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DENZIL PLACE. 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2007 with funding from 
 
 IVIicrosoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/denzilplacestoryOOfanerich 
 
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 DENZIL PLACE 
 
 A STORY IN VERSE. 
 
 ^CXxMAXfi. ,^.^\ 
 
 BY 
 
 VIOLET FANE. 
 
 LONDON : 
 CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY. 
 
 1875- 
 
HARRISON AND SONS, PRINTERS, 
 
 ST. martin's lane. 
 
 feipr 
 
9^3 
 
 PART I. 
 
 ** Alas, that love should be a blight and snare. 
 To those who seek all sympathies in one ! " 
 
 Shelley. 
 
 M865209 
 
This is not living, tho' I move and breathe, 
 Ah, is there nothing better in the world ? 
 I love to see the lily's cup unfurl'd 
 To greet the sun, — I love the lake beneath 
 And all the beauty of these barren days, 
 But is there nothing better ? As I gaze 
 I seem to dream a mad unmeaning dream 
 About some fairy thing I have not known. 
 Sigh on, wild winds! your everlasting moan 
 Haunts me in summer whilst the thrushes sing 
 And ev'ry day in ev'ry year, the ring 
 Of something sad seems floating on the air, 
 I hear it sighing round me ev'rywhere. 
 And yet I hope and wait, whilst still I seem 
 As tho' my soul were drifting down a stream 
 To meet some unknown, unexpected thing. 
 
DENZIL PLACE. 
 
 ** This is the place. Stand still, my steed, 
 Let me review the scene. 
 And summon from the shadowy past 
 The forms that once have been." 
 
 Longfellow. 
 
 ** And on that cheek, and o'er that brow, 
 So soft, so calm, yet eloquent. 
 The smiles that win, the tints that glow, 
 
 But tell of days in goodness spent, 
 A mind at peace with all below, 
 A heart whose love is innocent. " 
 
 Byron. 
 
 L 
 
 THERE, in yon gabled house amongst the oaks 
 Which shut it off from this, the highway road 
 That skirts the park towards the village side, 
 They used to dwell together ; he was old, 
 
6 Denzil Place, 
 
 And she, his wife, a very child in looks, — 
 Her woman's soul, as yet an unfledg'd thing 
 Seem'd waiting almost wearily for wings. — 
 Most dutiful, and kind, and seeming gay 
 She moved about, the sunbeam of the house, 
 But like a temp'rate sunbeam, such as here 
 Warms us in England ; she knew no extremes 
 Of passionate grief or boisterous merriment 
 Such as so often stormily unite 
 In the untutor'd natures of the young, — 
 It was as tho' the day she wore the ring 
 And took the name of kim, her wither'd lord, 
 She had put by her youth with some old dress 
 And left it by mistake in her past home 
 Amongst her toys. She did not know the world 
 This orphan daughter of a ruin'd man. 
 Whose only friends had been the birds and flow'rs, 
 She only knew what they would have her know 
 Who taught her as they would, and only read 
 As they would have her read, and then at length 
 The guardian Avho had guarded her from far 
 (One she had never seen), plann'd out her life 
 And when the question of her marriage rose 
 Clench'd it at once because Sir John was rich. 
 
Denzil Place. 
 
 And then it was a lifeless life began, 
 
 For Constance (thus it was that she was named)) 
 
 To her not seeming so, who had not liv'd 
 
 As yet but for her dolls and lesson-books — 
 
 To be the mistress of the grandest house 
 
 For many miles, to fuss about the poor, 
 
 To teach the villagers, to dress and dine. 
 
 And meet the same dull neighbours ev'ry night — 
 
 This was her life ; to London now and then, 
 
 But only for a time, for to Sir John 
 
 The air seem'd echoing with a dragon's hiss, — 
 
 The Hydra-headed monster call'd " Reform" 
 
 That met him as he threaded thro' the streets 
 
 And seem'd to glare defiance as he pass'd — 
 
 His blear, distorting, ultra-Tory eye 
 
 Saw danger in a thousand harmless things 
 
 Unfear'd by Constance, to whom all seem'd noise 
 
 And hurry and excitement and fatigue, — 
 
 The world seem'd rushing to some hidden goal, — 
 
 All went so fast, and 'ere she ceased to stare 
 
 They were at home and life dragg'd on again. 
 
 The neighbours 'round her all led dreary lives 
 Yet did not know it ; stagnant tedious hours 
 
8 Denzil Place. 
 
 Crawl'd from the rising to the setting sun ; — 
 
 Such small ambitions, such a narrow creed 
 
 All held, and yet, withal, self-satisfied. 
 
 Each saw the mote within his brother's eye 
 
 As thro* a microscope, and hailing it 
 
 With joy, proclaim' d it to the little world 
 
 Of waiting Pharisees, whose open mouths 
 
 Could mutter other things besides their pray'rs. 
 
 Amongst these mouldy human vegetables 
 
 Constance rais'd up her head and seem'd a rose. 
 
 And when compared with their's, she deem'd her home 
 
 A garden, for not only did they live 
 
 Their dull, respectable and tedious lives 
 
 Apart from thoughts of Beauty, Art, or Love, 
 
 But many liv'd them too in enmity 
 
 One with another ; many too, were poor, 
 
 And liv'd in dwellings desolate and damp, 
 
 Empty of all save the provincial pride 
 
 Of Squire and Squiress ; others too, were ill, 
 
 For sometimes to the village where they liv'd 
 
 Came fevers; — from the chast'ning hand of God, 
 
 (So said Sir John, altho' a meddling man 
 
 Who came from London, made him build anew 
 
 Some cottages he thought were good enough. 
 
Denzil Place, .9 
 
 For such as had been born and bred in them ; 
 
 And tho' this meddUng man had also said 
 
 The fever had not been if good Sir John 
 
 Had mov'd more with the times). — But what of this ? 
 
 Some infidels will always see a cause — 
 
 A cause of bricks and mortar, in the curse 
 
 Sent down by God upon our sinful race ! 
 
 (So said the parson, and advised a pray'r. 
 
 But thought the drainage should be left alone. 
 
 As heretofore ;) and so they pray'd and pray'd, 
 
 And drank the water of polluted wells, 
 
 Whilst on the fever raged, and had its course ; 
 
 Then, strange to say, abated ; many homes 
 
 Made desolate, and in the village church 
 
 Were many mourning forms, and Constance, sad 
 
 And humbled, felt ashamed of being well. 
 
 Yet thank'd her God the fever spared her home. 
 
 So, looking not to those whose lives were bright — 
 
 Fairer than hers, she look'd around and saw 
 
 How sad life w^as for many ; thus she made 
 
 Her's seem the best ; — so free, she thought, from toil, 
 
 Exempt from pain and squalor, affluent, 
 
 And deck'd around with many pleasant things — 
 
10 Denzil Place, 
 
 The woods, the lake, the cheerful summer-room, 
 The careless moments, — nothing going wrong, — 
 This calmly negative and passive life 
 Seem'd good to her, and so the days went by. 
 
 To Constance had been bom a seeming son 
 Without the torture of the " pains of hell " 
 (As saith the pray'r book), unto him she clung 
 This childless second mother, young and fair ; 
 Roland his name ; he was the child of one 
 Who might, maybe, have seem'd a rival now 
 To Constance, had she lov'd kind old Sir John 
 With that unjust, impassion'd jealousy 
 Which reaches from the Present to the Past, — 
 His dead first wife had died before the boy 
 Had learnt her face, and Constance was to him 
 Playmate, and friend, and mother all in one. 
 
 To her he was the only link that bound 
 Her life to what was gay, and fresh, and free 
 From dull restraint ; a dear excuse for youth 
 And secret romping ; he was champion, friend, 
 And little lover, jealous, wayward, fond, 
 And brooking no control save from her hand. — 
 
Denzil Place. 1 1 * 
 
 ** Oh, had he been my son," she often thought, 
 " I could not love him more than now I do." 
 (Thus oft these self-anointed mothers speak, 
 With such a tender tremor in their voice, 
 They almost think their foolish words are true !) 
 
 Often in summer days these two would go 
 And gather cowslips in the dewy fields 
 Before the hay was mown. The cuckoo-flow'r 
 Here rais'd her fragile head, and here and there 
 With joyous cry, the happy child would hail 
 The rarer blossom of the orchis, prim 
 And purple, with its spotted snake-like leaves. 
 As the cool meadow sloped towards the lake, 
 The grass grew rank and tall and bulmshy, 
 And giant buttercups and pigmy frogs, 
 And all the wondrous sprawling water-flies, 
 Made little Roland clap his hands in glee — 
 Here was a boat, wherein the youthful friends 
 Would row at eventide, and watch the sun 
 Sink down behind the western woodland ridge ; 
 Then all the water grew a pink surprise 
 To Roland — pink at first, then pale and wan ^ 
 And yellow as the primroses, then white, 
 
12 Denzil Place, 
 
 A shining, dazzling, oval mirror, set 
 
 In the dim, dark'ning purple of the night. 
 
 Sir John, meanwhile, was busy at the town,— 
 
 The nearest tow^n, dispensing justice there. 
 
 Or corresponding in his library 
 
 AVith some one of the friends who lagg'd behind 
 
 The wheels of Progress. " This and this was good, 
 
 " But that was dangerous, and might do harm — 
 
 " It might do good, but good would come in time, 
 
 " No need to hurry it ; — the poor man's life 
 
 " Was happier and calmer when his mind 
 
 ** Look'd not beyond the clods from whence he sprung ; 
 
 " AVhy, let him plough, and thresh, and sow and reap, 
 
 " And let the better people of the world 
 
 " Trouble their wiser heads about his weal." 
 
 This was the usual strain in which he wrote 
 
 To those in London who were then in power ; 
 
 " A useful county man," they said of him, 
 
 " Not brilliant,— taking people by the ear, 
 
 " But staunch, and true, and English to the bone 1 " 
 
 Of him they spoke the truth, for he was true 
 And honest in that most dishonest cause — 
 
Denzil Place. 13 
 
 The war against the liberty of man, — 
 
 The war against the liberty of thought, — 
 
 The war against the poor the rich have made, — 
 
 The temporising for the little while 
 
 During the which God holds responsible 
 
 The living man, then after ^' Come what may ! 
 
 "• So long as all the evils that ensue 
 
 " Come not in this, my time, it matters not, 
 
 ** Starvation comes but once, — let well alone ! " 
 
 This was his argument, could he have look'd 
 
 Into the selfish secrets of his soul ; 
 
 But being kind and just in smaller things, 
 
 His very self suspected not himself 
 
 Of holding other than a party creed 
 
 Respectable and fair ; if to himself 
 
 And those like him most fair, what matter then ? 
 
 " Each for himself ! He was an Englishman ! " 
 
 To church together on the Sabbath mom 
 Constance and Roland used to wend their way. 
 All thro' the deeply-rutted Sussex lanes, 
 And o'er the fields, whilst on his sturdy cob, 
 Sir John would jog along the highway road. 
 In Constance had been born a passionate love 
 
; V4 Denzil Place, 
 
 Of Nature, all that was not made by man 
 
 Seem'd sacred, beautiful, and good to see. 
 
 Thus, tho' a Christian, in her gentle breast 
 
 Some unsuspected germ of Pantheism 
 
 Lay dormant \ much the easiest gate to Heav'n 
 
 Seem'd to be thro' the lovely works of God — 
 
 The flow'rs — the trees ; she often felt in church 
 
 How good it would have been to worship there 
 
 Amongst the oaks, as once the Druids did, 
 
 With nothing roofing off the blue of Heav'n, 
 
 And nothing interfering to distract 
 
 The heart from God ! Here, in the mouldy church, 
 
 So many sights arrested her young mind. 
 
 Seeming to drag it back again to earth, 
 
 And oftentimes she rais'd her timid eyes 
 
 To see the neighbours enter, one by one. 
 
 " And who is that ? " or " Why is she in black ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, I know, the son who was at school ! " 
 
 " She is in mourning for his grandmother ; 
 
 " And that's the Captain, who is going to wed 
 
 " With Helen." Often worldly thoughts like these 
 
 Constance would try to check, but still they came ; 
 
 Then there were sadder thoughts, — above the pew 
 
 The mildew'd hatchments of her husband's race 
 
Denzil Place, \ 5 
 
 Hung in a gloomy row upon the wall, 
 
 The one that hung over the entrance hall 
 
 The year that little Roland's mother died, 
 
 Eight years ago, when she was only twelve, 
 
 (Roland was eight years old,) she saw it then 
 
 And ask'd her maid the reason it was there, 
 
 That painted piebald sign-board, and half thought 
 
 That Farleigh Court had turn'd into an inn. 
 
 ** Some day," poor Constance thought, " I too must die 
 
 " And lie forgotten, nothing will be left 
 
 " To make these simple peasants think of me 
 
 " Save some such dismal diamond on the wall 
 
 " Of this old church ! My side will be in black 
 
 *' With three poor greyhounds madly rushing on, 
 
 " Ah, rushing whither ? But Death comes to all 
 
 " And Life is very often very sad !" 
 
 Sometimes they skirted Geoffrey Denzil's park 
 (Their absent nearest neighbour, then abroad, 
 Unknown as yet to Constance, tho' Sir John 
 Had been his guardian when he was a boy, 
 Their fathers being kinsmen). From the wall 
 That fenced it round, the ivy-tresses hung, 
 And served to help young Roland when he climb'd 
 
1 6 Denzil Place. 
 
 Follow'd by Constance, into Denzil park, 
 
 There would they wander, for the tangled shade 
 
 Unthinn'd for many years, possess'd a charm 
 
 For her young heart she scarce could understand, 
 
 The gnarled limbs of those neglected trees 
 
 Seem'd weirdly twisting into human shapes, 
 
 And nowhere did the ferns and mosses grow 
 
 In such luxuriance ; the rooks, too, built 
 
 Whole cities, she could scarcely call them nests, 
 
 And Roland once had said, on seeing them. 
 
 He thought the weight of them must make the heads 
 
 Of the poor heavy-laden fir-trees ache — 
 
 They often waded ankle-deep in leaves 
 
 Scatter'd by many winters ; — here the air 
 
 Seem'd heavy with the Past, from man to leaf, 
 
 But by and bye the tangled thicket ceased. 
 
 And evergreens, and winding gravel walks 
 
 (Untended now) led to the sloping lawn — 
 
 Quaint shapes of nymph and satyr guarded it, 
 
 And further on, a gate of filagree 
 
 Sided by Denzil dragons, open'd full 
 
 On the deserted terrace. Here and there 
 
 Forming the centre of a garden bed, 
 
 A yew-tree (pointed once, and duly trimmed 
 
Denzil Place. 1 7 
 
 As are the toy-trees of a Noah's Ark,) 
 
 Uprear'd its head, all ragged and unshorn, 
 
 And seem'd to show the garden's plan had been 
 
 Italian. With doors and windows barr'd, 
 
 Sometimes the trespassers would peep and mark 
 
 The silent, low, Elizabethan house 
 
 Behind the bowling-green ; thro' screening boughs 
 
 They often watch'd its only sign of life — 
 
 The kitchen chimney's faint blue smoke, that curl'd 
 
 Over the cedars when the wind was east. 
 
 One day (it was a Friday) they were thus 
 
 Roaming about, and playing hide and seek. 
 
 Spring-time was near, and all the noisy rooks 
 
 Were busy with their nests, — the day was fine. 
 
 And on the leafless trees the little buds 
 
 Were green with tender promises of spring. 
 
 The old house seemed to wear a brighter look, 
 
 The shutters were unbarr'd, an aged man, 
 
 A gardener, was passing to and fro 
 
 Rolling the gravel walks ; — some carpets hung 
 
 Upon the garden-gate ; — the breath of life 
 
 Seem'd once more waking with the budding spring ; 
 
 A groom rode by them on a chestnut horse, 
 
1 8 Denzil Place. 
 
 They look'd, and saw that ev'ry chimney smoked, 
 And Constance said, " He must be coming home." 
 
 They linger'd on till almost eventide, 
 Constance, unconsciously, whilst Roland play'd, 
 Lost in her aimless, nameless, day-dreaming. 
 And building many castles in the air. 
 Her years, so few, so pure, so soon arrang'd 
 Into this unemotional, dull, shape. 
 Not to be chang'd, had never known as yet 
 Those violent alternate lights and shades 
 Which many lives have weather'd, yet at times 
 She seem'd to feel the spray of coming storms, 
 Or bask beneath the rays of unknown suns, 
 Whilst something softly whisper'd to her heart 
 That life as yet had not begun for her — 
 She seemed to wait^ and often with a smile 
 She woke to chide her foolish maiden-dreams 
 And wonder'd how she ever could forget 
 That she had been the wife of good Sir John 
 For three whole years, and liVd at Farleigh Court. 
 
 This day it was the trotting of a horse 
 And all the cawing cloud of frighten'd rooks 
 
Denzil Place, 19 
 
 That call'd the gentle dreamer back to life, — 
 Roland had wander'd from her, and in sport 
 She waited for him, hiding in the shade 
 Of tangled laurels, near the avenue. 
 So thickly grown was all the underwood, 
 That Constance, dress'd in sombre color'd serge, 
 Was lost and hidden ; as she waited there 
 A rider on a chestnut horse pass'd by 
 (The same she noticed ridden by a groom 
 Two hours ago). From out her hiding-place 
 She watch'd him pass her ; — tho' unseen till then 
 His was a face she seem'd to know before, 
 And she felt glad the master had returned 
 To light the fires, and let the sunshine in. 
 To plant the terraces with glowing flow'rs, 
 To sweep away the wither'd winter leaves. 
 And bring the breath of life to Denzil Place. 
 
 There are some scenes in this our little life 
 Which the uncertain light of memory 
 Seems to illumine with more vivid glow 
 Than all the rest, as in old banquet halls 
 Dim with oak-panelling, ere candles beam, 
 Some falling log will raise a transient flame 
 
20 Dentil Place. 
 
 To light one pictured face upon the wall 
 
 When all the space around is indistinct, — 
 
 Thus Constance, looking back upon her youth, 
 
 At what she was, and what she was not yet, 
 
 In after years, saw Geoffrey Denzil ride 
 
 As she had seen him first, thro' long arcades 
 
 Of evergreens ; his head a little bow'd. 
 
 As tho' to shun the overhanging leaves, 
 
 And sitting somewhat forward on his horse, 
 
 His eager profile as he pass'd her by — 
 
 A little hawk-like — looking far to front, 
 
 His boyish head, with all its clustered curls 
 
 And trace of southern suns upon his cheek, — 
 
 Then^ she had heard the trotting of the horse 
 
 Upon the shingly English avenue 
 
 Long after that young rider had pass'd by ; 
 
 And after^ when so many more had pass'd 
 
 (The horsemen who had left her on Life's road), 
 
 She often seem'd to hear that trotting steed. 
 
 Between this picture and one other one 
 The intervening space was half obscured. 
 But next, she saw a garden in the sun, 
 A cypress, all festoon'd with Banksia rose, 
 
Denzil Place. 21 
 
 Emblem (she used to think) of Death and Love ; 
 And then she saw herself, once more, as then 
 Clinging to Love and Life. 
 
 These memories, 
 As tho' two pictures, destin'd to be hung 
 Always together, in the after days 
 Seem'd painted on the panels of her heart, — 
 They haunted her until that solemn hour 
 Which comes to all, when, rudely torn aside, 
 Or gently, as with tender hand, withdrawn, 
 The curtain falls, which shrouded heretofore 
 The picture we may look at only once. 
 
It came as I lay dreaming 
 
 As it doth ever, 
 Had I guess'd it's subtle seeming 
 
 Would I ever? never, never! 
 But it came as I lay dreaming. 
 
 So, as I lay dreaming, 
 
 On the river 
 Of my life went softly streaming, 
 
 On it's breast no little quiver 
 Wam'd me as I lay there dreaming. 
 
 Now I am no longer dreaming, 
 
 Waking, quaking — 
 Dazed, I watch the rushing, streaming, 
 
 Of the stormy waters breaking 
 On the dream that I was dreaming. 
 
 As a straw floats on the gleaming, 
 
 Dashing river. 
 So my heart seems tossing, teeming 
 
 With each impotent endeavour 
 Drown'd amidst the torrents streaming. 
 
 Ah, it came as I lay dreaming ! 
 
 And for ever 
 Must I listen to the screaming 
 
 Of the storm-birds, and the river 
 Dashing madly onwards, seeming 
 Bent on bearing on it's steaming 
 
 Headlong course, each poor endeavour, 
 
 Had I guess'd it, would I ever . . . ? 
 Never ! Never ! 
 But it came as I lay dreaming ! 
 
25 
 
 " A youth to whom was given 
 
 So much of earth, so much of heaven, 
 And such impetuous blood." 
 
 Wordsworth. 
 
 II. 
 
 T F Geoffrey Denzil never had return'd 
 -■- To Denzil Place, if from the distant shores 
 Where he had wander'd now for many years 
 His English heart had never long'd for home, 
 Then, maybe, this, the simple history 
 Of some few years in some few English lives 
 Had ne'er been written, or had worse repaid 
 Even than now, the pains to trace or read. 
 
 When homeward bound, no thoughts of coming change, 
 Of brighter days, or sadder, vex'd his mind 
 Indifferent to Fate. With careless eyes 
 He saw the white cliffs of his native land, 
 
26 Denzil Place. 
 
 His country ! Yet so stern and cold and grey 
 This misty sole surviving mother seem'd ' 
 After the smiling violet-scented lands 
 Where he had linger'd, that he wonder'd why 
 He had so yearn'd to see those shores again. 
 He mused of home, and here a flash of pain 
 And sad remembrance clouded o'er his brow, 
 As he bethought him that no happy face 
 Would beam to welcome him. Anon his thoughts 
 Returned in sadness to those bygone years 
 When, with the mother who had been to him 
 So much in youth, he had so lov'd the spot 
 He now approach'd thus carelessly. As yet 
 He had no thought of long abiding there, 
 But he was wearied of perpetual change 
 And exile, and he long'd to look again 
 On the once lov'd and still famihar scenes 
 Of his past boyhood ; thus upon the day 
 Which look'd so bright to Constance in the woods, 
 But which was dim and misty near the coast, 
 Geoffrey returned to lonely Denzil Place. 
 
 He had determined that, as never more 
 There was a chance of his remaining there 
 
Denzil Place. 27 
 
 'Twere best to let the house, for then at least 
 There would be light and life within its walls, 
 And the slow, certain fingers of decay- 
 Might be awhile arrested, so for this 
 He came to England. 
 
 But the days went by 
 And still he linger'd on, and Denzil Place 
 Remain'd unlet, nor did he lease the land 
 As he had purpos'd ere he left the south. 
 The days went by, the months, and then a year, 
 And but that now and then he went to town, 
 The lonely owner of those mortgaged lands 
 Stayed on at Denzil. Once the Denzil race 
 Had been amongst the wealthiest of squires ; 
 But thro' misfortune or thro' ignorance, 
 Or else thro' siding with the losing side 
 Whenever there was anything to lose, 
 Or else by being intellectually 
 Too far ahead the age in which they liv'd, 
 Or else by clinging to some yesterday 
 In Politics, Religion, or Reform, 
 And crawling thus too stubbornly behind, — 
 Be it enough to say they had been poor 
 
28 Denzil Place. 
 
 Of later years ; elections, lawsuits, debts. 
 Or earlier still, attainders, forfeits, dice. 
 Had left the present Denzil with a third 
 Of what had been his ancestors' estate ; 
 And thus he had not wealth enough to tend 
 With the magnificence it merited 
 His rambling red-brick mansion ; — and again, 
 As his extensive sylvan slopes and shades 
 Yielded him nothing save the Beautiful, 
 They but encumber'd him, and were it not 
 For the old memories that haunted them, 
 He long ago had sold them, to become 
 Once more a rich and independent man. 
 
 It was but seemly on returning home 
 
 That he should pay a visit to Sir John, 
 
 His former guardian, and his neighbour now ; 
 
 They talk'd together over future plans. 
 
 And much was said about the good to come 
 
 Of letting Denzil ; but Sir John opined 
 
 The good would never quite outweigh the ill — 
 
 Geoffrey should do as other people did — 
 
 Marry an heiress — live at Denzil Place — 
 
 Keep open house — be prudent in some ways, 
 
Denzil Place. 29 
 
 That without doubt, but dwell at his own home — 
 Rear children there, and when at last he died, 
 Be borne by his own grateful labourers 
 To his own vault, in his own church, and there 
 Be buried. 
 
 Here a softly open'd door, 
 A gentle rustling of a summer-dress. 
 And Constance look'd once more upon the man 
 She peep'd at fawn-like thro' the laurel leaves 
 At Denzil ; Geoffrey thought he ne'er had seen 
 In all his wanderings, a face so fair. 
 So soul-inspired — scarce seeming of the earth. 
 Because as yet enfolded, as the bud 
 Of some uncertain flow'r, which, cactus-like, 
 Might bear a flaunting bloom, passionate-hued. 
 Dyed with the dye of kisses and of blood. 
 Or else, with those frail blossoms of the spring, 
 Destin'd, it might be, but to bloom a day 
 And die the next, — thus she appear'd to him — 
 So out of place amongst so much that seem'd 
 So dreary, dull, prosaic, worm-eaten — 
 Surprised out of his usual sadden'd calm, 
 He learnt this was the wife Sir John had wed ; 
 Three years ago he read it in the Times, 
 
30 Denzil Place. 
 
 For, tearing once, to light the cigarette 
 
 Of an ItaHan princess, at Sienna, 
 
 A scrap of paper, as it met the flame 
 
 He, watching absently, read on the slip 
 
 The name of what was once his parish church, 
 
 Then read Sir John's, and guessing he was wed 
 
 Tried to read on, but the devouring flame 
 
 Had burnt up what had once been "Constance Leigh." 
 
 He little cared, and turning with a smile 
 
 He forthwith lit the fragrant cigarette 
 
 Of the Italian princess. Now, a pang 
 
 Shot thro' him as he thought how he had burnt 
 
 The name of one so good and beautiful 
 
 As he believ'd that Constance was ; at once 
 
 He knew she was the woman that she seem'd, 
 
 He guess'd the honesty of those sweet eyes, 
 
 The wild, fair face, so wise and yet so young, — 
 
 So wise, because not knowing Wisdom's use 
 
 Or Folly's ; ignorant alike of harm 
 
 (Call'd by so harsh a name), yet wrapp'd in dreams 
 
 Of an improbable future. Unconfess'd, 
 
 E'en to himself, a hunger in her eyes 
 
 Said to his wak'ning heart a thousand things. 
 
 Sir John explain'd the subject they discuss'd — 
 
Dentil Place, 31 
 
 " Denzil," he said, " is right well known to her, 
 " She and my son have rambled thro' your woods 
 " Many a time ; he talks of letting it — 
 " What think you, Constance ? " 
 
 " I am a poor man," 
 Geoffrey explain' d with mock humility, 
 " And beggars may not always have their choice." 
 *' Ah, Mr. Denzil, you seem rich to us," 
 Said Constance, " when we wander in your park 
 " And see so much to envy and admire ! 
 " Were Denzil mine, I could not let it go 
 " Into the hands of strangers ; but of course 
 " You will know best. The poor are all so glad 
 " You have come home ; we often speak of you — 
 " The poor and I together." 
 
 Such a charm 
 Lurk'd in the murmur'd music of her voice 
 That Denzil did not pause to meditate 
 Upon the wisdom of her simple words, 
 But from that hour the weighty subject dropp'd 
 And Geoffrey Denzil stay'd at Denzil Place. 
 
 Then there began for Constance a new life — 
 The dang'rous life of close companionship 
 
32 Denzil Place. 
 
 With one who is not bound by tie of blood 
 
 To be a comrade ; hitherto her days 
 
 Fled in contented converse with a child, 
 
 Or else in list'ning, kindly tolerant 
 
 To childish sayings from a dull old man, — 
 
 Those days seem'd good, she miss'd no promised joy, 
 
 But now how empty had they seem'd to her 
 
 Without this first-found sharer of her thoughts ! 
 
 Their very arguments (they dififer'd much 
 
 Upon religion), roused her from her dream, 
 
 And made of her a champion of the cross, 
 
 The zealous advocate of Highest Heav'n, 
 
 Her whole soul rose in arms to subjugate, 
 
 As with an angel's slashing two-edg'd sword, 
 
 The paganism of her new-found friend. 
 
 He held, indeed, unorthodox beliefs 
 
 And unbeliefs, (nay, mostly unbeliefs, 
 
 For these to him were easiest to hold,) 
 
 He felt so much was wrong here on the earth — 
 
 One giant fraud — a mutual " take in " — 
 
 An all-pervading system of deceit — 
 
 " Deluding one another " — this he saw, 
 
 And being by nature honest, loyal, true, 
 
Denzil Place, 33 
 
 He loath'd and hated all the canting lies 
 
 That smirk'd and prosper'd wheresoe'er he turn'd ; 
 
 Yet how to set things right he "did not know, 
 
 How to resuscitate to greener growth 
 
 The wither'd branches of a rotting tree — 
 
 To lop them off, he thought, were surely best, 
 
 So he had laid the axe unsparingly 
 
 To many an offshoot of the Tree of Faith, 
 
 But lacked the knowledge how to vitalize 
 
 The wholesome after-growth of tree and fruit 
 
 That he would raise instead. Without a creed, 
 
 His childhood's innocent beliefs puU'd down. 
 
 Stubborn, and seeming careless, (for in Care 
 
 He told himself he never should believe. 
 
 Nothing was worth a care !) Pensive at times, 
 
 Yet often kindling with a keener wit 
 
 Than we dull islanders are wont to show, 
 
 Inheriting a wild, impulsive heart, 
 
 Yet deeming he had drill'd himself to feel 
 
 No warmer than an iceberg ; with a face 
 
 Which said more of the secrets of his soul 
 
 Than he had wish'd maybe, could he have seen 
 
 The tell-tale flash of light that sometimes beam'd 
 
 From out his eager eyes ; — this was the man 
 
34 Denzil Place, 
 
 Who came to Constance in her loveless youth, 
 And, well-a-day ! 'twas just about the time 
 When she was wearied with Sir John's complaints 
 Against the railways and Democracy, 
 And when the extracts from the Tory press 
 Ceased to amuse her ! When this stranger came 
 His cold indifference to all these things 
 Became a bond of union, and in time 
 They smiled at them together. Then Sir John 
 Treated young Geoffrey Denzil like a boy. 
 Bore with his strange beliefs and unbeliefs. 
 And patronized and gave him good advice ; 
 And Constance, being married to Sir John, 
 Seem'd bound to be a sort of mentor too, 
 And took with him a sweet maternal way, 
 Tho' he was ten years older than herself. 
 And deem'd himself e'en older still, in heart. 
 
