Königsmark, the Legend of the Hounds and Other Poems/Countess Laura
COUNTESS LAURA.
IT was a dreary day in Padua;The Countess Laura, for a single yearFernando's wife, upon her bridal bed,Like an uprooted lily on the snow,The withered outcast of a festival,Lay dead. She died of some uncertain ill,That struck her almost on her wedding-day,And clung to her, and dragged her slowly down,Thinning her cheeks and pinching her full lips,Till, in her chance, it seemed that with a yearFull half a century was overpast.In vain had Paracelsus taxed his art,And feigned a knowledge of her malady;In vain had all the doctors, far and near,Gathered around the mystery of her bed.Draining her veins, her husband's treasury,And physic's jargon, in a fruitless questFor causes equal to the dread result.The Countess only smiled when they were gone,Hugged her fair body with her little hands,And turned upon her pillows wearily,As though she fain would sleep, no common sleep,But the long, breathless slumber of the grave.She hinted nothing. Feeble as she was,The rack could not have wrung her secret out.The Bishop, when he shrived her, coming forth, Cried, in a voice of heavenly ecstasy,"O blessed soul! with nothing to confess,Save virtues and good deeds, which she mistakes—So humble is she—for our human sins!"Praying for death, she tossed upon her bed,Day after day; as might a shipwrecked barkThat rocks upon one billow, and can makeNo onward motion towards her port of hope.At length, one morn, when those around her said,"Surely the Countess mends, so fresh a lightBeams from her eyes and beautifies her face,"—One morn in spring, when every flower of earthWas opening up to the sun, and breathing upIts votive incense, her impatient soulOpened itself, and so exhaled to heaven.When the Count heard it, he reeled back a pace;Then turned with anger on the messenger;Then craved his pardon, and wept out his heartBefore the menial; tears, ah me! such tearsAs love sheds only, and love only once.Then he bethought him, "Shall this wonder die,And leave behind no shadow? not a traceOf all the glory that environed her,That mellow nimbus circling round my star?"So, with his sorrow glooming in his face,He paced along his gallery of Art,And strode among the painters, where they stood,With Carlo, the Venetian, at their head,Studying the Masters by the dawning lightOf his transcendent genius. Through the groupsOf gayly-vestured artists moved the Count;As some lone cloud of thick and leaden hue.Packed with the secret of a coming storm, Moves through the gold and crimson evening mists,Deadening their splendor. In a moment, stillWas Carlo's voice, and still the prattling crowd;And a great shadow overwhelmed them all,As their white faces and their anxious eyesPursued Fernando in his moody walk.He paused, as one who balances a doubt,Weighing two courses, then burst out with this:"Ye all have seen the tidings in my face;Or has the dial ceased to registerThe workings of my heart? Then hear the bell,That almost cracks its frame in utterance;The Countess—she is dead!"—"Dead!" Carlo groaned.And if a bolt from middle heaven had struckHis splendid features full upon the brow,He could not have appearcd mere scathed and blanched."Dead!—dead!" He staggered to his easel-frame,And clung around it, buffeting the airWith one wild arm, as though a drowning manHung to a spar and fought against the waves.The Count resumed: "I came not here to grieve,Nor see my sorrow in another's eyes.Who'll paint the Countess, as she lies to-nightIn state within the chapel? Shall it beThat earth must lose her wholly? that no hintOf her gold tresses, beaming eyes, and lipsThat talked in silence, and the eager soulThat ever seemed outbreaking through her clay,And scattering glory round it,—shall all theseBe dull corruption’s heritage, and we, Poor beggars, have no legacy to showThat love she bore us? That were shame to love,And shame to you, my masters." Carlo stalkedForth from his easel, stiffly as a thingMoved by mechanic impulse. His thin lips,And sharpened nostrils, and wan, sunken cheeks,And the cold glimmer in his dusky eyes,Made him a ghastly sight. The throng drew back,As though they let a spectre through. Then he,Fronting the Count, and speaking in a voiceSounding remote and hollow, made reply:"Count, I shall paint the Countess. 'Tis my fate,—Not pleasure,—no, nor duty." But the Count,Astray in woe, but understood assent,Not the strange words that bore it; and he flungHis arm round Carlo, drew him to his breast,And kissed his forehead. At which Carlo shrank:Perhaps 'twas at the honor. Then the Count,A little reddening at his public state,—Unseemly to his near and recent loss,—Withdrew in haste between the downcast eyesThat did him reverence as he rustled by.Night fell on Padua. In the chapel layThe Countess Laura at the altar's foot.Her coronet glittered on her pallid brows;A crimson pall, weighed down with golden work,Sawn thick with pearls, and heaped with early flowers.Draped her still body almost to the chin;And over all a thousand candles flamedAgainst the winking jewels, or streamed downThe marble aisle, and flashed along the guard Of men-at-arms that slowly wove