Short measure ’tis.” “And yet enough,”
Said Derwent; “’tis a hopeful song;
Or, if part sad, not less adorning,
Like purple in a royal mourning.
We debtors be. Now come along
To table, we’ll take no rebuff.”
So Vine sat down among them then—
Adept—shy prying into men.
Derwent here wheeled him: “But for sake
Of conscience, noble Arnaut, tell;
When now I as from dream awake
It just dawns on me: how is this?
Wine-bibbing? No! that kind of bliss
Your Koran bars. And Belex, man,
Thou’st smoked before the sun low fell;
And this month’s what? your Ramadan?
May true believers thus rebel?”
Good sooth, did neither know to tell,
Or care to know, what time did fall
The Islam fast; yet took it so
As Derwent roguish prompted, though
It was no Ramadan at all;
’Twas far ahead, a movable fast
Of lunar month, which to forecast
Needs reckoning.
Ponderous pause
The Anak made: “Mahone has laws,
And Allah’s great—of course:—forefend!
Ho, rouse a stave, and so an end:
“The Bey, the Emir, and Mamalook lords
Charged down on the field in a grove of swords:
Hurrah! hurrah and hurrah
For the grove of swords in the wind of war!
“And the Bey to the Emir exclaimed, Who knows?
In the shade of the scimiters Paradise shows!
Hurrah! hurrah and hurrah
For the grove of swords in the wind of war!”
He sang; then settled down, a mate
For Mars’ high pontiff—solemn sate,
And on his long broad Bazra blade
Deep ruminated. Less sedate,
The Spahi now in escapade
Vented some Turkish guard-room joke,
But scarce thereby the other woke
To laughter, for he never laughed,
Into whatever mood he broke,
Nor verbal levity vouchsafed,
So leonine the man. But here
The Spahi, with another cheer
Into a vein of mockery ran,
Toasting the feast of Ramadan,
Laughing thereat, removed from fear.
It was a deep-mouthed mastiff burst,
Nor less, for all the jovial tone
The echo startling import won—
At least for Clarel, little versed
In men, their levities and tides
Unequal, and of much besides.
There by a lattice open swung
Over the Kedron’s gulf he hung,
And pored and pondered: With what sweep
Doubt plunges, and from maw to maw;
Traditions none the nations keep—
Old ties dissolve in one wide thaw;
The Frank, the Turk, and e’en the Jew
Share it; perchance the Brahmin too.
Returns each thing that may withdraw?
The schools of blue-fish years desert
Our sounds and shores—but they revert;
The ship returns on her long tack:
The bones of Theseus are brought back:
A comet shall resume its path
Though three millenniums go. But faith?
Ah, Nehemiah—and, Derwent, thou!
’Twas dust to dust: what is it now
And here? Is life indeed a dream?
Are these the pilgrims late that heard
The wheeling desert vultures scream
Above the Man and Book interred—
Scream like the haglet and the gull
Off Chiloe o’er the foundered hull?
But hark: while here light fell the clink
The five cups made touched brink to brink
In fair bouquet of fellowship,
And just as the gay Lesbian’s lip
Was parted—jetting came a wail
In litany from Kedron’s jail
Profound, and belly of the whale:
“Lord, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Intercede for me,
Angel of the Agony.
Spare me, spare me!
Merciful be—
Lord, spare me—
Spare and deliver me!”
Arrested, those five revelers there,
Fixed in light postures of their glee,
Seemed problematic shapes ye see
In linked caprice of festal air
Graved round the Greek sarcophagi.
15. IN MOONLIGHT
The roller upon Borneo’s strand
Halts not, but in recoiling throe
Drags back the shells involved with sand,
Shuffled and muffled in the flow
And hollow of the wallowing undertow.
In night Rolfe waked, and whelming felt
That refluence of disquiet dealt
In sequel to redundant joy.
Around he gazed in vague annoy
Upon his mates. The lamp-light dim
Obscurely showed them, strangely thrown
In sleep, nor heeding eye of him;
Flung every way, with random limb—
Like corses, when the battle’s done
And stars come up. No sound but slight
Calm breathing, or low elfin shriek
In dream. But Mortmain, coiled in plight,
Lay with one arm wedged under cheek,
Mumbling by starts the other hand,
As the wolf-hound the bone. Rolfe rose
And shook him. Whereat, from his throes
He started, glaring; then lapsed down:
“Soft, soft and tender; feels so bland—
Grind it! ’tis hers, Brinvilliers’ hand,
My nurse.” From which mad dream anon
He seemed his frame to re-command;
And yet would give an animal moan.
