Invective seem'd to wait behind her lips,
As waits a river level with the dam
Ready to burst and flood the world with foam:
And so she would have spoken, but there rose
A hubbub in the court of half the maids
Gather'd together: from the illumined hall
Long lanes of splendour slanted o'er a press
Of snowy shoulders, thick as herded ewes,
And rainbow robes, and gems and gemlike eyes,
And gold and golden heads; they to and fro
Fluctuated, as flowers in storm, some red, some pale,
All open-mouth'd, all gazing to the light,
Some crying there was an army in the land,
And some that men were in the very walls,
And some they cared not; till a clamour grew
As of a new-world Babel, woman-built,
And worse-confounded: high above them stood
The placid marble Muses, looking peace.
Not peace she look'd, the Head: but rising up
Robed in the long night of her deep hair, so
To the open window moved, remaining there
Fixt like a beacon-tower above the waves
Of tempest, when the crimson-rolling eye
Glares ruin, and the wild birds on the light
Dash themselves dead. She stretch'd her arms and
Across the tumult and the tumult fell.
"What fear ye, brawlers? am not I your Head? On me, me, me, the storm first breaks: I dare All these male thunderbolts: what is it ye fear?
Peace! there are those to avenge us and they come: 480
If not,―myself were like enough, O girls,
To unfurl the maiden banner of our rights,
And clad in iron burst the ranks of war,
Or, falling, protomartyr of our cause,
456. "illumin'd" till 1851.
470. Cf. B. W. Procter (The Pearl-Wearer):
Within the midnight of her hair.
472. Cf. Enoch Arden, 730-32.
474. 1847. and the wild sea-birds.
Die: yet I blame ye not so much for fear;
Six thousand years of fear have made ye that
From which I would redeem ye: but for those
That stir this hubbub-you and you I know
Your faces there in the crowd-to-morrow morn
We hold a great convention: then shall they
That love their voices more than duty, learn
With whom they deal, dismiss'd in shame to live
No wiser than their mothers, household stuff,
Live chattels, mincers of each other's fame,
Full of weak poison, turnspits for the clown,
The drunkard's football, laughing-stocks of Time,
Whose brains are in their hands and in their heels,
But fit to flaunt, to dress, to dance, to thrum,
To tramp, to scream, to burnish, and to scour,
For ever slaves at home and fools abroad."
She, ending, waved her hands: thereat the crowd
Muttering, dissolved: then with a smile, that look'd
A stroke of cruel sunshine on the cliff,
When all the glens are drown'd in azure gloom
Of thunder-shower, she floated to us and said :
"You have done well and like a gentleman,
And like a prince: you have our thanks for all:
And you look well too in your woman's dress:
Well have you done and like a gentleman.
You saved our life: we owe you bitter thanks:
Better have died and spilt our bones in the flood-
Then men had said-but now- -What hinders me
To take such bloody vengeance on you both ?-
Yet since our father-Wasps in our good hive,
You would-be quenchers of the light to be,
Barbarians, grosser than your native bears-
O would I had his sceptre for one hour!
You that have dared to break our bound, and gull'd
Our servants, wrong'd and lied and thwarted us—
I wed with thee! I bound by precontract
Your bride, your bondslave! not tho' all the gold That veins the world were pack'd to make your crown, And every spoken tongue should lord you.
Your falsehood and yourself are hateful to us :
I trample on your offers and on you:
Begone: we will not look upon you more.
Here, push them out at gates."
In wrath she spake.
Then those eight mighty daughters of the plough
Bent their broad faces toward us and address'd
Their motion: twice I sought to plead my cause,
But on my shoulder hung their heavy hands,
The weight of destiny: so from her face
They push'd us, down the steps, and thro' the court,
And with grim laughter thrust us out at gates.
We cross'd the street and gain'd a petty mound
Beyond it, whence we saw the lights and heard
The voices murmuring. While I listen'd, came
On a sudden the weird seizure and the doubt:
I seem'd to move among a world of ghosts;
The Princess with her monstrous woman-guard,
The jest and earnest working side by side,
The cataract and the tumult and the kings
Were shadows; and the long fantastic night
With all its doings had and had not been,
And all things were and were not.
As strangely as it came, and on my spirits
Settled a gentle cloud of melancholy;
Not long; I shook it off; for spite of doubts
And sudden ghostly shadowings I was one
To whom the touch of all mischance but came
As night to him that sitting on a hill
Sees the midsummer, midnight, Norway sun
Set into sunrise; then we moved away.
524. 1847-48-50. your face are loathsome.
537-46. While I listen'd . . came.
537. 1847-48-50. till upon my spirits.
548-49. 1847-48. Which I shook off, for I was young, and one.
Which I shook off, for I was ever one.
shadow of all mischance.
Thy voice is heard thro' rolling drums,
That beat to battle where he stands;
Thy face across his fancy comes,
And gives the battle to his hands:
A moment, while the trumpets blow,
He sees his brood about thy knee;
The next, like fire he meets the foe,
And strikes him dead for thine and thee.
So Lilia sang: we thought her half-possess'd,
She struck such warbling fury thro' the words;
And, after, feigning pique at what she call'd
The raillery or grotesque, or false sublime—
Like one that wishes at a dance to change
The music-clapt her hands and cried for war,
Or some grand fight to kill and make an end:
And he that next inherited the tale
Half turning to the broken statue, said,
"Sir Ralph has got your colours: if I
Your knight, and fight your battle, what for me?"
It chanced, her empty glove upon the tomb
Lay by her like a model of her hand.
She took it and she flung it. Fight" she said,
"And make us all we would be, great and good."
He knightlike in his cap instead of casque,
A cap of Tyrol borrow'd from the hall,
Arranged the favour and assumed the Prince.
The song (though altered) and the stanza following were added in 1850. There is an interesting variant of this song, printed in the Selections from Tennyson's poems published by Moxon in 1865, but afterwards suppressed. 1850. I, 2. When all among the thundering drums
Thy soldier in the battle stands,
Strikes him dead for them and thee!
Tara ta tantara!
Now, scarce three paces measured from the mound,
We stumbled on a stationary voice,
"Two from the palace" I.
"The second two: they wait," he said, "pass on;
His Highness wakes:" and one, that clash'd in arms, 5
By glimmering lanes and walls of canvas, led
Threading the soldier-city, till we heard
The drowsy folds of our great ensign shake
From blazon'd lions o'er the imperial tent
Whispers of war.
Entering, the sudden light
Dazed me half-blind: I stood and seem'd to hear,
As in a poplar grove when a light wind wakes
A lisping of the innumerous leaf and dies,
Each hissing in his neighbour's ear; and then
A strangled titter, out of which there brake
On all sides, clamouring etiquette to death,
Unmeasured mirth; while now the two old kings
Began to wag their baldness up and down,
The fresh young captains flash'd their glittering teeth,
The huge bush-bearded Barons heaved and blew,
And slain with laughter roll'd the gilded Squire.
At length my Sire, his rough cheek wet with tears, Panted from weary sides "King, you are free!
We did but keep you surety for our son,
7. 1847-48. until we heard.
13. A form used by Milton and Henry More; cf. Paradise Lost, vii. 455, "Innumerous living creatures," and Comus, 349, "close dungeon of innumerous boughs": it is the form commonly employed by Henry More. 15. 1847-48. out of which outbrake.
23. 1847-48. "You are free, O King!
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