 But, like so many men who roam the world 
 In quest of happiness — in quest of love. 
 His heart was almost virgin as a maid's, 
 Untouch'd as yet by any searching fires, 
 And knowing it untouch'd, he hence assumed 
 That Love existed only in the minds 
 
Denzil Place. 35 
 
 Of madmen and of poets ; — he had ne^er, 
 E'en in the wild meridian of his youth, 
 Mistaken Pleasure for her kinsman Love, — 
 He wish'd it had been possible to join 
 Their hands together, but as never yet 
 His lips had tasted their united joys, 
 He felt assured they ever walk'd apart, 
 And Love had always tum'd another way 
 When he met Pleasure, To a mind like his, 
 A fact observ'd some half a dozen times 
 Became a deep conviction, and henceforth 
 No contradiction seem'd admissible 
 Unto a nature sway'd by common sense, — 
 So Love did not exist, (at least for him^ 
 And Pleasure seem'd a ghastly haggard shape 
 When sad Experience had untied her mask, 
 But still, if Love were not an empty name 
 How sweet to love ! . . . . 
 
 The golden summer days 
 Seem'd to be fleeter than they were of old, 
 It seem'd to Constance never until now * 
 
 Had she e'er laugh'd, or sung, or felt amus'd. 
 E'en Nature look'd more fair and beautiful 
 As she and Denzil and the happy child 
 
 D 2 
 
36 Denzil Place. 
 
 Pass'd over sun-lit lawn or grassy glade. 
 But Constance^ with her strict ideas of life, 
 Had ne'er been satisfied to let the days 
 Pass only in enjoyment; duties, work, 
 She had, and so had Mr. Denzil too. 
 Upon whose fair estate so many poor 
 And needy peasants look'd to him as God 
 Who deals all mercies. He was kind and good, 
 And he would always listen to her words, 
 And take her gently hazarded advice — 
 Here was a humble means of doing good. 
 And she was pledged to many a Denzil clown 
 To do her best. 
 
 " You may not be too poor," 
 She said one day, "to do such little things 
 *^ As they require. Your bailiff rais'd the rent 
 " Of that thatch'd cottage near the Farleigh lodge, 
 " The very day old Sands was paralyzed — 
 " His son enlisted on the self-same day 
 " To be a soldier — he had been his help 
 " Like a right hand ; and then his daughter died 
 " In child-bed (Do they ever come alone 
 " Misfortunes ?). So, you see this poor old man 
 
Denzil Place. 37 
 
 " Who scarce can lift one arm, must, half the day 
 
 *^ Carry his daughter's child— his roof is gone, 
 
 " Or more than half, and lets in all the rain — 
 
 " (He was a first-rate thatcher once, himself, 
 
 " But now his arm . . . ). You said you meant to hunt 
 
 " This Winter — ^you are rich enough for that, 
 
 " Would it not make you happier to think 
 
 " You had one horse the less, and feel the while 
 
 " Your tenants had more comfortable homes?" 
 
 Denzil smiled at the keen philanthropy 
 
 Of this devoted Lady Bountiful ; 
 
 But in about a week she saw old Sands 
 
 Rent-free and roof'd, and very nearly well. 
 
 Sir John and Geoffrey often would dispute 
 
 On foreign politics, and oft for hours 
 
 She listen'd to discussions on the Pope — 
 
 His government — " too lib'ral," said Sir John, 
 
 " And afterwards see what became of it ! 
 
 " A lesson it will be to other States, 
 
 *' And Kings, and Principalities, and Pow'rs ! 
 
 " They were a people vain, hot-headed, weak — 
 
 " And Pius rashly gave their heads the rein. 
 
38 Denzil Place. 
 
 " Perhaps he saw the folly of his ways 
 
 " When from his windows in the Vatican 
 
 " Surrounded by the signs of anarchy, 
 
 " He heard the ravings of the demagogues, 
 
 " And all the ' Viva Verdis'' of the mob 
 
 " Under their bloody flags of liberty !" 
 
 " But think," said Denzil, " how the masses groan ! — 
 
 " And how those men who live themselves at ease 
 
 " Mourn for the suff 'rings of their fellow-m.en ! 
 
 *^ And then to know that even were they well 
 
 " Govern'd and cared for, educated, fed, 
 
 " It would be only by some accident, 
 
 " To lend a tyrant popularity — 
 
 " To serve a purpose — ^whilst the only cure 
 
 " For all their ills — the spirit of Reform 
 
 " Is further off than Rome is now from here ! 
 
 " I often think of it for days — at times 
 
 "It really is enough to turn one grey, 
 
 ** To think that human beings, with sight, smell, 
 
 " Taste, hearing, sense, and long experience, 
 
 " Are ignorant and helpless as the brutes 
 
 " That graze in yonder meadows 1 " 
 
 Then Sir John 
 '* See, Constance, now, how soon we all were doom'd. 
 
Denzil Place. 39 
 
 " Once Geoffrey Denzil ruled us over here ! 
 
 " The poignard and stiletto ! sword and fire ! 
 
 " And he may tremble, too, for Denzil Place ; 
 
 " Those long black-bearded gentlemen, his friends, 
 
 *' May use him as Mazzini fain would use 
 
 '* ' // Re galantuomo,' when he's serv'd 
 
 " His purpose like a puppet. As for him 
 
 " (Victor Emmanuel), I dread indeed 
 
 " For him and for the mischievous Cavour 
 
 " The guillotine, — the fate of Louis Seize. 
 
 •' Ah, those who love the cap of Liberty 
 
 " Have never seen it worn ! My father once—" 
 
 (And here an anecdote.) " But," Denzil said : 
 
 " When men arise, long smarting under ills, 
 
 " They do not always act with self-control 
 
 " And dignity ; they only feel their wrongs, 
 
 " And have not leisure for those tender tears 
 
 " The fortunate at home can shed at ease 
 
 " Over the ills of others ! When a man 
 
 ''Like Ciceravacchio, in 'Forty-eight " 
 
 " And who," ask'd Constance, in a timid voice, 
 " Was Ciceravacchio, of whom you speak?" 
 " A patriot," said Denzil, eagerly — 
 " And one who had the courage to declare 
 
40 Denzil Place. 
 
 " The sentiments he felt — a humble man, 
 
 " Rising through zeal and courage — firm, self-made, 
 
 " Mazzini-ite, a friend of Liberty, 
 
 " And not asham'd to own himself her friend." 
 
 But after Geoffrey left. Sir John explain'd : 
 
 '* Ciceravacchio was Mazzini's tool — 
 
 " He once sold forage in the streets of Rome — 
 
 " A weak, vain, cruel, disaffected man, 
 
 " Leagued with assassins." 
 
 Constance sadly thought, 
 " Alas, tho' so well-meaning and so brave^ 
 " How wrofig he steins in almost everything P"^ 
 And tried henceforth to influence for good, 
 In politics as well as piety. 
 Her erring friend — she ventured thus at last, — 
 " My husband says that those who think like you 
 ^^ Would * slice all England into sandwiches'-^ 
 " A little piece for each, of field and copse — 
 ** Destroying all our beautiful old parks — 
 " And that if one grew richer than the rest, 
 " (As some will always grow thro' industry 
 " And honest perseverance), then the men 
 *' Dwelling upon the neighb'ring strips of land 
 " Would rise and take his goods and burn his house. 
 
Denzil Place, 41 
 
 ** He says, if your opinions gain the day, 
 
 " He will be of the very first to go 
 
 *' To stake or scaffold for his principles — 
 
 *^ And that in twenty minutes from the time 
 
 " When round about us here the banners wave 
 
 " Of your ideal republic, you will meet 
 
 " A brutal mob, elated with success, 
 
 *' Bearing my head, maybe, upon a pike ! 
 
 " (How horrible !) He says the Pope is good 
 
 " And Ferdinand the Second excellent — 
 
 ** A ' model sovereign' — most merciful, 
 
 " Sparing the very subjects who would rise 
 
 " And sacrifice him for their selfish ends — 
 
 " Why, when his faithful soldiers fired on them, 
 
 " He call'd to them with pity ^ do not fire ! 
 
 " *Make prisoners;' he said 'but do not shoot, 
 
 " 'Spare my deluded subjects ! ' And he says 
 
 " That those three gentlemen who came to church 
 
 " Were one and all red-hot Republicans ! 
 
 " (Ah, do be careful !) —members of a club 
 
 " Which governs by stilettos and by knives. 
 
 " He says they did not go to church to pray, 
 
 " But that they only went to make their notes, 
 
 " And see if our religion would be good 
 
42 Denzil Place, 
 
 ** Should they succeed in driving out their own, 
 
 ** But then he also says (and so /think,) 
 
 " That no religion will exist for long 
 
 " When wicked men like these are once in pow'r." 
 
 " I do not think so either," Denzil said, 
 
 " If by that sacred name you designate 
 
 " A superstitious creed of terrorism, — 
 
 " But we must hope religion will improve 
 
 " Along with knowledge and intelligence. 
 
 " Those three black-bearded men were friends of mine ; 
 
 "' Italians, it is true, and years ago 
 
 " I was some time the guest of one of them. 
 
 " Talking, last Saturday, around the fire, 
 
 " Of England's customs, government, reforms, — 
 
 *^ We pass'd to England's women ; I was vain, 
 
 " And boasted of my lovely country-women, 
 
 "And long'd to show how beautiful some were; — 
 
 " And so I fear Sir John was partly right, 
 
 " And that they did not go to church to pray, — 
 
 " I fear they only went to look at you — 
 
 " If to do this will earn for them the names 
 
 " Of Red-Republicans or Carbonari, 
 
 ** I fear they all were reddest of the red." 
 
 ** But," Constance said, (ignoring with a blush 
 
Denzil Place, 43 
 
 This first decided compliment,) " Sir John 
 
 " Has also told me neither of the three 
 
 " Dare show their faces on Italian soil." 
 
 " Sir John is right," said Denzil, with a sigh, 
 
 •* Thanks to the godless narrow-mindedness 
 
 " Of the oppressors of courageous hearts. 
 
 " Sir John's ideas," he added, with a sneer, 
 
 " Are all so broad — so cosmopolitan — 
 
 " Tell him he ought to be elected Pope, 
 
 " And govern Rome." He did not know the cause. 
 
 But somehow he felt angry with Sir John — 
 
 Exasperated with his common-sense 
 
 And stolid absence of enthusiasm ; 
 
 And so he ventured on this little sneer 
 
 At the opinions of his kind old friend. 
 
 Constance oft marvell'd much that one who held 
 
 In such high reverence all greatest good. 
 
 Honor, and truth, and wisdom, yet should drift, 
 
 Anchorless, Christless, on life's stormy sea. 
 
 It griev'd her much, and oft she pray'd to find 
 
 Some spell to lure him to her gentler creed. 
 
 She could have floor'd his sophistries with texts ; 
 
 With any one but him she could have said : 
 
 " Look in ' Corinthians' (two,) and chapter ten, 
 
44 Denzil Place, 
 
 " Verse five, and drop this groundless argument ! " 
 
 Or, " turn to ^ Kings' (one,) chapter nine, verse six, 
 
 *' And prithee ever after hold thy peace ! " 
 
 But starting firom some heathen starting-point 
 
 Unknown to her, it was as tho' he said : 
 
 " No * Kings' and no ' Corinthians' for me ! " 
 
 The very honesty with which he own'd 
 
 His infidelity, disarm'd and shock'd 
 
 His faithful friend — so well he tmbeliev^d, 
 
 She thought he surely would believe^ as well, 
 
 As ardently, as earnestly, if once 
 
 She could but draw him to the saving fold. 
 
 " Or, all is false," he said, " or all is true, 
 
 ** If true, then let us live and die for it ; 
 
 " If false, then let us cast away this creed, 
 
 " However good, it cannot be the best, 
 
 " If based upon a long accepted lie. 
 
 " But, if our faith is 7iot the work of priests — 
 
 "If the great God, indeed, could stoop so low — 
 
 " If such a paltry plan to save us all, 
 
 " Or such a cruel trap to get us damned, 
 
 " Could please the high great God, then can he be 
 
 " The God to whom I clasp'd my infant hands ? — 
 
Denzil Place. 45 
 
 ** The God my lender mother lov'd ? — the God 
 
 " For whom the saints and martyrs dared to die ? 
 
 " Oh, give me back my youth's fideHty, 
 
 " But give me also back my childhood's God ! 
 
 *' Kind and forgiving Father ! from the clouds, 
 
 " How did'st Thou seem to heave the pitying sigh 
 
 " At my cut finger ! When my bullfinch died, 
 
 " I thought of how He counted all my hairs 
 
 " And all about the sparrows ! Now, alas ! 
 
 " The caring for the individual — 
 
 " The sparing one mean unit 'special pain 
 
 " Seems so averse to the great principle 
 
 *' Of abstract commonweal, methinks, that Heav'n 
 
 " Could scarcely work a pamper'd emmet good 
 
 " In this great ant-hill, without working ill 
 
 " To many more ; just, but Republican, 
 
 " His wrath must crush out Pestilence and Sin, 
 
 " What matter if the swing of His strong arm 
 
 " Strike down some good and whole amongst the rest ?" 
 
 Then Constance answer'd, " Oh, it cannot be ! 
 " I feel assured the Bible is the truth ! 
 " It is the only comfort of the poor. 
 " Think how the very poor and ignorant 
 
46 Denzil Place, 
 
 " Have liv'd for many years upon its words ! 
 
 " Then, what you say of Christianity, 
 
 " I pray that you may see things as they are — 
 
 " / understand it all — / grasp it all ; 
 
 " But even were its teachings too obscure, 
 
 *' You know that we are told 7iie cannot know. 
 
 " ' All things with God are possible/ and then, 
 
 " Think what a beautiful and tender creed ! — 
 
 ** Think of the little babe in manger laid — 
 
 " The three wise men, all looking for the star — 
 
 " (I work'd them once in colored Berlin wool ; 
 
 " They all wore turbans — dress'd in Eastern dress — 
 
 " And in the distance was the hostelrie.) 
 
 " Ah, can you doubt? (Her eyes were filled with tears,) 
 
 " And then the Virgin, with her lovely face — 
 
 " Oh, think upon the glory round that head ! 
 
 " How many painters lov'd to dwell on it ! — 
 
 " Much greater men than you — wiser than you — 
 
 " Yet they believed it all. Think, too, of those — 
 
 " The martyrs — all the early Christian saints 
 
 *•' Thrown to wild beasts ; then, Cranmer, it is true 
 
 " He died in what I call the civil war 
 
 '' Of Christianity— but still he died— 
 
 ** Died at the stake, and let his wrong right hand 
 
Denzil Place, 47 
 
 '* Burn first, and said it had offended him. 
 
 "- Think of his faith !— ah, how it must have hurt !" 
 
 She added, shuddering, and held her hand 
 
 Against the Hght, and stroked it tenderly, 
 
 Seeing before her only in her zeal 
 
 Archbishop Cranmer's burnt apostate hand. 
 
 Thus with her gentle female arguments 
 
 She strove to quench the heathen in his heart. 
 
 He listen'd for the sake of her sweet voice, 
 
 Which murmur'd on and on so childishly, 
 
 (So thought he) yet his heart went out to meet 
 
 The signs of her soft foolish innocence. 
 
 He felt the while as might some cruel hawk. 
 
 Beneath the shadow of whose outspread wings 
 
 A little bird is chirping her sweet song. 
 
 For surely did he deem her child-like mind 
 
 Would bend and yield to his, and those soft notes 
 
 Become the echo of his stubborn thought ; — 
 
 FeeHng she was his prey, for what he would, 
 
 He linger'd still in pity, teaching her, 
 
 (He fondly deem'd) and stifling the desires 
 
 That would have risen in his lawless heart 
 
 Had his poor little pupil seemed more wise. 
 
48 Denzil Place. 
 
 Thus months pass'd by, and whilst the old man dosed 
 
 In the long ev'nings, by the winter fire, 
 
 To listen to the sound theology 
 
 Of one, the other's sad materialism, 
 
 No guardian angel would have shed a tear, 
 
 And e'en a crouching Mephistopheles 
 
 Had scarcely dared to rub his hands in glee. 
 
 Yet in those fire- lit ev'nings, all unknown 
 
 To each as yet, the germ of bitter fruit 
 
 Was sown. By both more sadly ev*ry night 
 
 The soft " good night " was utter'd, when the foes 
 
 After their wordy tournament, clasp'd hands. 
 
 It seemed that Friendship, banish'd for awhile, 
 
 Rush'd with too sudden haste to her old place, 
 
 For as these votaries of hostile creeds 
 
 Parted reluctantly, (unguess'd by one^ 
 
 The Christian lov'd the Heathen, and the sinner 
 
 Felt all his heart's blood warm towards the saint. 
 
** Give it me back ! " she cried and turned away, 
 And press'd her hands against her throbbing brow, 
 
 *' All that your robber-hand has day by day 
 
 " Torn from her breast who braved you until now — 
 
 Give it me back ! 
 
 ** Give it me back — my heart that seem'd so free, 
 " My unsuspecting trust in all mankind — ■ 
 
 *' My fearlessness of changes that might be 
 *' And all my vanish'd peacefulness of mind — 
 
 Give it me back ! 
 
 " Give it me back — the undreaded parting-hour — 
 *' My careless hearing of your coming steed — 
 
 *' Give me the ready jest in hall and bow'r, 
 ** The easy welcome that I did not heed — 
 
 Give it me back ! 
 
 * * Give it me back — the tranquil dreamless night, 
 
 '* The uneventful passing hours of day — 
 " The morning sun that rose without delight, 
 
 "Yet did not fade in bitterness away — 
 
 Give it me back ! 
 
 ** Give it me back ! — alas, my words are vain ! 
 
 *' Nay, — keep it all, I yield you all the rest — 
 *' I am your slave — ah, master, let me gain 
 
 " Some echo of this love within my breast — 
 
 Give it me back ! " 
 
51 
 
 ** There are secret workings in human affairs which overrule 
 all human contrivance, and counter-plot the wisest of our 
 counsels, iij so strange and unexpected a manner, as to cast a 
 damp upon our best schemes and warmest endeavours. " 
 
 Sterne. (Sermon XXXIX. , page 1 70. } 
 
 ** My loving arms have clasped him from the black hungry 
 jaws of Death. 
 
 " I saw the Grim Foe open wide his red-leafed book, but he 
 wrote not therein the name of my brave love." 
 
 (Adah Isaacs Menken. ) 
 
 III. 
 
 '^ I ^O those who own the kindling blood of youth, 
 -*- I would say, " Watch and ward ! — beware, 
 beware ! — 
 Look from the topmost tow'r, like ' Sister Ann,' 
 But unlike her, 'tis not for coming friend 
 That I would have you search with shaded eyes 
 
52 Denzil Place, 
 
 Along the far horizon ; 'tis the foe, — 
 
 The moral whirlwind I would have you fear !" 
 
 Yet how provide against events which steal 
 Silent and snake-like on our quiet lives ? 
 (As thieves at midnight-hour used once to creep, 
 For now they rob by day.) — 
 
 I would face Fire 
 And Sword, and Love, more terrible than both. 
 Had I but time to buckle on my mail ; 
 But often it has been as tho' the Fates 
 Were press'd for time, and anxious to begin 
 Their work of devastation ; or if time 
 Is e'er vouchsafed to ponder, then, alas ! 
 Our armour is mislaid, or w^ant of wear 
 Hath made it rusty and averse to clasp. 
 
 Oh, for the peaceful lives we all might lead 
 If some good angel would but make a sign 
 At each approaching danger to the soul ! 
 But well-a-day ! temptations seem to creep 
 All shod with silence, and it is as if 
 In times of feudal warfare, long ago, 
 
Denzil Place, 53 
 
 An enemy approach'd, conceal' d by night 
 
 Towards the fort, whilst at the postern gate 
 
 The warder has not time to sound a blast 
 
 Ere foemen revel in the citadel — 
 
 Thus shamed, surprised, the poor beleaguered soul 
 
 Dies or surrenders, mortified and maim'd ! 
 
 'Twas thus with Constance, unexpected ills 
 Seem'd crowding now upon her harmless life 
 So calm before. Three quiet happy years 
 Had pass'd away since Geoffrey Denzil first 
 Retum'd to England ; — they were chosen friends 
 Constance and he, whilst as another son 
 He seem'd to good Sir John, and to his boy 
 An elder brother. 
 
 One wild, wintry, night 
 They sat at Farleigh round the blazing hearth, — 
 Roland had gone to rest, and good Sir John 
 Was sleeping in his chair. His sister Jane 
 (A spinster, who had but that night arrived) 
 Was knitting silently. From time to time 
 Her eagle eyes, above her spectacles, 
 Would glance to where two beautiful young heads 
 Seem'd somewhat close together, bending o'er 
 
54 Denzil Place. 
 
 Some plans of cottages and alms-houses. 
 
 This sister of Sir John's was younger far 
 
 Than was her brother — unlike him in face 
 
 As in her nature. She had once been fair, 
 
 Flatter'd and spoilt, and could not brook the thought 
 
 Of growing old. Selfish and cold and proud 
 
 (May be resulting from some shock receiv'd 
 
 To what she may have " pleased to call" her heart), 
 
 She now seemed turn'd to uncongenial ice. 
 
 And Constance, who liked almost everyone, 
 
 Felt chiird and frightened by her influence. 
 
 She also seemed to know, as children do, 
 
 (And dogs,) that she, this withering old maid. 
 
 Had never wasted o'ermuch love on her ; 
 
 Nay, she had seen her letters to Sir John 
 
 Dissuading him from wedding one so young. 
 
 And each one filled with gloomy prophecies — 
 
 This had been kind, (for Constance now and then 
 
 Had lately had misgivings of her own,) 
 
 But then she knew no kindly motive lurk'd 
 
 Beneath this good advice for him or her. 
 
 Sir John had known his sister wish'd to pass 
 Her days beneath his roof — to keep his house 
 
Derml Place. 55^ 
 
 And rule over his servants and his son, 
 
 And blurted out, in his blunt, honest, way, 
 
 The same to Constance, to excuse the thought 
 
 That there was aught of malice against her — 
 
 But Constance had been happier to know 
 
 It was some sentiment of enmity 
 
 Which she might conquer, than to know the words 
 
 Came from base motives of self-interest — 
 
 And so she did not love Miss Jane L'Estrange, 
 
 Who did not love her either. 
 
 On this night 
 There suddenly arose a cry of "fire !" 
 And shrieks and sobs, and sounds of hurrying feet — 
 Geoffrey at once rush'd to the op'ning door. 
 And thrusting all the frighten'd crowd aside, 
 Sprang up the stair, whilst Constance from below 
 Exclaim'd " Alas ! 'tis in the western wing 
 " Where little Roland sleeps ! oh, save his life ! " 
 " And Mr. Denzil !" Miss L'Estrange call'd out, 
 Ere Geoffrey's active figure disappeared — 
 " I pray you, in the room that faces south — 
 " The blue front room — my room — save all you can — 
 " My Bible and my rings — my dressing-case — 
 " My keys, my purse" — ^but here her voice was drown'd 
 
56 Denzil Place, 
 
 By cries of frighten'd women, weights that fell, 
 
 And sounds of coming footsteps from below, 
 
 Hast'ning to succour those who still might be 
 
 Alive, where there was such a chance of death. 
 
 Then Miss L'Estrange begg'd Constance to be calm, 
 
 " An active boy would not be burnt in bed — 
 
 " He is upon the roof, and helping now 
 
 ** To quench the fire — or if, perchance, the smoke 
 
 " Has hinder'd him from waking, 'tis a death 
 
 " More painless, probably than I shall die — 
 
 " We, providentially, are safe enough, 
 
 *' Ere they can reach the place where now we stand 
 
 " The flames will yield ; and then the garden door 
 
 *' Is close at hand. ('Tis well that all my things 
 
 " Are not arrived ; — that blunder I deplored 
 
 " Was for the best.) Pray conquer your alarm ! " 
 
 Sir John awoke and cried " God bless my soul ! " 
 
 And cough'd and sneezed, and then rang all the bells — 
 
 The screaming maid-servants press'd down the stairs, 
 
 Hurling before them all their worldly goods 
 
 As yet unburnt, and which they hoped to save — 
 
 For they had all been gossiping below. 
 
 Whilst undisturbed the fire was burning on, 
 
Denzil Place. 57 
 
 Till, going up to bed, with many a joke 
 Made by the way, and full of " cakes and ale," 
 They met the smoke, and heard the crackling beams 
 And all their laughter turned to piercing cries. 
 
 Constance stood cHnging to the crowded stair ; 
 They jostled past her, rough and toil-stain'd men. 
 Who came from out the village, having seen 
 The flames that shot up over Farleigh Court, — 
 Two sweeps, as black as demons, whom she met. 
 She seized by each of their hard sooty hands, 
 And pray'd they would save little Roland's life 
 " And Mr. Denzil's." — For a horrid dread 
 Gnaw'd at her heart, new-born and terrible — 
 It was the thought that Geoffrey, brave and strong, 
 Would rush to meet his doom, urged on, may be, 
 By those last parting words she hurled at him, 
 Without a seeming care about his life. 
 In utter helplessness she waited long. 
 Feeling each moment like a creeping age 
 And list']]ing for the voices that she lov'd — 
 At last each pulse seem'd silent, and the fear 
 That she might swoon, or show a woman's heart 
 When she would fain be braver than a man, 
 
5 8 Denzil Place, 
 
 Urged her to stagger to an open door 
 
 Which led down narrow terraced steps of stone 
 
 Into the garden. 
 
 There, she saw the flames 
 Lighting the startled landscape far and near ; 
 The angry tempest blew them to the East, 
 Where, streaming like the tongues of hungry fiends, 
 They seem'd to hurry on to meet the moon. 
 Which, calm and still, beyond the glare of red, 
 Watch'd with her placid eye the raging fire. 
 
 Anon, a cloud of smoke, and flames that seem'd 
 Half quench'd, fill'd Constance with a ray of hope, 
 Then with a fiercer glare, high up in heav'n 
 Again they darted, to be driv'n once more 
 Towards the kingdom of the quiet moon. 
 
 " The roof has fall'n ! " anon she heard them cry. 
 
 And dreading to behold the fiery foe, 
 
 Fed with fresh food, spring forth in horrid glee, 
 
 She hastened in, as pallid as the forms 
 
 Of marble on the narrow terraced stair. 
 
Denzil Place, 59 
 
 Sir John, with happy smile and beaming eye, 
 
 Met her, and grasp'd her hands and kissed her cheek, 
 
 Crying, "He's safe! he's safe!" But Constance, stunn'd 
 
 And looking like a disembodied ghost, 
 
 Ask'd, feebly, " Who ? Where is he ? Which of them ?" 
 
 To whom Sir John replied, " The boy ! the boy ! " 
 
 And Roland, with his happy childish face 
 
 A little pale, ran to the open arms 
 
 Which Constance stretch'd towards him absently. 
 
 A horrid fear which clutch'd her by the throat 
 
 Threaten'd to suffocate her, till at last 
 
 She hurried forward, and as one inspired, 
 
 Said, in a firm authoritative voice : 
 
 " All are not saved, for Mr. Denzil still 
 
 " May be amongst the fiercest of the flames — 
 
 " We will reward the one who rescues him." 
 
 " Aye, that we will — he saved my Roland's life ! " 
 
 Sir John exclaimed, on which the soldier Sands 
 
 (The son of that old man whom Constance once 
 
 Had so befriended, and who for awhile 
 
 Had sought his native village) hearing her, 
 
 Leap'd up the stair, and hasten'd to the spot 
 
 Where the now half-extinguish'd fire had raged. 
 
 Constance was following, when kind Sir John 
 
6o Denzil Place, 
 
 Restrain'd her, saying, " No, you must not go, 
 ^' The falling floors and ceilings are not safe 
 " Altho' the fire is conquer'd ; then, alas, - 
 " He may be burnt or crushed, or even worse, — 
 " You must not go." 
 
 So, looking as for Life, 
 So, praying, could her lips have form'd a pra/r. 
 So hoping, could her heart have dared to hope, 
 And longing, with a longing terrible 
 Intense and breathless ; thus she waited on. 
 
 The moments pass'd, then nearly half an hour, 
 When at the summit of the winding stair 
 She saw two men, one was the soldier Sands — 
 The other was — not Denzil ; — in their arms 
 They carried something covered with a cloak, 
 Cumbersome, oblong, difficult to guide 
 A down the stair. 
 
 Then Constance guess'd the worst, 
 And all the ills she had not feared before 
 Rushed to her heart — the guilty, hopeless truth I — 
 Then there arose before her anguished mind 
 The vision of a future, desolate, — 
 
Denzil Place, 6 1 
 
 The dim vast desert of an empty world 
 Mapp'd out in ghastly colours ; and Sir John, 
 Thinking to spare her tender heart the shock 
 It needs must feel at any horrid sight 
 Of Death or mutilation, took her hand 
 And led her gently to the morning-room. 
 
 But Geoffrey Denzil, though he scarcely breathed, 
 Was yet alive — beneath some fallen beams 
 And crumbled brick-work, blackened by the smoke 
 And drenched with water, they at first had deem'd 
 He had been crushed, for scarcely could they tell 
 What aspect he would wear when they had freed 
 His almost buried form. One broken arm 
 Hung limp and useless ; he was stunned, they saw 
 By a thick beam which struck him on the brow, 
 But still he lived ; — they tended him with care, 
 Washed from his cheek the trace of smoke and blood, 
 And saw that it was pale, but still the face 
 Of one who liv'd. The doctor set his arm. 
 And watch'd him long, and said some hopeful words. 
 Thus Constance saw him,when,with new-found strength. 
 Hearing he liv'd, with Roland by her side, 
 
62 Denzil Place, 
 
 She asked for tidings, longing once again 
 To see his face ere it might be too late. 
 
 The doctor left his chair beside the bed 
 And gave it her, then whispered to the boy 
 'Twere better he should go away, for fear 
 So many present might work Denzil harm, 
 Should he awake to reason suddenly — 
 " I hope it may be well," he gravely said, 
 " But for a day or two we cannot tell." 
 Then, saying that if Constance would remain. 
 There were some few directions he would give 
 About his patient's treatment, for awhile 
 He left the room, and Constance sat alone 
 Beside the pale and still unconscious form 
 Of him she lov'd. 
 
 Then all her aching heart 
 Seem'd fi-lFd with some new desperate resolve 
 Once — once, before he died, to tell him all — 
 'Twas all so strange, so terrible, so new — 
 There lay the man she only knew she lov'd 
 Some few short hours ago — how soon to die ! 
 How short and sad the stay Love made with her ! 
 How dear he was to her ! How dear those eyes 
 
Denzil Place, 63 
 
 That could not see, or even feel, the tears 
 
 Which fell from her's uncheck'd ! — the effort made 
 
 To see him whilst he liv'd, had not survived 
 
 The ghastly dread his death-like look inspired — 
 
 " Oh, God, have mercy ! Hear the pray'r, I pray, — 
 
 " Give me his life ! " She did not pause to think 
 
 If this, her love, was sinful, or against 
 
 The laws that God or man has made for man — 
 
 She could not think — her wild solicitude 
 
 For him — for what she felt was life to her 
 
 Made her forget and trample in the dust 
 
 All save this one absorbing madd'ning pain. 
 
 She thought she would not care, so he should live, 
 
 E'en if she did not ever see again 
 
 The face that seem'd so beautiful to her — 
 
 Only to know that sofnewhere, far away, 
 
 He liv'd and breathed, and that there was a hope, 
 
 However vague, that she might once again 
 
 Dream (only dream !) to look at him on earth ! 
 
