ITALIAN RHAPSODY AND OTHER POEMS OF ITALY By ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON o *-> rQ O >< FQ O 3 O CO 3 CO CO * I O FH H G cd txO -P to to G-H to) cJ -P G HXinj O t>0 G O -P >>H G XI O H -P to O 0-P -P cd O -p s to X! H 4-> G -P 13 > cd Xl G OX! to l G to Gx?0 xi p op 3 to o G P ^ b 3 t x! x! to 4J 4-> f[ | o so *CJ O O t-t -P -p *2 S O F^ H G Xl , G S G G cd 00 to XJH 0H pS tO FH O-P HIGH niaH3(JNv/ o v ) Former Ambassador to Italy Says Nation Needs Verse to Spur Imagination. HIS BIRTHDAY TOMORROW Writes Tribute to Roosevelt.wrq but Views Recognition of Russia as Mistake. MALLARANNY BEACH. Nothing Is here but beauty: a blue dome, Cloudless, in Ireland the land of cloud; A bluer sea, not clamoring with the loud Homeric music of the waves that roam The rocks and inlets white with angry foam, But gentle as a lion s sleep; yon proud Blue sloping headland, firm as though it plowed The yielding sea, as the keen share the loam. Twixt here and home nothing bjit beauty Ifes Across the lonely leagues from land to land. Ocean, thou confidant of smiles and sighs, Tell her who lingers on another strand *. That I forget not, but as evening dies I write a name of beauty on the sand. ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON A SONG OF AGE. What is it that makes a lifetime?; To hold the manly strength Of youth s rejoicing strife^Jme Till it reaches the Psalmjsj; lengtl, Is it worth the strain of the I years pain To keep the body alive? 1 Would you rather be old at eighty Or young at thirty-five? The fairest tree in the orchard That makes the Maytime bright, , By pest and the tempest tortured, May droop with early blight. And many a flame of a promisin, name That men thought might survive To light the world at eighty, Dies down at thirty-five. But if still the heart beat steady, ^ With Love as its only note, And the world s need finds you ready To pull in the common lioat; And you ve learned that Beauty s the helpmate of Duty To keep the soul alive: Would you rather be young at eighty Than old at thirty-five? ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON, ITALIAN RHAPSODY AND OTHER POEMS OF ITALY THE OLD VALENTINE. When you were at your fair fourteen, And February was at his (Ah, nothing sweeter could have been, As- nothing sweeter is), There came among your valentines One all made up of loving lines With Cupid s darts . Through bleeding hearts (Were his initials accidental?) You kissed the rhymes A hundred times And never thought them sentimental. At forty life s most lonely. age- When valentines come not, Go seek again that treasured page Unseen but unforgot. One poignant moment let a tear Flow for a boy s love so sincere: That tribute give Whereby shall live The lost, so tender and so gentle. Thank heaven that still Mid prose and ill, You can, in dream, be sentimental. ROBERT, UNDERWOOD JOHNSON* Cbe Butbor s previous ipoems * SAINT-GAUDENS: AN ODE, AND OTHER VERSE. By ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON. Published by the Author, 70 Fifth Avenue, New York: i6mo. Pp. 361. Price $2.00, postage prepaid. This is the fourth edition of the author s collected poems, and includes the volumes "The Winter Hour" and "Songs of Liberty," now separately out of print. POEMS OF WAR AND PEACE. By ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON. Second edition, with many new poems, includingThe Panama Ode, The Corridors of Congress, Rheims, Embat tled France, The Sword of Lafayette, The New Slavery, The"Crowned Republic, and other Poems of the Great War. New York: Pub lished by the Author at 70 Fifth Avenue. 1 6mo. Pp. 1 14. Price $1.50, postage prepaid. NOTE : The price of the present volume is $1.00, postage prepaid. ITALIAN RHAPSODY AND OTHER POEMS OF ITALY BY ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON MEMBER OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND LETTERS AUTHOR OF " SAINT-GAUDBNS : AN ODE, AND OTHER VERSE," " POEMS OF WAR AND PEACE" ; CO-EDITOR " BATTLES AND LEADERS OF THE CIVIL WAR" 4** NEW YORK : PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR AT 70 FIFTH AVENUE 97 __ 1 B U. Johnson s WU1 Filed in Surrogate 3 Couit. in v state at lss in urr valued his estate at l^ss $10,000. Copyright, 1917, by ROBERT UNDKKWOOD JOHNSON WtOiOH cdtOCQO)iOCOCOHC-OH O^O) H tO 0HW C\2 HO2 CV2HH tO tO OC\J H dnd 3 O O MM CONTENTS PAGE "A CITY WITH A SOUL" (Florence) ...... I ITALIAN RHAPSODY 3 LOVE IN ITALY n SALVINI 12 THE HOUR OF AWE 13 TITIAN S Two LOVES, IN THE BORGHESE 15 BROWNING AT ASOLO (Inscribed to his Friend Mrs. Arthur Bronson) .17 To ONE WHO NEVER GOT TO ROME (Edmund Clarence Stedman) 19 THE SPANISH STAIRS 23 THE NAME WRIT IN WATER (Piazza di Spagna, Rome). SPRING AT THE VILLA CONTI 26 COMO IN APRIL 28 THE VINES THAT MISSED THE BEES. (To Count Cosimo Rucellai of Florence with a copy of his ancestor Giovanni Rucellai s poem "The Bees") .... 29 THE POET IN THE CHILDREN S EYES. (To Countess Edith Rucellai, descendant of Joseph Rodman Drake) . 