INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP.

I.

You know, we French stormed Ratisbon:

A mile or so away,

On a little mound, Napoleon

Stood on our storming-day;

With neck out-thrust, you fancy how,

Legs wide, arms locked behind, As if to balance the prone brow Oppressive with its mind.

II.

Just as perhaps he mused 'My plans
That soar, to earth may fall,
Let once my army-leader Lannes
Waver at yonder wall,—'

Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew
A rider, bound on bound

Full-galloping; nor bridle drew

Until he reached the mound.

III.

Then off there flung in smiling joy,

And held himself erect

By just his horse's mane, a boy:
You hardly could suspect-
(So tight he kept his lips compressed,

Scarce any blood came through)

You looked twice ere you saw his breast

Was all but shot in two.

IV.

'Well,' cried he, 'Emperor, by God's grace

We've got you Ratisbon!

The Marshal's in the market-place,

And you'll be there anon

To see your flag-bird flap his vans

Where I, to heart's desire,

Perched him!' The chief's eye flashed; his plans

Soared up again like fire.

V.

The chief's eye flashed; but presently
Softened itself, as sheathes

A film the mother-eagle's eye

When her bruised eaglet breathes. 'You're wounded!' 'Nay,' the soldier's pride Touched to the quick, he said:

'I'm killed, Sire!' And his chief beside, Smiling the boy fell dead.

TWO IN THE CAMPAGNA.

I.

I wonder do you feel to-day

As I have felt since, hand in hand, We sat down on the grass, to stray In spirit better through the land, This morn of Rome and May?

II.

For me, I touched a thought, I know,
Has tantalized me many times,
(Like turns of thread the spiders throw
Mocking across our path) for rhymes
To catch at and let go.

III.

Help me to hold it! First it left

The yellowing fennel, run to seed

There, branching from the brickwork's cleft,

Some old tomb's ruin yonder weed

:

Took up the floating weft,

IV.

Where one small orange cup amassed

Five beetles,-blind and green they grope,

Among the honey-meal and last,

Everywhere on the grassy slope,

I traced it. Hold it fast!

V.

The champaign with its endless fleece
Of feathery grasses everywhere!
Silence and passion, joy and peace,
An everlasting wash of air-
Rome's ghost since her decease.

VI.

Such life here, through such lengths of hours,
Such miracles performed in play,

Such primal naked forms of flowers,
Such letting nature have her way
While heaven looks from its towers!

VII.

How say you? Let us, O my dove,
Let us be unashamed of soul,
As earth lies bare to heaven above!
How is it under our control

To love or not to love?

VIII.

I would that you were all to me,
You that are just so much, no more.
Nor yours nor mine, nor slave nor free!
Where does the fault lie? What the core
O' the wound, since wound must be?

IX.

I would I could adopt your will,

See with your eyes, and set my heart Beating by yours, and drink my fill

At your soul's springs,-your part my part In life, for good and ill.

X

No. I yearn upward, touch you close,
Then stand away. I kiss your cheek,
Catch your soul's warmth,-I pluck the rose
And love it more than tongue can speak-
Then the good minute goes.

XI.

Already how am I so far

Out of that minute? Must I go
Still like the thistle-ball, no bar,

Onward, whenever light winds blow,
Fixed by no friendly star?

XII.

Just when I seemed about to learn!
Where is the thread now? Off again.
The old trick! Only I discern-

Infinite passion, and the pain
of finite hearts that yearn.

(1855.)

UP AT A VILLA-DOWN IN THE CITY.

(As distinguished by an Italian Person of quality.)

I.

Had I but plenty of money, money enough and to spare,
The house for me, no doubt, were a house in the city-square ;
Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads at the window there!

II.

Something to see, by Bacchus, something to hear, at least!
There, the whole day long, one's life is a perfect feast;

While up at a villa one lives, I maintain it, no more than a beast.

III.

Well now, look at our villa! stuck like the horn of a bull
Just on a mountain edge as bare as the creature's skull,
Save a mere shag of a bush with hardly a leaf to pull !
-I scratch my own, sometimes, to see if the hair's turned wool.

IV.

But the city, oh the city-the square with the houses! Why? They are stone-faced, white as a curd, there's something to take

the eye!

Houses in four straight lines, not a single front awry;

You watch who crosses and gossips, who saunters, who hurries by ; Green blinds, as a matter of course, to draw when the sun gets

high;

And the shops with fanciful signs which are painted properly.

V.

What of a villa? though winter be over in March by rights, 'Tis May perhaps ere the snow shall have withered well off the

heights:

You've the brown ploughed land before, where the oxen steam and wheeze,

And the hills over-smoked behind by the faint grey olive-trees.

VI.

Is it better in May, I ask you? You've summer all at once;
In a day he leaps complete with a few strong April suns.
'Mid the sharp short emerald wheat, scarce arisen three fingers well,
The wild tulip, at end of its tube, blows out its great red bell
Like a thin clear bubble of blood, for the children to pick and sell.

VII.

Is it ever hot in the square? There's a fountain to spout and

splash!

In the shade it sings and springs; in the shine such foam-bows

flash

On the horses with curling fish-tails, that prance and paddle

and pash

Round the lady atop in her conch-fifty gazers do not abash, Though all that she wears is some weeds round her waist in a sort of sash.

VIII.

All the year long at the villa, nothing to see though you linger, Except yon cypress that points like death's lean lifted forefinger. Some think fireflies pretty, when they mix i' the corn and mingle, Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks of it seem a-tingle. Late August or early September, the stunning cicala is shrill, And the bees keep their tiresome whine round the resinous firs on the hill.

Enough of the seasons,-I spare you the months of the fever and chill.