 Kneeling beside the bed she tried to pray, 
 But her impatient spirit fear'd lest Heav'n 
 Was too far off to listen to her pray'r, 
 
64 Denzil Place, 
 
 So, in the madness of her agony, 
 
 She calFd to Geoffrey Denzil, praying him 
 
 Upon her bended knees that he would live. 
 
 " Oh, if you die," she said, " you break my heart, 
 
 " Good-bye to life ! oh, let me die with you ! 
 
 " Think of the three whole years we have been friends, 
 
 ** Think of the places we have seen together — 
 
 " When you are gone my poor dreams crumble down, 
 
 " Oh, stay with me ! oh, live to be again 
 
 " My chosen friend ! ah, do not go away ! — 
 
 " I love you more than life — come back to me !" 
 
 She threw her hopeless arms about his neck. 
 
 For o'er his face a death-like pallor spread, — 
 
 Some change seem'd working in him — all her soul 
 
 Look'd out upon him from her haggard eyes. 
 
 He did not move, she thought he scarcely breathed— 
 The pulses of her body seem'd to die — 
 " Oh, speak to me ! Ah, do not leave me thus ! 
 " Oh, Geoffrey, Geoffrey ! you will break my heart I" 
 She sobb'd, and fainting, fell upon the floor. 
 
 I know not how it was some bell was rung. 
 And by and bye a servant sought the room 
 
Denzil Place. 65 
 
 Denzil was sitting looking at the wall, 
 And Constance lay unconscious at his side, 
 " She fainted," in the faintest voice he said — 
 " This shock has been too great" — ^he waved his hand, 
 " I'm better now," he said. " Leave me alone — 
 ' Take care of her, she needs must want repose." 
 
 They took her to her chamber, where she lay 
 As one exhausted ; ev'ry now and then 
 She sadly ask'd them, " Is he still alive ?" 
 Or else she wept and said, " He was my all 
 " On earth, my one companion ! Save his life !" 
 
 Sir John was touch'd, and watch'd her tenderly. 
 
 And told his sister with how true a love 
 
 She lov'd his boy, for never did he doubt 
 
 That all her trouble came from fears for him — 
 
 But Miss UEstrange compress'd her virgin lips. 
 
 Put on a face of Sphinx-like mystery, 
 
 And shook her head with a contemptuous look 
 
 At good Sir John, who was not one of those 
 
 Bom to decipher riddles. Thus for days 
 
 Prostrate and weak, and wandering at times, 
 
 She kept her chamber ; sometimes for whole hours 
 
66 Denzil Place, 
 
 She stared at the gay pattern on the wall, 
 Forming the tendrils and the leaves and flow'rs 
 Into unmeaning words and animals, 
 And human faces, all unknown to her. 
 The doctor merely echoed Geoffrey's words : 
 " The fright has been too much, she needs repose ; 
 " She has received a shock, and nervous fear 
 " Prostrates her mind and body ; let her rest." 
 
 And Denzil ? Had he felt those tender arms. 
 
 And was he silent ? Had that gentle voice 
 
 Summoned his truant spirit back to earth, 
 
 And was the change that pass'd across his face 
 
 (That change which Constance feared had boded death) 
 
 Only a slow revival to that life 
 
 He may have felt her warm breath bid him live ? — 
 
 1 cannot say — I hope he did not hear 
 
 The words I hope would never have been said 
 
 Had he not seem'd so very near to death — 
 
 Yet still, I also hope, that, had he heard 
 
 And had he felt each re-awaken'd pulse, 
 
 Throbbing triumphantly the knell of Death, 
 
 He still had felt the laws of honor bade 
 
 Him seem to die, when, had he seemed to live, 
 
Denzil Place. 6y 
 
 It had been difficult to live and spare — 
 
 " The strong should e'er be merciful ;" with him^ 
 
 He may have felt that weakness was the strength 
 
 To which he might have ow'd a victory, 
 
 And may have scorn'd to profit by those fears 
 
 It may have seemed she all too fondly nursed — 
 
 There are some things that are not known at once, 
 
 And this is one ; — so let it be enough 
 
 To say that Geoffrey Denzil did not die ; 
 
 Tho' stunn'd and bruised, and with a broken arm, 
 
 He did not suffer any other ills, 
 
 And ere pale Constance, with a languid step 
 
 And downcast eyes, once more resumed the life 
 
 Of ev'ry day, Denzil seem'd quite as strong 
 
 And like his former self as he had been 
 
 Before the Fire. 
 
 It was with many fears 
 And coy misgivings, that his hostess clasp'd 
 His outstretch'd hand (the left, the right one still 
 Hung in a sling) the day when first they met. 
 Her voice was trembHng, and a guilty blush 
 O'erspread her faded cheek — she did not dare 
 To meet his eye, all was to her so changed — 
 He did not seem the Geoffrey of the Past, 
 
68 Denzil Place. 
 
 Nor did she feel as once that Constance felt 
 Whose love was innocent. 
 
 He spoke the first, 
 She thought his voice had never seem'd so cold, 
 So calm, so measured, studied and polite — 
 (I feel assured he had not heard her words — ) 
 He spoke to her with all that careless ease 
 She long'd to borrow ; this, his icy tone. 
 Restored at last her courage, tho' she felt 
 A pang of disappointment at her heart, 
 (That tender erring heart that so had beat 
 And ached, and almost broken for his sake !) 
 Sir John explain'd that Denzil, not content 
 With saving Roland from a fiery death. 
 Had added newer cause for thanks, and wish'd 
 That she. Sir John, his sister and the boy, 
 Should stay at Denzil, till at Farleigh Court 
 The ravages by fire and water wrought 
 Had been repair'd ; Sir John, who saw in this 
 Only the kindness which a friend on friend 
 Would willingly confer, agreed to go, 
 And so, as soon as Constance should be well, 
 Twas thus arranged. At first she did not know 
 How to confront a change so sudden, made 
 
Denzil Place, 69 
 
 Without her knowledge, and unsought by her — 
 
 To dwell within the precincts of his home, 
 
 To see around her all the thousand things 
 
 Which needs must breathe of him, to live with him 
 
 In this new, even closer intimacy, 
 
 Just after she had wrested from her heart 
 
 Its fatal secret — was this wise or right ? 
 
 Yet how could she protest ? What should she say ? 
 
 How could she meet him as she used of yore ? 
 
 Unconsciously she had recourse to pray'r, 
 
 And lifting up her heart, she pra/d that God 
 
 Would grant her strength to fight the Pow'rs of 111. 
 
 But as she stood and stammer'd out her thanks, 
 And fear'd that they, (so many) might, as guests, 
 (And lor so long,) prove inconvenient — 
 Denzil explained, that even could it be 
 That such might be the case another time, 
 Yet now it would be otherwise. " Indeed," 
 He said, "the kindness will be all your own, 
 *^ It will be good of you to keep my house 
 '''■ Well air'd and cared for whilst I am away ; 
 " Next week I start for Germany." 
 
 Away! 
 
70 Denzil Place. 
 
 So he was going from her ! Ah, how soon 
 The fears about the safety of her soul 
 Vanished before this terrible surprise ! 
 So he was going — ah, then God was kind — 
 (Too kind !) but what a weary sunless life ! 
 He did not love — he was so calm and cold, 
 And she could well have learnt to school her heart- 
 She could, at least, have seen him ev'ry day ; 
 But now apart, with land and sea between. 
 And dangers, distance, adverse winds, and Time 
 To drive him further from her ! . . . . 
 
 But 'twas well, 
 And God was merciful, and helping her. 
 
 Here Denzil said his horse was at the door ; 
 " There are some things to settle ere I go,*' 
 He said to Constance, and before her heart 
 Could realize that this was his farewell — 
 This cold left-handed parting, he was gone, 
 And Constance was alone. 
 
 (I feel assured 
 He had not heard the tender words she said 
 When she believed him dying ; I am glad.) 
 
Oh, love ! thou who shelt'rest some 
 'Neath thy wings so white and warm, 
 Wherefore on a bat-like wing 
 All disguised did'st thou come 
 In so terrible a form ? 
 
 As a dark forbidden thing, 
 As a demon of the air — 
 As a sorrow and a sin, 
 
 Wherefore cam'st thou thus to me, 
 As a tempter and a snare ? 
 
 When the heart that beats within 
 This, my bosom, warm'd to thee, 
 Was it from a love of sinning, — 
 From a fatal love of wrong, 
 From a wish to shun the light ? 
 Nay ! I swear at the beginning 
 
 Had'st thou sung an angel's song, — 
 Had this wrong thing been the right, 
 Thou had'st seem'd as worth the winning 
 And with will as firm and strong 
 I had lov'd with all my might ! 
 
73 
 
 " Un jour tu sentiras peut-etre 
 
 Le prix d'un coeur qui nous comprend, 
 Le bien qu'on trouve a le connaitre 
 Et ce qu'on souffre en le perdant." 
 
 (Alfred de Musset. ) 
 
 ' I gang like a ghaist, and I care na to spin, 
 I daur na think on Jamie, for that wad be a sin ; 
 But I'll do my best a gude wife aye to be, 
 For Auld Robin Gray he is sae kind to me." 
 
 {'' Auld Robin Gray,'' by Lady Anne Lindsay.) 
 
 IV. 
 
 O O it was over ! Love had come to her 
 *^ All unsuspected, in her harmless youth, 
 But hardly had she known that it was he 
 Before his wings were spread and he was gone. 
 Oh, desolation ! — All the hopeless train 
 Of new emotions, hitherto unguess'd, 
 
74 Denzil Place, 
 
 Crowded upon my hapless heroine — 
 The mystery of silence, and the love 
 Of solitude to brood — to brood on what ? 
 The guilty blush, the forced and ghastly smile. 
 The fears, the pray'rs, the vain delusive hopes, 
 For what ? For whom ? To what ungodly end ? 
 Oh, Misery ! oh. Death ! and yet, (oh. Shame !) 
 Strange mingling of the bitter and the sweet ! 
 Oh, treasure newly found ! oh, priceless pearl ! 
 Oh, Life ! oh, Love ! 
 
 These were the chequer'd thoughts 
 That made of Constance such a guilty thing. 
 An alter'd woman, pale, and wrapp'd in dreams, — 
 A lovely shadow of her former self. 
 Ah, now she learnt so many hidden things ! — 
 The secret of the bird's soft even-song, 
 And what the winter wind at midnight said — 
 The sympathetic, dumb companionship 
 Of Nature, with her blessed haunted shades 
 And empty shrines ! The sward that lately bow'd 
 Each happy little blade beneath his tread, — 
 The seat where once they sat — the target still 
 Stabbed with his certain arrow in the gold — 
 (There was another target from whose core 
 
Denzil Place. 75 
 
 Upsprung a pointed poison'd random dart !)— 
 
 Ahj-what a history in everything ! 
 
 And that same sun, and that calm careless moon, 
 
 Rising and setting as they used of yore, 
 
 But lighting with their radiance a world 
 
 Seeming so dark and different to her ! 
 
 But tho' to Constance as a dread surprise 
 Had come this sudden wakening to truth, 
 Yet there were many who had prophesied 
 This fatal ending to a friendship form'd 
 Against the rules of Prudence. 
 
 Round about 
 The tatt'ling neighbours oft had smiled to meet 
 Upon the dusty mile of highway road 
 Which separated Denzil from Sir John's, — 
 The eager horseman, making for the lodge 
 Of Farleigh Court, and often had they sigh'd 
 With many a gloomy presage, when they saw 
 The pony-carriage with the dappled greys 
 Driven by Constance, who with rod and line. 
 Or else with sketch-book, pencils, and camp-stool, 
 Was going to fish or sketch in Denzil Park. 
 
J^ Denzil Place. 
 
 Roland was there, of course, but then they thought 
 
 Of all the tender nothings one may say 
 
 Before a child ; or how so slight a check 
 
 Might even serve to fan the torch of Love — 
 
 Their ready minds imagined many words 
 
 Wrapp'd up in metaphor, or said in French, 
 
 Italian, German, of so many tongues 
 
 Denzil was master — surely some of these 
 
 Might even mystify poor dear Sir John 
 
 If spoken as tho' quoted from a book — 
 
 Ah, then those books ! a language in themselves ! 
 
 Accomplices in crime ! The subtle mark 
 
 Beneath those passages that breathe of love ! — 
 
 The Lancelots and guilty Guineveres — 
 
 All their forbidden converse underlined — 
 
 The Fausts and Marguerites, and Heloise 
 
 And Abelard, Francesca — all the throng 
 
 Of wicked lovers and illicit loves ! 
 
 Nay, they might almost spare themselves the pains 
 
 Of even this, and use the English tongue. 
 
 And it w^ould seem the same to good Sir John 
 
 As Hebrew or Chaldean — such to him 
 
 The language of the poet or the flow'r, — 
 
 The cunning compliment — the tender glance, 
 
Denzil Place. 77 
 
 Who was so simple, thick-headed and good ! 
 Why, they might almost squeeze their guilty hands 
 Beneath his honest nose, and he remain 
 As blind as was that husband in the tale 
 Of Pope and Chaucer, ere he had his sight 
 Too suddenly restored. How much they pray'd 
 That poor Sir John might not awaken thus ! 
 
 So did the scandal-loving neighbourhood 
 Gossip and slander ; many shook their heads 
 On hearing Constance had been ill, and much 
 They whisper'd and surmised when they were told 
 How she and good Sir John had gone to stay 
 At Denzil ; but this fact, somehow, became 
 Shorn of all interest when soon they learnt 
 That Geoffrey Denzil had departed, bound 
 For foreign lands. It seem'd a cruel thing 
 That he should go away just at the time 
 When they foresaw a "thick'ning of the plot !" 
 But still they did their best, and soon they wove 
 The fears and tremors which poor Constance felt 
 Into some sentimental malady 
 Connected with his absence. — One old man 
 Who had a wicked twinkle in his eye, 
 
yS Defizil Place. 
 
 At a dull local dinner, with a leer 
 Inquired facetiously which fire had caused 
 Lady L'Estrange's illness ? that one lit 
 By Mr. Denzil, or the lesser one 
 He help'd extinguish ? All his listeners here 
 Titter'd convulsively, and one of them 
 Call'd him a " naughty, odious, funny man." 
 
 But Constance did not hear these calumnies 
 (Having, alas, a fatal grain of truth !) — 
 Those envious voices did not penetrate 
 The tangled brakes of Denzil Park, which rose 
 Bird-haunted, flower starr'd, a leafy screen 
 Between the idle whisp'ring world and her. 
 
 'Twas early spring-time, all the eager buds 
 Were pressing into life, as on that day 
 Three years ago, when Constance, like a child. 
 Came smiling hither, playing hide and seek — 
 Thinking to cull the earliest snow-drop flow'r. 
 Or find the first four blue hedge-sparrow's eggs,- 
 Seeking for these, she came, and met her Fate,- 
 Hoping and seeking now (against her will) 
 To meet some trace of him who was her Fate 
 
Denzil Place, 79 
 
 She wander'd listlessly, and found but these 
 
 The early eggs of happy mated birds 
 
 And the first snow-drop, looking like that one 
 
 Three years ago ; but had it been the same. 
 
 And had its hanging head concealed an eye. 
 
 That little peeping modest eye had mark'd 
 
 The change wrought in those white and trembling hands 
 
 That cuird so tenderly its transient bloom ! 
 
 Alas, for snow-drop immortality !— 
 
 The same to careless eyes, yet not the same, — 
 
 Heir to the drooping head and fragile stem, — 
 
 Heir to the chaste traditions of the race — 
 
 Emblem to trusting hearts of those belov'd 
 
 Whose sleeping bodies, wrapp'd in silent clay. 
 
 Await the second wakening to life. 
 
 To rise like these fair blossoms, from a dark 
 
 Mysterious imprisonment ! Ah, who 
 
 May say if this long-cherish'd metaphor 
 
 Which Spring each year renews, is, as a whole, 
 
 Perfect, or but a visionary hope 
 
 Begot of Faith and Love ? Ah, true indeed 
 
 The wondrous resurrection of the flow'r, — 
 
 The flow'r of kin, the fragrant heir-in-fee. 
 
So Denzil Place, 
 
 But not, alas, that flow' r of bygone Spring 
 Which, brown and faded, lies between the leaves 
 Of some old book, a soulless scentless thing, 
 Wither'd as those dear hands, maybe, that culFd 
 Its dead forgo tton blossom ! Ah thatflow'r, 
 That very flow' r I Grant me the grace to know,— 
 To understand the subtle second life 
 Which was not crush'd, when on its pearly youth 
 Closed those dim pages like a living tomb ! 
 
 But to sad Constance, filFd with trusting faith, 
 Came no such wistful musings ; — in her eyes 
 The pointed petals rising from the earth 
 Were emblems of the pure immortal soul 
 Aspiring heavenwards ; those snowy leaves 
 Seem'd like the folded wings of patient saints 
 Waiting the signal of the April show'r 
 To spread themselves in glorious disproof 
 Of sophistry, above the empty graves 
 Of their awakened hearts ; and thus she watch'd 
 Sadly, but trustfully, the coming Spring. 
 
 Within the house, upon the paneird walls 
 Hung many portraits, and in some of these 
 
Deiizil Place, 8 1 
 
 Constance at times perceiv'd, (or deemed she did,) 
 
 Some turn of eyebrow, or some flash of eye, — 
 
 Some curl of hair or pointed cut of beard, 
 
 RecalUng that last scion of the house 
 
 Who occupied so much her wand'ring thoughts. 
 
 On these she often dwelt, and o'er and o'er 
 
 Spelt their departed names, and lov'd to trace 
 
 That fancied likeness to her absent host ; 
 
 Till by and bye these ancestors became 
 
 As friends, who seem'd to understand her heart — 
 
 She knew them all, and to her dying day 
 
 Might have been question'd as to names and dates. 
 
 Nor made a single blunder. 
 
 First there came 
 The first Lord Denzil, of Queen Mary's reign, 
 Attainted, and beheaded in the Tow'r, 
 (A man of fifty, with a pointed beard. 
 Wearing a scarlet skull-cap, clad in black.) — 
 His eldest son, a lad of seventeen — 
 In breast-plate and buff coat, (an early tomb 
 Awaited him, for, falling from his horse. 
 He died before his still more luckless sire.) — 
 Then ladies, ruif' d and starch'd and farthingaled, 
 Imprison'd in their pearl-strewn stomachers 
 
82 Denzil Place. 
 
 So stiff, they surely scarcely could have breathed ! 
 
 (Alas, where are they now, those Orient pearls 
 
 Sewn with such lavish prodigality 
 
 Over the dresses of our grandmothers ? 
 
 Some pear-shaped, dropping from their tender ears, 
 
 And others in magnificent festoons 
 
 Hanging about their shoulders ? — 
 
 Pearls like these 
 The ladies of my family possess'd — 
 Witness their portraits, did they pawn or sell 
 Or melt them, like dark Egypt's Queen, in wine, — 
 A toast to some more modern Anthony 
 In doublet and trunk-hose ? or else did they — 
 They or their thriftless, careless handmaidens, 
 Break all the strings, and let them roll away 
 Like common beads, under the rugs and chairs. 
 Being so large and round ? Ah, had they but 
 (To use a billiard phrase) had "legs enough" 
 To roll a little further — down to me ! ) — 
 Then came the beetle brows of one Sir Guy 
 With his two brothers, oblong, in a row. 
 Their heads in profile, whilst his own, in full 
 Scowled at poor Constance as she gazed on him. — 
 Ev'rard and Ralph came next, who both died young. 
 
Denzil Place, 83 
 
 And then a Geoffrey ; Constance read the name, 
 
 It seem'd to ease the aching of her heart 
 
 To see those letters, painted in in white 
 
 Beneath the coat of arms ! Unfortunate 
 
 This Geoffrey was, he died at Naseby field 
 
 Fighting for Charles, whilst on the other side 
 
 His brother Hugh fought under Oliver, 
 
 (Alas for Civil War, which brothers thus 
 
 Could " Cain and Abel-ify" ! but so it was.) 
 
 Then simp'ring dames, artistically draped, 
 
 Each holding betwixt thumb and fore finger 
 
 A spray of jess'mine, — painted at the time 
 
 When ev'ry lady seem'd to dress in blue, — 
 
 Next, all bewigged, and with his hanging sleeves, 
 
 She saw another Ralph, a Jacobite, 
 
 On whom King James, when he had fled to France, 
 
 Bestow'd some " barren honors." Next to these 
 
 There came the days of powder and of paint, 
 
 Patch, pig-tail, petticoat and high-heel'd shoe, 
 
 And so they glided downwards, to the days 
 
 Remember'd by the living, and the last 
 
 Of all the line was Geoffrey's grandfather 
 
 Playing the violin, beneath a bust 
 
 Of sage Minerva — by his side the globes 
 
84 Denzil Place, 
 
 Of Earth and Heaven. He was known to Fame 
 
 As a mild poet of the night-cap school, 
 
 He also held an office at the Court, 
 
 And prosper'd, wrote, and fiddled till he died, 
 
 The only lucky Denzil. " And a fool." — 
 
 (So Geoffrey said, half jealous of the praise 
 
 Monopolized by this weak forefather. 
 
 Who wrote a poem, call'd " The Birth of Love," 
 
 Which, as some compensation for the ills 
 
 His house had will'd the House of Hanover, 
 
 He dedicated with a fulsome pen 
 
 Dipp'd more in milk and water than in ink. 
 
 To the plain-headed tho' deserving Queen 
 
 Of George the Third, in which she was compared 
 
 To Venus, and the Prince of Wales to Love.) 
 
 But what to Constance seem'd the dearest thing 
 Was a fair little boy who held a dog, — 
 Painted some five-and-twenty years ago 
 In water colours : very badly drawn. 
 Having a prim white frock and sky-blue sash ; 
 His little hoop and stick were lying near. 
 And in the distance there was Denzil Place— 
 This funny little picture had no name, — 
 
Denzil Place. 85 
 
 The little fair-hair'd boy was like a doll, 
 
 Or still more like all other little boys 
 
 In any other badly finish'd sketch ; 
 
 Yet Constance lov'd it — it was small and light, 
 
 Easy to move, and so she took it down 
 
 From off its nail, and brought that little boy 
 
 To dwell where she might see him, in her room. 
 
 Her room ! it had been Geoffrey Denzil's once, 
 
 She had not known it, choosing it by chance 
 
 Because from out its windows she could see 
 
 So fair a landscape — woods and grassy slopes, 
 
 And nearer, when she look'd towards the left. 
 
 The arch'd beginning of the avenue. 
 
 Dusk with its over-hanging evergreens 
 
 E'en in the leafless seasons of the year — 
 
 This chamber, on the basement of the house, 
 
 Open'd upon a spacious corridor. 
 
 And at one end of this, three steps led down 
 
 Into the dim, low, silent library 
 
 Which Constance lov'd, for here besides the books 
 
 (She lov'd to read,) were rang'd upon the floor* 
 
 Some four or five square cases, made of tin, 
 
 Dark-color'd, and on these, in letters white, 
 
86 Deiizil Place, 
 
 Constance devour' d, with eager hungry eyes 
 
 The name she lov'd, despite of all the shame 
 
 Such love might bring her. She would close the doors 
 
 On chilly afternoons and sit alone, 
 
 Feasting her eyes on those beloved words : 
 
 This " Geoffrey Henry De?tzil, Denzil Place'^ 
 
 Was comfort to her at this dreary time, 
 
 And here she used to read and write and dream, 
 
 And try forgetting, or in rasher moods 
 
 Try to remember ev'ry line and tone 
 
 Of vanish'd features or of silent voice. 
 
 For she was very lonely in these days 
 
 Of early Spring : Sir John and Miss L' Estrange 
 
 Went almost daily to inspect the works 
 
 At Farleigh Court, where builders, white washers. 
 
 And painters, all were busied with repairs. 
 
 Constance would often watch them as they pass'd 
 
 Under her windows o'er the swampy lawn 
 
 After the rain ; her husband's stalwart form. 
 
 Upright and hale, despite his sixty years. 
 
 And Miss L'Estrange, who, clinging to his arm. 
 
 Trudged with the brisk flat-footed energy 
 
 Of wither'd spinsterhood, and keeping step 
 
Denzil Place, 87 
 
 With his more manly stride, thro' wind and rain 
 Accompanied Sir John. As in a dream 
 Constance would watch them, wave a languid hand, 
 And with a shiver turn towards the fire ; — 
 Time was when she could also breast the storm 
 And brave the struggles of encroaching Spring 
 With unrelenting Winter, but those times 
 Were changed, and now she shudder'd as she gazed 
 On mist and sleet ; so, when the days were cold 
 She stay'd within the doors of Denzil Place. 
 
 Roland had gone to School \ she often wrote 
 And said " Ah, how I miss you dear, dear boy ! 
 ** The place is different — it all seems changed — 
 " Now you are gone" — and even as she wrote 
 She tried to think it was indeed the loss 
 Of him, her youthful playmate, made her sad. 
 
 One day as she was writing in her room. 
 And listlessly considering what to say, — 
 What news she had to tell the absent boy, 
 To write of which might serve to lure her mind 
 From one sad thought ; and as she dreamily 
 O'erturn'd the pages of the writing-book, 
 She started suddenly, and seem'd to wake 
 
88 Denzil Place. 
 
 To newer life, for she had found a trace — 
 An unexpected trace of him she lov'd. 
 
 There on a scrap of paper, partly torn, 
 
 She read these words, in Geoffrey Denzil's hand : 
 
 " At last. It almost seems too hard to bear — 
 
 " But so it is, and I must go from hence." 
 
 She look'd, and on the scarce used blotting-book 
 
 Perceived some straggling and uncertain lines 
 
 Illegible, (if she had tried to read,) 
 
 Save where her timid, hesitating eye 
 
 Espied the curling crescent of a " C," 
 
 And knew her name had once been blotted there. 
 
 Why did he go away? What was so " hard" — 
 
 " Almost too hard to bear" (she thought,) " for hi7n f 
 
 But whilst she mused, her self-accusing heart 
 
 Dared not delude itself with such a doubt. 
 
 A hundred trivial unimportant things 
 
 Flash'd to her memory, in each of which 
 
 She seem'd to read a hidden meaning now, — 
 
 She knew, and all her aching lonely heart 
 
 Went out to Geoffrey Denzil over-sea. 
 
 Next day an aged dame, the housekeeper, 
 
 (Once Geoffrey's nurse,) knock'd gently at the door, 
 
Denzil Place, 89 
 
 Said some half-dozen kind maternal words 
 About her health, then took the blotting-book 
 And lock'd it up, and Constance felt as tho' 
 A friend was gone. "Was Mr. Denzil well 
 " Before he left ?" she ask'd the kindly dame, 
 " Yes, he seem'd well, but moody — he was odd — 
 " The Denzils all were odd in all their ways — 
 " Incomprehensible ; — his father odd, 
 " Incomprehensible," — (and here the dame 
 Muttered a homely Athanasian Creed 
 About the family she serv'd so long) — 
 " Before he left," she said, " he wrote in here 
 "' Near half the night ; he made a kind of Will — 
 " (They are so strange !) and then he sent for me 
 " And told me what to do when he was dead — 
 " He gave me then two letters, — one for Prince 
 " (The country lawyer here) and one for you — 
 " He said, my lady, if I died before 
 " (As well I hope I may !) your letter then 
 " Was to be sent to Prince, and so to you, 
 "' I think 'tis something touching the entail 
 " Of this estate ; Sir John, you know, is heir 
 "To all that part his kinswoman brought in 
 " As dowry ; but Sir John is likely soon 
 
go Denzil Place. 
 
 " To go, my dear, the way of younger men, — 
 '* (Don't look down-hearted,) Mr. Roland then, 
 *^ If master does not marry, has it next, 
 " And this is something telling you of that — 
 *' Maybe you'll never know if master lives, 
 " As aye I pray he may.'' ** I pray he may," 
 Poor Constance echo'd. 
 
 So, he thought of her 
 On that last ev'ning he had passed at home 
 Before his voluntary exile thence ! — 
 This sacred chamber^ where she sat and wept, 
 Knew all the secrets of that absent heart ! 
 Here had he written to her — here, maybe. 
 Where she was standing now, a week ago, 
 (One little week !) he stood, and had his thoughts 
 Wander'd to her above the fir-tree tops 
 Over the silent rooks ? When all men slept 
 He was awake, and writing in this room, 
 And she, one little easy mile away. 
 Was waking too, at Farleigh Court alone. 
 Nursing the fatal secret of her love ! 
 
 Ah, hapless Constance ! so, then, this was love — 
 This was the master passion of the earth, 
 
Denzil Place, 9 1 
 
 This was the envied Messing of the few, 
 
 The common curse of the unfortunate ! 
 
 She saw before her now, without disguise, 
 
 The outline of her uneventful life ; 
 
 Till now, her lonely childhood, motherless — 
 
 The handsome easy-going parish priest, 
 
 Her father, who had fixed upon the Church 
 
 As a profession, merely as a means 
 
 Of livelihood for him, a younger son 
 
 Of an impov'rish'd house. His thriftless ways. 
 
 His open-handed dealings with the poor 
 
 "Which saved much time and trouble" (so he said,) 
 
 And then his love of sport, his love of wine, 
 
 His pressing debts, increasing poverty. 
 
 And finally his illness and his death — 
 
 And then she saw herself, a little girl 
 
 With large appealing eyes, dress'd all in black, 
 
 Taken to dwell with a stern kinswoman 
 
 She could not love * once more she seem'd to live 
 
 In fancy, o'er those miserable days 
 
 Of solitude and sadness ; — then she thought 
 
 Of the first day she saw good kind Sir John 
 
 With wrinkled rosy face, and genial laugh. 
 
 And how, one day, he took her for a ride — 
 
92 Denzil Place. 
 
 Lent her a horse, and used to cheer the house, 
 
 And make a kinder woman of her Aunt 
 
 Whene'er his honest footstep cross'd the door — 
 
 And how, when she was only seventeen, 
 
 He drove her Aunt and her to Farleigh Court, 
 
 Where, in the billiard-room he question'd her 
 
 If she admired the place ? She said she did, 
 
 " So beautiful, so grand, the rooms so large." 
 
 " Well, why not live here !" kind Sir John exclaim'd, 
 
 Then hemm'd and haw'd, whilst on his cheek the red 
 
 Grew redder ; then, with apoplectic snort. 
 
 He hurried from the room, and Constance stood 
 
 Bewilder'd at his words, tho' guessing nought 
 
 Of their intended meaning. 
 
 Up and down 
 She roird the white and color' d billiard-balls — 
 (She yet could hear the harmless ^ cannoning,* 
 And still more harmless ' kisses ' that they made 
 These three unconscious witnesses to what 
 So chang'd her life !) Then by and bye her Aunt 
 Enter'd the room, and open'd wide her arms. 
 Enfolding to an unaccustom'd kiss 
 The fair astonish'd girl. Sir John stood near 
 Smiling and gibb'ring, in a whirl of hope 
 
Denzil Place. 93 
 
 And doubting diffidence ; and next she thought 
 
 Of how (all ignorant of what they meant, 
 
 Those marriage vows, either to bind or break). 
 