30 FAREWELL TO ITALY 31 THE CROWNED REPUBLIC 35 , IN AN ARBOR, ASOLO By Percy G. Pinkerton My perfumed jasmine-tent commands An outlook vast along the lands. Northward, green hills confront my gaze, Shrouded In filmy morning haze. Their smooth sides take a deeper dye As the red sun deserts the sky, When clouds, like poppy-petals, fall And fade around a purple wall Whose top or>e fain SM3N DF aiqissod HB uo pus 2u[qocajd jo aauyijoduij eq} am }q2nB)aABq Xaqi 9}BJ A"UB jy sunvg -quinu 2ui;Ba-9jg pun e^u EJO jo aaq -uinu u{B)jao B epnpui jsncu 4i )^q) eSJB[ os o{pa aqj, -s^uapuodisajaoo -UBO ^ui jo eouB^aodiai a sn ^a^i -Siq Joj esnaxa on ei oaaq) ano ui iseSy eiPPlK em jo SJB/A -ap s,iaBaq siq oj SuipaoooB poo diqs As his own publisher, Robert l ;i(h r- wood Jo<hnson is issuing from his office in Jjew York a volume of his hitherto uncollected poems entitled "The Pact of Honor and Other Poems Grave or Gay." They will include the title poem, apropos of the Briand-Kellogg Treaty; "The New Olympians" (the aviators); "The Hall of Fame, at Night"; personal poems on Eleonora Duse. Raquel Meller. Henrik Ibsen; impressions of travel in Italy, France and Switzerland; and "A Grave at Stockbridge," dealing in part \vith the subject of immortality. Lighter poems in the collection are "The Young Chevalier," the ballad of Lindbergh, "The Amateur Circus" and "A Sentimental Journey in I Ireland." E. F. E. TO ALL WHO LOVE ITALY Johnson Beads His Sonnet. then Robert Underwood Johnson, iaring the academic robes bestowed ion him when he received the de- je of Doctor of Letters from. New rk University, read the following met written by him for the occa- n: ^Ju HENRIK IBSEX. STREPHON TO CHLOE. A Tribute of an Idealist. y for bare forma of thought should we contend ? claim him realist; I hail him here, thful, acute, alive, profound, sincere. rcMight of souls where vice and virtue bleerf, J of the faltering conscience lest it bend ore the blast of circumstance, in fear, loclast of cant: ironic seer; fiiny to the people, but their friend., reining of Dante is not far to seek fen his grim faithful surgery we see Iding wrong from right and strong from weak. fired to Sophocles he well may be, en to the Three Fates of the ancient Greek adds a fourth, in man s heredity. hen came more Norwegian music, icluding with the Norwegian na- Dear, not tomorrow but today Give me the laggard word I crave Love is no jewel put away In velvet silence; wear it brave Upon your bosom, joy-entwined. Oh, hasten, hasten to be kind. Come, honor love with use today; Make it a gift and not a debt. See how the hours speed away; Shall each be laden with regret? Beauty was made not for the blind; Then hasten, hasten to be kind. I suffer now, but how much more Shall you, when, in Time s retro spect, You shall your cruelty deplore On which your happiness was wrecked? Lest love shall leave you far behind, Hasten, beloved, to be kind. ROBERT UNjDJBS.W,Ope JQHU gQJS t tO CJ o rH ^ O 0, q CD rj > t-t O ITJ to O CO CJ O W O C; O yi Tj "^J CD O O fl B CJ 13 ?3 EH c3 oi cd Q CO ?H -P CJ O 4^ < 0) H >> to rH rQ : D 4-^ fH ff- 4 M M H 3 T! O ~J O a CJ O &4 H H PQ <S CD to ^ pq o H^H 1 O * CO 4^> H PH Cd CO* J-. CD CJ H -H N CD CO 0) Jk; N} CH - p Q) CO Cd C -- TJ H O f-4 I fc/> /-I V-i -^ DO M H &i)4J CJ -H CJ CJ CD C H H O rH 4^ -i-> flHtJ-P H -H O) CO tO CH cj to -H 3 JH O 5H .- j EH PQ Jb3- O Q -H O> H H C? n B H 25 EH "A CITY WITH A SOUL" (FLORENCE) GAY or gloomy with her skies, Gray Paris like an opal lies Sparkling on the front of France. Avignon doth hold a lance In a tourney-list with Nimes. Fair Seville basks in helpless dream Of conquest, as in caged air Dreams the tamed lion of his lair. Regal Genoa still adorns Her ancient throne ; and Pisa mourns. Now we traverse holy ground Where three miracles are found : One of beauty when with dyes Of her own sunset Venice vies. One of beauty and of power Rome, the crumbled Babel-tower Of centuries piled on centuries Scant refuge from Oblivion s seas That swept about her. And the third? O heart, fly homeward like a bird, And look, from Bellosguardo s goal, Upon a city with a soul ! Who that has climbed that heavenly height When all the west was gold with light, "A CITY WITH A SOUL" And nightingales adown the slope To listening Love were lending hope, Till they by vesper bells were drowned, As though by censers filled with sound Who who would wish a worthier end To every journey? or not blend With those who reverently count This their Transfiguration Mount? From "The Winter Hour." SAVORING JOY. Haste not to joy. harbor the sweet suspense. The sun surprises not the world will But dawns with ever-lessening retl NorTthe starry curtain of the nigh X fall ungcntly. Yon full rive 1 often at some meditativ The P rose holds back its glory in th bud And Nature s temple has its ves bule. So let your wooing be: first, with such look That Fate must wait till your one word be spoken; Then choice; then tenderness; and then the token Of clasping hands, caressing caressed. When you have turned these pages Love s book The loved one may peruse with yov UNDERWOOD JOHNSON. ITALIAN RHAPSODY ITALIAN RHAPSODY* DEAR Italy ! The sound of thy soft name Soothes me with balm of Memory and Hope. Mine, for the moment, height and sweep and slope That once were mine. Supreme is still the aim To flee the cold and gray Of our December day, And rest where thy clear spirit burns with unconsuming flame. ii There are who deem remembered beauty best, And thine, imagined, fairer is than sight Of all the charms of other realms confessed, Thou miracle of sea and land and light. Was it lest, envying thee, The world unhappy be, Benignant Heaven gave to all the all-consoling Night? * Read before the Mother Chapter of the Phi Beta Kappa Fraternity, William and Mary College, February 10, 1902. 