Second Book of Verse - Eugene Field 2 стр.

ST. MARTIN'S LANE winds up the hill,
And trends a devious way;
I walk therein amid the din
Of busy London day:
I walk where wealth and squalor meet,
And think upon a time
When others trod this saintly sod,
And heard St. Martin's chime.

But when those solemn bells invoke
The midnight's slumbrous grace,
The ghosts of men come back again
To haunt that curious place:
The ghosts of sages, poets, wits,
Come back in goodly train;
And all night long, with mirth and song,
They walk St. Martin's Lane.

There's Jerrold paired with Thackeray,
Maginn and Thomas Moore,
And here and there and everywhere
Fraserians by the score;
And one wee ghost that climbs the hill
Is welcomed with a shout,
No king could be revered as he,
The padre, Father Prout!

They banter up and down the street,
And clamor at the door
Of yonder inn, which once has been
The scene of mirth galore:
'Tis now a lonely, musty shell,
Deserted, like to fall;
And Echo mocks their ghostly knocks,
And iterates their call.

Come back, thou ghost of ruddy host,
From Pluto's misty shore;
Renew to-night the keen delight
Of by-gone years once more;
Brew for this merry, motley horde,
And serve the steaming cheer;
And grant that I may lurk hard by,
To see the mirth, and hear.

Ah, me! I dream what things may seem
To others childish vain,
And yet at night 'tis my delight
To walk St. Martin's Lane;
For, in the light of other days,
I walk with those I love,
And all the time St. Martin's chime
Makes piteous moan above.

OUT yonder in the moonlight, wherein God's Acre lies,
Go angels walking to and fro, singing their lullabies.
Their radiant wings are folded, and their eyes are bended low,
As they sing among the beds whereon the flowers delight to grow,

"Sleep, oh, sleep!
The Shepherd guardeth His sheep.
Fast speedeth the night away,
Soon cometh the glorious day;
Sleep, weary ones, while ye may,
Sleep, oh, sleep!"

The flowers within God's Acre see that fair and wondrous sight,
And hear the angels singing to the sleepers through the night;
And, lo! throughout the hours of day those gentle flowers prolong
The music of the angels in that tender slumber-song,

"Sleep, oh, sleep!
The Shepherd loveth His sheep.
He that guardeth His flock the best
Hath folded them to His loving breast;
So sleep ye now, and take your rest,
Sleep, oh, sleep!"

From angel and from flower the years have learned that soothing song,
And with its heavenly music speed the days and nights along;
So through all time, whose flight the Shepherd's vigils glorify,
God's Acre slumbereth in the grace of that sweet lullaby,

"Sleep, oh, sleep!
The Shepherd loveth His sheep.
Fast speedeth the night away,
Soon cometh the glorious day;
Sleep, weary ones, while ye may,
Sleep, oh, sleep!"

WHEN I was broke in London in the fall of '89,
I chanced to spy in Oxford Street this tantalizing sign,
"A Splendid Horace cheap for Cash!" Of course I had to look
Upon the vaunted bargain, and it was a noble book!
A finer one I've never seen, nor can I hope to see,
The first edition, richly bound, and clean as clean can be;
And, just to think, for three-pounds-ten I might have had that Pine,
When I was broke in London in the fall of '89!

Down at Noseda's, in the Strand, I found, one fateful day,
A portrait that I pined for as only maniac may,
A print of Madame Vestris (she flourished years ago,
Was Bartolozzi's daughter and a thoroughbred, you know).
A clean and handsome print it was, and cheap at thirty bob,
That's what I told the salesman, as I choked a rising sob;
But I hung around Noseda's as it were a holy shrine,
When I was broke in London in the fall of '89.

At Davey's, in Great Russell Street, were autographs galore,
And Mr. Davey used to let me con that precious store.
Sometimes I read what warriors wrote, sometimes a king's command,
But oftener still a poet's verse, writ in a meagre hand.
Lamb, Byron, Addison, and Burns, Pope, Johnson, Swift, and Scott,
It needed but a paltry sum to comprehend the lot;
Yet, though Friend Davey marked 'em down, what could I but decline?
For I was broke in London in the fall of '89.

Of antique swords and spears I saw a vast and dazzling heap
That Curio Fenton offered me at prices passing cheap;
And, oh, the quaint old bureaus, and the warming-pans of brass,
And the lovely hideous freaks I found in pewter and in glass!
And, oh, the sideboards, candlesticks, the cracked old china plates,
The clocks and spoons from Amsterdam that antedate all dates!
Of such superb monstrosities I found an endless mine
When I was broke in London in the fall of '89.