 She went to church in white, and how the way 
 
 Was strewn with flow'rs, and how she pass'd the grave 
 
 Of her dead father, and the wish she felt 
 
 That he could see his daughter's happiness. 
 
 Her happiness I ah, bitter mockery ! 
 
 Since then her heart had fathom'd many truths ! 
 
 She knew that bitterest of bitter things 
 
 (As says a German writer) not to feel 
 
 So much the pangs of sorrow, as to guess 
 
 The unsuspected happiness we miss'd ! 
 
 Yet could she be so heartless as to wrong, 
 Even in thought, this generous old man 
 Who took her from the dull monotony 
 Of her desponding youth ? He had perform'd 
 All he had vow'd, she could alone deplore 
 Her own shortcomings ! If he had but been 
 Her father, or her uncle, or her friend — 
 How she had lov'd him then ! but now, alas, 
 Upon her guilty head each kindness fell 
 Like coals of fire ! But she would do her best. 
 
94 Denzil Place. 
 
 And if she could not love him as she ought, 
 
 At least her wretched heart would pray for strength 
 
 To fight against this other alien love ! — 
 
 And so she pray'd, and registered a vow 
 
 That she would cast away for evermore 
 
 This fatal snare, and strive to be to him 
 
 (Her husband) such a wife as she had hoped, 
 
 Before she knew the meaning of the words 
 
 " Love, honor, and obey.'' 
 
 Alas, for these — 
 The vows of mortals vowing not to love ! 
 At which, I wonder, do the mocking gods 
 Smile most — at these, or at those rasher vows 
 To love eternally ! Alas, that both 
 Should be so often but as sounding brass 
 And tinkling cymbal ! The relentless Fates 
 Are weaving, as we swear, the tangled webs 
 Of a deceitful dim Futurity 
 Into a galHng everlasting chain. 
 Or snipping with their scissors the last link 
 Of what we deem'd would fetter us for life ! 
 Ah, will they change their pre-concerted plan 
 And shift the web to what should be the woof 
 At sight of pray'rs and tears, and wringing hands ? 
 
Denzil Place, 95 
 
 I dare not say, but Constance, as she pray'd. 
 Felt happier and calmer — o'er her stole 
 A dreary resignation, wrapp'd in which 
 As in a garment, still she wept and pray'd. 
 
Oh, under my breast I can feel it still 
 
 My foolish heart that is throbbing yet — 
 Whilst his horse's hoofs from the distant hill 
 
 Seem to echo the words *' Forget ! forget I 
 
 " Forget, — for * I lov'd but I ride away ' 
 
 " So rise and forget me and dry your tears, 
 *' For the words that I whisper'd were easy to say, 
 
 *' And the love must be strong that will weather the years!" 
 
 Forget ? ah, forget me my fair false love — 
 
 Forget me, the courser that speeds on the wind. 
 
 Forget all the fancies my poor heart 'wove — 
 
 The dreams and the hopes that you leave behind ! 
 
 But you, my love, I can never forget. 
 
 And so be you false, or so be you true, 
 The seal of your kiss on my soul is set 
 
 And this heart that is beating is beating for you ! 
 
99 
 
 ** Ask me no more : thy fate and mine are sealM, 
 I strove against the stream and all in vain ; 
 Let the great river take me to the main : 
 No more, dear love, for at a touch I yield ; 
 Ask me no more." 
 
 Tennyson. 
 
 " Ce que les poetes appellent 1' Amour, et les moralistes 
 I'Adult^re." 
 
 Ernest Feydeau. 
 
 V. 
 
 T T /"HAT is it makes the silent hours of night 
 ^ ^ So sad, so desolate, to those who love ? 
 It cannot be because in lieu of sun, 
 A paler planet sails aloft in heaVn ; 
 Or that the firmament is prick'd with stars — 
 Is it, maybe, when half the drowsy world 
 Are made oblivious by the chains of sleep 
 To grief, and joy, and love, that thro' some strange 
 
100 Denzil Place, 
 
 Mysterious compensating natural law, 
 The other half of human kind, who wake, 
 Made doubly sensitive, with keener force 
 Feel those emotions which the sleeping world 
 Forget in dreams ? 
 
 Outside the diamond panes 
 Of the bay-window'd room where Constance sat 
 One night in early March, the tempest howled 
 With all the fury of the Equinox ; 
 Whene'er the wind abated, in a show'r 
 Of stinging sleet, the noisy midnight rain 
 Beat on the window. Now and then the fire 
 (By which she lingered reading) hissed and smoked 
 As down the chimney, driven by the wind 
 There fell a haiHng handful of the storm. 
 
 Constance had long been reading, now she paused, 
 Push'd back her hair, and softly sighing, closed 
 The finish'd second volume of her book. 
 The house was silent — the tempestuous voice 
 Of the conflicting elements without 
 Made the dim chamber where she sat alone 
 Seem doubly desolate. A thrill of fear. 
 She knew not why, crept over eVry sense, 
 
Denzil Place, i o r 
 
 (A feeling difficult to realize 
 
 In daylight, but which oftentimes at night 
 
 Hath chill'd the blood in braver hearts than her's) — ' 
 
 Thinking to scare away this haunting shade 
 
 Of an invisible terror, one by one 
 
 She Ht the candles, stirr'd the dying fire, 
 
 And strove to summon fear-dispelling thoughts ; 
 
 As thus she ponder'd, suddenly there rose 
 
 The long-denied and heart-forbidden dream. 
 
 Flashing across her mind ; she seem'd to hear 
 
 With sad distinctness ev'ry silent tone 
 
 Of that dear voice — that well remember'd face 
 
 Arose so plainly to her memory 
 
 She long'd to call upon this shadow-man 
 
 To speak — to move, to show himself indeed 
 
 To her expectant eyes ! 
 
 It was as tho' 
 The room was full of Geoffrey — all the air 
 Seem'd heavy with his presence, tho' unseen 
 It was as if his spirit hover'd near — 
 So near it seem'd, that o'er her heart a dread 
 Crept like an icy blast, for she had heard 
 That oftentimes ere mortals leave the earth 
 Their spirits hover thus a little while, 
 
1 02 Denzil Place. 
 
 Making the influence of their presence felt 
 
 By those who lov^d them ; oh, if he had died ! 
 
 If somewhere far away, with land and sea 
 
 And mountain-ridges rising up between 
 
 Their sunder'd hearts, his thoughts had turned to her, 
 
 And thro' some subtle nameless agency 
 
 His soul, upon the wings of his desire 
 
 Had flown to nestle near her, ere it rose 
 
 Above all human loves ? In vain she tried 
 
 To wake some more substantial train of thought 
 
 Instead of this unreasonable dread 
 
 Of the impossible. Alas, her book 
 
 (A simple story of a city life — 
 
 The wholesome history of honest toil, 
 
 Inventions, strivings after modest fame 
 
 Amongst the smoke of London,) she had read. 
 
 It was a book the very thought of which 
 
 Would exorcise perforce all foolish fears 
 
 Of midnight phantoms, bringing as it did 
 
 Such unromantic scenes of common life 
 
 Before the mind, unsentimental — real — 
 
 She took it up, and listlessly turned o'er 
 
 The pages she had read, then starting up 
 
 Bethought her that the third last volume lay 
 
Denzil Place. 1 03 
 
 Upon the sofa in the Hbrary 
 
 Where she had left it with her worsted work 
 
 Some hours ago — 
 
 She almost feafd to pass 
 In her " uncanny " superstitious mood 
 The row of staring Denzils on the walls 
 Of the deserted corridor, but yet 
 Knowing how foolish were such childish fears, 
 She wrapped herself in a long flowing robe 
 Which made her seem herself a lovely ghost, 
 And taking up her candle, flitted thro' 
 The quiet passage — down the flight of stairs, 
 And pushing noiselessly the oaken doors 
 She glided quickly thro' the silent room 
 To where she saw the volume of her book. 
 
 As she advanced she heard a rustling sound. 
 At first she thought " it is the midnight wind 
 " Driving against the dripping window-ledge 
 " Some spray of ivy," then, her heart stood still. 
 And all her life's warm blood seem'd turn'd to ice 
 As she beheld, not far from where she stood, 
 The stooping figure of a man, who knelt 
 Carefully searching thro' the title-deeds 
 
1 04 Denzil Place. 
 
 And papers which an iron case contained 
 Mark'd with the much loVd name. 
 
 "A thief!" she thought, 
 And stood amazed and petrified with fe^r — 
 Tho' speechless, from her terror-stricken Ups 
 Escaped a gasp of horror — then the man 
 
 Rose to his feet, and look'd her in the face — 
 
 She utter'd one low incoherent cry 
 
 And fainting, fell in Geoffrey DenziFs arms. 
 
 AVhen she recover'd consciousness, her head 
 Was resting on his breast — against her own 
 His cheek was press'd, and on her mouth she felt 
 The ardent lips of her too well-belov'd 
 Kissing her back to life, and heard his words 
 Thrill thro' her being, as he murmur' d thus — 
 
 " My love, my life ! my love whom I have lov'd 
 So long, so tenderly, ah, look at me ! 
 Speak to me ! say again those blissful words 
 You said when you believ'd I heard them not !" 
 (So, he had heard !) " Ah, darling, ere I go 
 " Leaving behind me all I love so well, 
 " Oh, let me know that she who is to me 
 
Denzil Place. 1 05 
 
 " Far dearer than is aught on earth — in heav'n — 
 
 " Has been to me but once my very own ! 
 
 " Surely the marriage vows we may not break 
 
 " Are such as our' s had been if God had will'd 
 
 " That we had met before, and now could live 
 
 " Join'd heart and soul and body, till we died — 
 
 " God knows that I have wrestled with my love 
 
 " As Jacob with the angel, or as man 
 
 " May wrestle with a fiend sent here to tempt 
 
 " His soul astray, I tore myself from home 
 
 " And only came to it again by stealth 
 
 " As would a thief, so that I might not meet 
 
 " So sweet a snare as lurks in these dear eyes — 
 
 " But now some stronger, some more subtle pow'r 
 
 ^* Than I possess, has wilFd that we should meet 
 
 " Here in the dead of night, where none can see, 
 
 ^' In this deserted room, now face to face 
 
 *' I find my love alone — I hold her fast — 
 
 ^* Ah, can I be of earth — of flesh and blood — 
 
 *' Can I be mortal man, and let her go ?" 
 
 " Geoffrey, have mercy !" 'twas an anguish'd cry 
 
 As of a terror-stricken hind at bay, 
 
 As, all defenceless, lock'd in his embrace 
 
io6 Denzil Place, 
 
 She strove to thrust away his eager lips, 
 Feeling his hot breath on her trembling cheek 
 And in amongst her loosely knotted hair, 
 And the wild beating of his desp'rate heart 
 Out-throbbing her's. 
 
 Alas^ her strength was gone ! 
 As a long pent-up river breaks its banks 
 And rushes madly onward to the sea, 
 So did the heart of Constance overleap 
 Its breastwork of resolves, uprais'd with tears 
 And many pray'rs, and heedless as the stream 
 Rush'd on to meet the ocean of his love. 
 To mingle with it, sinking soul and sense 
 In those enchanted waters. 
 
 By and bye 
 A noise as of a gently closing door 
 Made Geoffrey start ; Constance, as one entranced, 
 Lay passive in the prison of his arms. 
 Feeling some new delicious languor steal 
 Over her senses, blinding, deafening, 
 A " death in life." 
 
 " Some one is passing near," 
 He whispered, " Darling, for the love of heav'n 
 
Denzil Place. 107 
 
 See that you gain your chamber unobserv'd — 
 I will not stay to work you harm, by morn 
 I shall be miles away." She held his hand 
 As tho' to let him guide her to the door, 
 Then, turning, said as in a waking dream, 
 Looking as pale and haggard as a ghost, 
 '* Remember me sometimes." 
 
 " My love, my life, 
 " My only darling," Geoffrey cried, and press'd 
 Once more his hungry loving lips to hers ; 
 " I never can forget you whilst I live — 
 " Good night — good-bye." 
 
 As a somnambulist 
 Treads without seeing, so did Constance walk 
 Towards her lonely chamber ; in the hearth 
 A few expiring embers now and then 
 Crack'd forth a sign of life. The candles still 
 Were flick'ring, but a regiment of dwarfs 
 Compared to what they had been when she left — 
 This told her first she had been long away, 
 For in her fever'd brain the flight of Time 
 She could not calculate ; — so mad, so swift 
 Were those enchanted moments ; yet a life, 
 Nay more, it seem'd a whole eternity 
 
1 08 Denzil Place, 
 
 Of wild emotion, passion, ecstacy, 
 
 Had pass'd since those four tapers first were lit ! 
 
 She saw some flow'rs she gathered yesterday 
 
 Unfaded, tho' it seemed so long ago, 
 
 She went towards her glass half absently. 
 
 And gazed and started, for her face looked changed — 
 
 The air of child-like innocence was gone — 
 
 She groan'd aloud, and falHng on her knees 
 
 She covered with her white and trembling hands 
 
 What seem'd the fair accomplice of her guilt. 
 
 How long she thus remained she did not know, 
 
 But when she saw the first faint struggling ray 
 
 Of morning, dazed, and shivering with cold 
 
 She rose from off her knees, look'd out, and saw 
 
 A wintry sun rise on her new-born life, 
 
 (For so it seem'd). Her flimsy dressing-gown 
 
 Was blown aside, and the chill morning air 
 
 Breathed on her heart, but still she stood, and look'd 
 
 As might a statue. All at once she heard 
 
 A sound as of a passing horse's hoofs — 
 
 The laurels hid the rider, but she knew 
 
 That it was Geoffrey, faithful to his word. 
 
Denzil Place, 1 09 
 
 Tearing himself from England and from Love. 
 
 Till then she had not analyzed her thoughts, 
 
 They all had been so wild with self-reproach, 
 
 But now an uncontrollable desire 
 
 To follow him who " lov'd and rode away " 
 
 Made her outstretch her empty aching arms 
 
 Towards the spot wherefrom the dying sound 
 
 Was now but faintly echo'd ; then to heav'n 
 
 She raised them pleadingly, with clasping hands, 
 
 And in her desolation cried aloud 
 
 *' God bless my darling wheresoe'er he goes !" 
 
Dearest ! if we had never met 
 
 Happier, perchance, had been my fate, 
 Maybe the tear-drops would have wet 
 
 My cheek less often than of late. 
 
 My face would not have look'd a lie 
 
 To hide the thoughts I dared not speak; 
 Unsigh'd had been these sighs I sigh, 
 
 Unblush'd these blushes on my cheek. 
 Perchance my smile had been sincere, 
 
 And life had seem'd an easy task. 
 Ere Love had tempted me to wear 
 
 This guilty ever-galling mask. 
 This might have been, but 'tis not so, 
 
 Ah, happier far if it had been ! 
 The fatal shaft has left the bow 
 
 And hit a target unforeseen ! • 
 It is not so ! And had it been ? 
 
 Alas, had I to live again 
 I would not sacrifice my love 
 
 To save my soul an endless pain. 
 I would not sacrifice for this 
 
 That darken'd light's last ling'ring beams, 
 Or lose the memory of a kiss 
 
 Which now I only feel in dreams. 
 And tho' this music of the Past 
 
 May echo thro' succeeding years, 
 Till smiles may learn to spring at last 
 
 Out of the memory of tears. 
 
 Yet would I die, if near thy heart 
 
 I could but breathe my last fond vow, 
 
 And kiss away on thy dear lips 
 The life I do not value now ! 
 
"3 
 
 ** Love, all defying love, who sees 
 No charm in trophies won with ease, 
 Whose rarest, dearest fruits of bliss 
 Are plucked on danger's precipice ! " 
 
 Moore. 
 
 *' Now, if this man should be 
 
 Vain, selfish, light, or hearted with a stone, 
 Or worthless any way, as there are many, 
 I've given myself, like alms unto an idiot. 
 To be for nothing squandered ! " 
 
 T. L. Beddoes. 
 
 VI. 
 
 OH, lovers of all ages, kingdoms, climes, 
 How have you sufFer'd ! What a motley crew 
 Would throng the earth could all your buried hordes 
 Collect from out the scatter'd dust of Time 
 And re-assume the human shapes you wore ! 
 Yet, could you carry in your wither'd hands 
 Some record telling of the hopes and fears 
 That thriird you once, I ween that each of these 
 
114 Denzil Place, 
 
 Would bear a closer semblance to the other 
 
 Than would the fashion of your winding-sheets ! 
 
 The legend 'graven on the scarabee, — 
 
 The pictured emblem of the Ninevite, — 
 
 The roll of papyrus, held in the grasp 
 
 Of the illustrious mummy, — all of these 
 
 Translated, doubtless would resemble much 
 
 Our modern hist'ries of despairing sighs. 
 
 Or those still further from us, — tales of loves 
 
 Antediluvian or pre-Adamite, 
 
 When, haply, in the groves now fossilized. 
 
 Haunted by monster Megatherium 
 
 And Plesiosaums, mortals liv'd and lov'd 
 
 And sinn'd, as now they live and love and sin. 
 
 Granted that those can love whose eyes have been 
 All ignorant of tears, whose kiss is bless'd 
 By priestly benediction, — in whose lives 
 A kindly heav'n has will'd that Love and Law 
 Should be united : Duty and Desire, 
 Honor and Happiness Hnk'd hand in hand, 
 Show'r gifts upon them, in their hours of bliss 
 Should they but raise their eyes, they seem to see 
 The wings of hov'ring angels, and the hosts 
 
Denzil Place. 115 
 
 Of highest heav'n, with sweet approving smiles 
 Joining the throbbing chorus of applause 
 Wrung from their grateful bosoms. 
 
 These indeed 
 May love, and wherefore not ? but what of those 
 Who love despite the thunders of the just, 
 Whose ev'ry heart ache, welcomed by the jeers 
 Of mocking fiends, is chasten'd by the gods ? 
 Hide in thy bosom, poor unfortunate. 
 That love which is thy torture and thy crime, 
 Or cry aloud to those departed hosts 
 Of ghostly lovers ; can they be more deaf 
 To thy disaster than the living world, 
 Who with a careless smile will note the pain 
 Caused by thy fooHsh self-inflicted wound ? 
 
 When Constance 'woke after that fatal nighty 
 She thought at first " Ah, I have dream'd a dream 
 Too terrible — too sweet !" then all at once 
 The truth flash' d on her, crushing her with shame 
 And self-abasement — yet to this was join'd 
 So great a tenderness for him who wrought 
 Her misery, that had she had but wings 
 She would have flown to nestle in his breast. 
 
 I 
 
1 16 Denzil Place. 
 
 She looked in consternation at the clock 
 And saw with wonderment that it was noon. 
 Fearing Sir John would question such delay 
 She rang her bell, and hastily began 
 To make amends for what would seem to him 
 Unwonted indolence. Anon her maid 
 Enter'd the room, and hoping she was well, 
 Gave her two letters, one was from Sir John 
 The other from his sister. " Both were gone 
 (The girl explain'd) ^' to London, where Sir John 
 " Had suddenly -been summon'd whilst she slept, 
 '^ He, knowing that my lady is not strong, 
 " Had order'd that she should not be disturb'd, 
 *^ But left these letters, telling her the cause 
 " Of his departure." 
 
 Constance, too surprised 
 To question her informant, broke the seals 
 Of the two letters ; then she knew full well 
 The reason she had been deserted thus 
 As one plague-stricken, left to sigh alone. 
 
 She opened first the letter from Sir John 
 With hands that trembled, and as in a dream 
 She read these words — 
 
Denzil Place. 117 
 
 " Constance, I am too shocked 
 " Even to contemplate or to bewail 
 " The fate I suffer — it has come to me 
 " So suddenly : enough that I know all — 
 " I will not torture you by saying more 
 " On what I feel you will repent in time — 
 " The many troubles that have come at once — 
 " The fire, and then this unexpected blow — 
 " Have shatter'd me in mind ; — this is my wish 
 " To spare you all I can of that disgrace 
 " Which needs must fall most heavily on you 
 " Who, I believe have wish'd to do the right — 
 " (How strong the dire temptation must have been 
 ''' Which led e'en you astray I dare not think !) 
 " This is my wish — that you should go to Town. 
 *' (I send you money.) Say that I am there 
 " Summon'd in haste by business, and once there 
 " Leave England for awhile — I shall return 
 " And say your doctor sent you to the South — 
 " Be happy if you can — I cannot bear 
 "' To meet you yet awhile — some day maybe — 
 * ^ I do this for the honour of our house 
 ** And for the little boy you used to love. 
 " Good-bye, God bless you, I can write no more." 
 
Ii8 Denzil Place, 
 
 The other letter was a longer one. 
 
 " Abandon'd woman ! " (thus the words began,) 
 
 ** To-morrow I shall blush to think my pen 
 
 " Could so pollute itself as spell your name I 
 
 " Was it to bring disgrace upon our house 
 
 " That you, a country parson's pauper child 
 
 " Should flirt and fawn and flatter till at last 
 
 '' You gain'd your selfish end, and made a man 
 
 '^ Treble your age, your husband and your dupe ? 
 
 " Maybe, the guilty partner of your crime 
 
 " You 'fancied' ere you were my brother's wife, 
 
 " But he, more cunning, like all libertines, 
 
 *' Knowing at once the woman that you were 
 
 *' Was wiser than Sir John, whose simple mind 
 
 ** Judged others by himself 
 
 " Ah, well he knew 
 *' This Mr. Denzil, with his easy creed 
 ''' And looser morals ! He was not your dupe ! 
 ^' These Atheists throw ofl" beliefs themselves, 
 " They cramp and fetter them, and act as bars 
 " To their desires, but when they want a wife 
 , " They do not fasten on the like of you ! 
 " Somewhere, (for I am told that he has fled,) 
 " He no doubt smiles in his deceitful sleeve 
 
Denzil Place. 1 1 9 
 
 " At you, his victim ! Ah, the noble part 
 
 ^' That he has acted ! All his fine ideas 
 
 "' About his ^ Honour ' and the ^ I.ove of Right ' 
 
 " His 'Adoration of the Beautiful' 
 
 " The * Liberty of Man' (ah, here indeed 
 
 ^' He acted up to what he boldly preach'd 
 
 " If you are beautiful, as he is man !) 
 
 " But where was stow'd his 'honour'' all these years — 
 
 *' These three whole years, during the which, with you 
 
 *' His neighbour's wife, he liv'd in deadly sin ? 
 
 *' Why, all the neighbourhood was rife with it ! 
 
 *• Your names were link'd together ev'ry where ! 
 
 *' The poor, who were too dull to understand 
 
 " The indiscretion lurking in their words 
 
 " Named your two names together ev'ry day, 
 
 " Your's is a bye word! All my brother's house 
 
 *' Have been respected since they came to dwell 
 
 '' Here in this county, (nigh three hundred years,) 
 
 " And but for this, you would have seen ere now 
 
 " The scornful finger pointed as you pass'd 
 
 " By e'en those very grateful villagers 
 
 '' You lov'd to patronize and queen it o'er ! 
 
 '' My brother wishes to protect you still 
 
 *^ From all the infamy you well deserve, 
 
1 20 Denzil Place. 
 
 " And hopes that you will go and dwell abroad 
 
 '• Whilst he lives on in solitude — his lips 
 
 " Too generously silent. Thank your God 
 
 ''' You had a husband who could thus repay 
 
 " Your treachery and guilt ! He knows it all — 
 
 *' I watched you stealing to your paramour — 
 
 " (How many nights you thus have sought his side 
 
 *• 'Twere vain to ponder on !) Ah, well conceiv'd 
 
 *' Those midnight visits ! All the servants bribed, 
 
 ^' The groom in ambush, waiting for the horse, 
 
 '' The house door open'd with the master's key ! 
 
 *' But not so well arranged but that the door 
 
 '* Of that most horrid room was left ajar — 
 
 '^ (Long practice makes too bold, the pitcher oft 
 
 '^ Goes to the well and breaks the hundredth time !) 
 
 ''' Ah, if its walls could speak, what would they say, 
 
 ''What tales of midnight orgie, foulest sin ! 
 
 " (I shudder at the thought !) 'Twas there I saw 
 
 *' As he was bidding you a last farewell, 
 
 " So close together your two guilty heads, 
 
 " I scarce could tell the hateful things apart — 
 
 " Whilst he was pressing on your lying lips 
 
 '•' His own, which doubtless scarcely yet were dry 
 
 ^•' From kissing some such creature as yourself! 
 
Denzil Place, 121 
 
 " Ah, you are fairly match'd ! Go, seek him now, 
 
 " Implore his mercy, s\vear to be to him 
 
 '* Truer than you have been to one more true, 
 
 ^' And Hst his answer ! He will cast you ofif 
 
 " And lower sinking, till the lowest scum 
 
 ^' Of human earth will scorn to mix with you, 
 
 " Your lonely life, fed with that poison, Sin, 
 
 " Must needs be short, and then, unlov'd, unmiss'd, 
 
 " Your soul will pass to the high judgment seat 
 
 " To meet its doom ; then will it be for me 
 
 " To pray that in those bitter latter days 
 
 " You may be penitent, and that the heav'n 
 
 " You so have sinn'd against, may deal to you 
 
 '^ More mercy than your evil heart thought fit 
 
 " To mete to others, le.ast of all to us ! 
 
 '^ Nay, even now (to show my heart is free 
 
 " From thoughts of vengeance for your cruel wrong, 
 
 ''And with the hope that I may make you feel 
 
 " The virtuous can wish the sinner well, 
 
 '' I say, may God have mercy on your soul, 
 
 " And bless your exile with a lasting good 
 
 " Wrought to your spirit ! 
 
 " With this earnest hope 
 " I sign myself yours truly, Jane L'Estrange." 
 
122 Denzil Place, 
 
 Constance had wept when she had read the first— 
 
 The kind sad letter of her outraged lord 
 
 But now she felt as is supposed to feel 
 
 The worm that has been trampled till it turns, — 
 
 The malice lurking in each spiteful line, 
 
 The pent-up poison flowing from this pen, 
 
 Let loose at last, as from the adder's tongue — 
 
 The base injustice, the impatient wish 
 
 Thus to exaggerate and multiply 
 
 Her fault, all this directed at herself . 
 
 She did not dare resent — it was deserved — 
 
 But what she felt she never could forgive 
 
 Were those envenom'd arrows aim'd at him 
 
 Her love, her life ; the angry crimson blood 
 
 Rush'd to her cheek as she read o'er again 
 
 Each bitter accusation. Well she knew 
 
 That he had fallen from his high resolve, 
 
 But then her heart would have it that he fell 
 
 Fighting against some superhuman pow'r — 
 
 A power he had striven with for years — 
 
 She would not think that that beloved form 
 
 Concealed a cruel calculating heart 
 
 Such as she heard had sometimes lurk'd beneath 
 
 A mien deceptive. Yet these lying lines 
 
Denzil Place. 123 
 
 So far impressed her that her mind conceiv'd 
 That first intangible small germ of Doubt ^ 
 So bitter — so impossible to kill 
 In solitude, his tender lips alone 
 Could drive away the demon that these words 
 Had summon'd into life, and where was he ? 
 '* Ah, grant that I may see him once again," 
 She pray'd, " That I may know these words are false 
 " And that his heart is true ! My darling ! " 
 
 Here, 
 (Had there been aught in willing^ Geoffrey's form 
 Had stood before the lady of his love, 
 Impeli'd by J;hat divine affinity 
 Which triumphs over distance, death, and time, 
 But tho' her ardent spirit long'd and lov'd 
 He did not come, and Constance wept alone. 
 
 Then she bethought her how she oft had heard 
 Wise saws about the fickleness of men. 
 And how they love to pluck forbidden fruit, 
 And how, when tasted, they will fling away 
 What they have striven with such pains to grasp — 
 Or how a man will often in his heart 
 Despise the woman who will yield to him, 
 
1 24 Denzil Place. 
 
 Loving some other, who is hard and cold 
 And unrelenting ; — how upon the paths 
 Of men like these, lie many faded flow'rs 
 Strewn with the years, and trodden under foot, 
 Loves of all shades and colours — many-voiced, 
 With song-notes variable as the birds' 
 By sunny shores, and under alien skies 
 Beguiled and won. She sadly thought, " Alas ! 
 " I may be such a little thing to him — 
 " A passing thought — a moment's light caprice, 
 *' Whilst he is, oh, so very much to me !" 
 
 Then sadly she prepared her to depart. 
 An outcast and an exile ; first she tore 
 Into a thousand fragments, which she burnt, 
 The hated letter. With a sinking heart 
 She bade a sad farewell to ev'ry spot 
 She lov'd so well. The garden she explored, 
 And gather'd from each glossy evergreen 
 A dear memento — laurel, box, and fir. 
 Cypress and rosemary, and one dark spray 
 Of sad funereal yew, to which there clung 
 A single waxen berry ; these she bound 
 Into a garland, and thereon she wrote 
 
Denzil Place. 125 
 
 " This wreath of leaves was gather'd in the garden 
 *' Of Eden ; — to be kept for evermore." 
 
 She did not know, who had not seen as yet 
 The bright luxuriant gardens of the South 
 How little like the fancied fields of Heav'n 
 This one would seem in an Italian's eyes, 
 Accustom'd to behold in his own land 
 Such blaze of blossom — such a brilliant sun ! 
 But unto her it seemed as tho' the doors 
 Were closed upon some earthly paradise, 
 As soon as swung the heavy iron gates 
 Of Denzil Park, behind the speeding wheels 
 Of the old-fashion' d carriage, on the mom 
 She and her maid departed on their way — 
 So much she lov'd the home that was his home, 
 The sacred spot where she had seen him first. 
 
 Her maid, who watch'd her shyly, wonder'd why 
 
 Lady L'Estrange's eyes were fill'd with tears, 
 
 When she herself was all too pleas'd to leave 
 
 The dull old mansion and the tiresome trees 
 
 Of dismal Denzil, and to go to Town, 
 
 But Constance felt as if her heart would break, 
 
 "Good-bye" she thought, "Dear trees, dear shaded walks, 
 
126 Denzil Place. 
 
 *' Earth that his feet have trod — good-bye, good-bye ! 
 " Good-bye, old house, where he was born and bred, 
 " Where he may dwell some day, and some day die, 
 " Home of the buried fathers of my love !" 
 
 Thus Constance quitted silent Denzil Place, 
 To face that stern relentless outer world 
 Of which she knew so little. Never more 
 For her those gates unfasten'd ; — ne'er again 
 Fell her light footstep on the polish'd floors, 
 Nor were the dim old oaken panell'd walls 
 Flatter'd again by that sweet flitting shade 
 Caressing them. The old house stands and waits. 
 And all its windows look like straining eyes 
 Watching for Constance, — for the fairy thing 
 That suddenly became identified 
 With its moth-eaten records of the Past. 
 Ah, never more ! those windows wait in vain. 
 Thro' all the changing years she will not come. 
 No more her sunny head and wistful eyes 
 Will grace the empty open window-frames ! 
 She came and went, as vanishes a dream, 
 And the old house is waiting her in vain. 
 
PART II. 
 
PART II. 
 
 ' The angels, not half so happy in heaven 
 
 Went envying her and me ; 
 Yes ! that was the reason (as all men know 
 
 In this Kingdom by the sea, ) 
 That the wind came out of the cloud by night 
 
 Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee. 
 