4 ITALIAN RHAPSODY ill Remembered beauty best? Who reason so? Not lovers, yearning to the same dumb star That doth disdain their passion who, afar, Seek touch and voice in velvet winds and low. No, storied Italy, Not thine that heresy, Thou who thyself art fairer far than Fancy e er can show. IV To me thou art an ever-brooding spell ; An old enchantment, exorcised of wrong; A beacon, whereagainst the wings of Song Are bruised so, they cannot fly to tell ; A mistress, at whose feet A myriad singers meet, To find thy beauty the despair of measures full and sweet. Of old, ere caste or custom froze the heart, What tales of thine did Chaucer re-indite, Of Constance, and Griselda, and the plight Of pure Cecilia, all with joyous art ! ITALIAN RHAPSODY 5 Oh, to have journeyed down To Canterbury town, And known, from lips that touched thy robe, that triad of renown! VI Fount of Romance whereat our Shakspere drank ! Through him the loves of all are linked to thee By Romeo s ardor, Juliet s constancy. He sets the peasant in the royal rank ; Shows under mask and paint Kinship of knave and saint, And plays on stolid man with Prospero s wand and Ariel s prank. VII Another English foster-child hadst thou When Milton from the breast of thy delight Drew inspiration. With a vestal s vow He fed the flame caught from thy sacred light. And when upon him lay The long eclipse of day, Thou wert the memory-hoarded treasure of his doomed sight. ITALIAN RHAPSODY VIII Name me a poet who has trod thy soil ; He is thy lover, ever hastening back, With thee forgetting weariness and toil, The nightly sorrow for the daily lack. How oft our lyric race Looked last upon thy face ! Oh, would that i were worthy thus to die in thine embrace ! IX Oh, to be kin to Keats, but as a part Of the same Roman earth! to sleep, unknown, Not far from Shelley of the virgin heart, Where not one tomb is envious of a throne; Where the proud pyramid, To brighter glory bid, Gives Cestius his longed-for fame, marking immortal Art. Or, in loved Florence, to repose beside Our trinity of singers ! Fame enough To neighbor lordly Landor, noble Clough, And her, our later sibyl, sorrow-eyed. ITALIAN RHAPSODY 7 Oh, tell me not their arts, But their Italian hearts Won for their dust that narrow oval, than the world more wide ! XI So might I lie where Browning should have lain, My "Italy" for all the world to read, Like his on the palazzo. For thy pain In losing from thy rosary that bead, England accords thee room Around his minster tomb A province conquered of thy soul, and not an Arab slain ! XII Then take these lines, and add to them the lay, All inarticulate, I to thee indite : The sudden longing on the sunniest day, The happy sighing in the stormiest night, The tears of love that creep From eyes unwont to weep, Full with remembrance, blind with joy, and with devotion deep. 8 ITALIAN RHAPSODY XIII Absence from thee is such as men endure Between the glad betrothal and the bride ; Or like the years that Youth, intense and sure, From his ambition to his goal must bide. And if no more I may Mount to Fiesole . . . Oh, then were Memory meant for those to whom is Hope denied. XIV Show me a lover who hath drunk by night Thy beauty-potion, as the grape the dew : T were little wonder he were poet too, With wine of song in unexpected might, While moonlit cloister calls With plashy fountain-falls, Or darkened Arno moves to music with its mirrore light. xv Who can withstand thee? What distress or care But yields to Naples, or that long day-dream We know as Venice, where alone more fair Noon is than night; where every lapping streai ITALIAN RHAPSODY 9 Wooes with a soft caress Our new-world weariness, And every ripple smiles with joy at sight of scene so rare. XVI The mystery of thy charm ah, who hath guessed? T was ne er divined by day or shown in sleep ; Yet sometimes Music, floating from her steep, Holds to our lips a chalice brimmed and blest : Then know we that thou art Of the Ideal part Of Man s one thirst that is not quenched, drink he howe er so deep. XVII Thou human-hearted land, whose revels hold Man in communion with the antique days, And summon him from prosy greed to ways Where Youth is beckoning to the Age of Gold ; How thou dost hold him near And whisper in his ear Of the lost Paradise that lies beyond the alluring haze ! 