their turns,Backward and forward, through the distant gloom.When Carlo entered, his unsteady feetScarce bore him to the altar, and his headDrooped down so low that all his shining curlsPoured on his breast, and veiled his countenance.Upon his easel a half-finished work,The secret labor of his studio,Said from the canvas, so that none might err,"'T am the Countess Laura," Carlo kneeled,And gazed upon the picture; as if thus,Through those clear eyes, he saw the way to heaven.Then he arose; and as a swimmer comesForth from the waves, he shook his Jocks aside,Emerging from his dream, and standing firmUpon a purpose with his sovereign will.He took his palette, murmuring, "Not yet!"Confidingly and softly lo the corpse;And as the veriest drudge, who plies his artAgainst his fancy, he addressed himselfWith stolid resolution to his task.Turning his vision on his memory,And shutting out the present, till the dead,The gilded pall, the lights, the pacing guard,And all the meaning of that solemn sceneBecame as nothing, and creative ArtResolved the whole to chaos, and reformedThe elements according to her law:So Carlo wrought, as though his eye and handWere Heaven's unconscious instruments, and workedThe settled purpose of Omnipotence. And it was wondrous how the red, the white,The ochre, and the umber, and the blue,From mottled blotches, hazy and opaque,Grew into rounded forms and sensuous lines;How just beneath the lucid skin the bloodGlimmered with warmth; the scarlet lips apartBloomed with the moisture of the dews of life;How the light glittered through and underneathThe golden tresses, and the deep, soft eyesBecame intelligent with conscious thought,And somewhat troubled underneath the archOf eyebrows but a little too intenseFor perfect beauty; how the pose and poiseOf the lithe figure on its tiny footSuggested life just ceased from motion; soThat any one might cry, in marveling joy,"That creature lives,—has senses, mind, a soulTo win God's love or dare hell's subtleties!"The artist paused. The ratifying "Good!"Trembled upon his lips. He saw no touchTo give or soften, "It is done," he cried,—"My task, my duty! Nothing now on earthCan taunt me with a work left unfulfilled!"The lofty fame, which bore him up so long,Diced in the ashes of humanity;And the mere man rocked to and fro againUpon the centre of his wavering heart.He put aside his palette, as if thusHe stepped from sacred vestments, and assumedA mortal function in the common world."Now for my rights!" he muttered, and approachedThe noble body. "O lily of the world!So withered, yet so lovely! what wast thou To those who came thus near thee—for I stoodWithout the pale of thy half-royal rank—When thon wast budding, and the streams of lifeMade eager struggles to maintain thy bloom,And gladdened heaven dropped down in gracious dewsOn its transplanted darling? Hear me now!I say this but in justice, not in pride,Not to insult thy high nobility,But that the poise of things in God's own sightMay be adjusted; and hereafter IMay urge a claim that all the powers of heavenShall sanction, and with clarions blow abroad.—Laura, you loved me! Look not so severe,With your cold brows, and deadly, close-drawn lips!You proved it, Countess, when you died for it,—Let it consume you in the wearing strifeIt fought with duty in your ravaged heart.I knew it ever since that summer-dayI painted Lila, the pale beggar's child,At rest beside the fountain; when I felt—Oh, heaven!—the warmth and moisture of your breathBlow through my hair, as with your eager soul—Forgetting soul and body go as one—You leaned across my easel till our cheeks—Ah, me! 'twas not your purpose—touched, and clung!Well, grant 'twas genius; and is genius naught?I ween it wears as proud a diadem—Here, in this very world—as that you wear.A king has held my palette, a grand-dukeHas picked my brush up, and a pope has begged The favor of my presence in his Rome.I did not go; I put my fortune by.I need not ask you why: you knew too well.It was but natural, it was no way strange,That I should love you. Everything that saw,Or had its other senses, loved you, sweet,And I among them. Martyr, holy saint,—I see the halo curving round your head,—I loved you once; but now I worship you.For the great deed that held my love aloof,And killed you in the action! I absolveYour soul from any taint, For from the dayOf that encounter by the fountain-sideUntil this moment, never turned on meThose tender eyes, unless they did a wrongTo nature by the cold, defiant glareWith which they chilled me. Never heard I wordOf softness spoken by those gentle lips;Never received a bounty from that handWhich gave to all the world. I know the cause.You did your duty,—not for honor's sake,Nor to save sin or suffering or remorse,Or all the ghosts that haunt a woman's shame,But for the sake of that pure, loyal loveYour husband bore you. Queen, by grace of God,I bow before the lustre of your throne!I kiss the edges of your garment-hem,And held myself ennobled! Answer me,—If I had wronged you, you would answer meOut of the dusty porches of the tomb:—Is this a dream, a falsehood? or have ISpoken the very truth ?"