 But our love it was stronger by far than the love 
 
 Of those who were older than we — 
 
 Of many far wiser than we ; 
 And neither the angels in heaven above 
 
 Nor the demons down under the sea 
 Can ever dissever my soul from the soul 
 
 Of the beautiful Annabel Lee." 
 
 Edgar Allan Poe. 
 
Oh, lost and lov'd, and gone before ! 
 
 I look and long with tearful eyes 
 For what will come to me no more, 
 
 The summer warmth of southern skies. 
 The sunny waves that rise and swell 
 
 And seem to me at times as near 
 As those that echo in a shell 
 
 Held to a child's attentive ear, 
 Oh, lost and lov'd ! The magic thread 
 
 That binds my heart to scenes like these 
 Shines not alone from radiance shed 
 
 Thro' golden fruited orange-trees. 
 The murmur of that tidelegs sea. 
 
 The odour of those thousand flow'rs 
 Alone, had never lent to me 
 
 This day-dream of delicious hours ! 
 Ah, thou wert there . . . ! Dear sunny clime 
 
 In which we lived our happy day, 
 No changes \vrought by tide or time 
 
 Can steal thy borrow' d charms away ! 
 For, turning back to Love and thee 
 
 These dismal hours reflect again 
 The radiance of that summer-sea 
 
 And dull the anguish of my pain. 
 Dear Land of Love ! I sometimes dream 
 
 That I, unloved, am wand' ring there, 
 And wonder if its groves would seem 
 
 As fragrant, or its skies as fair — 
 I wonder too, if this dim light 
 
 This mock'ry of a summer sun. 
 Might not appear to me more bright 
 
 If shared by that beloved one ? 
 
 K 2 
 
I know not, but at eventide, 
 
 After this faded sun has set, 
 When thro' the window, open wide, 
 
 I breathe the scented mignionette 
 And all the flow'rs thou loved'st so well. 
 
 The clematis and violet. 
 And drooping yellow asphodel. 
 
 Then mem'ry whispers to my heart 
 Of all the joys denied to me. 
 
 And wheresoever love, thou art 
 I fain would go and dwell with thee ! 
 
133 
 
 " Italia, Italia, o tu cui feo la sorte 
 
 Dono infelice di bellezza ; ond ' hai 
 Funesta dote d'infiniti guai 
 Che in fronte scritti per grand doglia porte. " 
 
 ViNCENZO FiLICAIA. 
 
 ' A land 
 
 Which was the mightiest in its old command 
 
 And is the loveliest, and must ever be 
 The master mould of Nature's heavenly brand 
 Wherein were cast the heroic and the free, 
 The beautiful, the brave, the lords of earth and sea." 
 
 Byron. 
 
 VII. 
 
 /^^H, Italy ! how dare I write of thee 
 
 ^-^ When other bolder lips than mine have fail'd 
 
 To sing thy praise as I would have it sung ? — 
 
 Home of the myrtle and the violet — 
 
 Sky of serenest, clearest, bluest blue, 
 
 Earth of intensest, warmest fruitfulness — 
 
1 34 Denzil Place. 
 
 Where life is Md, and ev'ry quicken'd sense 
 Impatient, drinks in loveliness, and feasts 
 On wonder after wonder ! 
 
 Having bask'd 
 Beneath thy glorious, seldom-shrouded sun, 
 And lov'd beneath thy scented orange boughs. 
 Dear land of Art, of Beauty, and of Love, 
 Now that my happy lips can proudly add 
 The name of Freedom to thy list of charms, 
 Fain would I, when my journey here is done 
 Mix with thy sweet emancipated Earth ! 
 
 Constance had sought this land which, like herself, 
 
 Was bless'd (or cursed) by Heaven with the dow'r— 
 
 ^ The fatal dow'r of Beauty,' but alas 
 
 For her, altho' resembling Italy 
 
 In being born to this fair heritage — 
 
 E'en more unfortunate than that sweet land 
 
 She groan'd in faster fetters ) — all in vain 
 
 For her Italians liberators rose, 
 
 Mazzini, Garibaldi, and Cavour, 
 
 Breaking a bondage less inveterate 
 
 Than was her own ; weighing upon the heart 
 
 The burden of a fatal servitude 
 
Denzil Place, 135; 
 
 Defies emancipation \ — thus she sigh'd 
 
 A lovely slave in chains — (those chains that seem 
 
 To some like brittle bands of summer flow'rs, 
 
 As Love, descending airily on them 
 
 With the soft 'lighting of a butterfly, 
 
 Leaves no sad trace behind to mark the place 
 
 Where his white wings have press'd, whilst on 
 
 another 
 More keenly sensitive, he burns a scar 
 Searing and withering unto the core 
 The hapless heart that never more is whole.) 
 How could she free herself from all the host 
 Of newly waken'd torments ? How subdue 
 The multitude of restless enemies 
 Besieging her, and harassing her soul ? 
 Love and Despair, and vascillating Hope, 
 And Self-reproach, and Jealousy, and Doubt ? 
 How put to flight these fierce invading foes — 
 These tyrants — these Tedeschi of the heart ? 
 
 The town near which sad Constance made a home 
 Was by the shores of that delightful sea 
 Tideless, and often bluer than the sky 
 Kissing its utmost edge ; towards the hills 
 
% 36 Denzil Place, 
 
 Which bounded it to westward, gardens grew 
 And olive-grounds, where nestling in the shade 
 Of orange-groves, and dim with treliss'd ways 
 Overrun with creepers, painted villas rose 
 With cool low rooms, paved with their octagons 
 Of shining crimson tiles, whilst on their walls 
 The cunning artist had depicted scenes 
 Repeating those the gay Venetian blinds 
 Shut out from view — long line of sunny sea 
 And orange-gardens, sombre cypress trees 
 And sparkling fountains ; all the ceilings too 
 Seem'd mimic vaults of heav'n, altho* the art 
 Of mortal painter could not imitate 
 The cloudless blue of the Italian sky. 
 
 In one of these my heroine dwelt alone 
 
 An exile and a penitent : her home, 
 
 The smallest of two villas which were call'd 
 
 By the same name, stood in the garden grounds 
 
 Of its more spacious neighbour. Those who know 
 
 The wondrous beauties of that flowr'y land 
 
 Will see in fancy such a fairy place 
 
 As was this southern garden ! Tow'rds the left 
 
 (Looking to seaward) rose the boundary 
 
Denzil Place, 1 37 
 
 Which shut this Eden from the outer world — 
 A sunny wall of stucco, painted pink, 
 Where, sporting in and out the frequent chinks 
 Left by the clumsy scaffolding, she watch'd 
 The playful pointed lizards in the sun. 
 She often strove to catch them, but in vain ; 
 Like many other far more precious things 
 They glided thro' her fingers, or, at times 
 Half blinded with the glory of the sun. 
 She only grasp'd a shadow, scaring thus 
 The fleet reality, which slid away 
 Leaving her empty-handed. 
 
 Near this wall 
 Was built a shady summer-house or bow'r 
 In which there was a window, garlanded 
 With many-colour'd roses, clematis. 
 And tendrils of the scarlet passion-flow'r. 
 Oft sitting in this leafy balcony 
 That over-look'd the narrow stone-paved way 
 Which led down from the mountains to the town 
 She mused for hours, fann'd by delicious air. 
 And list'ning to the unaccustom'd sounds 
 Wafted around her. Tinkling southern chimes, 
 The ratt'ling hoofs of heavy-laden mules, 
 
1 33 Denzil Place. 
 
 The cracking whips of sun-burnt muleteers 
 
 Who goaded on with curses or with songs 
 
 The patient creatures, smother'd with their bells 
 
 And scarlet tassels. Seated carelessly 
 
 Amongst their panniers, knitting as they rode, 
 
 The black-eyed peasant-women laugh'd and joked 
 
 And shouted to the men. Or, sadder sounds 
 
 Would reach her, when the brown Franciscan friars 
 
 Pass'd, bearing to their convent in the hills 
 
 The silent dead. The painted effigies 
 
 Upon the waving banners which they bore 
 
 Reach'd almost to the window where she sat, — 
 
 The twinkling candles, and the crucifix 
 
 Uplifted high in air, to which there hung 
 
 The ghastly figure of a naked Christ 
 
 Surrounded by the horrid instruments 
 
 Of human torture, sponge, and murd'rous spear 
 
 And wreath of biting thorns — all these recali'd 
 
 With painful vividness the agony 
 
 Of God on earth ; anon, from time to time 
 
 Long after the procession pass'd her by. 
 
 Borne back upon the gentle southern breeze 
 
 She heard again that dismal monotone. 
 
Denzil Place. 1 39 
 
 The convent had been hidden in the shade 
 
 Of sombre oHve- trees, but that aloft 
 
 Its pointed belfry, roof'd with colour'd tiles 
 
 Betray'd the refuge of those holy men 
 
 Who here had fled the turmoil of the world 
 
 Vowing to bear perpetual poverty 
 
 And live according to the godly rules 
 
 Dictated by St. Francis. Or, again, 
 
 When western breezes, with their balmy breath, 
 
 Changed the dim branches to a shining sea 
 
 Of glist'ning brightness, turning heavenwards 
 
 The silver under lining of their leaves. 
 
 Then Constance could behold betwixt the boughs 
 
 The high enclosing walls, and thro' the gates 
 
 Could catch a gUmpse of tombstones gay with flowers 
 
 And color'd crosses, many deck'd like shrines 
 
 With off'rings of affection ; for 'twas there 
 
 Towards the convent gates that Constance oft 
 
 Would take her morning stroll, or, with her book 
 
 'Twas there she sat beneath the olive-trees 
 
 And watch'd the monks, clad in their russet gowns, 
 
 Go forth in twos and threes, some bearing sacks 
 
 And empty baskets, making for the town 
 
 To beg or market. She would try to guess 
 
140 Denzil Place, 
 
 What cause induced each individual 
 
 To Hve this Hfe, and wove strange histories 
 
 Of bhghted hopes, or unrequited love, 
 
 Or sad bereavement, making of the world 
 
 A place so desolate, that it were best 
 
 To shut its mem'ries out with iron gates 
 
 And massive walls ; but these were only dreams 
 
 Of one who thought that all the world, like her, 
 
 Had lov'd and suffer'd ; — this religious sect, 
 
 Mostly recruited from a peasantry 
 
 Sunk in the lowest depths of ignorance 
 
 And superstition, scarcely boasted one 
 
 Whose life would be more worthy to record 
 
 Than that of a dumb animal which toils 
 
 And helps to till the fertile earth, whose flow'rs 
 
 It is too dull and weary to admire — 
 
 For them no sentimental griefs of heart 
 
 Or morbid longings for a solitude 
 
 Remote from haunts of men ! those iron ills 
 
 Of human life, disease and poverty, 
 
 Had driven fishermen too old to fish. 
 
 Or muleteers too lame to drive their mules, 
 
 Into this forced seclusion, nothing loth 
 
 They changed their well-worn homespun coats of blue 
 
w 
 
 Denzil Place. 141 
 
 For the brown, heavy-looking, holy cloth 
 Of the Franciscan order ; — ill they learnt 
 And even worse pronounced their Latin pray'rs, 
 These poor Italian peasants, but their dress, 
 Their shaven tonsures, and their sandal' d feet 
 Fiird Constance with a sense of mystic awe — 
 To her they seem'd the pious chosen few 
 Who, for the love of Christ, had put away 
 Those evil lusts and longings of the flesh 
 So dear to man, and here in solitude 
 And constant pray'r had buried evermore 
 The recollections of their stormy lives. 
 
 Ah, all the storms they ponder'd on were those 
 Braved on that beautiful capricious sea 
 Which Constance lov'd ; of these they often talk'd 
 With holy brethren — brethren once who shared 
 Their ocean perils and their finny spoil. 
 
 Within the cloisters of the nunnery 
 Which stood still further hidden in the hills. 
 There may, perchance, have throbb'd some heavy 
 hearts ' 
 
142 Deiizil Place. 
 
 Stricken by arrows with a sharper point, 
 
 Inflicting pangs far more incurable 
 
 Than those of hunger, thirst, or rheumatism, 
 
 But yet the placid features of the nuns 
 
 Seem'd to belie this pitying surmise. 
 
 As Constance heard them, in their modest tones. 
 
 Give her a smiling blessing as they pass'd. 
 
 Of one of these, the sympathetic voice. 
 
 And dreamy eyes, made Constance feel for her 
 
 As for a friend. This sister show'd her o'er 
 
 The convent garden, gave her flow'rs and fruit. 
 
 And praised the while the peaceful pray'rful life 
 
 Led by herself and all the sisterhood. 
 
 " To know," she said one day, as Constance paced 
 
 With this new-found companion- up and down 
 
 The convent terrace (looking tow'rds the sea 
 
 And distant hills) " That sin can only live 
 
 " Outside the doors we close against the world — 
 
 " To feel that after God has lent us life 
 
 '' We give the gift He gave us back to Him — 
 
 " Devoting to such noble servitude 
 
 " The energies of body, mind, and soul — 
 
 " What greater happiness than this on earth ? 
 
Denzil Place, 143 
 
 •^ If, whilst our minds and our immortal souls 
 
 ''' Are fresh with all the warm enthusiasm 
 
 " Of our first years, what pious satisfaction 
 
 " If then for Him we mortify the flesh, 
 
 " And dedicate to Him each hidden thought, 
 
 *' Each longing aspiration of the soul ! 
 
 " And then the blessed knowledge that our pray'rs 
 
 " May ease the punishments of purgatory, 
 
 " Earn'd and deserv'd by those departed souls 
 
 " Who sinn'd on earth, but which the gracious Lord, 
 
 ^* The blessed son of Mary, condescends 
 
 " To mitigate and shorten ; ponder well 
 
 " And ask that God may make you realize 
 
 " The sacred pow'r of pray'r — the bitter sin 
 
 '^ Of cold neglect." 
 
 " Ah, these are thoughts indeed," 
 Constance replied, " Would lure my heart to pray, 
 " Could I but learn to credit such a creed ! 
 " Most touching is the beautiful idea 
 '' Of intercession for the helpless dead ; 
 " Ah, who would ever dare unclasp his hands 
 •' Or rise from off his knees, could he but deem 
 '^ This sweet belief of your's were only true ! 
 '"' But we are taught a less poetic faith. 
 
144 Denzil Place, 
 
 " And this to us seems like a tender tale 
 
 " To tempt the knees to bend, and lift the hands 
 
 *' Of those who would not truly pray for aught 
 
 *•' They could not measure, taste, or understand, 
 
 " Or else associate with sentiments 
 
 ^' Of earthly love and friendship, reaching on 
 
 " And thus continuing e'en after death. 
 
 " If what you think is true — is true indeed — 
 
 " I pray in time to bring my stubborn mind 
 
 " To know and feel its truth ; yet, if 'tis false, 
 
 " Tho' sweet the thought of praying for the dead, 
 
 " I would not lean upon a fleeting shadow 
 
 " However fair ! What can our finite minds 
 
 "- Know of the dim hereafter of the soul ? 
 
 " One man may dream his own belief the best, 
 
 " And force his obstinate idea of Heav'n 
 
 " Or Hell, upon the vacillating minds 
 
 "• Of those who do not care to think themselves, 
 
 " And like to take religion ready-made — 
 
 " But 'tis the feeble sight of one poor worm 
 
 " Leading the others who are blinder still ! 
 
 *' For me, I trust ; I do not think I feel 
 
 " Like some, the need that any one should pluck 
 
 " The skirts of God for me — reminding Him 
 
Deiizil Place, 145 
 
 '' To pardon. Mercy is His attribute, 
 
 " And what seems good to Him, I know is good. 
 
 *^ I like to think He will be merciful, 
 
 " And that our too great self-abasement pains 
 
 " One who has made us for such noble things. 
 
 " He surely must have meant that we should work 
 
 " And seek ourselves the gifts we ask of Him — 
 
 " A troop of idle, cringing mendicants 
 
 " Must please Him less, tho' crouching at His feet, 
 
 " Than the brave man who feels responsible — 
 
 " Who fights his way and wins, and lays his crown 
 
 " Of laurels at his heav'nly Father's feet 
 
 "And gives him all the glory ? 
 
 " All the hours 
 " You and the Sisters pass in asking gifts 
 " Might surely bring you better things at last, 
 " Could you but go with praises in your hearts 
 " Out into life, and in the striving world 
 "Meet and subdue the Great Antagonist, 
 " Instead of fleeing from him ! You are good, 
 " And I, a sinner — so forgive these words 
 " From my unworthy lips ! I should rejoice 
 " To leave the weary world, and come to you 
 " And live in peace and pray'r amongst these hills 
 
r.46 Denzil Place. 
 
 " And happy olive-grounds ; but that, to me 
 " Who have so sinn'd and striven, this, the Hfe 
 " You lead, would seem too passive and inert 
 "• Tho' 'tis a life free from the bitter sting 
 " Of self-reproach ; — -forgive me for my words." 
 
 (There was a tinge in this, her argument 
 Of Geoffrey Denzil's subtler sophistry, 
 A few short years ago she had not dared 
 To speak thus boldly upon sacred things.) 
 Her words were in Italian, but the Nun 
 Answer'd her sadly in the English tongue — 
 " Dear lady, I am English, let us speak 
 " The language of the country I regret 
 ^' And fain would see again before I die. 
 " When two sad women, in a foreign land 
 " Led by the sacred sympathy of grief 
 " Thus seek companionship, and hope to find 
 ^' Not only this, but maybe friendship too, 
 '^ What need to deal in useless mysteries 
 *' Or make concealments ? " 
 
 Constance smiled, and said, 
 '' You must have wonder'd at my awkward words 
 *' Of bad Itahan ! May I ask you why 
 
Denzil Place. 147 
 
 " You left our native island ? Do not heed 
 " My idle questions should they give you pain." 
 
 " Alas," the Sister answer'd, " Soon is told 
 
 " The reason of my choice; my life at home 
 
 ** In England, was unfortunate, I came 
 
 " Hither to lose my sad identity ; 
 
 " I have succeeded, by the grace of God, 
 
 " As a frail flow'r in this sweet southern garden 
 
 " Which may have been a seedHng from the north, 
 
 " Expands into a glorious second life 
 
 " Forgetful of its storm-toss'd origin, 
 
 " So have I been re-born to taste those joys 
 
 '' I knew not of, the Spirit's triumphing 
 
 " Over the fallen flesh." 
 
 Impatient tears 
 Here fell from Constance's attentive eyes 
 As in the Sister's short biography 
 She traced a sad resemblance to her own. 
 The dew, so chilling after southern suns, 
 Was falling now, and ev'ry leaf and blade 
 Seem'd heavy with a sympathetic tear, 
 And Constance, shivering, drew on her cloak. 
 
148 Dcmil Place. 
 
 Kissed the kind Sister on her sallow cheek, 
 And sped towards her little twinkling home. 
 
 All night she could not sleep, tho' worn and tired 
 She toss'd and turn'd, and ever and anon 
 Came to her mind Sister Theresa's words, 
 Which she repeated oft : "' My life at home 
 " In England was unfortunate ; I came 
 " Hither to lose my sad identity — 
 " I have succeeded." . . . 
 
 Then at last she thought, 
 " I will give up the weary, wicked world, 
 *' And live this idle, happy, pray'rful life 
 " Amongst the vines. Calm and self-satisfied, 
 " I may be spared the pain of many tears, 
 " And helpless, hopeless, longings to forget — 
 " Oh God, that it were possible to lose 
 " One hated, blessed, haunting memory ! " 
 
 Her head was aching, and she seem'd to hear 
 The jingling southern chimes, now faint and low. 
 Now clanging with a harsh and angry tone, 
 And hammering a fierce discordant knell 
 Into her fever'd brain. The empty room 
 
Denzil Place, 149 
 
 Seem'd full of chatt'ring strangers, pressing on 
 Into her presence ; thro' the bolted doors 
 They seem'd to crowd and elbow one another — 
 She did not fear them, but she wonder'd why 
 The world had grown so small — so populous, 
 So noisy, and so sadly wearisome ! — 
 She wonder'd at a thousand other things 
 Which had not seem'd so wonderful before- - • 
 Compared this thing with that, and multiplied, 
 Subtracted — added — till her mind became 
 A prison-house of figures, struggling all 
 To make some given number. Then the twos 
 And threes and fours all suddenly became 
 Huge human forms j amazed and terrified. 
 She call'd for help against these horrid shapes. 
 And when the frighten'd servants heard her cries 
 They hasten'd to her, finding her alone 
 But raving in a fever ; all her mind 
 Distorted, wand'ring and delirious, — 
 The secrets of her inmost soul let loose, 
 She call'd to Geofirey, with a piteous cry, — 
 "" Come back to me ! deserted and alone 
 " I wander thro' the world and look for you ! 
 '^So desolate — so lonely — and so cold !" 
 
150 Deiizil Place, 
 
 (And here she shudder'd), then she rambled on 
 Of Roland and Sir John. 
 
 The doctor came, 
 And bled her, as Italian doctors bleed 
 Whenever they can find a fit excuse 
 To use their lancets. Then her auburn hair 
 He roughly cut with scissors, lest its weight 
 Should add towards the fever in her brain. 
 
 'Twas thus she lay for many weary days 
 Peop'ling an almost perfect solitude 
 With phantoms from the unforgotten past, 
 And seeming oftentimes to see in dreams 
 Her absent lover, with his earnest eyes 
 Gazing at her with anxious, loving looks, 
 And reading all the secrets of her soul. 
 
When in our lives some evil change 
 Fills our sad eyes with transient tears, 
 
 If not from piety, we turn 
 
 From habit, to those stars that burn 
 With quiet sympathetic light 
 Up in the blue ethereal spheres — 
 
 Those far star-lands, where comets range 
 From time to time, and whence the sight 
 
 Uplifted, seems to meet the eyes 
 
 Of God, assuming planet guise, 
 
 Tho' heav'n-abiding, earthward bent 
 Towards our heavy eyes that weep : 
 Ah, little stars, your vigils keep 
 
 High in the distant firmament ! 
 Visible witnesses to prove 
 That 'tis not only Death and Love 
 Which mortals may not comprehend. 
 For what you are, and whither tend 
 
 Your constellations, clustering 
 
 And clinging to the vault of heav'ri 
 
 We know not, sadly wondering 
 All veil'd and blinded as we are, 
 Thoughtlessly worshipping that star 
 Maybe the omen of our end ! 
 How dare we, till the clouds are riven 
 Shrouding our dull intelligence 
 Hope for encouragement from thence, 
 
 When e'en we know not what is best 
 For our own welfare day by day, 
 
 Obeying blindly the behest 
 
 Of hearts as changing as the waves, 
 
 Fickle and ignorant as they — 
 
Mere puppets in some mighty hand 
 Luring us on to shoal or strand, 
 Or to mysterious ocean-caves, 
 Where our dead hearts may be the food 
 Of cruel syrens of the flood. 
 In vain I lift my tearful eyes 
 Towards th' impenetrable skies, 
 The careless stars vouchsafe no light 
 To show which path is wrong or right, 
 Without a hope, without a guide, 
 I seem a straw upon the tide 
 
 Of Life's inevitable stream ; 
 All helpless to resist the flow 
 Of such a cataract, I seem 
 Without a will — would I could know 
 If it were best to trust my boat 
 Upon this mystic wave and float 
 Towards the ocean-gates, and be 
 Borne to the unfathomable sea ? 
 
153 
 
 *' Quan presto se va el placer, 
 Como despues de acordado 
 Da dolor ; 
 
 Como, al nuestro parecer, 
 
 Qualquiera tiempo pasado 
 
 Fue mejor." 
 
 Spanish Song. 
 
 "Comme on n'est jamais en liberie d'aimer ou de cesser 
 d' aimer, I'amant ne peut se plaindre avec justice de I'incon- 
 stance de sa mattresse, ni elle de la legerete de son amant." 
 
 La Rochefoucauld. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 A FTER long days of fever and of pain 
 -^•^ There comes a lull, which almost mimics death,, 
 When the weak frame, which a false energy- 
 Has fired with transient force, revives to find 
 The languid level of that listless life 
 Which surely follows on the fever's track. 
 
154 Denzil Place. 
 
 Then one by one upon the wakening sight 
 Dawn the famihar objects ; gradually 
 The doubtful, semi-dormant mind renews 
 Its old impressions, by the contrast made 
 Terribly sharp, expressive and distinct. 
 
 To Constance came this slow awakening 
 As from the past experience of a soul 
 Toss'd into port from some mysterious sea, 
 Quick-sanded, and of dangerous ebb and flow — 
 She look'd around, and saw the well-known room, 
 Her little bed within its arch'd alcove — 
 The painted chimney-board, and on a chair 
 She saw a pray'r book and a rosary 
 And the blue over-garment of a Nun — 
 A plate of oranges, some fresh cut flow'rs — 
 A heap of needle-work she noticed next — 
 And then the tall geranium-tree that climb'd 
 Up half the house, look'd thro' the window-pane 
 And nodded its red head, and seem'd to say 
 " Good morning ! welcome back again to Life 
 And sunshine !" 
 
 Thro' the folding-doors ajar. 
 Which led into the httle sitting-room. 
 
Denzil Place, 155 
 
 She saw a bending form, and recognised 
 
 Sister Theresa's pallid pensive face — 
 
 Beside the open window at her work 
 
 She sat, her busy needle up and down 
 
 Plied without ceasing, whilst a moted beam 
 
 Of golden sunshine falling on her head, 
 
 Liken'd her to those pale pre-Rafaelite 
 
 Pictures of suff'ring saints, which seem to waft 
 
 A faint, sad, odour of asceticism 
 
 Down to these striving, money-making days 
 
 In which we live. Then, when her wand'ring eyes 
 
 Had seen the sister, with a gentle sigh 
 
 As of contentment, Constance turn'd aside 
 
 And fell into a quiet dreamless sleep. 
 
 Dreamless — yet often did she seem to feel 
 
 The vague and half-acknowledged influence 
 
 Of fond eyes looking at her whilst she slept, 
 
 Shedding on her their kind caressing beams. 
 
 And now and then, she saw upon the wall 
 
 The shadow of the Sister as she work'd. 
 
 Or leaning o'er her, list'ning if she breathed 
 
 Calmly and quietly, and once she thought 
 
 She heard some whisper'd words in that dear voice 
 
156 Denzil Place, 
 
 She dared not ever hope to hear again 
 Save in such waking dreams. 
 
 Thus, half asleep 
 She floated on the quiet sun-lit hours 
 Back into life. The Sister rais'd her head 
 With propping pillows, read to her, and talk'd, 
 And told her stories of Italian life : 
 As thus the Nun was tending her one day- 
 She fell asleep, and waking up refresh'd 
 As with returning strength, she softly rose, 
 Half dress'd herself, and looking in the glass 
 Miss'd her long auburn hair, and met a face 
 Looking like that of some sweet southern boy 
 With tender dreamy eyes, and curling hair 
 Cut closely round the little classic head. 
 
 She thought Theresa would be glad to see 
 How strong she was, and how her tender care 
 Had nurs'd her back to life. An exile here 
 She lifted up her grateful heart to God 
 Who thus had will'd that she should find a friend, 
 For in her desolation she had thought 
 That all the world abhorred and hated her. 
 jAh, when we deem we are deserted thus 
 
Denzil Place. 15/ 
 
 What double tenderness and gratitude 
 We feel for those who even by mistake 
 Have thrown to us some little random word, 
 Some crumb of comfort ! How the ready tears 
 Which would not rise to plead nor to resent, 
 Will flood our eyes when some kind stranger thus 
 Has heart to pity all the wounds of ours ! 
 Much more did Constance feel indebted now 
 To this devoted woman, who had thus 
 Nursed her from Christian charity and love ; — 
 She gently push'd the folding doors aside 
 And thinking but to see that placid face 
 She look'd into the sun-lit sitting-room. 
 
 She look'd, and all her re-awaken'd being 
 Flung to the winds its languid apathy, 
 Whilst all the blood in her impassive veins 
 Hasten'd tumultuously once more to warm 
 Her faded cheeks ; for, looking out to sea 
 And seeming dark against its blue expanse 
 Framed by the flower-cover'd window-sill. 
 Sat Geoffrey Denzil, leaning on his hand 
 As plunged in thought. 
 
 With wild impatient eyes 
 
158 Denzil Place, 
 
 She gazed on him who seem'd the 'live response 
 To those uncertain visions, which the night 
 Of Nature and of Reason had reveal' d 
 To her unquiet mind. Yes, there alone 
 He waited silently : she thought his face 
 Look'd older and more haggard than of yore, 
 Its features somewhat harder, and the lines 
 Which time or care had traced upon his brov/ 
 Seem'd written now in plainer characters. 
 As Constance look'd, she noted ev'ry turn 
 Of form and feature ; DenziFs proud sad face 
 (The face she knew, and lov'd, alas, so well !) 
 Turn'd half aside, away from where she stood, 
 Showing the outline of his haughty brow, 
 His sunburnt cheek, and little pointed beard. 
 Resembled much that portrait of Van Dyke 
 Which the great master painted of himself. 
 Or even more those gallant cavaliers 
 Whose pictures deck'd the walls of Denzil Place. 
 
 Constance, with all a woman's instinct, guess'd 
 That this was not the first and only time 
 That Geoffrey Denzil, looking at the sea. 
 Had watched and waited near her all the day, 
 
De7izil Place. 159 
 
 Hoping for happy tidings ev'ry morn 
 And sadly leaving, when the ev'ning light 
 Flush'd all the changeful Mediterranean, 
 The house where hover'd on the brink of death 
 The woman whom he lov'd : 
 
 She truly guess'd ; 
 The peasants beating with their staves and canes 
 The purple berries from the olive-boughs, 
 Had often paus'd and watch'd with curious eyes 
 The figure of the tall young Englishman, 
 Who hasten'd ev'ry morning from the town 
 Towards the painted Villa Belvedere. 
 Arrested by no obstacle, he strode 
 O'er outspread olive-sheets, and often left 
 His footprints in the drying golden grains 
 Of Indian com. Or, Briton-like, he leapt 
 Each rugged wall or pointed aloe-hedge 
 Which separated garden-grounds or groves 
 Of olive and of orange. 
 
 Well they knew 
 That either love, or some absorbing grief 
 Impell'd him thus, and for his handsome face 
 And careworn look, they smilingly forgave 
 His indiscriminating disregard 
 
i6o Denzil Place. 
 
 Of property or landmark. Ah, those days 
 Were days indeed of bitterness to him ! 
 'Twas little wonder if his anxious face 
 Bore trace of all his spirit underwent 
 During this cruel time ! Amongst his hair 
 (Had Constance follow'd blindly the advice 
 Of her impetuous heart, and with her arms 
 Encircled that dear head,) she would have seen 
 How many subtle little silver threads 
 Were coiled and intermingled with the brown, 
 For love of her ! 
 