10 ITALIAN RHAPSODY XVIII In tears I tossed my coin from Trevi s edge, A coin unsordid as a bond of love, And, with the instinct of the homing dove, I gave to Rome my rendezvous and pledge. And when imperious Death Has quenched my flame of breath, Oh, let me join the faithful shades that throng that fount above. II LOVE IN ITALY THEY halted at the terrace wall ; Below, the towered city lay ; The valley in the moonlight s thrall Was silent in a swoon of May. As hand to hand spoke one soft word Beneath the friendly ilex-tree, They knew not, of the flame that stirred, What part was Love, what Italy. They knew what makes the moon more bright Where Beatrice and Juliet are, The sweeter perfume in the night, The lovelier starlight in the star ; And more that glowing hour did prove, Beneath the sheltering ilex-tree, That Italy transfigures Love, As Love transfigures Italy. 12 SALVINI SALVINI "DEAD is old Greece," they mourned ere yet arose This Greek this oak of old Achaian graft Seed-sown where westward tempests wept and laughed, As now when some great gust of heaven blows From lair levantine. How the giant grows! Not to lone ruin of a withered shaft, But quaffing life in every leafy draught, Fathered by Storm and mothered by Repose. Nay, doubt the Greeks are gone till, this green crest In splendor fallen, round the wrack shall be Prolonged, like memories of a noble guest, The phantom glory of the actor s day. Then, musing on Olympus, men shall say The myth of Jove took rise from lesser majesty. THE HOUR OF AWE 13 THE HOUR OF AWE NOT in the five-domed wonder Where the soul of Venice lies, When the sun cleaves the gloom asunder With pathways to Paradise, And the organ s melodious thunder Summons you to the skies ; Not in that rarest hour, When over the Arno s rush The City of Flowers flower Looms in the sunset flush, And the poignant stroke from the tower Pierces the spirit s hush; Not Rome s high vault s devising That builded the heavens in, When you know not the anthem s rising From the song of the cherubin, Where, sight and soul surprising, Dusk utters your dearest sin : 14 THE HOUR OF AWE Not these nor the star-sown splendor, Nor the deep wood s mystery, Nor the sullen storm s surrender To the ranks of the leaping sea, Nor the joy of the springtime tender On Nature s breast to be; But to find in a woman s weeping The look you have longed to find, And know that in Time s safe-keeping, Through all the ages blind, x - Was Love, like a winged seed, sleeping, For you and the waiting wind. TITIAN S TWO LOVES, IN THE BORGHESE 15 TITIAN S TWO LOVES, IN THE BORGHESE ONE forgets not the first dead he sorrowed over; One forgets not the first kiss of the first lover. Not the dust of ages could remembrance cover How in Titian s golden kingdom first I strayed. Oh, that Roman morning s azure, softly sifting Through the gray, the while the rapt eye caught the rifting Of the sun s rich fire where molten mists were drifting, As one looks upon an opal gently swayed. Ah ! but in the palace there was sun more golden ! Art for once to Nature was no more beholden. Man to his beloved had the passion olden Sung in color, and his mighty Love grew Fame. For I guessed, while hotly others were contending Which was Love Divine, that each to each was lending Supplemental graces for a perfect blending That to paint one twofold woman was his aim. l6 TITIAN S TWO LOVES, IN THE BORGHESE One without the other s beauty were but torso : Human needs divine, ah, yes, and maybe more so- By divine is needed. (Singing down the Corso I, elate, enthralled, went, happy just to be!) Yet till thee at last I knew each blended feature Where the two Loves meet in rightly balanced nature - Never had I known a tithe of Titian s creature : God, the master limner, painted both in thee. BROWNING AT ASOLO 17 BROWNING AT ASOLO (INSCRIBED TO HIS FRIEND MRS. ARTHUR BRONSON) THIS is the loggia Browning loved, High on the flank of the friendly town; These are the hills that his keen eye roved, The green like a cataract leaping down To the plain that his pen gave new renown. There to the West what a range of blue ! The very background Titian drew To his peerless Loves. O tranquil scene ! Who than thy poet fondlier knew The peaks and the shore and the lore between? See ! yonder s his Venice the valiant Spire, Highest one of the perfect three, Guarding the others : the Palace choir, The Temple flashing with opal fire Bubble and foam of the sunlit sea. l8 BROWNING AT ASOLO Yesterday he was part of it all Sat here, discerning cloud from snow In the flush of the Alpine afterglow, Or mused on the vineyard whose wine-stirred row Meets in a leafy bacchanal. Listen a moment how oft did he ! To the bells from Fontalto s distant tower Leading the evening in ... ah, me ! Here breathes the whole soul of Italy As one rose breathes with the breath of the bower. Sighs were meant for an hour like this When joy is keen as a thrust of pain. Do you wonder the poet s heart should miss This touch of rapture in Nature s kiss And dream of Asolo ever again? "Part of it