O ye that hanker after boons that others idle by,
The battered things that please the soul, though they may vex the eye,
The silver plate and crockery all sanctified with grime,
The oaken stuff that has defied the tooth of envious Time,
The musty tomes, the speckled prints, the mildewed bills of play,
And other costly relics of malodorous decay,
Ye only can appreciate what agony was mine
When I was broke in London in the fall of '89.

When, in the course of natural things, I go to my reward,
Let no imposing epitaph my martyrdoms record;
Neither in Hebrew, Latin, Greek, nor any classic tongue,
Let my ten thousand triumphs over human griefs be sung;
But in plain Anglo-Saxon that he may know who seeks
What agonizing pangs I've had while on the hunt for freaks
Let there be writ upon the slab that marks my grave this line:
"Deceased was broke in London in the fall of '89."

BAMBINO in his cradle slept;
And by his side his grandam grim
Bent down and smiled upon the child,
And sung this lullaby to him,
This "ninna and anninia":

"When thou art older, thou shalt mind
To traverse countries far and wide,
And thou shalt go where roses blow
And balmy waters singing glide
So ninna and anninia!

"And thou shalt wear, trimmed up in points,
A famous jacket edged in red,
And, more than that, a peaked hat,
All decked in gold, upon thy head
Ah! ninna and anninia!

"Then shalt thou carry gun and knife.
Nor shall the soldiers bully thee;
Perchance, beset by wrong or debt,
A mighty bandit thou shalt be
So ninna and anninia!

"No woman yet of our proud race
Lived to her fourteenth year unwed;
The brazen churl that eyed a girl
Bought her the ring or paid his head
So ninna and anninia!

"But once came spies (I know the thieves!)
And brought disaster to our race;
God heard us when our fifteen men
Were hanged within the market-place
But ninna and anninia!

"Good men they were, my babe, and true,
Right worthy fellows all, and strong;
Live thou and be for them and me
Avenger of that deadly wrong
So ninna and anninia!"

NOTABLY fond of music, I dote on a sweeter tone
Than ever the harp has uttered or ever the lute has known.
When I wake at five in the morning with a feeling in my head
Suggestive of mild excesses before I retired to bed;
When a small but fierce volcano vexes me sore inside,
And my throat and mouth are furred with a fur that seemeth a buffalo hide,
How gracious those dews of solace that over my senses fall
At the clink of the ice in the pitcher the boy brings up the hall!

Oh, is it the gaudy ballet, with features I cannot name,
That kindles in virile bosoms that slow but devouring flame?
Or is it the midnight supper, eaten before we retire,
That presently by combustion setteth us all afire?
Or is it the cheery magnum?  nay, I'll not chide the cup
That makes the meekest mortal anxious to whoop things up:
Yet, what the cause soever, relief comes when we call,
Relief with that rapturous clinkety-clink that clinketh alike for all.

I've dreamt of the fiery furnace that was one vast bulk of flame,
And that I was Abednego a-wallowing in that same;
And I've dreamt I was a crater, possessed of a mad desire
To vomit molten lava, and to snort big gobs of fire;
I've dreamt I was Roman candles and rockets that fizzed and screamed,
In short, I have dreamt the cussedest dreams that ever a human dreamed:
But all the red-hot fancies were scattered quick as a wink
When the spirit within that pitcher went clinking its clinkety-clink.

Boy, why so slow in coming with that gracious, saving cup?
Oh, haste thee to the succor of the man who is burning up!
See how the ice bobs up and down, as if it wildly strove
To reach its grace to the wretch who feels like a red-hot kitchen stove!
The piteous clinks it clinks methinks should thrill you through and through:
An erring soul is wanting drink, and he wants it p. d. q.!
And, lo! the honest pitcher, too, falls in so dire a fret
That its pallid form is presently bedewed with a chilly sweat.

May blessings be showered upon the man who first devised this drink
That happens along at five a. m. with its rapturous clinkety-clink!
I never have felt the cooling flood go sizzling down my throat
But what I vowed to hymn a hymn to that clinkety-clink devote;
So now, in the prime of my manhood, I polish this lyric gem
For the uses of all good fellows who are thirsty at five a. m.,
But specially for those fellows who have known the pleasing thrall
Of the clink of the ice in the pitcher the boy brings up the hall.

WHAT though the radiant thoroughfare
Teems with a noisy throng?
What though men bandy everywhere
The ribald jest and song?
Over the din of oaths and cries
Broodeth a wondrous calm,
And mid that solemn stillness rise
The bells of Notre Dame.

"Heed not, dear Lord," they seem to say,
"Thy weak and erring child;
And thou, O gentle Mother, pray
That God be reconciled;
And on mankind, O Christ, our King,
Pour out Thy gracious balm,"
'Tis thus they plead and thus they sing,
Those bells of Notre Dame.