 ''^ For her P'' Ah, reader, thou 
 Who with thy chaste and disapproving eye 
 May^st deign to read this simple history, 
 " Wise as a serpent, harmless as a dove," 
 Let not the voice of thine immaculate heart 
 Go forth to judge my hapless heroine 
 Who was not fashion' d of that sterner stuff, 
 Fit to pursue the undeviating path 
 Of perfect wisdom ! Surely to resist 
 With such an impulse tearing at her heart 
 Must prove at least she was not always weak ; 
 So, pretty prude, read on, nor skip the page 
 Whereon no tale of amorous interview 
 
Denzil Place, i6i 
 
 Will cause thy gentle cheek to wear a blush, 
 For Constance, almost fearful as thyself. 
 Found strength to close the double folding-doors 
 As a defence against her guilty heart 
 And Geoffrey Denzil. 
 
 As he quickly turn'd 
 He only saw a fluttering muslin fold 
 Which somehow seem'd entangled in the door. 
 And then a wan white hesitating hand 
 Withdrew what might have been a flag of truce 
 To the reluctant warfare he had waged 
 For many weary days against his heart. 
 
 Thus Constance could be strong, and cruel too — 
 
 So Denzil thought, as fearing to pursue 
 
 The trembling fugitive who thus in haste 
 
 Regain'd the precints of the sanctuary. 
 
 He made one stride towards the closing door 
 
 And there remain'd discomfited and sad 
 
 With disappointment. 
 
 When the Sister came 
 She found poor Constance with a flutt'ring heart 
 And tearful eyes. "When did he come?" she ask'd, 
 
1 62 Denzil Place, 
 
 " x\h, what avails to try and do the right 
 
 " And flee away from evil ! For to me 
 
 " The earth contains not two more terrible things 
 
 " Than, or to see him or to see him not ! 
 
 " Oh, tell me 1 did he come and seek me here 
 
 " Or did you guess my heart and send for him ? 
 
 " He is the very dearest thing to me 
 
 " In all the world, and yet we are not wed ! 
 
 " He liv'd quite near us in our country home — 
 
 " We used to wander in the summer woods 
 
 *> And walk together thro' the rustling leaves 
 
 " Of Autumn ; in the dismal winter days 
 
 " I long'd for light and warmth, and turn'd to him 
 
 " And seem'd to find them both ; — he made the Spring 
 
 "" Seem greener, fresher, and more full of hope — 
 
 " With him, each thing in nature grew to be 
 
 " More beautiful, and guessing not the cause, 
 
 " I let the days go by as in a dream — 
 
 " My husband was the kindest of old men — 
 
 " He trusted me too well, and then at last 
 
 " One day I found myself a guilty thing 
 
 " And so it happen'd." .... 
 
 Then Theresa sigh'd 
 And said that often in the wicked world 
 
Denzil Place. 163 
 
 Like tragedies occurred. " You are so help'd 
 
 " By ev'ry thing around you, to incline 
 
 " To Folly and to Sin ; e'en you yourself 
 
 " Half charge the fields and flowers with your fault 
 
 " And hold the forest trees responsible, — 
 
 " But what of laughter, song, and merriment, 
 
 " The blaze of lights, — and music and the dance — 
 
 " The dress invented but to charm the eye?" 
 
 " It may be often thus," Constance repHed, 
 
 " But not with us, dear Sister ; true we lov'd — 
 
 " But our's no mushroom-fancy in one night 
 
 " Forced into life ; nor was our's sudden love 
 
 " Dancing to pleasant sound of pandean pipes 
 
 " And dying with the music ; — when I die 
 
 " And not till then, will die in me this beam 
 
 " Off-shot from heaVn — this music of the spheres ! 
 
 " Nay — I, alas, can plead no such excuse, 
 
 " For in almost as pure an atmosphere 
 
 ^* As that wherein you say your daily pray'rs, 
 
 " And summon'd by no more seductive strain 
 
 "" Than the clear tolling of your convent bell, 
 
 ** Sprang into life my fatal love for him. 
 
 " You are so good — you cannot understand — 
 
164 D en zil Place. 
 
 " Ah, Sister, Love — than all the seven sins^ 
 '^ Ts surely far more difficult to quell !" 
 
 Theresa answer'd that she was not good 
 But a mere erring woman like herself — 
 Who had at last been led into the fold 
 Of the Good Shepherd. 
 
 " Women deem they love," 
 She added, ^' But their love is writ on sand, 
 " To fade before the first encroaching wave 
 " Which sweeps away the letters, and the place 
 *' Once fair and smooth again, they trace straightway 
 ^' Another name, which still another wave 
 " Will kiss to death." 
 
 " Ah, cruel metaphor ! " 
 Sigh'd Constance with a shudder. " Waves may come 
 " And men may come and go with changing forms, 
 *' But in the world, to all eternity 
 ^' There lives one man — one only name to me ! '* 
 
 *^ Ah, * souvent femme varied '^ replied the Nun,, 
 
 " But in this happy household where I dwell, 
 
 " (Where you may dwell if God vouchsafes you grace,) 
 
 "' We serve one Master only, and admit 
 
Denzil Place. 165 
 
 " Of no allegiance which is split in two — 
 
 " (You know the text — and how we may not serve 
 
 " Both God and Mammon.) What is earthly love? 
 
 " How can a passing passion take the guise 
 
 " And ape the majesty of higher things ? 
 
 " We men and women are but floating straws 
 
 " On the inevitable stream of Destiny — 
 
 " We love not whom we would, and oft the heart 
 
 " Resists its fetters, but of what avail ? 
 
 " Some secret current, such as will impel 
 
 " Two of these said poor straws to cling together, 
 
 " (United by the circlet of a bubble 
 
 " Which breaks and frees them lower down the stream) 
 
 " Inclines our human hearts to him or her, 
 
 " Or all as surely breaks the brittle bands 
 
 " Binding our fickle natures ! Ere I sought 
 
 '' This happy solitude, I knew the world, 
 
 " I heard Love spoken of, and did not shun 
 
 " The mention of his name; but I have liv'd 
 
 " And learnt, and I am older far than you, 
 
 " Ah, Love is bitterness ! I had a friend .... 
 
 " One I knew well when I was of the world — 
 
 " And could I prove to you by her sad fate 
 
 " The little worth of all our human loves — 
 
1 66 Denzil Place. 
 
 " The heart's unparalleled inconstancy — 
 
 " I would relate to you her histoiy." 
 
 " I wait to hear it," Constance sadly said, 
 
 *^ And wish, indeed, you could invent some tale 
 
 *^ To teach me fickleness !'' 
 
 Then said the Nun — 
 '''• A lady lov'd, and oftentimes she sigh'd 
 " To one who courted her on English soil, 
 " ' Alas, maybe I could have lov'd you once — 
 " ' But now too late ! too late ! it cannot be ! 
 " ' My heart is far away in Hindostan 
 " ' Where braving for my sake the double ills 
 " ' Of heat and cold (the cold is at his heart 
 " * For loss of me !) my lover toils to gain 
 " ' The gold with which to win me from the hands 
 '^ ^ Of sordid parents,' as she spoke one day, 
 " Open'd the door, and with a startled cry 
 " She fell upon the Anglo-Indian's breast 
 " Before that other man who lov'd her well — 
 " Then all her friends rejoiced, and she was wed, 
 *^ And he who lov'd her fled across the seas 
 " Unknown to her, in grief and bitterness ; 
 " And she, too hurried almost, to reflect, 
 " Prepared to journey to that distant land 
 
Denzil Place, 167 
 
 " To which her husband ow'd his growing wealth. 
 
 " Then all went well at first — amused she watch'd 
 
 " The curious elements of Indian life — 
 
 " And whilst she moved and journey'd all went well 
 
 '^ For at her heart there was an aching pain 
 
 " She sought to kill by constant restlessness 
 
 " And change of scene — and so the days went by ; 
 
 " But when she came to Trichinopoly 
 
 " (One short day's journey from her future home,) 
 
 " She said to him (her husband,) ' Leave me here, 
 
 " ^ My sad, sad heart is broken — let me die — 
 
 " ^ I lov'd the man I would not own I lov'd — 
 
 " ' You were so long away — I pray'd for you — 
 
 " ^ I said so often that I lov'd you well 
 
 " ^ I ended by believing what I said — 
 
 " ^ Oh, curse me ! put me from you ! let me go ! 
 
 " ^ I cannot lie at night so near your heart 
 
 " ' When I am dreaming of that other man ! ' 
 
 " Her husband heard her — he was stern and cold, 
 
 " An Indian judge, (tho' in his secret heart 
 
 " Methinks he was in favour of Suttee, 
 
 " So firmly did he deem the marriage-tie 
 
 '* Bound women to their lords in Hfe and death !) 
 
 " He did as she desired — for, cursing her, 
 
1 68 Denzil Place. 
 
 " He put her from him, and he let her go 
 
 " Back to the land where last she saw the man 
 
 " She really lov'd. Prepared to weather storms 
 
 "And bear for him disgrace and poverty — 
 
 ^* Prepared for him to live a life of sin 
 
 " So she might see his face and make it glad — 
 
 " She thus return'd ; but with her reach'd the shore 
 
 " The tidings of an English victory, 
 
 " And then she heard how on Crimean heights 
 
 " This man she lov'd, and came to seek, had fall'n 
 
 " Fighting at Alma. Naught to her remain'd, 
 
 " The heart within her bosom seem'd to die — 
 
 " She forthwith said good-bye to all the world 
 
 " And took the vows of a poor Sisterhood 
 
 " As I have done." 
 
 The tears were in her eyes 
 And Constance turn'd away to hide her own, 
 " So now she is a Nun," she said, " like you — 
 " I pity her — and almost understand 
 " Her history — yet fear this heart of mine 
 " Is floating on a less uncertain sea — 
 " I dread that I shall love him till I die." ' 
 
I said * ' Ah, give me this ! I shall not care 
 
 * ' What after-storms may beat, come blast and hail — 
 " Come all the ills that make the rest despair 
 
 I shall not care ! " 
 I said '* There is no good that can compare 
 
 ' * With this, that makes all other blessings pale, 
 *' And if I lose e'en Heav'n, yet gain my pray'r 
 
 1 shall riot care !" 
 
171 
 
 ** With thee conversing I forget all time ; 
 *' All seasons, and their change, all please alike. 
 " Sweet is the breath of Morn, her rising sweet, 
 *' With charm of earliest birds ; pleasant the Sun, 
 *' When first on this delightful land he spreads 
 " His orient beams on herb, tree, fruit, and flower, 
 " Glistening with dew ; fragrant the fertile Earth 
 " After soft showers ; and sweet the coming on 
 " Of grateful Evening mild ; then silent Nis^it 
 " With this her solemn bird, and this fair Moon, 
 " And these the gems of Heaven, her starry train ; 
 *' But neither breath of Morn, when she ascends 
 ** With charm of earliest birds ; nor rising Sun 
 *' On this delightful land ; nor herb, fruit, flower, 
 * ' Glistening with dew ; nor fragrance after showers ; 
 *' Nor grateful Evening mild ; nor silent Night, 
 " With this her solemn bird, nor walk by Moon, 
 *' Or glittering starlight, without thee, is sweet." 
 
 Milton. 
 
 IX. 
 
 i^^ONSTANCE had listen'd with attentive ear 
 
 ^"-^ To this almost convincing argument 
 
 Proving a woman's instability 
 
 Of heart and purpose ; but tho' pitying 
 
 Sister Theresa and the Indian Judge, 
 
 She would not own that the inconstancy 
 
172 Deftzil Place, 
 
 Of one weak woman, taught her firmer heart 
 
 To feel less fond or less unfortunate. 
 
 And then she thought, maybe, her kindly nurse 
 
 Had only introduced this anecdote 
 
 To change the dang'rous current of her thoughts 
 
 Centred on Denzil. 
 
 " But you did not say " 
 She pleadingly resumed, " how to this place 
 ^* So far away, so hidden from the world, 
 '' He turn'd his footsteps, and thus found me out ?" 
 Theresa told her then, in simple words. 
 The hist'ry of the strange coincidence 
 Of her first meeting Denzil ; it was thus : 
 
 " When first you had the fever," she began, 
 
 " (I knew it but by chance, when passing here 
 
 " To beg your contribution for the poor 
 
 " Your servants told me you were ill in bed ;) 
 
 " I sought your side, and found your English maid 
 
 " Almost distracted with anxiety — 
 
 " Not understanding what the doctor said, 
 
 " And powerless to indicate her fears 
 
 ** Or your requirements ; so, she sat and wept, 
 
 " Whilst you were utt'ring wild delirious words. 
 
Denzil Place. 1 7 3 
 
 *^ At first they all seem'd meaningless to me, 
 
 " But by and bye, a passionate appeal 
 
 " To some one it was evident you lov'd 
 
 ^' Named ' Geoffrey ' warn'd me that you might commit 
 
 " Some indiscretion of speech, and lest your maid 
 
 " Should hear your words, I sent her from the room, 
 
 " My pretext, that a fever such as your's 
 
 *' She too might sicken with, and be to you 
 
 ^^ A mere incumbrance, rather than a help. 
 
 *^ 'Twas thus I came to be alone with you, 
 
 " And then it was that all your random words 
 
 " Of self-reproach, and those impassion'd names 
 
 " You call'd your absent lover, touch'd my heart 
 
 *^ And told me half the truth ; and now I fear'd 
 
 *' To summon to your side your lawful lord 
 
 *' Lest I should bring some dark avenging shape 
 
 " To what I guess'd might be your hiding-place." 
 
 (Here Constance could not help a furtive smile 
 
 At the idea these passing words call'd up 
 
 Of good Sir John, with rosy wrinkled face. 
 
 In Hessian boots and gold-rimm'd spectacles, 
 
 Who did not seem to answer to the name 
 
 Of * dark avenging shape.') 
 
 / The Nun went on — 
 
1 74 Denzil Place, 
 
 " But when I ask'd your maid, I heard from her 
 
 " That he you raved of was your husband's friend, 
 
 '^ Seeming almost his son, — so well-belov'd, 
 
 " By all your household honoured and revered, 
 
 " And ^ Would that he were here ! ' the girl exclaim'd. 
 
 '^ So, thinking it were sad to die alone 
 
 "■ (For then I trembled lest you might not live,) 
 
 " I wrote a letter to that absent one 
 
 " Of whom you raved ; I did not need to ask 
 
 " What name he bore, since o'er and o'er again 
 
 " You moan'd it in the watches of the night, 
 
 " Beseeching you might see him once again — 
 
 " I soon discover'd also where he dwelt, 
 
 '^ And praying God would pardon me the sin 
 
 " Of bringing thus two erring human beings 
 
 "' Together, that one parting soul might speed 
 
 " Peaceful and satisfied, (if both indeed 
 
 " Had lov'd and err'd) I hasten'd to the town 
 
 " Bearing my letter thither, and therein 
 
 *' I told of how you lay upon the brink 
 
 " Of Death and darkness, and of how your lips 
 
 ^' Had oftentimes repeated o'er his name — 
 
 "- And how I heard he was your husband's friend, - 
 
 " Of whom I only knew he was not here — 
 
Denzil Place. 175 
 
 " And you were lonely ; — that from this I fear'd 
 " You might be shadow'd by some passing cloud 
 '' Of his displeasure — then I said to him 
 " That he would know, and he would surely write 
 " And solve what seem'd the myst'ry of your life, 
 ''' And tell me how to act \ then full of doubts 
 " I sign'd and seal'd it. 
 
 " When I reach'd the post 
 " I gave my letter that it might be weigh' d, 
 " And as that lazy old Antonio, 
 ^' (The bent, grey-bearded man — the man you know,) 
 " Turn'd o'er the letter in his dirty hand, 
 " He, spelling the direction, told me how 
 " An Englishman had been that very day 
 *' Asking for letters to that self-same name — 
 *' I marveird much at such a strange event, 
 '^ And learning where he sojourn'd, sought him out, 
 '' And it was truly he to whom I wrote, 
 " His name was Geoffrey Denzil." 
 
 " Say again," 
 Cried Constance, wildly starting up in bed, 
 '' What was his name ? Repeat it once again, 
 *' I love to hear it from another's lips 
 " The while I try to make myself believe 
 
1/6 Defizil Place, 
 
 " I hear it for the first and only time — 
 
 *^ And try to wonder how its sound would seem 
 
 " Were it once more indifferent to me 
 
 " As when I had not known him ! but alas, 
 
 " This is a kind of silly childish game 
 
 "" I play at, trying to deceive my heart — 
 
 ^^ In vain, in vain ! I cannot now recall 
 
 " Even these few impressions of a Past 
 
 '' In which he was not ! Tell me what he said 
 
 ^' When first he knew I was so near to him, 
 
 '^ And ill, and asking for him day and night?" 
 
 " Ah," said Theresa, '' you were ill indeed 
 
 ^' And near to death, or else you would have felt 
 
 " His wild despairing kisses on your brow, 
 
 '"'• Your lips, your hair, your hands " 
 
 " What ! was he here, 
 " Here in this very room ?" poor Constance cried 
 Shock'd and bewilder'd, and yet glad at heart — 
 *' Yes, he seem'd mad, he would not be denied, 
 " And I was weak — and you were so, so ill ! 
 
 *^ Ah, how he loves you ! " 
 
 Constance seem'd to feel 
 A sudden rush of happiness and health, 
 
Derizil Place. I TJ 
 
 *' To-morrow I shall rise and dress," she said, 
 
 *' And feel as strong as felt my former self, 
 
 " And you will let him find me sitting there 
 
 " Beside the window. I will see him once, 
 
 " And thank him for his love, and say ^ good-bye. ' " 
 
 " Then you are strong indeed," the Sister said, 
 
 " If half the world had strength for such ^good-byes' 
 
 " How far more blest the other half had been ! 
 
 " How many had been happier, or unborn ! " 
 
 Good-bye, good-bye ! ah, easy little word 
 When two fond, foolish, lovers, say it o'er, 
 And make it but the plausible excuse 
 To meet once more to say it once again 1 
 Ah, sweet indeed those make-believe farewells. 
 With that dear head on our too happy breast, 
 And those sweet eyes the brighter for their tears, 
 And that fond, flutt'ring, heart, that starts and throbs. 
 But will not break at any rate to-night ! 
 Good-bye, good-bye ! and once again good-bye ! 
 
 But there are real farewells, when haggard-eyed 
 We stare all tearless, and with silent lips. 
 At one who once has made our life a dream 
 
 N 
 
1 78 Denzil Place, 
 
 Of happiness, well knowing we must wake 
 
 And live thro' bitter morrows I These are times 
 
 When to our own deceitful selves we say 
 
 " This is real sorrow^ all that came before 
 
 " Was but a mere delusive mockery, 
 
 " Only assumed to make another sad, * 
 
 " Or acted, as an actor plays a part 
 
 '^ For self-advancement ; — this is pain at heart, 
 
 " This — this is desolation !" 
 
 Even thus 
 Constance and Geoffrey felt that they could face 
 And bear those false farewells of ev'ry day. 
 Whilst yet they fear'd to say that fatal word 
 Which almost seem'd another name for death. 
 
 She had indeed, in agitated tones, 
 
 (With many timid glances at the door, 
 
 As tho' she fear'd the eye of Miss L'Estrange,) 
 
 Implor'd of Geoffrey Denzil to depart — 
 
 And she had held his hand, and said * goodbye ' 
 
 And sad ' God-bless-yous,' and her eyes were wet, 
 
 Yet Denzil did not leave her, for he said 
 
 (Making his conscience readily his dupe, 
 
 And almost in a voice of indignation,) ' 
 
Denzil Place, 1 79 
 
 "How can I leave you in a foreign land, 
 
 '' Deserted, ill, and suff'ring, and for me 
 
 " Bearing humiliation and disgrace ? 
 
 " The common laws of cold civility — 
 
 " Humanity, — the merest loosest bond 
 
 *' Of careless passing friendship, would demand 
 
 " That having met you here, by accident, 
 
 " I stay at least till you are strong and well." 
 
 And Constance, loving, temporising, weak. 
 
 Had felt a burden lifted from her heart, 
 
 And echo'd softly Geoffrey Denzil's words, 
 
 " When I am well . . ." and thus it was he stay'd. 
 
 How had they met ? Was Constance cold and stern. 
 
 And Geoffrey like the Spartan youth of old 
 
 Who nursed without complaint his gnawing fox ? 
 
 I do not know exactly how they met — 
 
 Perchance as mortals made of moulded ice, 
 
 Without emotion, or as you or I 
 
 Had met again, after suspense and doubt 
 
 Our own true love, on an Italian eve. 
 
 Alone, save for a little crescent moon 
 
 No thicker than an eye-lash, or a " C " — 
 
 (A waning moon, for when she first appears 
 
i8o Denzil Place. 
 
 She forms a sulky " C " that turns its back 
 And will not be a letter, come what may, 
 Whilst Denzil on this happy ev'ning saw 
 On looking up, for very joy, to heav'n, 
 Her dear initial shining in the sky 
 Seeming to bid him hope !) 
 
 Some weeks from then 
 They sat together 'neath the spreading shade 
 Of a thick twisted chesnut tree, with stem 
 Of giant girth ; amongst the herbage green 
 Were feeding parti-colour'd sheep and goats, 
 And here and there were scatter'd moss-grown rocks, 
 Fall'n from the shadowing mountain years ago, 
 Seeming like lesser mountains, lately born, 
 Uplifting pigmy peak and spur, that rose 
 Piercing the velvet breast of Mother Earth. 
 Here, far beyond the convent in the hills, 
 The landscape wore a less Italian look. 
 The ground was grassy as an English lawn. 
 And the light-colour'd green of chesnut leaves 
 Replaced the sombre olive. From the hills 
 Two mountain torrents, free'd from Winter's thrall, 
 Which erst had turn'd them into silent snow, 
 
Denzil Place, i8i 
 
 As tho' rejoicing in their liberty, 
 
 Rush'd headlong to the sea, and meeting here 
 
 Mingled their waters, and triumphantly 
 
 With noise, henceforth proclaim'd themselves a stream 
 
 Of some importance, bearing as they did 
 
 On their united tides the fallen trunks 
 
 Which, higher up, the busy wood-cutters 
 
 Sent without further trouble to the town 
 
 For sale and export. With a thund'rous noise 
 
 These floating corpses of departed trees 
 
 Hurl'd down each shelving wat'ry precipice, 
 
 Met the huge rocks which form'd the landing-place 
 
 To some such other stair ; there paused a space, 
 
 And then, envelop'd in a cloud of spray 
 
 Once more awoke the echoes. 
 
 Hitherto 
 Constance had fear'd to seek this spot alone, 
 Or even with the gay Italian girl 
 Who led her mule ; for kind old Angela 
 (Her gard'ner's wife,) had shown to her one day 
 The shaggy skin of a devouring wolf 
 Shot in this very place some years ago 
 By a brave son of her's who since had died, 
 And Constance was a coward, dreading beasts 
 
1 82 Denzil Place. 
 
 And birds of prey, and monsters of the deep, 
 Far more than moral dangers, which no sword 
 Or mortal's gun, however ably aim'd 
 Can stab or kill ; but God who made the heart 
 Implants in each its diff'rent form of fear, 
 And oftentimes we shun the lesser harm 
 Yet coax some cunning danger to our breast 
 Which, serpent-like, will sting our trusting heart 
 Or foolish feeding hand ; — but now she felt 
 No fear of mountain wolf or forest snake. 
 Since he was near who was so brave and strong, 
 For something in his presence there convey'd 
 To her a sense of safety from all ill. 
 
 Constance was working, and she did not speak, 
 And Geoffrey, stretched full length upon the grass. 
 Had just been reading, now he paused, and propped 
 His small uplifted head upon his hand. 
 And Constance felt his eloquent grey eyes 
 Fix'd on her own, which droop'd upon her work. 
 He spoke at length, but did not speak of love. 
 For it is possible to love, and lie 
 Upon the sward at the Beloved's feet. 
 And yet give utt'rance but to careless talk 
 
Denzil Place, 183 
 
 Of bird, or tree or flow'r, or even things 
 
 Seemingly more removed than these from love. 
 
 Thus Denzil spoke, for by a mutual bond 
 
 These two had bound themselves that whilst they stay'd 
 
 Together in the South, (he at the town, 
 
 And she amongst the olives,) they would shun 
 
 That fatal subject, and that they would be 
 
 Dear and united friends and nothing more. 
 
 They watch'd each other keenly, fearing lest 
 
 One or the other should o'erpass the bounds, 
 
 And proving himself (or her^€d) too weak, 
 
 Should break the compact, — slave to memories past 
 
 Or to some dream of futures false and fair. 
 
 But they had hitherto been true and stern — 
 
 True to their stern resolve ; it may have been 
 
 Because they felt that eVry little word 
 
 Was brimming over with that subtle sense 
 
 Apparent in their very breath, which tried 
 
 To breathe of lawful things, and thus that theme, 
 
 Unutter'd, and yet always understood, 
 
 They did not need to christen by its name, 
 
 But as a fav'rite child is often call'd 
 
 By one far less harmonious than its own. 
 
1 84 Denzil Place, 
 
 From sheer excess of fondness, so they shunn'd 
 Shame-faced and shy, the tell-tale name of " Love" 
 Knowing they lov'd too well ! 'Twas thus each word 
 Seem'd but an ugly nickname for the one 
 They dared not utter. But each understood. 
 So when she said 
 
 " Hark to that thund'ring sound ! 
 " Is it a coming storm or floating tree 
 " Striking against the rocks ? " then unto him 
 Her words would seem to say — 
 
 *' Ah, I was frail I 
 " I drifted with the tide— the headlong stream 
 " Wreck'd me against a rock, yet I rejoice 
 ^* To wreck upon a rock I love so well — 
 " Alas, I love you — love you ! pity me 
 '* And love me as I love I " And when he said 
 Some trivial words like these 
 
 " Ah, do not fear, 
 " No coming storm is clouding o'er the sky, 
 " 'Tis but the floating timber which the stream 
 " Is bearing to the sea," it seem'd to her 
 As tho' he said — 
 
 ^' Ah, darhng, do not fear ! 
 " For I am strong as yonder rapid stream^ 
 
Dendl Place, 185 
 
 "• And I will bear you safely to the sea 
 
 " Whither all journey \ put your trust in me 
 
 '^ And love me as I love." 
 
 But ere they reached 
 This seeming state of perfect self-control, 
 There were so many problems to explain, 
 So that from time to time they were constrain'd 
 To dwell upon the Past. How Geoffrey came 
 To be alone at Denzil Place that night ? 
 Why Constance, too, was waking at that hour ? 
 The fragments of the letter she had found 
 In Denzil's Avriting ? First, why Geoffrey came. 
 
 He told her how a distant relative 
 Had died, and he was summon'd to return 
 To England, which he had but lately left; 
 How, on arriving there, he found some chance, 
 (Some wish to spite the kinsman who till then 
 Had hoped to be his heir,) had made him leave 
 To Geoffrey Denzil half his property — 
 How he, too sad to be rejoiced at this, 
 (Since now he had surprised his fatal love, 
 And made a vow that he would never harm 
 But keep as pure as is the driven snow 
 
I S6 De7tzil Place, 
 
 The mem'ry of his idol) — had resolved 
 
 That, as he needs must visit Denzil Place, 
 
 To take some papers from an iron safe, 
 
 Relating to his new inheritance. 
 
 He would not do so till the silent night — 
 
 So, saying as a pretext, at the inn, 
 
 That he desired they would not tell Sir John 
 
 Of his arrival, lest the good old man 
 
 Should deem he trespass'd, staying at the Hall 
 
 When Denzil was in England ; he arranged 
 
 To ride there when the household were in bed. 
 
 Awaited only by his ancient nurse, 
 
 Who, telling him the house was plunged in sleep, 
 
 Had led him to the silent library 
 
 And left him to his search ; the rest we know. 
 
 His letter was a lover's rhapsody, 
 
 To be deliver'd if his love surviv'd 
 
 Her husband and himself; for in his heart 
 
 Had lurk'd a wish that she might some day know 
 
 How he had lov'd her once. Therein he told 
 
 The guilty reason of his sudden flight, 
 
 And after telling how he strove in vain 
 
 To school his wayward heart, he wrote these words, 
 
Denzil Place. 187 
 
 Which Constance partly read at Denzil Place — 
 '^ That you should be another's — you who seem 
 '' Created to be mine in ev'ry sense 
 " In which a woman may belong to man — 
 " Whom, after all these waiting years, I meet 
 " At last ; it almost seems too hard to bear, 
 " But so it is, and I must go from hence ! " 
 
 Then Geoffrey spoke of strange affinities, 
 And how a woman, meeting such a man, 
 Reads on his brow that he is lord of her — 
 The lover of her life ; and how a man 
 Who meets a certain maid (or e'en, alas ! 
 A certain matron,) murmurs to himself 
 " This is the woman who was made for me ' 
 " To love and cherish ! " 
 
 He reminded her 
 What dress she wore the first time they had met ; 
 And Constance, with a flutter at her heart, 
 Remark'd how ev'ry detail was described. 
 Omitting nothing. "It was all of white. 
 The day was warm and sunny, and you stood 
 Framed for awhile inside the open door. 
 And looking like an angel — in your hand 
 
1 88 Denzil Place. 
 
 You held your gloves and shady garden-hat — 
 
 Your hair was knotted with a color'd snood 
 
 To suit the floating coral-color'd sash 
 
 That bound you, like a baby, round the waist, 
 
 And then you spoke — ! You seem'd so young and fair 
 
 That I, who then had neither care nor creed. 
 
 Adopted you at once as patron saint, 
 
 And afterwards — ^you know — " 
 
 Then Constance sigh'd, 
 ** With me, I think it must have been the Fire 
 " And seeing you so very near to death." 
 " The Fire with j^^^/," said Denzil, " but with me 
 " Not only fire, but ev'ry element — 
 " Earth, Air, and Fire, and Water, all combined 
 " To tell me how I hunger'd for your heart 
 '^ Long, long, before you told me it was mine ! 
 '^ I said ^ Whatever comes I shall not care 
 " If without harming her, I win her love ' — 
 " But when I thought my wicked lawless will 
 ^* Had wrought you harm, a prey to deep remorse 
 " I fled in horror at my evil deed 
 " And call'd myself a villain. 
 
 "You were kind" 
 (Constance had said) " to spare my guilty soul 
 
Dentil Place. 1 89 
 
 " The pain of this reproach ; — I ahvays fear'd 
 
 " That you would taunt me, I, who must have seem'd 
 
 " So prudish, and so full of texts and saws — 
 
 " I fear'd that you would mock me, and exclaim 
 
 " ^ Ah, hypocrite ! where is your wisdom now I ' " 
 
 " And you were also kind," said Denzil then, 
 
 " To spare me, or, with that old Tiger-Cat 
 
 " Who in her letter call'd me ^ Atheist ' 
 
 " You might have deem'd it was my lack of cant 
 
 " That made me love you ; and once having lov'd 
 
 " Stretch forth my robber-hand to steal my prize — 
 
 " Look in your glass, and see what to have seen 
 
 ^' Had conquer'd Christian Knight or Saracen — 
 
 " There is no question of this creed or that 
 
 " When once we kneel to Woman as to God I " 
 
 " A god of clay," said Constance with a sigh, 
 
 " A shadow on a stream — a fleeting thing — 
 
 " Lasting whilst Beauty lasts — it dies with Death, 
 
 ^* And blessed is that woman who may be 
 
 " Even a mem'ry !" 
 