yesterday," we moan? Nay, he is part of it now, no fear. What most we love we are that alone. (His body lies under the Minster stone, But the love of the warm heart lingers here. "LA MURA," ASOLO, June 3, 1892. TO ONE WHO NEVER GOT TO ROME 19 TO ONE WHO NEVER GOT TO ROME (EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN) [ON his long-deferred and only trip to Italy Stedman en tered the country from the north for what proved to be a very brief sojourn, for soon after reaching Venice he was suddenly obliged to return to America. It remained his cherished desire to see the Eternal City, and the Roman Committee of the Keats-Shelley Memorial long hoped that he might be present at the proposed dedication of the Keats House, contemplated for the 23d of February, 1908. He died five weeks before that day, when the lines which fol low were written. As the active and devoted Chairman of the American Committee he took a leading part in this project. Probably his last words written for publication on a literary topic were in praise of the two poets, to which he added a transcription from "Ariel," his ode on Shelley.] You who were once bereft of Rome With but the Apennines between, And went no more beyond the foam, But loved your Italy at home As others loved her seen : You knew each old imperial shaft With sculpture laureled to the blue ; Where martyr bled and tyrant laughed ; Where Horace his Falernian quaffed, And where the vintage grew. 20 TO ONE WHO NEVER GOT TO ROME The Forum s half -unopened book You would have pondered well and long ; And loved St. Peter s misty look, With vesper chantings in some nook Of far-receding song. Oft had you caught the silver gleams Of Roman fountains. To your art They add no music. Trevi teems With not more free or bounteous streams Than did your generous heart. I hoped that this Muse-hallowed day Might find your yearning dream come true That you might see the moonlight play On ilex and on palace gray As t were alone for you; That your white age might disappear Within the whiteness of the night, While the late strollers, lending ear To your young joy, would halt and cheer At such a happy wight ; 21 That you, whose toil was never done, Physicianed by the Land of Rest, Might, like a beggar in the sun, Watch idly the green lizard run From out his stony nest; That you, from that high parapet That crowns the graceful Spanish Stairs, (Whose cadence, as to music set, Moving like measured minuet, Would charm your new- world cares), Might see the shrine you helped to save ; And yonder blest of cypresses, That proud above your poets wave. Warder of all our song, you gave What loyalty to these ! The path to Adonais bed, That pilgrims ever smoother wear, Who could than you more fitly tread? Or with more right from Ariel dead The dark acanthus bear? 22 TO ONE WHO NEVER GOT TO ROME Alas ! your footstep could not keep Your fond hope s rendezvous, brave soul ! Yet, if our last thoughts ere we sleep Be couriers across the deep To greet us at the goal, Who knows but now, aloof from ills, The heavenly vision that you see The towers on the sapphire hills, The song, the golden light fulfils Your dream of Italy ! THE SPANISH STAIRS 23 THE SPANISH STAIRS [Ix will be recalled that the house in which Keats died adjoins the Spanish Stairs in Rome. It has been proposed to remove the fountain below them to make room for the tramway in the piazza.] ROME, symbol of all change, oh, change not here ! Thou, ever avid of beauty, who shall say Thou hast forsworn it in a vain display And blare of discord, as though eager ear Listening for nightingale heard chanticleer? Oh, leave these sunny stairs, that float and stray From fountain blithe and flowers rich array To beckoning bells and chanting nuns anear. Of all the dead that loved them, hear that voice Whose sorrow and last silence once they knew, Whose spirit guards them with his flaming theme, The immortal joy of beauty. Oh, rejoice, And stay thy hand : that future ages, too, By them may mount to heaven, like Jacob in his dream. PIAZZA DI SPAGNA, St. Agnes Eve, 1003. 24 THE NAME WRIT IN WATER THE NAME WRIT IN WATER (PIAZZA DI SPAGNA, ROME) The Spirit of the Fountain speaks: YONDER s the window my poet would sit in While my song murmured of happier days ; Mine is the water his name has been writ in, Sure and immortal my share in his praise. Gone are the pilgrims whose green wreaths here hung for him, Gone from their fellows like bubbles from foam ; Long shall outlive them the songs have been sung for him; Mine is eternal or Rome were not Rome. Far on the mountain my fountain was fed for him, Bringing soft sounds that his nature loved best : Sighing of pines that had fain made a bed for him ; Seafaring rills, on their musical quest ; Bells of the fairies at eve, that I rang for him ; Nightingale s glee, he so well understood ; Chant of the dryads at dawn, that I sang for him ; Swish of the snake at the edge of the wood. THE NAME WRIT IN WATER 25 Little he knew twixt his dreaming and sleeping, The while his sick fancy despaired