—"The very truth!"A voice replied; and at his side he saw A form, half shadow and half substance, stand,Or, rather, rest; for on the solid earthIt had no footing, more than some dense mistThat wavers o'er the surface of the groundIt scarcely touches, With a reverent look,The shadow's waste and wretched face was beniAbove the picture; as though greater aweSubdued its awful being, and appalled,With memories of terrible delightAnd fearful wonder, its devouring gaze."You make what God makes,—beauty," said the shape."And might not this, this second Eve, consoleThe emptiest heart? Will not this thing outlastThe fairest creature fashioned in the flesh?Before that figure, Time, and Death himself,Stand baffled and disarmed. What would you askMore than God's power, from nothing to create?"The artist gazed upon the boding form,And answered: "Goblin, if you had a heart,That were an idle question, What to meIs my creative power, bereft of love?Or what to God would be that selfsame power,If so bereaved?"—"And yet the love, thus mourned,You calmly forfeited. For had you saidTo living Laura—in her burning ears—One half that you professed to Laura dead,She would have been your own. These contrariesSort not with my intelligence. But speak,Were Laura living, would the same stale playOf raging passion, tearing out its heartUpon the rock of duty, be performed?" "The same, O phantom, while the heart I bearTrembled, but turned not its magnetic faithFrom God's fixed centre." "If I wake for youThis Laura,—give her all the bloom and glowOf that midsummer day you hold so dear,—The smile, the motion, the impulsive soul,The love of genius,—yea, the very love,The mortal, hungry, passionate, hot love,She bore you, flesh to flesh,—would you receiveThat gift, in all its glory, at my hands?"A smile of malice curled the tempter's lips,And glittered in the caverns of his eyes,Mocking the answer, Carlo paled and shook;A woeful spasm went shuddering through his frame,Curdling his blood, and twisting his fair faceWith nameless torture. But he cried aloud,Out of the clouds of anguish, from the smokeOf very martyrdom, "O God, she is thine!Do with her at thy pleasure!" Something grand,And radiant as a sunbeam, touched the headHe bent in awful sorrow. "Mortal, see"———"Dare not! As Christ was sinless, I abjureThese vile abominations! Shall she bearLife's burden twice, and life's temptations twice,While God is justice?"—"Who has made you judgeOf what you call God's good, and what you thinkGod's evil? One to him, the source of both,The God of good and of permitted ill.Have you no dream of days that might have been,Had you and Laura filled another fate?—Some cottage on the sloping Apennines, Roses and lilies, and the rest all love?I tell you that this tranquil dream may beFilled to repletion. Speak, and in the shadeOf my dark pinions I shall bear you hence,And land you where the mountain goat himselfStruggles for footing." He outspread his wings,And all the chapel darkened, as though hellHad swallowed up the tapers; and the airGrew thick, and, like a current sensible,Flowed round the person, with a wash and dash,As of the waters of a nether sea.Slowly and calmly through the dense obscure,Dove-like and gentle, rose the artist’s voice:"I dare not bring her spirit to that shame!Know my full meaning,—I who neither fearYour mystic person nor your dreadful power.Nor shall I now invoke God's potent name,For my deliverance from your toils. I standUpon the founded structure of his law,Established from the first, and thence defyYour arts, reposing all my trust in that!"The darkness eddied off; and Carlo sawThe figure gathering, as from outer space,Brightness on brightness; and his former shapeFell from him, like the ashes that fall off,And show a core of mellow fire within.Adown his wings there poured a lambent flood,That seemed as molten gold, which plashing fellUpon the floor, enringing him with flame;And o'er the tresses of his beaming headArose a stream of many-colored light,Like that which crowns the morning. Carlo stoodSteadfast, for all the splendor reaching up The outstretched palms of his untainted soulTowards heaven for strength. A moment thus; then asked,With reverential wonder quivering throughHis sinking voice, "Who, spirit, and what art thou?""I am that blessing which men fly from,—Death.""Then take my hand, if so God orders it;For Laura waits me." "But, bethink thee, man,What the world loses in the loss of thee!What wondrous art will suffer with eclipse!What unwon glories are in store for thee!What fame, outreaching time and temporal shocks,Would shine upon the letters of thy nameGraven in marble, or the brazen heightOf columns wise with memories of thee!""Take me! If I outlived the Patriarchs,I could but paint those features o'er and o'er:Lo! that is done." A smile of pity litThe seraph's features, as he looked to heaven,With deep inquiry in his tender eyes,The mandate came. He touched with downy wingThe sufferer lightly on his aching heart;And gently, as the sky-lark settles downUpon the clustered treasures of her nest,So Carlo softly slid along the propOf his tall easel, nestling at the footAs though he slumbered; and the morning brokeIn silver whiteness over Padua.