 So the days pass'd by 
 And thus these wicked people liv'd and lov'd. 
 
You said to me, in that sad hour of parting, 
 
 So much, so little, and yet ev'rything — 
 
 My eager lips, so rudely interposing, 
 
 Broke the soft sounds your own, maybe, had murmur'd 
 
 In that dim hour of silence ! Tho' of sorrow 
 
 It seem'd the cup was fill'd to overflowing 
 
 I could not weep, for joy at being near you. 
 
 And guessing all the words you left unspoken, — 
 
 So much — so little — and yet ev'rything ! 
 
 You gave to me, on that dear night of parting, 
 
 So much, so little, and yet ev'rything — 
 
 So little to the hunger of my longing — 
 
 So much to meet the measure of deserving, 
 
 And ev'rything of heaven in a moment — 
 
 Oh, cruel Time ! oh, midnight chimes that sounded ! 
 
 Yet, in your arms, how dared I curse the moments 
 
 Which brought with all their dread of desolation 
 
 So much, so little, and yet ev'rything? 
 
 You seem'd to me in that last hour of parting 
 
 So much, so little, and yet ev'rything — 
 
 * So much, so little ! ' . . . Loving, yet divided 
 
 For ever from me : — in the hated future 
 
 Link'd with another ; — madly lov'd — ' not wisely,' 
 
 Met all too late, and lending love and sunshine 
 
 And all delight, and leaving, (had you left me,) 
 
 Only a memory of vanish'd beauty 
 
 To be to me for ever and for ever. 
 
 So much, so little, and yet ev'rything ! 
 
193 
 
 **Rappelle-toi, lorsque les destinees 
 
 M'auront de toi pour jamais separee, 
 Quand le chagrin, I'exil et les annees 
 
 Aiiront fletri ce coeur desespere, 
 Songe a mon triste amour, songe a I'adieu supreme ; 
 L'absence ni le temps ne sont rien quand on aime ; 
 Tant que mon coeur battra 
 Toujours il te dira 
 
 Rappelle-toi. " 
 
 Alfred de Musset. 
 
 " Oh, my love ! my love ! 
 '* Have we now reach'd the end of these dear groves ? 
 *' Shall we together walk no more thro' life? 
 ' * The arid desert stretches out beyond ; 
 " Across it lies a pathway rough with stones 
 " And edged with tangled briars. No grateful shade, 
 ** No grassy banks afford the Traveller rest, 
 ' ' And thou would'st have me wander there alone, 
 " An outcast from our garden Paradise, 
 ** And far from thee, my love, my soul's delight ! 
 
 H. P. Campbell. 
 
 A 
 
 X. 
 
 T length arrived those last unwelcome days 
 Which heralded that last sad day of all, 
 When those who, haply, never should have met, 
 Felt bound in honor, or, to say farewell, 
 Or else to let the angry world go by 
 And chng together; she to bear the shame. 
 
194 Densil Place. 
 
 And he the keen reproach of having caused 
 
 Such shame in her. For Constance, who was weak, 
 
 And influenced above all influence 
 
 By him she lov'd, had deem'd it would be best 
 
 (Now she could never more on bended knee 
 
 Appeal to God but as a guilty thing,) 
 
 That she should honestly avow her love, 
 
 And live to be his wife, at least in heart, 
 
 Who vow'd to her his life's fidelity. 
 
 Often in vain she look'd across the sea 
 
 When Denzil left her at the ev'ning hour, 
 
 Hoping to read upon the pink expanse 
 
 Some sign or symbol telling how to act. 
 
 She often long'd to open wide her arms 
 
 And say to Denzil, " Geoflrey, I am your's 
 
 ** In life — in death ! " if it were but to see 
 
 The cloud upHft which shrouded that dear brow ! 
 
 But, as he left those happy olive-grounds, 
 
 And ere he vaulted o'er the boundary 
 
 Dividing town from country, 'neath the shade 
 
 Sister Theresa, in her quiet dress 
 
 Would glide in silence thro' the garden gate, 
 
 And seeking Constance, in an earnest voice 
 
Denzil Place, 195 
 
 Would strive to exorcise the sinful thought, 
 And seem to treat the sacred name of Love 
 As a mere thing of naught — a childish thing. 
 
 " There are some moments in our lives " she said 
 
 " When we can almost see (both seem so plain !) 
 
 " The fair good angels pointing out one way, 
 
 " And on the other side the pow'rs of hell 
 
 " Who strive to drag us trembling to the brink 
 
 " Of some abyss ! Not that I deem your friend," 
 
 (She added, in a calm prosaic tone,) 
 
 " Poor Mr. Denzil, who seems kind at heart, 
 
 " A demon in disguise, but lawless love 
 
 " Must needs assume to all discerning eyes 
 
 " A shape of dread, a form to be abhorred." 
 
 " And are not lack of candour and deceit," 
 Constance exclaim'd, " two things to be abhorred ? 
 " And dwelling underneath a shelt'ring roof 
 " Respected, when you have not earn'd respect, 
 " And living as a wife with one you wrong — 
 " Next him at night, and near him all the day, 
 " And longing all those nights and all those days 
 " For but one gHmpse of one sad absent face, 
 
196 Denzil Place, 
 
 " Are these not also things to be abhorred ? 
 
 " Methinks I could return to Farleigh Court, 
 
 '^ If I might hide away amongst the woods, 
 
 " And pray, and read good books, and nurse a skull 
 
 *' Like yon sweet picture of the Magdalen — 
 
 " But to go back to him who knows my fault, 
 
 " And screens me out of kindness from the scorn. 
 
 '^ Our country neighbours would but be too glad 
 
 '' To show'r upon me ! They must guess the truth ,- 
 
 " From what the sister of my husband said 
 
 " They even knew it long before myself — 
 
 '* I know not which would be the worst to bear, 
 
 " My husband's kind forbearance, or the sneers 
 
 *' Of those who, whilst they flatter'd to my face 
 
 '' Would whisper cruel words behind my back — 
 
 " And then I never could see Geoffrey more — 
 
 " It will be hard to bear !" 
 
 Now this was how 
 It came to pass that Constance dream'd at all 
 Of leaving Italy and going home. 
 
 Roland L'Estrange had written to her twice — 
 At first, a school-boy letter, full of tales 
 Of work and holiday, yet such good will 
 
Denzil Place, 1 97 
 
 Was shown in every simple blotted line, 
 
 That Constance knew Sir John had kept his word, 
 
 And had not tried to influence his son 
 
 Against his erring wife. 
 
 " My father's hand 
 "" Is crippled with the gout, he begs me say " 
 The letter ran,) " or he would write himself." 
 Froro^gratitude, Constance had rashly sent 
 When next she wrote, a timid message back, 
 Hoping the crippled hand was nearly well — 
 Whereat another letter from the boy 
 Had plainly ask'd of Constance to return. 
 
 For, all went wrong, he said, now she was gone — 
 The servants left — his Aunt was, oh, so cross ! 
 She finally had quarrell'd with Sir John 
 And left him all alone to grief and gout — 
 His father said all luck had left the house 
 Since she was taken ill and went abroad ! 
 
 Then, lastly came a letter from Sir John 
 Entreating her return, and " All the Past 
 Should be forgotten," only she must come; 
 And both these letters had for many days 
 
1 98 Denzil Place. 
 
 Remained unanswer'd, whilst poor Constance felt 
 Torn, or by fiends and angels, or by Love 
 And sterner Duty, first this way or that. 
 Whilst all her mind, and all her anxious heart 
 Were tortured and bewilder'd by the thought 
 Of what her final answer ought to be 
 When ev'rybody's welfare seem'd to her 
 So much at variance ! 
 
 Then to the winds 
 Did Geofirey Denzil fling his good resolves. 
 And madden'd at the dread of losing her 
 He strove with migh«t and main to make her stay 
 Until Sir John might hear the scandal breathed 
 And drive her from him into DenziFs arms 
 To be his very own for evermore. 
 
 * ' I swear if any child were born of you," 
 
 He said to her one balmy afternoon, 
 
 " I would not press you, Constance, but you leave- 
 
 " In leaving home for me, what do you leave ? 
 
 " A kind old man, but he can be replaced — 
 
 " You cannot even know the pleasant pang 
 
 " A bride may feel, who leaves the loving breast 
 
 '' Of her fond mother for the folding arms 
 
Denzil Place. 199 
 
 " Of her Belov'd ; — you are not kith or kin, 
 
 " But mated by mischance, who might have been 
 
 " Father and daughter, child and grandfather — 
 
 " The long, dull years that seem your married days, 
 
 " To him are but a little speck of time — 
 
 " A fleeting moment in an old man's life 
 
 " Who liv'd and lov'd long, long ere you were born ! 
 
 " Ah, he may miss you, as those fathers miss 
 
 " Or as those grandfathers, a two years' child, 
 
 " But think of what we are ! Friends — friends till death, 
 
 " And lovers — loving till this heart of mine 
 
 " Ceases to beat, and husband, dear, and wite, 
 
 "If you will let me call you by that name 
 
 " And wear my ring upon your little hand. 
 
 " I say again, if round about your knees 
 
 " Were rosy faces grouped, and tiny hands 
 
 " And piping voices, ever and anon 
 
 " Clasping and calling you to stay at home, 
 
 " I had been base indeed to bid you stray 
 
 " And leave for me those sunny little heads 
 
 " But now /" 
 
 (Here Constance press'd against her brow 
 A trembling hand, whilst with the other one 
 
2CXD Denzil Place. 
 
 She gently push'd away her tempter's lips, 
 And tried to think he was a " Pow'r of Hell.") 
 
 " Nay, I would rather," Denzil wildly cried, 
 " Much as I loathe the superstitious creed 
 " That dooms a woman to a life unlov'd 
 " Of penance and seclusion, that you went 
 " And prison'd your sweet youth within the walls 
 " Of yonder convent, than that you should go 
 " Seeking yourself, and of your own free will 
 " The hateful life you used to live before !" 
 Then softened by her scared bewilder'd look. 
 He added, " I am mad, and seem to you 
 " To utter foolish words ; — do what is best 
 " For you, my darling ; should you feel one day 
 " The bitterness of parting with all joy, 
 '' (Such as I feel to-day), come back to me 
 *' And we will try to make, despite the World, 
 " A new fair life together; I shall walty 
 
 Thus torn and tortured with conflicting doubts 
 Did Constance travel thro' these latter days 
 (For such she deem'd they were,) in Italy. 
 Her lover's passionate entreaties now 
 
Denzil Place. 201 
 
 Tearing her gentle heart ; and then the Nun's, 
 Who seemed to see to ev'ry compHcation 
 One only answer, one sure remedy 
 Against the Future's perils, and implored 
 That she would forthwith give herself to God, 
 And " 'prison her sweet youth " (as Denzil said) 
 Within the quiet convent in the hills. 
 
 From no vain wish to be " sensational " 
 
 Or blend into her life the picturesque 
 
 And hollow teachings of an alien creed, 
 
 Did Constance entertain the wav'ring thought 
 
 Of yielding to the Sister's stern advice. 
 
 She knew that there were many knotty points 
 
 Of doubt and darkness she must overcome — 
 
 That many new convictions should be born, 
 
 And many old associations slain, 
 
 Ere she could honestly embrace a faith 
 
 In which she was not born ; but then she thought 
 
 A calm devotional life of high intent. 
 
 Must needs be pleasing in the eyes of God 
 
 By whatsoever name its votaries 
 
 Were call'd and recognized throughout the earth ; 
 
 Also, within her bosom, next her love, 
 
202 Denzil Place, 
 
 Liv'd that unutterable desire for rest, 
 
 Known only unto those whose hapless fate 
 
 Has ever been to battle with the waves, 
 
 When they would fain have waited on the shore, 
 
 Nor e'er adventured on the stormy seas. 
 
 So, thus it stood — she purposed to return 
 
 To Farleigh Court, to see Sir John once more 
 
 And try to bear the life she once had borne ; 
 
 But should she prove too burden'd with her Past 
 
 To live such life in peace and honesty, 
 
 Then she would bid farewell to all the world, 
 
 And seeking once again this sunny clime. 
 
 Would try and live, as liv'd of old the saints, 
 
 A life of penitence and piety — 
 
 And should this life, after the 'portion'd time 
 
 From lack of faith, seem all too hard to bear, .... 
 
 *^ Then " Denzil cried, " Tho' there are convent walls 
 
 " Yet there are those who fain would scale and climb 
 
 " E'en higher walls, to bear away from thence 
 
 " Their only happiness !" 
 
 So, of these ways — 
 The three opposing pathways left to tread — 
 Constance had tried to follow first the best. 
 If not the brightest ; whilst that sunny line 
 
Denzil Place. 203 
 
 Of flower-spangled path, she strove to shun 
 Even in fancy. 
 
 Then the days slipped by 
 And Geoffrey Denzil grew an alter'd man, 
 Haggard and desperate, and full of fears. 
 And Constance too, was pale and wan, and felt 
 Against her heart a weary gnawing pain ; 
 And thus arose the sun upon the day 
 Before the one when they were doom'd to part. 
 
 Sad and remorseful, Constance mark'd the change 
 
 Her resolution wrought in Denzil's face 
 
 And voice and bearing, and she wonder'd much 
 
 How any one so weak and frail as she 
 
 Could thus subdue and conquer one so strong, 
 
 Who ne'er had seem'd disturb'd by greater things. 
 
 On this last day, about the sunset hour 
 They wander'd forth together, each one sad, 
 Pre-occupied and silent ; as they walk'd 
 Their thoughts went winging o'er the glitt'ring sea 
 Homeward to England, and they liv'd again 
 In fancy, thro' that night at Denzil Place, 
 
204 Denzil Place. 
 
 Which seem'd to mark an epoch in their fate. 
 
 I know not if 'twas wholly with remorse 
 
 That Denzil mused upon those midnight hours 
 
 Which gave to him the woman of his dreams, 
 
 Or whether even Constance, as she gazed 
 
 Into the eyes of him she lov'd so well, 
 
 Felt all the anguish she had known before 
 
 At having once been ev'rything to one 
 
 To whom, alas, she soon would be as naught 
 
 Save a fair clinging memory ! 
 
 At first 
 They bent their way towards the neighb'ring town, 
 And stroll'd mechanically down the quay. 
 And saw and heard, as in a waking dream. 
 The sights and sounds around them, all the while 
 Feeling like beings from some other sphere 
 Dropp'd down from cloud-land. Ev'rything they saw 
 On this too mournful day seem'd so distinct 
 And yet so lifeless, since these lookers-on 
 Had concentrated all they own'd of life 
 On one another ; so like changing scenes 
 Painted upon a magic lantern's slides 
 All seem'd a mockery, yet afterwards 
 Recurred to them each passing sight they saw 
 
Denzil Place. 205 
 
 On that last day, and that sad parting night, 
 With haunting vividness. 
 
 Upon the strand 
 The red-capp'd fishermen — the idle throng 
 Of chatt'ring beggars standing on the bridge, 
 The peasant-women in their shady hats 
 Guarding their fragrant store of fruit and flow'rs 
 Beside the market-cross. Then in the streets 
 The gaily-colour'd awnings, shadowing 
 The windows bright with rich Italian wares. 
 The gold and silver works in filigree. 
 The shining coral, carv'd in many shapes — - 
 Then grouped in twos and threes about the port 
 Some few departing townspeople were seen, 
 Bound for a neighb'ring city ; two who seem'd 
 To part in sorrow, since with many sighs 
 They clung and wept, a maiden and a youth, 
 Doubtless affianced, for, before the hour 
 When rang the signal for the speeding boat 
 To bear the youth away from her he lov'd. 
 They traced upon a dusty prickly-pear 
 The link'd initials of their hapless names. 
 Then, to the left, another couple stood 
 Taking their leave ; two shovel-hatted priests, 
 
2o6 Denzil Place. 
 
 Who, following the custom of the South, 
 Were taking snuff and kissing one another. 
 And op'ning wide their black embracing arms. 
 A little further, on the other side. 
 The town became a stragg'ling colony 
 Of painted villas, — here they saw a goat 
 Standing in biped-fashion, on a wall, 
 Reaching his greedy shaggy-bearded mouth 
 Towards the blossoms of a Judas-tree 
 All pink and leafless, looking as he stood 
 As one might deem the false Apostle look'd 
 With russet beard, his God-forsaken gaze 
 Seeking some branch of a sufficient strength 
 Whereon to hang himself, (for Rumour saith 
 From some such pink pre-destin'd gallows-tree 
 Swung, long ago, the suicided form 
 Of the accursed Jew, Iscariot, 
 Who thus escaped the torments of remorse 
 Earn'd by his base betrayal of the Christ,) 
 
 Thus wand'ring listlessly, they reached at last 
 A garden they had often sought before, 
 Where Constance used to sketch, for here it seem'd 
 That Nature, Art, and Past and Present join'd 
 
Denzil Place, 207 
 
 To make an earthly Eden ; — it had been 
 Long years ago, a Roman residence 
 Of some importance, and tho' ruin'd now 
 And desolate, its beauty still survived 
 To lure all lovers of the picturesque. 
 
 Here stately terraces of sculptured stone 
 Looked seaward, where against the ev'ning sky 
 The marble statues of forgotten gods 
 Uprose alternately with flow'ry urns 
 Overrun with clematis ; from thence a walk, 
 Dark and mysterious e'en at noon-tide heat, 
 But now a seeming subterranean arch 
 Of arbutus and bay-trees, led the way 
 Towards a small pavilion, ruin'd too 
 And long ago deserted. 
 
 Geoffrey turn'd, 
 Uncheck'd by Constance, down this dim arcade 
 Where now and then a moonbeam sifted thro' 
 The mingling branches, threw a silv'ry streak 
 On the untended path, and but for which 
 They scarce had seen their way, and could but feel 
 The scarlet berries of the arbutus 
 Which roll'd like coral beads about their feet. 
 
2o8 Denzil Place. 
 
 Here was a bench, built in a stone recess 
 O'ertraced with scroll-work, near the grey remains 
 Of what had been of yore a Roman bath, 
 Where Constance, who w^as weary with her walk, 
 Sank down exhausted — Denzil held her hand. 
 And both were silent, for their hearts were full. 
 
 (Deem it not strange that they should roam so late 
 Fair reader, who hast never left thy home 
 After the few first flittings of the bat ! 
 For, wnere he sun is lavish with his beams 
 As in these southern lands, this is the hour 
 When those who dread his fierce meridian heat, 
 Go forth, approved by custom, 'neath the rays 
 Of a more temperate planet; hence they stay'd.) 
 
 Upon the terrace, like a row of ghosts, 
 They saw the moonlit glories of the past 
 Silv'iy and silent, and from time to time 
 Some echo reach'd them wafted from the town 
 Of song or music, but these died away 
 At last, in silence, and the croaking frogs, 
 And now and then a falling leaf or fruit, 
 Or the clear piping of a nightingale. 
 Alone recall'd their spirits back to earth. 
 
Denzil Place, 209 
 
 For both seem'd lost in some absorbing dream 
 
 Impossible to utter or translate 
 
 Into material language ; thus for hours 
 
 They scarcely spoke, until they heard the chimes 
 
 Of midnight, echo from the noisy spires 
 
 Of all the many churches of the town. 
 
 Then Constance, frighten'd at the flight of time. 
 Would fain have hurried to her quiet home. 
 But ere she rose, the ghastly haunting dread 
 That this might be her last and only hope 
 Of playing truant thus, induced her still 
 A little while to linger : Denzil then 
 Awaking from his mournful reverie. 
 Held fast her hands, as one in shipwreck clings 
 To spar or mast, or as a miser grasps 
 Some cherish'd treasure he is soon to lose, 
 Whilst all the pent-up anguish in his heart 
 He strove to ease by his impassion'd words 
 Of love and mad reproach, for by those chimes 
 He knew how soon they needs must say farewell. 
 
 Ah, if in that despairing parting hour 
 
 All the wild grief they felt at sev'ring thus, 
 
2 lo Denzil Place. 
 
 Or all the bliss at being side by side — 
 
 If their warm youth, and the delicious South, 
 
 And ev'ry soft intoxicating sound 
 
 Breathing of amorous and intensest life 
 
 Fed with sweet odours ; — if all this conspired 
 
 To vanquish their too sternly sterile vows — 
 
 If ev'ry little faint malicious flowV, 
 
 And ev'ry cunning little croaking frog — 
 
 And ev'ry happy hanging orange-orb 
 
 And tender bridal-bud, — if all these seem'd 
 
 But small familiar echoes from the voice 
 
 Of Nature, which invited them to join 
 
 In her regardless self-abandonment. 
 
 So doubly dangerous when both the hearts 
 
 That beat in unison, love with a love 
 
 Which * passeth knowledge,' if — ^but wherefore muse 
 
 On that which Night, and Solitude, and Love 
 
 Witness'd alone ? unless the cypress too, 
 
 Or dark arbutus, with its scarlet fruit, 
 
 May silently have listen'd to their vows 
 
 Or shudder'd at their long, forbidden kiss ! — 
 
 These folded in their dim mysterious shade 
 
 The two poor lovers, as they sought the town, 
 
 Clinging together sadly to the last, 
 
Deiizil Place. 211 
 
 Or arm in arm, or holding hand in hand 
 Like litde children. 
 
 Down the walk they pass'd ; 
 The East was red, and speeding on the wings 
 Of Destiny, they saw the boding signs 
 Of dread To-morrow. Near the fading moon 
 Their enemy lay blushing o'er the hills. 
 
To my heart I waking, say 
 
 " This must be Love " 
 As the first strugg'ling ray 
 Of the too happy day 
 
 Peeps from above. 
 
 '' Ah, this must be Love," I sigh 
 
 When the dim light 
 Fades from the western sky, 
 And the far mountains He 
 
 Wrapp'd in the night. 
 
 If thou had'st not dawn'd, oh Day ! 
 
 Then, blessed Night, 
 Thou had'st endured for aye. 
 Stay, night of kisses, stay ! 
 
 Veil out the light ! 
 
 If thou had'st not darken'd. Night, 
 
 Then, happy Day, 
 Thou had'st shone long and bright, 
 Fleet day of dear delight 
 
 Fade not away ! 
 
 Oh, Night ! to thy sister. Day, 
 
 Reach out thy wand. 
 Thou dost know, thou can'st say 
 Why I would have you stay 
 
 Thus hand in hand ! 
 
 Thou can'st say, for thou dost know,- 
 
 Night, tell to Day 
 Why thy dim moments flow 
 
 Warm'd with a warmer glow 
 Than sun-lit ray ! 
 
Oh, Day ! whisper unto Night 
 
 All thou hast known, 
 When, 'neath thy sun and shade 
 
 Fleeter hours Love has made 
 E'en than thine own ! 
 
 Night and Day ! whilst you can hold 
 
 Joy like to this, 
 Dear is the black and gold 
 Of your soft wings, that fold 
 
 Me to his kiss. 
 
 But, when mingled sun and shade 
 
 Bring me no more 
 Flowers like those that made 
 
 All other blossoms fade 
 Their light before. 
 
 Weave then for thy brows of light 
 
 A cypress wreath. 
 Day, that wert once so bright ! 
 Darken to Night, and Night ! 
 
 Fade into Death ! 
 
215 
 
 ' ' And we are man and wife together 
 Altho' thy breast, once bold 
 With song, be closed and cold 
 Beneath flowers' roots and birds' light feet." 
 
 J. L. Beddoes. 
 
 * ' Se voir le plus possible, et s'aimer seulement. 
 
 Sans ruse et sans detours, sans honte ni mensonge, 
 Sans qu'un desir nous trompe ou qu'un remords nous ronge 
 Vivre a deux et donner son coeur a tout moment. " 
 
 Alfred de Musset. 
 
 XL 
 
 WHEN Constance rose at morn 'twas not from 
 sleep, 
 But from a dreary hopeless contemplation 
 Of the most glorious sunrise. (That same sun 
 Would rise and set, but never more, maybe. 
 Cast two fond clinging shadows on the path 
 That two misguided mortals never more 
 Might tread together in the coming years !) 
 
2i6 Denzil Place. 
 
 ^' Ah, cruel herald of a hapless morn !" 
 
 She thought with aching heart, ^' Of what avail 
 
 " For me, yon flaunting gorgeous display 
 
 '' Of pink and gold and primrose, since your rays 
 
 *^ Are destin'd soon to light me from my love ? " 
 
 It was as tho' the sympathetic sun 
 
 Had guess'd her thought, for as the hour approach'd 
 
 When she departed from her flow'ry home, 
 
 He shrouded o'er the glory of his face. 
 
 And Geoffrey Denzil drove her to the town 
 
 Wrapp'd in her cloak, on quite an English day 
 
 Of mist and rain. All look'd so different. 
 
 And seem'd so doubly gloomy and forlorn 
 
 From long association with the sun — 
 
 She thought the day assumed a widow' d look 
 
 Which harmonized with what her aching heart 
 
 Could now no longer hide. 
 
 Thus to the strand 
 They went together. Sheltered from the rain 
 She waited there, and watch'd the dreaded boat 
 Lying against the stone-work of the port. 
 Its palpitating engine now and then 
 Hissing and smoking, whilst upon the deck 
 The bales and baggage of the passengers 
 
Denzil Place. 2 1 7 
 
 I^ay strewn in wild confusion. Denzil rose 
 
 And left her side to help her English maid, 
 
 Who, being ignorant of foreign speech, 
 
 Was almost helpless ; — as he thus explain'd 
 
 And cater 'd for the comfort of the maid 
 
 And her fair mistress, some one touched his arm — 
 
 He turn'd, and saw the sunburnt gardener 
 
 Belonging to the villa Belvedere, 
 
 Who held a written message, ominous 
 
 With the dark cover of a telegram — 
 
 It was for Constance, but the worthy man 
 
 Link'd her with Denzil in his artless mind, 
 
 And innocently thought that what was her's 
 
 Must surely be of interest to him. 
 
 And he was right, for never written words 
 Sent such a thrill thro' Geoffrey Denzil's heart 
 As these few lines which flutter'd to the ground 
 Dropp'd from poor Constance's wan, nerveless hand. 
 
 The message w^as from Roland, and ran thus — 
 " My father's horse, on Monday afternoon, 
 '* Stumbled and threw him, and he died to-day. '^ 
 They did not speak — but thro' each startled brain 
 
2 1 8 Denzil Place, 
 
 Rush'd an unutterable flood of thoughts 
 Conflicting — unexpected, love, remorse, 
 Astonishment, and the delirious hope 
 Of an unhoped-for Future ! . . . . 
 
 Now, in truth, 
 Who would have thought Sir John L'Estrange's cob, 
 That trusty, confidential, animal. 
 Would throw his rider, or that being thro\Mi 
 Poor dear Sir John would never rise again ! 
 But so it was ; — mth little tufted tail 
 Uprais'd in air, and quick awak'ning ears, 
 Over the purple heather, unperceived. 
 Bounded away, to lay some other snare 
 The real malefactor ; soft and grey, 
 A little downy rabbit, with no guile, 
 Or thought of all the changes that ensued 
 Because he bored his little hermit's hole 
 Just where Sir John L'Estrange's horse would tread, 
 Making that pleasant Monday afternoon 
 Sir John's last Monday in this world of sin, — 
 So full of snares, to count from rabbit-holes 
 Upwards, to those worse perils to the soul, 
 Which good Sir John, who liv'd a worthy life 
 
Dmzil Place, 2 1 9 
 
 Had ne^er encountered in his easy road — 
 
 For the jog- trotting of his trusted cob 
 
 Was emblematic of the quiet pace 
 
 With which he journey'd thro' the peaceful days 
 
 Ere Constance went abroad. 
 
 So, he was gone 
 The kind old man with rosy apple cheeks, 
 And never more his " Ultra-Tory eye " 
 Will note the signs of danger from afar — 
 And we must hope that he has gone to dwell 
 Where all is order'd as he would approve, — 
 An absolute perpetual monarchy, 
 Wliere the Great Autocrat is King of Kings, 
 And where the subjects know no tyranny 
 Save the just guidance of a Father's hand. 
 
 In two short years from that eventful day, 
 Beneath the shade of scented orange boughs 
 And flowering myrtles, near a cypress tree 
 Clung round with roses, Constance sat and mused 
 In a fair garden. Her's were blissful dreams. 
 And from her heart a never-ending hymn 
 Of gratitude and praise rose up to heav'n — 
 
2 20 De7izil Place. 
 
 Above the feath'ry palms and calm blue sky 
 Reflected in the glitt'ring tideless sea. 
 
 For time had made her Geoffrey Denzil's wife, 
 
 And she was once again in Italy — 
 
 Nor did this sacred second marriage-ring 
 
 Encircling her slight finger, exorcise 
 
 (As rings, alas ! have oft been known to do !) 
 
 Aught of the tenderness she felt before 
 
 When It was bitterness and shame to love. 
 
 And Denzil, with his independent heart 
 
 Scorning the laws and customs of the world. 
 
 Learnt it was not alone the guilty zest 
 
 With which some natures seek forbidden fruit 
 
 That heretofore had made him deem he lov'd. 
 
 For now that they were lawful man and wife 
 
 The love he felt for her intensified 
 
 And deepen'd with the days — the happy days I 
 
 And with these days were blended happy nights- 
 
 Oh, bless'd experience, but to few vouchsafed I 
 
 The treble unity of heart and mind 
 
 And all those pulses of material life, 
 
 Which throb in harmony to one great end — 
 
Denzil Place. 221 
 
 The sweet, perpetual, intermingling 
 
 Of sense and soul, — the mutual interchange 
 
 Of all that each can render — each receive ! 
 
 Oh, for but half a year of such a dream 
 
 How willingly would I exchange the rest — 
 
 Those future years of loveless solitude 
 
 Which Heaven may predestine me to live I 
 
 For days which darken into blissful nights 
 
 When, heart to heart, in one another's arms 
 
 We sink not into blank forgetfulness, 
 
 Since e'en in sleep the senses realize 
 
 The sacred presence of our best belov'd ! 
 
 For nights that fade into the happy dawn 
 
 When, after this sweet half-unconsciousness. 
 
 We wake to know we were not duped by dreams, 
 
 But that we hold against our grateful heart 
 
 Our dearest treasure ! oh, for days and nights 
 
 Such as I sometimes dream of, give me grief 
 
 And after-pangs of bitter suffering. 
 
 But let me glory in the unknown joy 
 
 Of some such days and nights before I die ! 
 
 " Ah," Denzil said, " How had I pray'd for this, 
 " But that I never proved an answer 'd pray'r ! 
 
222 Denzil Place. 
 
 " This is the first great undeserved reward 
 " That God has giv'n me in my restless Hfe 
 " Of doubt and speculation." 
 
 Constance sigh'd 
 *^ Till now I also said indeed the words, 
 " Praying with hands and lips, but in my heart 
 " I fear I did not dare anticipate 
 " Any fulfilment ! Then, alas, I know 
 " I always pray'd for very earthly things — ■ 
 " That I might be belov'd, — that one might live 
 " Whom God, in his high wisdom doom'd to die — 
 " That I may have a daughter or a son — 
 " Such pigmy wishes, look'd at from High Heav'n ! 
 " Tis right we should not always have our way — 
 " And then again, I pray'd another pray'r — 
 "I pray'd I might resist the pow'r you gain'd 
 " Over my heart, I felt it more and more 
 " As days went on ; that pray'r seem'd never heard." 
 She dropp'd her eyes, and blushing, sigh'd anew, 
 But he repeated all triumphantly 
 Her murmur'd words, " That pray'r was never 
 heard ! " 
 
 " Ah, unregenerate ! will you always doubt ? 
 