of his fame, What glory I held in my loverly keeping : Listen ! my waters will whisper his name. 26 SPRING AT THE VILLA CONTI SPRING AT THE VILLA CONTI OF Time and Nature still the fairest daughter, Low-voiced Repose! Here thou dost ever dwell, While Fancy wills no more to wander on. With how few simples dost thou steep the sense, Holding in soft suspense, Like pauses in the tolling of a bell, The beauty coming and the beauty gone. Nothing is here but woods and water, Spaces, and stone, and a sculptor s wit Simply to fashion it Into one long line of many niches, Whose fountains are fed by the rushing riches That, bowl to bowl, from the woodland pool Fall in a rhythm clear and strong, Singing to Nature her eldest song, Prattling their paradox restfully restless. O March, with never a moment zestless, Nor the sun too warm nor the shade too cool ! O May and the music of birds now nestless ! Come soon and brood o er the woodland pool ! SPRING AT THE VILLA CONTI 27 (For lover or nightingale who can wait? j Whenever he cometh he cometh late.) ^} The light plays over the ilex green, Turning to silver the somber sheen, And Spring in the heart of the day doth dwell As the thought of a loved one dwells with me, And only three cypresses to tell "This is not Heaven, but Italy." FRASCATI, March, 1903. 28 COMO IN APRIL COMO IN APRIL THE wind is Winter, though the sun be Spring : The icy rills have scarce begun to flow; The birds unconfidently fly and sing. As on the land once fell the northern foe, The hostile mountains from the passes fling Their vandal blasts upon the lake below. Not yet the round clouds of the Maytime cling Above the world s blue wonder s curving show, And tempt to linger with their lingering. Yet doth each slope a vernal promise know: See, mounting yonder, white as angel s wing, A snow of bloom to meet the bloom of snow. Love, need we more than our imagining To make the whole year May? What though The wind be Winter if the heart be Spring? THE VINES THAT MISSED THE BEES (TO COUNT COSIMO RUCELLAI OF FLORENCE WITH A COPY OF HIS ANCESTOR GIOVANNI RUCELLAl s POEM "THE BEES") ONCE, when I saw the tears upon your vines You told me they were "weeping" but for what? I find their secret in your kinsman s lines : They missed the honeyed music he has caught. FLORENCE, April, 1906. 30 THE POET IN THE CHILDREN S EYES THE POET IN THE CHILDREN S EYES TO COUNTESS EDITH RUCELLAI, DESCENDANT OF JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE, IN HER ALBUM, CONTAINING LINES BY BROWNING, LONGFELLOW, LOWELL, AND OTHERS) THOU of a poet s blood, and many a tie Of kin or friendship with the singing race : How shall I dare, without a throb or sigh, Near these lost bards beloved my name to place ! One wish I offer, though with halting fingers : That in thy brood, of eager eyes divine, The poet that within the mother lingers May find a voice worthy the deathless line FLORENCE, April, 1906. FAREWELL TO ITALY FAREWELL TO ITALY WE lingered at Domo d Ossola Like a last, reluctant guest Where the gray-green tide of Italy FloAvs up to a snowy crest. The world from that Alpine shoulder Yearns toward the Lombard plain The hearts that come, with rapture, The hearts that go, with pain. Afar were the frets of Milan ; Below, the enchanted lakes; And was it the mist of the evening, Or the mist that the memory makes? We gave to the pale horizon The Naples that evening gives; We reckoned where Rome lies buried, And AVC felt where Florence lives. FAREWELL TO ITALY And as Hope bends low at parting For a death-remembered tone, We searched the land that Beauty And Love have made their own. We would take of her hair some ringlet, Some keepsake from her breast, And catch of her plaintive music The strain that is tenderest. So we strolled in the yellow gloaming (Our speech with musing still) Till the noise of the militant village Fell faint on Calvary Hill. And scarcely our mood was broken Of near-impending loss To find at the bend of the pathway A station of the Cross. And up through the green aisle climbing (Each shrine like a counted bead), We heard from above the swaying And mystical chant of the creed. Then the dead seemed the only living, And the real seemed the wraith, FAREWELL TO ITALY And we yielded ourselves to the vision We saw with the eye of Faith. Then she said, "Let us go no farther: T is fit that we make farewell While forest and lake and mountain Are under the vesper spell." As we rested, the leafy silence Broke like a cloud at play, And a browned and burdened woman Passed, singing, down the way. T was a song of health and labor, Of childlike gladness, blent With the patience of the toiler That tyrants call content. "Nay, this is the word we have waited," I said, "that a year and a sea From now, in our doom of exile, Shall echo of Italy." Just then what a burst from the bosquet As a bird might have found its soul ! And each by the halt of the heart-throb Knew t was the rossignol. 