“God help thee, and may such ice make
Except against some solid? nay—
But thou who mark’st, get thee away,
Nor in such coals of Tartarus rake.”
So Rolfe; and wide a casement threw.
Aroma! and is this Judæa?
Down the long gorge of Kedron blew
A balm beyond the sweet Sabæa—
An air as from Elysian grass;
Such freshening redolence divine
As mariners upon the brine
Inhale, when barren beach they pass
By night; a musk of wafted spoil
From Nature’s scent-bags in the soil,
Not in her flowers; nor seems it known
Even on the shores wherefrom ’tis blown.
Clarel, he likewise wakeful grew,
And rose, joined Rolfe, and both repaired
Out to a railed-in ledge. In view
Across the gulf a fox was scared
Even by their quiet coming so,
And noiseless fled along a line
Of giddy cornice, till more slow
He skulked out of the clear moonshine;
For great part of that wall did show,
To these beneath the shadowed hight,
With arras hung of fair moon-light.
The lime-stone mountain cloven asunder,
With scars of many a plunge and shock
Tremendous of the rifted rock;
So hushed now after all the thunder,
Begat a pain of troubled wonder.
The student felt it; for redress
He turned him—anywhere—to find
Some simple thing to ease the mind
Dejected in her littleness.
Rolfe read him; and in quiet way
Would interpose, lead off, allay.
“Look,” whispered he, “yon object white—
This side here, on the crag at brink—
’Tis touched, just touched by paler light;
Stood we in Finland, one might think
An ermine there lay coiled. But no,
A turban ’tis, Djalea’s, aloof
Reclining, as he used to do
In Lebanon upon proud roof—
His sire’s. And, see, long pipe in state,
He inhales the friendly fume sedate.
Yon turban with the snowy folds
Announces that my lord there holds
The rank of Druze initiate—
Not versed in portion mere, but total—
Advanced in secrets sacerdotal;
Though what these be, or high or low,
Who dreams? Might Lady Esther learn?”
“Who?”
“Lady Esther. Don’t you know?
In Libanus, and read the stars;
Self-exiled lady, long ago
She prophesied of wizard wars,
And kept a saddled steed in stall
Awaiting some Messiah’s call
Who came not.—But yon Druze’s veil
Of Sais may one lift, nor quail?
We’ll try.”
To courteous challenge sent,
The Druze responded, not by word
Indeed, but act: he came; content
He leaned beside them in accord,
Resting the pipe-bowl. His assent
In joining them, nay, all his air
Mute testimony seemed to bear
That now night’s siren element,
Stealing upon his inner frame,
Pliant had made it and more tame.
With welcome having greeted him,
Rolfe led along by easy skim
And won the topic: “Tell us here—
Your Druze faith: are there not degrees,
Orders, ascents of mysteries
Therein? One would not pry and peer:
Of course there’s no disclosing these;
But what’s that working thought you win?
The prelate-princes of your kin,
They—they—doubtless they take their ease.”
No ripple stirred the Emir’s son,
He whiffed the vapor, kept him staid,
Then from the lip the amber won:
“No God there is but God,” he said,
And tapped the ashes from the bowl,
And stood. ’Twas passive self-control
Of Pallas’ statue in sacked Rome
Which bode till pushed from off the plinth;
Then through the rocky labyrinth
Betook him where cool sleep might come;
But not before farewell sedate:—
“Allah preserve ye, Allah great!”
16. THE EASTER FIRE
“There’s politesse! we’re left behind.
And yet I like this Prince of Pith;
Too pithy almost. Where’ll ye find
Nobleman to keep silence with
Better than Lord Djalea?—But you—
It can not be this interview
Has somehow—” “No,” said Clarel; “no,”
And sighed; then, “How irreverent
Was Belex in the wassail-flow:
His Ramadan he links with Lent.”
“No marvel: what else to infer?
Toll-taker at the Sepulcher.
To me he gave his history late,
The which I sought.—You’ve marked the state
Of warders shawled, on old divan,
Sword, pipe, and coffee-cup at knee,
Cross-legg’d within that portal’s span
Which wins the Holy Tomb? Ay me,
With what a bored dead apathy
Faith’s eager pilgrims they let in!”
“Guard of the Urn has Belex been?”
