love, sole mortal thing
   Of worth immortal, done the wrong
To count it, with the rest that sing,
   Unworthy of a serious song;
And love is my reward; for now,
   When most of deadning time complain,
The myrtle blooms upon my brow,
   Its odour quickens all my brain.

The richest realm of all the earth
   Is counted still a heathen land:
Lo, I, like Joshua, now go forth
   To give it into Israels hand.
I will not hearken blame or praise;
   For so should I dishonour do
To that sweet Power by which these Lays
   Alone are lovely, good, and true;
Nor credence to the worlds cries give,
   Which ever preach and still prevent
Pure passions high prerogative
   To make, not follow, precedent.
From loves abysmal ether rare
   If I to men have here made known
New truths, they, like new stars, were there
   Before, though not yet written down.
Moving but as the feelings move,
   I run, or loiter with delight,
Or pause to mark where gentle Love
   Persuades the soul from height to height.
Yet, know ye, though my words are gay
   As Davids dance, which Michal scornd.
If kindly you receive the Lay,
   You shall be sweetly helpd and warnd.

Once more I came to Sarum Close,
   With joy half memory, half desire,
And breathed the sunny wind that rose
   And blew the shadows oer the Spire,
And tossd the lilacs scented plumes,
   And swayd the chestnuts thousand cones,
And filld my nostrils with perfumes,
   And shaped the clouds in waifs and zones,
And wafted down the serious strain
   Of Sarum bells, when, true to time,
I reachd the Deans, with heart and brain
   That trembled to the trembling chime.

Twas half my home, six years ago.
   The six years had not alterd it:
Red-brick and ashlar, long and low,
   With dormers and with oriels lit.
Geranium, lychnis, rose arrayd
   The windows, all wide open thrown;
And some one in the Study playd
   The Wedding-March of Mendelssohn.
And there it was I last took leave:
   Twas Christmas: I rememberd now
The cruel girls, who feignd to grieve,
   Took down the evergreens; and how
The holly into blazes woke
   The fire, lighting the large, low room,
A dim, rich lustre of old oak
   And crimson velvets glowing gloom.
No change had touchd Dean Churchill: kind,
   By widowhood more than winters bent,
And settled in a cheerful mind,
   As still forecasting heavens content.
Well might his thoughts be fixd on high,
   Now she was there!  Within her face
Humility and dignity
   Were met in a most sweet embrace.
She seemd expressly sent below
   To teach our erring minds to see
The rhythmic change of times swift flow
   As part of still eternity.
Her life, all honour, observed, with awe
   Which cross experience could not mar,
The fiction of the Christian law
   That all men honourable are;
And so her smile at once conferrd
   High flattery and benign reproof;
And I, a rude boy, strangely stirrd,
   Grew courtly in my own behoof.
The years, so far from doing her wrong,
   Anointed her with gracious balm,
And made her brows more and more young
   With wreaths of amaranth and palm.

Was this her eldest, Honor; prude,
   Who would not let me pull the swing;
Who, kissd at Christmas, calld me rude,
   And, sobbing low, refused to sing?
How changed!  In shape no slender Grace,
   But Venus; milder than the dove;
Her mothers air; her Norman face;
   Her large sweet eyes, clear lakes of love.
Mary I knew.  In former time
   Ailing and pale, she thought that bliss
Was only for a better clime,
   And, heavenly overmuch, scornd this.
I, rash with theories of the right,
   Which stretchd the tether of my Creed,
But did not break it, held delight
   Half discipline.  We disagreed.
She told the Dean I wanted grace.
   Now she was kindest of the three,
And soft wild roses deckd her face.
   And, what, was this my Mildred, she
To herself and all a sweet surprise?
   My Pet, who rompd and rolld a hoop?
I wonderd where those daisy eyes
   Had found their touching curve and droop.

Unmannerly times!  But now we sat
   Stranger than strangers; till I caught
And answerd Mildreds smile; and that
   Spread to the rest, and freedom brought.
The Dean talkd little, looking on,
   Of three such daughters justly vain.
What letters they had had from Bonn,
   Said Mildred, and what plums from Spain!
By Honor I was kindly taskd
   To excuse my never coming down
From Cambridge; Mary smiled and askd
   Were Kant and Goethe yet outgrown?
And, pleased, we talkd the old days oer;
   And, parting, I for pleasure sighd.
To be there as a friend, (since more),
   Seemd then, seems still, excuse for pride;
For something that abode endued
   With temple-like repose, an air
Of lifes kind purposes pursued
   With orderd freedom sweet and fair.
A tent pitchd in a world not right
   It seemd, whose inmates, every one,
On tranquil faces bore the light
   Of duties beautifully done,
And humbly, though they had few peers,
   Kept their own laws, which seemd to be
The fair sum of six thousand years
   Traditions of civility.