33 34 FAREWELL TO ITALY Then we drew to each other nearer And drank at the gray wall s verge The sad, sweet song of lovers, Their passion and their dirge. And the carol of Toil below us And the paean of Prayer above Were naught to the song of Sorrow, For under the sorrow was Love. Alas ! for the dear remembrance We chose for an amulet : The one that is left to keep it Ah ! how can he forget ? THE CROWNED REPUBLIC 35 THE CROWNED REPUBLIC FORGIVE us, Italy, who have loved thee long, Daughter of Beauty, Cynosure of Song, That we who knew thee fair should not have known thee strong. For Beauty is no weakling, taking odds From earthly Power and cringing at its nods, But giver of sovereign laws to immemorial gods. She is no mere contriver of design, Of thrilling color or uplifting line; She sings within the soul a music all divine. And when she sets the ardent youth aflame With duty, brooking no unworthy aim, She is but Justice honored by another name. ii We should have read the roster of thy great Who from mismated fragments inchoate The fair mosaic made of thine harmonious state ; Alike in nothing but in love of thee While thou wert yet a dream of Liberty, They gave thee all they were and all they hoped to be: 36 THE CROWNED REPUBLIC He of Savoy, first man and then a king ; He of Caprera, armed with David s sling ; He of Turin, who won with wise imagining ; He of the Tuscan vineyards, firm as steel ; And he of Genoa, priest of the common weal, And he whose voice to Venice was a tocsin-peal. O land for whom thy sons were fain to die As lovers are to live ! No obloquy Their secrets could unlock, their purpose turn awry. In thy deep dungeons Freedom grew to might, Nourished by darkness as the rose by light. Would tyrants conquer Thought : they must abolish Night. Behind the bars where Settembrini dwelt, Beside the chains whose scars Poerio felt, Above the beds bereaved where dauntless women knelt, Thine image, as in Dante s vision, shone The Italy that some day would be one, When alien yoke was cleft and cruel sands were run. in Now, when the old oppressor of thy land Had weakly chosen by his side to stand Who holds the torch and bribe in either treacherous hand, THE CROWNED REPUBLIC 37 Thought they to fright thee by war s awful price, Or silence thee by lure of paradise Thee with thy glorious ancestry of sacrifice? Forgive us, we were over-slow to scan The incredible cunning of the monstrous plan Whereby the spider State has set its web for Man ; But fallen are the scales, and now our heart That with thee stormed the startled Alps, takes part With glad and welcome aid from mint and mine and mart. And, haply, on thy waves our ships may dare The iron shark within his stealthy lair Till the freed seas forget what late was their despair. Oh, fortunate if our torn flag be found Comrade of thine on some embattled ground Thenceforth by Garibaldi s memory made renowned. What name in all thine epic history But his to summon us and trumpet thee Who found his foster land what thou wert born to be! Pillar of cloud and fire, his spirit soar th Above thy eager legions pressing forth And cheers them on to save their brothers of the North. O Crowned Republic, let us be of those Who know and conquer all the people s foes Without, within that dare the gates of Freedom close. June 8, 1917. THE WISTFUL DAYS. What is there wanting in the spring? The air is soft as yesteryear ; The happy-nested green is here, And half the world is on the wing. The morning beckons, and like balm Are westward waters blue and calm. Yet something s wanting in the spring. What is it wanting in the spring ? O, April, lover to us all, What is so poignant in thy thrall When children s merry voices ring ? What haunts us in the cooing dove More subtle than the speech of love, What nameless lack or loss of spring ? Let youth go dally with the spring. Call her the dear, the fair, the young ; And all her graces ever sung Let him, once more rehearsing, sing. They know, who keep a broken tryst. Till something from the spring be missed We have not truly known the spring. Robert Underwood Johnson. B< XLi V JldN JUN V* 1 JLULiN (M Jit New England voice was beat and sympathy aspect of firr. He was a mar and of democj was without had any vanij out of him <bj was subjected the case of the , newspapers-J the World a ara dises of a Pi -JnpicI sip uos IrAi ssd- "U XnBO MTW OT^TIC rings of gold, they shall attire themselves with green robes, of satin and well-spun silk. " In turn they shall be offered basin.