Said Clarel, starting; “why then,—yes—”
He checked himself.—
“Nay, but confess,”
Cried Rolfe; “I know the revery lurks:
Frankly admit that for these Turks
There’s nothing that can so entice
To disbelieve, nay, Atheize—
Nothing so baneful unto them
As shrined El Cods, Jerusalem.
For look now how it operates:
To Christ the Turk as much as Frank
Concedes a supernatural rank;
Our Holy Places too he mates
All but with Mecca’s own. But then
If chance he mark the Cross profaned
By violence of Christian men
So called—his faith then needs be strained;
The more, if he himself have done
(Enforced thereto by harsh command)
Irreverence unto Mary’s Son.”
“How mean you?” and the speaker scanned.
“Why not alone has Belex been
An idling guard about The Tomb:
Nay, but he knows another scene
In fray beneath the self-same dome
At festivals. What backs he’s scored
When on the day by Greeks adored,
St. Basil’s Easter, all the friars
Schismatic, with the pilgrim tribes,
Levantine, Russian, heave their tides
Waiting the burst of fraudful fires
From vent there in the Holy Tomb
Which closeteth the mongers. Room!
It jets! To quell the rush, the lines
Of soldiers sway: crack falls the thong;
And mid the press, some there, though strong,
Are trampled, trodden, till they die.
In transfer swift, igniting fly
The magic flames, which, caught along
By countless candles, multiply.
Like seas phosphoric on calm nights,
Blue shows the fane in fog of lights;
But here ’tis hurricane and high:
Zeal, furious zeal, and frenzying faith
And ecstasy of Atys’ scath
When up the Phrygian mount he rushed
Bleeding, yet heeding not his shame,
While round him frantic timbrels pushed
In rites delirious to name.
No: Dindymus’ nor Brahma’s crew
Dream what these Christian fakirs do:
Wrecked banners, crosses, ragged palms—
Red wounds thro’ vestments white ye view;
And priests who shout ferocious psalms
And hoarse hosannas to their king,
Even Christ; and naught may work a lull,
Nor timely truce of reason bring;
Not cutting lash, nor smiting sword,
Nor yet—Oh! more than wonderful—
The tomb, the pleading tomb where lay Our Lord.”
“But who ordains the imposture? speak.”
“The vivid, ever-inventive Greek.”
“The Greek? But that is hard to think.
Seemly the port, gentle the cheer
Of friars which lodge upon this brink
Of Kedron, and do worship here
With rites august, and keep the creed.”—
“Ah, rites august;—this ancient sect,
Stately upholstered and bedecked,
Is but a catafalque, concede—
Prolongs in sacerdotal way
The Lower Empire’s bastard sway;
It does not grow, it does but bide—
An orthodoxy petrified.
Or, if it grow, it grows but with
Russia, and thence derives its pith.
The Czar is its armed bishop. See,
The Czar’s purse, so it comes to me,
Contributes to this convent’s pride.
But what’s that twinkling through the gloom
Far down? the lights in chantry? Yes!
Whence came the flame that lit? Confess,
E’en from Jerusalem—the Tomb,
Last Easter. Horseman from the porch
Hither each Easter spurs with torch
To re-ignite the flames extinct
Upon Good-Friday. Thus, you see,
Contagious is this cheatery;
Nay, that’s unhandsome; guests we are;
And hosts are sacred—house and all;
And one may think, and scarcely mar
The truth, that it may so befall
That, as yon docile lamps receive
The fraudful flame, yet honest burn,
So, no collusive guile may cleave
Unto these simple friars, who turn
And take whate’er the forms dispense,
Nor question, Wherefore? ask not, Whence?”
Clarel, as if in search of aught
To mitigate unwelcome thought,
Appealed to turret, crag and star;
But all was strange, withdrawn and far.
“Yet need we grant,” Rolfe here resumed,
“This trick its source had in a dream
Artless, which few will disesteem—
That angels verily illumed
Those lamps at Easter, long ago;
Though now indeed all come from prayer
(As Greeks believe—at least avow)
Of bishops in the Sepulcher.
Be rumor just, which small birds sing,
Greek churchmen would let drop this thing
Of fraud, e’en let it cease. But no:
’Tis ancient, ’tis entangled so
With vital things of needful sway,
Scarce dare they deviate that way.
The Latin in this spurious rite
Joined with the Greek: but long ago,
Long years since, he abjured it quite.
Still, few Rome’s pilgrims here, and they