When I behold the skies aloft
   Passing the pageantry of dreams,
The cloud whose bosom, cygnet-soft,
   A couch for nuptial Juno seems,
The ocean broad, the mountains bright,
   The shadowy vales with feeding herds,
I from my lyre the music smite,
   Nor want for justly matching words.
All forces of the sea and air,
   All interests of hill and plain,
I so can sing, in seasons fair,
   That who hath felt may feel again.
Elated oft by such free songs,
   I think with utterance free to raise
That hymn for which the whole world longs,
   A worthy hymn in womans praise;
A hymn bright-noted like a birds,
   Arousing these song-sleepy times
With rhapsodies of perfect words,
   Ruled by returning kiss of rhymes.
But when I look on her and hope
   To tell with joy what I admire,
My thoughts lie crampd in narrow scope,
   Or in the feeble birth expire;
No mystery of well-woven speech,
   No simplest phrase of tenderest fall,
No likend excellence can reach
   Her, thee most excellent of all,
The best half of creations best,
   Its heart to feel, its eye to see,
The crown and complex of the rest,
   Its aim and its epitome.
Nay, might I utter my conceit,
   Twere after all a vulgar song,
For shes so simply, subtly sweet,
   My deepest rapture does her wrong.
Yet is it now my chosen task
   To sing her worth as Maid and Wife;
Nor happier post than this I ask,
   To live her laureate all my life.
On wings of love uplifted free,
   And by her gentleness made great,
Ill teach how noble man should be
   To match with such a lovely mate;
And then in her may move the more
   The womans wish to be desired,
(By praise increased), till both shall soar,
   With blissful emulations fired.
And, as geranium, pink, or rose
   Is thrice itself through power of art,
So may my happy skill disclose
   New fairness even in her fair heart;
Until that churl shall nowhere be
   Who bends not, awed, before the throne
Of her affecting majesty,
   So meek, so far unlike our own;
Until (for who may hope too much
   From her who wields the powers of love?)
Our lifted lives at last shall touch
   That happy goal to which they move;
Until we find, as darkness rolls
   Away, and evil mists dissolve,
That nuptial contrasts are the poles
   On which the heavenly spheres revolve.

Wheneer I come where ladies are,
   How sad soever I was before,
Though like a ship frost-bound and far
   Withheld in ice from the oceans roar,
Third-winterd in that dreadful dock,
   With stiffend cordage, sails decayd,
And crew that care for calm and shock
   Alike, too dull to be dismayd,
Yet, if I come where ladies are,
   How sad soever I was before,
Then is my sadness banishd far,
   And I am like that ship no more;
Or like that ship if the ice-field splits,
   Burst by the sudden polar Spring,
And all thank God with their warming wits,
   And kiss each other and dance and sing,
And hoist fresh sails, that make the breeze
   Blow them along the liquid sea,
Out of the North, where life did freeze,
   Into the haven where they would be.

Anne lived so truly from above,
   She was so gentle and so good,
That duty bade me fall in love,
   And but for that, thought I, I should!
I worshippd Kate with all my will,
   In idle moods you seem to see
A noble spirit in a hill,
   A human touch about a tree.

The lack of lovely pride, in her
   Who strives to please, my pleasure numbs,
And still the maid I most prefer
   Whose care to please with pleasing comes.

One morning, after Church, I walkd
   Alone with Mary on the lawn,
And felt myself, howeer we talkd,
   To grave themes delicately drawn.
When she, delighted, found I knew
   More of her peace than she supposed,
Our confidences heavenwards grew,
   Like fox-glove buds, in pairs disclosed.
Our former faults did we confess,
   Our ancient feud was more than heald,
And, with the womans eagerness
   For amity full-signd and seald,
She, offering up for sacrifice
   Her hearts reserve, brought out to show
Some verses, made when she was ice
   To all but Heaven, six years ago;
Since happier grown!  I took and read
   The neat-writ lines.  She, void of guile,
Too late repenting, blushd, and said,
   I must not think about the style.

Day after day, until to-day,
   Imaged the others gone before,
The same dull task, the weary way,
   The weakness pardond oer and oer,
The thwarted thirst, too faintly felt,
   For joys well-nigh forgotten life,
The restless heart, which, when I knelt,
   Made of my worship barren strife.
Ah, whence to-days so sweet release,
   This clearance light of all my care,
This conscience free, this fertile peace,
   These softly folded wings of prayer,
This calm and more than conquering love,
   With which nought evil dares to cope,
This joy that lifts no glance above,
   For faith too sure, too sweet for hope?
O, happy time, too happy change,
   It will not live, though fondly nurst!
Full soon the sun will seem as strange
   As now the cloud which seems dispersed.

She from a rose-tree shook the blight;
   And well she knew that I knew well
Her grace with silence to requite;
   And, answering now the luncheon bell,
I laughd at Mildreds laugh, which made
   All melancholy wrong, its mood
Such sweet self-confidence displayd,
   So glad a sense of present good.

I laughd and sighd: for I confess
   I never went to Ball, or Fête,
Or Show, but in pursuit express
   Of my predestinated mate;
And thus to me, who had in sight
   The happy chance upon the cards,
Each beauty blossomd in the light
   Of tender personal regards;
And, in the records of my breast,
   Red-letterd, eminently fair,
Stood sixteen, who, beyond the rest,
   By turns till then had been my care:
At Berlin three, one at St. Cloud,
   At Chatteris, near Cambridge, one,
At Ely four, in London two,
   Two at Bowness, in Paris none,
And, last and best, in Sarum three;
   But dearest of the whole fair troop,
In judgment of the moment, she
   Whose daisy eyes had learnd to droop.
Her very faults my fancy fired;
   My loving will, so thwarted, grew;
And, bent on worship, I admired
   Whateer she was, with partial view.
And yet when, as to-day, her smile
   Was prettiest, I could not but note
Honoria, less admired the while,
   Was lovelier, though from love remote.