- ol gold and goblets filled with the desire ol the senses, things which delight the eye. " Wonderful shall be their reward, ad mirable their place of rest. "As I listened to this promise I plucked from the grass one of the jewelled vases which decked the earth ; and then I iearned that the yellow tulip of Persia has the scent and color of autumn pears^ Here, yeu see, is no traveler .Intent upon filling a notebook with more or less in- the quiet aban fall in ruin, to crown the a halo of lighi "Each ever Sultan Bajazc to his seraglio to the hands of the dust of "Xow this d garments and ing treated lik was swept tc Sultan s pages to His Majest; Robert E. Rogers iWhen a considerable time elapses between a i . * in the public service, ar it believed to be in the welfare." He was co-founder movement to make the 1 ment, perhaps one of achievements. Designated Poet Laureate of Amer In a word, he was { American school, moi you know what I m<" His poetry, copious was of the old class and often unintellig poet with hardly s\ ings. He was a mer contemporary, Aldei once called in his Age of American L And to sum it by a fellow critic, T of pleasure, and wh called him the Poet He left a strong deep perhaps, sine flow more rapidly place too rapidly summed perfectly and development meant to tfiis coun AUSTRO-GERMAN CUSTOMS UNION ROUSES EUROPE Vienna Urges Others to Join as Answer to Protests on Plan. CZECHS VIOLENTLY OPPOSED Briand Starts Inquiry Into Move Curtius Sees Envoys in Drive for Approval. By \HIT BURXETT. Special Cable Dispatch to THE Sex. Copyright, 1931, by Tlie New York Sun Foreign Service. VIENNA, March 23. The declara tion by Germany and Austria of their willingness to create a customs agreement between themselves and invite other nations to join-thus making a sort of European union in line with Aristide Briand s idea, but with its initiative centers in central TTI,... ,,, +^/iair tVio most discussed A MADRIGAL OF ASPETOOK. Call it river or call it brook, Give me the shady Aspetook! Far-heard within the Summer hush, The music of its prattling rush Robs not the valley of repose; And whether it pauses or whether it flows, It makes a never-ceasing call To the urchins of dreamy Merryall. The boy in wild-grape-scented June Through open windows hears the tune, And, caught in the thrall of Aspe took, ForUonging cannot see his book; His hope plays truant to his fear. Seasons there are for sled and ball, But Aspetook through all the year Beckons the boys of Merryall. Past the thick refuge of the deer, Yet within sound of chanticleer, Through green-arched tunnels of de light It breaks into the sunny air To greet the bathers of "Monverre"; Then hurries round the rocks In flight, As though the world were waiting all For news of drowsy Merryall! Some day my feet will follow down Its gentler current toward the sea, To find its merge by Milford town Where calms of Housatonic be. Today I ll mount through shade and gleam, Wade my cool way against the stream, And challenge every swirl and fall Of Aspetook to Merryall. ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON. 20234 A 000 688 999 " SERVICES TODAY" FOR DR. JOHNSON Dr. F. H. Berg to Officiate at Rites in New York University Chapel in the Bronx MANY LEADERS TO ATTEND Mayor La Guardia, Dr. Butler, Gov. Cross and Dr. Phelps Among Those on List Distinguished representatives of the arts and of letters, public offi cials and educators will attend the funeral service today at 4 P. M. for Robert Underwood Johnson, poet and director of the Hall of Fame, in the chapel of New York Uni versity, University Heights, at 181st Street, the Bronx. Burial will be at 12:45 P. M. tomorrow at Stock- bridge, Mass. Dr. Irving Husted Berg, New York University chaplain and dean of the College of Arts and Pure Science, will officiate at the serv ice. Dr. John H. Finley, editor of THB NKW YORK TIMES, a friend of Dr. Johnson, will read a poem by Alexander Pope, which Dr. John son requested be read at his fu neral service. Honorary pallbearers and the in stitutions they represent will be: Academy of Arts and Letters, Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler, Governor Wilbur L. Cross of Connecticut, Charles Downer Hazen, Dr. Wil liam Lyon Phelps, Royal Cortissoz, Herbert Adams, Archer M. Hunt- , Ington and Adolph A. Weinman. ; National Institute of Arts and Let- :ers. Dr. Walter Damrosch, Henry J 3. Canby, Arthur Train and Harri- lon S. Morris. New York Uni versity, Chancellor Harry Wood- mrn Chase and Finley J. Shepard. Among those expected to attend the services are : Mayor La Guardia, Robert I. Aitken, Maxwell Ander son, Chester Beach, Gifford Beal, Stephen Vincent Beaet, William Rose Benet, Robert Bridges, How ard Brockway, George Elmer Brown, Owen Da via, William A. Delano, John Erskine, Barry Faulk ner, John Flanagan, William J. Glackens, John Gregory, Albert L. Groll, Jules Guerin, Clayton Hamil ton, Brian Hooker, Philip James. Also Carl Paul Jennewein, John C. Johansen, William Mitchell Ken dall, Leon Kroll, Lee Lawrie, Ernest Lawson, Walter Lippmann, DeWitt Lockman, Hermon A. Mac- Neil Paul Manship, Edward Mc- Cartan, Ernest C. Peixotto, Ernest Pool, Ernest David Roth, F. Well ington Ruckstull, Ernest Schelling, Harry Rowe Shelley, John Sloan, Eugene Speicher, Albert Sterner, Albert Stoessel, Whitney Warren, Harry W. Watrous, Irvin R. Wiles, Ezra Winter and Mahonri M. Young. Also the Misses Cecilia Beaux, Rachel Crothers, and Edna Ferber, and Mrs. Jffhn C. Johansen and Mrs. Bessie Boxinoh. Faculty, student, alumni and ad ministrative representatives of the university ajso will attend. Dr. Johnson died on Thursday in his home" at 327 Lexington Avenue. He was 84 years old.