And so, methinks, God, bending down
To ken the things of earth,
Heeds not the mockery of the town
Or cries of ribald mirth;
For ever soundeth in His ears
A penitential psalm,
'T is thy angelic voice He hears,
O bells of Notre Dame!

Plead on, O bells, that thy sweet voice
May still forever be
An intercession to rejoice
Benign divinity;
And that thy tuneful grace may fall
Like dew, a quickening balm,
Upon the arid hearts of all,
O bells of Notre Dame!

SAINT JO, Buchanan County,
Is leagues and leagues away;
And I sit in the gloom of this rented room,
And pine to be there to-day.
Yes, with London fog around me
And the bustling to and fro,
I am fretting to be across the sea
In Lover's Lane, Saint Jo.

I would have a brown-eyed maiden
Go driving once again;
And I'd sing the song, as we snailed along,
That I sung to that maiden then:
I purposely say, "as we snailed along,"
For a proper horse goes slow
In those leafy aisles, where Cupid smiles,
In Lover's Lane, Saint Jo.

From her boudoir in the alders
Would peep a lynx-eyed thrush,
And we'd hear her say, in a furtive way,
To the noisy cricket, "Hush!"
To think that the curious creature
Should crane her neck to know
The various things one says and sings
In Lover's Lane, Saint Jo!

But the maples they should shield us
From the gossips of the place;
Nor should the sun, except by pun,
Profane the maiden's face;
And the girl should do the driving,
For a fellow can't, you know,
Unless he's neglectful of what's quite respectful
In Lover's Lane, Saint Jo.

Ah! sweet the hours of springtime,
When the heart inclines to woo,
And it's deemed all right for the callow wight
To do what he wants to do;
But cruel the age of winter,
When the way of the world says no
To the hoary men who would woo again
In Lover's Lane, Saint Jo!

In the Union Bank of London
Are forty pounds or more,
Which I'm like to spend, ere the month shall end,
In an antiquarian store;
But I'd give it all, and gladly,
If for an hour or so
I could feel the grace of a distant place,
Of Lover's Lane, Saint Jo.

Let us sit awhile, beloved,
And dream of the good old days,
Of the kindly shade which the maples made
Round the stanch but squeaky chaise;
With your head upon my shoulder,
And my arm about you so,
Though exiles, we shall seem to be
In Lover's Lane, Saint Jo.

THERE are happenings in life that are destined to rise
Like dear, hallowed visions before a man's eyes;
And the passage of years shall not dim in the least
The glory and joy of our Sabbath-day feast,
The Sabbath-day luncheon that's spread for us three,
My worthy companions, Teresa and Leigh,
And me, all so hungry for crumpets and tea.

There are cynics who say with invidious zest
That a crumpet's a thing that will never digest;
But I happen to know that a crumpet is prime
For digestion, if only you give it its time.
Or if, by a chance, it should not quite agree,
Why, who would begrudge a physician his fee
For plying his trade upon crumpets and tea?

To toast crumpets quite à la mode, I require
A proper long fork and a proper quick fire;
And when they are browned, without further ado,
I put on the butter, that soaks through and through.
And meantime Teresa, directed by Leigh,
Compounds and pours out a rich brew for us three;
And so we sit down to our crumpets and tea.

A hand-organ grinds in the street a weird bit,
Confound those Italians! I wish they would quit
Interrupting our feast with their dolorous airs,
Suggestive of climbing the heavenly stairs.
(It's thoughts of the future, as all will agree,
That we fain would dismiss from our bosoms when we
Sit down to discussion of crumpets and tea!)

The Sabbath-day luncheon whereof I now speak
Quite answers its purpose the rest of the week;
Yet with the next Sabbath I wait for the bell
Announcing the man who has crumpets to sell;
Then I scuttle downstairs in a frenzy of glee,
And purchase for sixpence enough for us three,
Who hunger and hanker for crumpets and tea.

But soon ah! too soon I must bid a farewell
To joys that succeed to the sound of that bell,
Must hie me away from the dank, foggy shore
That's filled me with colic and yearnings for more!
Then the cruel, the heartless, the conscienceless sea
Shall bear me afar from Teresa and Leigh
And the other twin friendships of crumpets and tea.

Yet often, ay, ever, before my wan eyes
That Sabbath-day luncheon of old shall arise.
My stomach, perhaps, shall improve by the change,
Since crumpets it seems to prefer at long range;
But, oh, how my palate will hanker to be
In London again with Teresa and Leigh,
Enjoying the rapture of crumpets and tea!