Denzil Place. 223 
 
 '' And yet," she added, grasping at a straw, 
 
 '' You know at any rate, pray'r does no harm — 
 
 " If wasted, it is wasted, but the air 
 
 " Is all the purer for our purer thought — 
 
 " It is no superstition that degrades 
 
 " Like some that men have follow'd long ago — 
 
 " I feel so grateful when I see the sun 
 
 " Shining as now, on such a lovely scene — 
 
 " My inward intimate existence yearns 
 
 ," To give some proof of gratitude to God 
 
 '' And so to Him I lift my heart in pray'r.'' 
 
 And thus the days went on, until at last 
 One of the little pray'rs that Constance pray'd 
 Was granted to her, and her grateful heart 
 Began to realize the long'd-for bliss 
 Of knowing that some soul-begotten ray 
 Of light and life, intense — intangible — 
 Meeting with Denzil's warm impatient lips 
 In those dear days and those mysterious nights, 
 Had wrought in her that wond'rous miracle, 
 Ever recurring, yet for ever new, 
 Incomprehensible and beautiful, — 
 That inexplicable, sweet, incarnation 
 
224 Dcnzil Place, 
 
 Of two-fold love, first-felt, a flutt'ring hope 
 Faint as the plash of muffled elfin oars 
 In some unfathomable mystic lake, 
 Or as the fancied murmur of the waves 
 To one who has been dreaming of the sea. 
 
Ah, my own love ! The years may pass, 
 The Winter and the Summer days, 
 The city's fog, the dreamy haze 
 
 That hovers o'er the country grass 
 
 Hanging betwixt the earth and sky 
 When black against its pink and gold 
 At eventide, the trees enroll'd 
 
 Stand like some dark conspiracy ; 
 
 Sable accomplices of Night 
 
 In the forced murder she has done, 
 Helping to hide the dying sun 
 
 Dragg'd down from his imperial height 
 
 And sinking in his gory bed — 
 
 My love ! all hours and days may go 
 And leave no trace, yet in the glow 
 
 Of dying suns, and moons that shed 
 
 A calmer light ; and in the stars 
 And indefatigable waves, 
 And in the faint gold streak that laves 
 
 The last forsaken ocean bars — 
 
 There art thou ever ; all in vain 
 I ask some sign of life from thee 
 Yet I believe thou liv'st to me 
 
 In all I love in life, again, 
 
 And somewhere, in land, sky or sea, 
 I have a hope I cannot kill 
 That there my loving or my will 
 
 May give thee back again to me ! 
 
22/ 
 
 ' God is folding up the white tent of my youth." 
 
 ' It is too late, too late ! 
 You may not kiss back my breath to the sunshine." 
 
 Adah I. Menken. 
 
 " We know not whether death be good, 
 But life at least it will not be : 
 Men will stand saddening as we stood, 
 Watch the same fields and skies as we 
 And the same sea." 
 
 Swinburne. 
 
 XII. 
 
 A LAS, I would in this uncertain world 
 •^^^ AH prosper'd where it seem'd that all went well ! 
 I would that never without urgent cause, 
 Those who are bless'd and loving, wronging none. 
 Should, as it were, be cheated of their dues 
 And robbed by Fate of their hard-earn'd content. 
 There are some good and worthy on the earth 
 
 Q2 
 
228 Denzil Place, 
 
 But who seem destin'd for some hidden end 
 
 To be for ever spokes in ev'ry wheel — 
 
 Encumbrances in ev'rybody's path — 
 
 The millstones of the world, of sterling stuff 
 
 But wearisome to wear around the neck — 
 
 That these the great tho' too impatient gods 
 
 Should sometimes prematurely set aside 
 
 I do not wonder, knowing it is hard 
 
 In this vast varying community 
 
 To be alike benevolent to all 
 
 Or satisfy the cravings of all hearts. 
 
 So, when Sir John met such a sudden doom 
 
 It almost seem'd as if the Fates had said 
 
 " Here is an honest, red-faced kind old man 
 
 ^' Who never has done harm to any one — 
 
 " But yet, because of bungling human laws 
 
 " He stands for ever, whilst he lives and breathes 
 
 " As an insuperable obstacle, 
 
 " Marring the moments of that luckless pair 
 
 " Whose vast capacity for happiness 
 
 *' He blights unwittingly." 
 
 And then it seem'd 
 As if the three relentless beldames plann'd, 
 
Denzil Place. 229 
 
 And caused the little guileless downy beast 
 To burrow near that Sussex highway road. 
 
 Now^, when this worthy man was sacrificed, 
 
 I was ashamed I could not sorrow more, 
 
 But, feeling as it were ' behind the scenes ' 
 
 I thought " Well, well, since some one must have died 
 
 (For Death intrudes in fiction as in fact,) 
 
 I almost think he can be spared the best — 
 
 So now they will be happy all their lives 1 
 
 And I may tell of how they liv'd and lov'd, 
 
 And how they henceforth kept the decalogue 
 
 And died respected at a ripe old age I 
 
 But Life is stranger in its chequered course 
 Than aught that ever fancy taught or feign'd — 
 There are injustices, and ups and downs, 
 And strange caprices on the part of Fate 
 Which seem to us most inexplicable 
 And sad and hopeless ! 
 
 So, Sir John was dead. 
 And Constance married to the man she lov'd. 
 For whom she sinn'd and suffer'd years ago, 
 And Geoffrey lov'd her, and the fleeting days 
 
230 Denzil Place. 
 
 To them were as a blessed glimpse of heav'n, 
 
 And Denzil, who had been a sceptic once, 
 
 Felt in his soul the germs of Faith and Love 
 
 Upspringing from his earnest gratitude 
 
 To that great Pow'r he recognized at last, 
 
 And Constance knew that near her heart the flow'r 
 
 Of their united love lay folded close 
 
 In dreamless slumber, destin'd soon to breathe 
 
 The fragrant air that she and Geoffrey breathed 
 
 Together, in those fleeting wedded days. 
 
 But she had rashly said " Ah, let me live 
 
 " Only to know this blessed hope is true, 
 
 *^ Then come what may," and her unthinking words 
 
 Were register'd by the relentless Fates. — 
 
 The day she long'd and pray'd for dawn'd at last. 
 
 And Constance kiss'd the cheek of Geoffrey's child. 
 
 And he was near her, but no time was given 
 
 Him to rejoice in what she deem'd a joy, 
 
 For in her struggle with this second life 
 
 His little wife pass'd from him into death. 
 
 Half stupified he watch'd her lying there 
 So calm and still, who but some hours ago 
 Was warm with life ; — so sudden it all seem'd, — 
 
Denzil Place, 231 
 
 The words we say at parting left unsaid, 
 And round about him all the many things 
 Inanimate, yet seeming now to cry 
 With eager voices, " No, she is not dead ! " 
 All in a row the little high-heel'd shoes 
 Those fairy feet would never wear again, — 
 Upon a chair her hat and parasol. 
 Whilst the white dress she wore but yesterday 
 Was flutt'ring in the flower-scented air 
 From where it hung upon the looking-glass — 
 The glass that never more would mirror back 
 That well-known earnest face, for she was dead ! 
 
 Sooner than here in England, dawn'd that day 
 Of desolation, when upon the stair 
 Sounded the grating footsteps of strange men. 
 The sable-suited myrmidons of Death, 
 Coming to bear away that silent form 
 And hide it from the watching of wet eyes. 
 
 Geoffrey was sitting in the shrouded room. 
 Gazing with haggard eyes and bloodless lips 
 On the sweet face of what was Constance once — 
 As one entranced, he scarcely realized 
 
232 Denzil Place, 
 
 This new and terrible calamity; 
 
 But when he heard strange voices in the house, 
 
 Guessing their ghastly meaning, from his breast 
 
 Escaped a stifled groan of agony. 
 
 And all his soul in startled consciousness 
 
 Awoke to know the greatest of all griefs 
 
 Had fall'n upon him ; then he wildly cried — 
 
 '^ Ah, dear and lovely face of her I love ! 
 
 " Could I but watch it ever sleeping so, 
 
 " E'en should those eye-lids never more unclose 
 
 '^ And those sweet lips be silent evermore, 
 
 " Yet could I wait and watch thro' all the years 
 
 " And keep alive her tender memory. 
 
 " Ah, shame to bury such a lovely thing 
 
 " All out of sight in earth's unfeeling breast — 
 
 *^ I have a horrid dread that thro' long years 
 
 " My memory may fail to call her back ! 
 
 " Oh, should I e'er forget her ! — Let her stay 
 
 " And do not hurry her away so soon 
 
 " To loneliness and darkness !" 
 
 Here the Nun 
 Sister Theresa, Constance's old friend, 
 (For they were staying near the sunny town 
 
Denzil Place. 233 
 
 Where first they met her) led him from the room 
 And whisper'd words of Christian hope and faith, 
 But thro' them all, to his remorseful heart 
 There ran an under current of reproach — 
 It seem'd to him as tho' the Sister said 
 (Whatever form she made the words assume,) 
 " Ah, surely yonder convent in the hills 
 '' Had been a brighter prison than the one 
 " To which your boasted love has sent her now." 
 I know not whether such a passing thought 
 E'er flitted thro' her mind, or if his brain. 
 Perverted by its load of suffering, 
 Originated ev'ry sentiment 
 That could inflict self-torture. 
 
 ^^ Cease, I pray," 
 He said, when next the Sister, meeting him 
 Strove to console him with her well-meant words, 
 " In pity cease these vain and empty tales 
 " About the tender mercies of your God ! 
 "" What is this life that He has given me 
 " Now that the world is empty of her ? Where 
 " May I discover any trace of her ? 
 " Transform'd, or blended into what is fair 
 " In Nature, may I recognize again 
 
234 Denzil Place. 
 
 " Some spark of that pure flame that was her breath ? 
 
 " Ah, had I but her innocent behef 
 
 " Of winged meetings in another sphere 
 
 '^ How good tVould be to wait and hope for her ! 
 
 " Ten thousand years of waiting would I wait, 
 
 " Here in this very flesh, ten thousand years, 
 
 " To clasp at their eventual expiration 
 
 " So dear a blessing ! " 
 
 Then he sadly thought 
 " Alas, I did not value her enough 
 " When she was with me ! All my love of her 
 ^^ Was not enough of love — that sacred thing, 
 "Her hand, I often only lightly held 
 " (Not thinking it was lent to lie in mine 
 '' But for a moment !) whilst my fickle mind 
 " Wander'd away to England. On my breast 
 " She has lain her head and slept, and I have slept, 
 " Closing mine eyes to the great happiness 
 '' Of gazing on her, I repair'd to dreams 
 " In which she sometimes did not follow me — 
 *• She was as lost to me for long whole hours 
 " As now she is to all eternity ! 
 '' Now would I wake, watching her sweetest face 
 " Thro' sleepless ages, could I feel again 
 
De7tzil Place, 235 
 
 " The cheek that lightly on my happy heart 
 
 ^^ Used once to lean ! These are the first sad days 
 
 " That I have felt God's anger in my life — 
 
 " She was so good, so pure, so beautiful — 
 
 " Thinking no evil thought — it was for me 
 
 " She left her innocent life of good intent 
 
 " To sail with me upon the stormy sea 
 
 '^ Of passion — it was I who dragg'd her down 
 
 " To the low level of my selfish life — 
 
 " I took her for my own, I mix'd with mine 
 
 "Her pure identity; — I spoil'd, devoured, 
 
 '^ And revell'd in my godless victory — 
 
 " And now I am a murderer, like Cain. 
 
 " My kiss has kilFd my darling, — all my life 
 
 " Is henceforth chasten'd with a deathless hunger 
 
 '' Insatiable — vain, ah, cursed words 
 
 " ' Impossible ' and ' Never ' and ' Too late !' " 
 
 He look'd towards the cradle, where the babe 
 With upturned face of lily fairness, slept 
 The sleep of innocence ; in vain he strove 
 To trace some likeness to his buried love 
 In those impassive features, scarcely yet • 
 Deserving such a name ; — the fast closed eyes 
 
236 Denzil Place. 
 
 Wanting as yet the mother's silken fringe 
 Of curhng eyelashes on either lid — 
 The open mouth, a tiny, triangle, 
 He bent to kiss, but tho' he seem'd to breathe 
 The perfume of the blue starch-hyacinth, 
 Yet nothing met the longing of his lips 
 Of her — his wife — the mother of his child ! 
 Then, half in anger with the helpless cause 
 Of his chang'd life, and wholly in despair, 
 He cover'd with his hands his haggard face 
 And knew the bitterest of human griefs. 
 
 And so they buried Constance out of sight. 
 And Geoffrey Denzil never saw again 
 His darling's face ; but he remembers her 
 As last he saw her ; scatter'd all around 
 Her sleeping form, the scented southern flow'rs, 
 The single rose, and double violet. 
 And mignionette, and bright anemone, 
 And in her hand she held a faded wreath 
 Of English evergreens — box, laurel, fir, 
 V And one dark spray of sad funereal yew 
 To which a single shrivell'd berry clung, — 
 These were the leaves that Constance gather'd once 
 
Denzil Place, 237 
 
 Before she quitted silent Denzil Place, 
 
 Whereon her husband read her written words — 
 
 " This wreath of leaves was gather'd in the garden 
 
 " Of Eden; to be kept for evermore." 
 
 And so he laid them there, that, if indeed 
 
 That sleeping form should ever rise from death 
 
 (As she believ'd,) and soar triumphantly 
 
 To other brighter realms, she then should find 
 
 On waking into glorious second life, 
 
 This little faded memory of earth 
 
 Still clinging to her pale unfolding hand. 
 
 And like her, maybe, re-awakening 
 
 To life and freshness ; so that, 'midst the flow'rs 
 
 Of Heaven's garden, some soft falling seed, 
 
 (Perchance the little shrivell'd yew-berry,) 
 
 From these sad sprays of Earth, translated thus, 
 
 Might, taking root, uprise and bloom again. 
 
 Reminding one amongst the seraph-band 
 
 Of those faint, fleeting moments pass'd and gone. 
 
 When she had lov'd, and wander'd 'neath the shade 
 
 Amongst the haunted groves of Denzil Place. 
 
 After six weary years of wandering 
 
 The news arrived at Denzil that once more 
 
238 Denzil Place, 
 
 Its master would return. No longer poor 
 
 In this world's goods, since by the sudden Will 
 
 Of his rich relative, his fortune now 
 
 Was more than doubled, but how 'reft of all 
 
 Those only riches worthy of the name 
 
 We need not pause to tell ! and with him came 
 
 A little fair-hair'd girl calFd Violet — 
 
 (So named after the fragrant fav'rite flow'r 
 
 Of her dead mother). Something in her eyes 
 
 Reminded many of the villagers 
 
 Of that sweet face that never more on earth 
 
 Would beam upon them. 
 
 As they sat in church, 
 The tall, sad, father, and the little girl, 
 On the first Sunday after their return. 
 Both priest and peasant eye'd them curiously, 
 And Geoffrey Denzil felt an awkward sense 
 Of mixed defiance and self-consciousness 
 He had not known before ; — he also fear'd 
 That they might whisper on their way from church 
 And tittle-tattle o'er his buried past, 
 Dragging maybe, the name he most ador'd 
 From the high place from whence he worshipp'd it- 
 For he had only sought his village church 
 
Denzil Place, 239 
 
 Thinking that she would like him to be there, 
 And from no wish to meet the prying eyes 
 Of country gossips. Then it seem'd to him 
 That young Sir Roland, from his curtain'd pew 
 Beneath the mildew'd hatchments of his race, 
 Look'd with his large dark eyes askance at him, 
 And seem'd to say, " So you are home again, 
 Author of the dishonour of my house ! " 
 But if young Roland's eyes grew somewhat sad 
 At sight of Denzil and his little girl. 
 It was but at the memories they 'roused 
 Of her, his early playmate and his friend 
 Whom still he lov'd and mourn'd, for to his ears 
 Had never come those scandalous reports 
 Whisper'd around, and only Geoffrey's mind 
 O'er sensitive, could have imagin'd aught 
 Of enmity or malice in that glance. 
 
 (Constance's hatchment never grated there 
 Against the whitewash'd walls of Farleigh Church, 
 When summer breezes stirr'd the dingy baize 
 That hid the open'd door ; there is no sign. 
 No tablet, urn, or monumental stone 
 Recalling to the minds of those who pray 
 
240 .Denzil Place, 
 
 Her who once knelt amongst them, and who now 
 Sleeps under bluer skies. 
 
 Far, far away, 
 There, in the cemetery on the hill 
 Where Protestants are buried, does she. lie — 
 There is a dearth of grass in Southern lands 
 But such a wealth of flow'rs ! Anemones 
 As many color'd as the changing wave, 
 Narcissus, single roses, violets — 
 And some sweet blossom hanging from a tree 
 Whose name I know not — golden is its bloom, 
 And soft as feathers from some magic bird — 
 These droop around her, fann'd by gentle gales, 
 And over these, again, a cypress tow'rs, 
 And in amongst its sombre boding shade 
 A Banksia rose is climbing towards the sky. 
 Striving maybe, to reach it by the help 
 Of that high fun'ral tree, as hopeful hearts 
 Aspire to Heaven on the wings of Death.) 
 
 So, after this first Sunday, it was long 
 Ere Geoffrey Denzil went to church again, 
 For there he met so many memories 
 He fain would bury ; but his little girl, 
 
Dettzil Place. 241 
 
 (To glad', he thought, a hov'ring angel's eyes,) 
 
 He taught to worship where her mother knelt 
 
 In those old days before he saw her face ; 
 
 And never more at sacred rite or name 
 
 Did his curved lips assume a sceptic's smile, 
 
 Since Constance had believ'd that all was true ; 
 
 And if there was a heaven, she was there, 
 
 And she would welcome him, if any deed 
 
 Or any suffering of his on Earth 
 
 Could wipe away the Past, and give the saints 
 
 That greater joy than when those " ninety-nine 
 
 Just men " present themselves " Who " (saith the text) 
 
 Need no repentance." 
 
 Thus, if strange, 'twas true. 
 That tho' poor Constance, with her yielding will 
 Had seem'd to him at first a feeble child 
 In pow'rs of reasoning and abstruse thought, 
 Yet she had left upon his sterner mind 
 (So confident before, in its proud aim 
 At self-emancipation from all chains 
 Imposed by man as advocate of heav'n !) 
 A deeper trace than he had ever dream'd. 
 
 Thus, a faint spark, if left at liberty 
 
242 Denzil Place, 
 
 To nestle in the hollow of an oak, 
 May gently light a beacon in its heart, 
 Or leave a mark upon the glowing wood-^- 
 Whilst up towards heav'n the evanescent flame 
 Will die in smoke, so soft, and blue, and vague. 
 It seems beyond belief so faint a thing 
 Could leave so deep a trace upon the tree ! 
 
 And this is why the poor at Denzil Place 
 
 Are all so well and warmly housed and clad, 
 
 And why the old and young, in glowing words, 
 
 Sound Denzil's praises, and on Sabbath morns 
 
 Will pray that God may bless him, in their pray'rs, 
 
 And think of him with reverence and love. 
 
 (P'or this is where the godly often err, — 
 
 The sinner sinning against one command 
 
 Of God or man, need not in consequence 
 
 Prove murderer, or thief, extortioner, 
 
 Mover of neighbour's landmarks, seething kids 
 
 In mother's milk, or, being by mischance 
 
 Found wanting once, prove base in ev'rything. 
 
 For human souls I hold no hopeless creed 
 
 Of utter degeneration to decay 
 
 And degradation, just because the fault, 
 
Denzil Place. 243 
 
 " The little rift " maybe '' within the lute " 
 
 Was not where your's or mine made oar's play false !) 
 
 So Geoffrey Denzil taught his little girl 
 
 The godly saws he did not follow once, 
 
 And as he look'd on her he tried to think 
 
 That tender bud would bloom into a flow'i 
 
 Like the dead flow'r he mourn' d. 
 
 It was a grief 
 To him to think she had not known his love, 
 That never, never, in the after years 
 Could he converse of her as one they knew 
 And wept together ! This would make him sad, 
 And seem'd to chill the love he bore the child, 
 Whilst with the innocent indifference 
 Of children for the mother who has borne them. 
 Who died for them, but whom they have not seen. 
 And did not know, and cannot therefore mourn, 
 She often ask'd, '' Had she black eyes, or blue, 
 " Mama ?" and many careless questions more 
 Cutting like knives. " She had brown eyes, my child.'' 
 He answer'd her, '' And never your's or mine 
 " Will look upon such lovely eyes again." 
 
 Thus thro' the years, the father looking back, 
 
244 Denzil Place. 
 
 The little daughter full of child-like hope, — > 
 Strangers in thought, yet by a mutual love 
 Uniting hearts, together hand in hand, 
 These two walked on towards the hoped-for Heaven. 
 
245 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 " And soon again shall music swell the breeze ; 
 Soon, issuing forth, shall glitter thro' the trees 
 Vestures of nuptial white ; and hymns be sung, 
 And violets scatter'd round; and old and young 
 In every cottage-porch with garlands green 
 Stand still to gaze, and gazing, bless the scene; 
 While her dark eyes declining, by his side 
 Moves in her virgin- veil the gentle bride." 
 
 Rogers. 
 
 THE other day, in somewhat pensive mood, 
 I saunter'd down a dusty Sussex lane 
 Late in the afternoon ; the sun was hot, 
 And tho' the road was shaded by the oaks 
 In the off-lying hedgerows near the park, 
 Yet still I long'd for those intenser shades 
 I saw afar, between the iron gates 
 Of Denzil Place, (for I had sought the scene 
 Of this sad simple story, and could see 
 The woods of Denzil Place and Farleigh Court,) 
 But ere I reach'd the tempting tangled shade 
 
246 Coriclnsion. 
 
 I heard the clattering of coming steeds, 
 And round the tufted angle of the lane 
 A youth and maiden suddenly appear'd 
 Beaming with life and laughter. As they pass'd 
 I watch'd them curiously, for both of them 
 Were beautiful, and something made me feel 
 A deeper interest than e'er inspired 
 The sight of any other youth or maid. 
 
 The girl was fair, with wealth of golden locks. 
 And something in the colour of her eyes 
 Reminded me of eyes I used to know 
 In years gone by. I turn'd aside to ask 
 An aged woman, who, on seeing them. 
 Had risen from her seat beside her hives 
 And dropp'd a curtsey ; who and what they were 
 This comely pair ? 
 
 " She, with the yellow locks," 
 Answer'd the dame, endeav'ring while she spoke 
 To catch a glimpse of their retreating forms, 
 " Is Violet Denzil, and the gentleman 
 '' Who rode with her, and follows her as shade 
 " Follows on sunshine, is our master here 
 " The youn^ Sir Roland ; old Sir John L'P'.strange 
 
Coiichision. 247 
 
 " Married the mother of Miss Violet 
 
 " Before she married Mr. Denzil there 
 
 '^ Over at Denzil Place, (you see the gates,) 
 
 ^' So they are kind of kin-like, and yet still 
 
 " Our parson says they are not kin at all, 
 
 '^ Since young Sir Roland is not child of her 
 
 ^' But of Sir John's first lady, and he says 
 
 "" He hopes that he shall live to join their hands 
 
 " As man and wife, and parson also says 
 
 ^' Their marriage-ring will join the properties, 
 
 '^ And put to shame some scandal-mong'ring tales 
 
 '' Folks whisper'd here." 
 
 With this she turn'd away 
 And fearless of the buzzing colony 
 That swarm'd about the ruffles of her cap. 
 Began to celebrate some mystic rite 
 Connected with her bees, whilst on I stroll'd, 
 Following the prints which those two horses' hoofs 
 Left in the dusty road, and lost in thought. 
 
 So this fair being with the golden hair 
 
 Was Violet Denzil, born in Italy, 
 
 The child of Love and Beauty ! and the youth 
 
 Was that brave handsome boy who used to romp 
 
248 Conclusion. 
 
 And ramble with his lovely stepmother 
 
 Thro' fields and woodlands in the years gone by ; 
 
 And they would marry, (so the parson thought, 
 
 And who should be so good a judge as he, 
 
 Who doubtless had wise reasons for such thought ?) 
 
 Ah, here, if marriage of the young and fair, — 
 
 If blooming cheeks and lovely sunny head. 
 
 Wedding with brave brown eyes and stalwart frame 
 
 And manly heart, e'er promised happiness. 
 
 Then should these two, who like some glowing dream 
 
 Of Prince and Princess in a fairy-tale, 
 
 So gaily gallopp'd past me, on the road 
 
 To Life and Love ; then should these two be bless'd 
 
 With ev'ry earthly good ; — around their knees 
 
 May happy children laugh and sport in glee. 
 
 And children's children, in the after years — 
 
 Good little Geoffreys and fair Constances, 
 
 Who must not sin like naughty grandpapa. 
 
 Or pretty grandmama, who died so young. 
 
 And whose sweet picture, in a musHn dress 
 
 " With coral-color'd sash and shady hat. 
 
 And looking like an angel," they will see 
 
 Hanging within the walls of Denzil Place. 
 
EPILOGUE. 
 
 lay a«iide my pen, — my story ends, 
 
 ** Of some few years in some few English lives ; " 
 Warning of evils wrought by bosom friends 
 
 To some few English husbands and their wives, — 
 A simple story — unimprov'd by rhymes, 
 
 And unembellish'd with that mystic glow 
 Which hovers o'er the tales of olden times, 
 
 The chivalresque rom aunts of long ago. 
 Yet I would say, to compensate for this, 
 
 (Had but my Constance lov'd the man she ought, 
 And had my Geoffrey's been a lawful kiss, ) 
 
 That I had felt and understood each thought 
 Portray'd in them ; and that they liv'd and mov'd 
 
 And had their being outside the gilded rim 
 Of this poor book, and that they sinn'd and lov'd, 
 
 And that in truth I knew both her and him. — 
 Or wholly in the flesh, or as, may be, 
 
 A sculptor recognises, blent in one 
 From many models borrow'd, arm or knee 
 
 Or rounded throat or bosom ; — and the sun 
 Has shone in very truth on ev'ry scene 
 
 My humble pen has striven to portray. 
 And Denzil Place and Farleigh Court have been 
 
 With all their inmates, and I know the day 
 
250 Epilogue. 
 
 When Constance first saw Geoffrey Denzil ride 
 
 Thro' long arcades of evergreens, and when 
 She knelt in love and anguish by his side 
 
 And told him all her aching heart knew then. 
 Not by these names were known this erring pair, 
 (Nor yet that injured husband, kind and old) — 
 But he was human, she alas, was fair — 
 
 And ' good Sir Johns ' are always manifold. 
 You search in vain for moral or advice — 
 
 For flow'ry language, — complicated plot, — 
 Or cunning metaphor, or neat and nice 
 
 And pointed epigram, — you find them not 
 I tremble for my reader's kind good will, 
 
 And hang a bashful head, yet seem to see 
 (No doubt with partial eyes,) a moral still 
 Which lingers here, if only seen by me. 
 Poor Constance was not bom so bad and base 
 
 As needs must seem a guilty faithless wife. 
 And had her heart been harder, or her face 
 
 Less fair, she might have liv'd a blameless life. 
 She was the eager champion of the poor. 
 
 And Denzil was her helper in the cause, 
 High were their motives, and their conduct pure, 
 
 And if his soul despised our human laws 
 It was because they seem'd less just and true 
 
 Than those that he had fashion'd as his own, — 
 He would have form'd a new religion, too, 
 
 E'en better, — broader, — than this present one. 
 He did not forge, as weapon to obtain 
 
 His evil purpose, any cunning scheme 
 Such as some men have form'd, who wish'd to gain 
 
 The love of other women, — for his dream 
 Had been to veil his idol in the shrine 
 
 His love and reverence had rais'd on high, 
 
Epilogue. 251 
 
 And worship her as tho' a thing divine 
 
 Almost too sacred for the human eye 
 To hght upon ; — whilst she had seen with grief 
 
 In him the signs of a persistent will 
 To war against all orthodox belief, 
 
 Yet hoped, with patience, to convert him still, 
 So sought his side, nor ever miss'd the chance 
 
 Of tender word of counsel, wise and strong 
 Beyond her years, or sweet reproachful glance 
 
 At any word or action seeming wrong. 
 No naughty novels did my Geoffrey lend, — 
 
 No Ernest Feydeaiis, and no Paul de Kocks^ 
 He was the *' working man of England's friend " 
 
 And talk'd of Progress whilst she knitted socks, 
 
 'Twas thus they fell ! E'en as they sagely 
 
 plann'd 
 
 The reformation of the human kind, , 
 
 They saw their boasted bulwarks blown as sand 
 
 At the remorseless mercy of the wind ! 
 '* Captain or Colonel, Knight, or man-at-arms " 
 
 So vci2,y you fall, whilst gazing at the sky. 
 Blind to the many dangers and alarms 
 
 Which close beside you in your pathway lie ! 
 And you, fair lady, who could never err 
 
 Save from your beauty, or your * melting mood ' 
 Which dreads all cruelty, — be warn'd by her 
 
 And be a little cruel to be good ! 
 She did not fall from love of deadly sin, 
 
 Nor did her breast for guilty pleasures glow, 
 And pure had been the heart that beat within, 
 
 Save for her fatal fear of saying " no.'' 
 But ah, forgive her ! in the coming years 
 
 She cannot cross your path, or cause your cheek 
 To blush for her dehnquencies, — her tears 
 
 Are dried for ever, and her voice will speak 
 
252 Epilogue. ' 
 
 To Geoffrey Denzil not one loving word 
 
 Of all the many he remembers yet, 
 Nor is her fairy footfall ever heard 
 
 Now or for ever ; — so forgive, forget 
 Her many faults and failings, she is dead, 
 
 And many miss her, and would fain recall 
 Her and her frailties, and would e'en, instead. 
 
 Exaggerate her virtues ; — faults and all 
 Some foolish people lov'd her. She is gone n 
 
 Like this sad autumn day, of which the hue 
 Suij^ well this landscape ; — all the sculptured stone 
 
 Of these two Denzil dragons, wet with dew 
 Is glist'ning from a newly risen moon 
 
 Charming the hazy distance 'neath her reign 
 Of silv'ry sad enchantment. Very soon 
 
 Thro' ev'ry quaint Elizabethan pane 
 Glimmers a twinkling light. Farewell old home ! 
 
 Old house with windows looking like the eyes 
 Of some old friend, who smiles at those who come 
 
 And sighs for those who go ;— but mostly sighs 
 For her who never more will come or go. 
 
 And never more may look upon thy face ! 
 Farewell sad witness of her shame and woe, 
 
 Farewell to Constance and to Denzil Place. 
 
 HARRISON AND SONS, PRINTERS, ST. MARTIN'S LANE. 
 
icx^sz^^