Chapter III

O glass subtly evil, O confusion of colours!
O light bound and bent in, O soul of the captive,
Why am I warned? Why am I sent away?
Why is your glitter full of curious mistrust?
O glass subtle and cunning, O powdery gold!
O filaments of amber, two-faced iridescence!

Ite

Go, my songs, seek your praise from the young and from the intolerant,
Move among the lovers of perfection alone.
Seek ever to stand in the hard Sophoclean light
And take your wounds from it gladly.

Dum Capitolium Scandet

How many will come after me
singing as well as I sing, none better;
Telling the heart of their truth
as I have taught them to tell it;
Fruit of my seed,
O my unnameable children.

Know then that I loved you from afore-time,
Clear speakers, naked in the sun, untrammelled.

To καλὀν

Even in my dreams you have denied yourself to me
And sent me only your handmaids.

The Study in Aesthetics

The very small children in patched clothing,
Being smitten with an unusual wisdom,
Stopped in their play as she passed them
And cried up from their cobbles:
_Guarda! Ahi, guarda! ch’ è be’a!_[A]

But three years after this
I heard the young Dante, whose last name I do not know--
For there are, in Sirmione, twenty-eight young
Dantes and thirty-four Catulli;

And there had been a great catch of sardines,
And his elders
Were packing them in the great wooden boxes
For the market in Brescia, and he
Leapt about, snatching at the bright fish
And getting in both of their ways;
And in vain they commanded him to _sta fermo!_
And when they would not let him arrange
The fish in the boxes
He stroked those which were already arranged,
Murmuring for his own satisfaction
This identical phrase:
_Ch’ è be’a._

And at this I was mildly abashed.

[A] _Bella._

The Bellaires

RIGHT
_Aus meinen grossen Schmerzen_
_Mach’ ich die kleinen Lieder._

The good Bellaires
Do not understand the conduct of this world’s affairs.
In fact they understood them so badly
That they have had to cross the Channel.

Nine lawyers, four counsels, five judges and three proctors of the King,
Together with the respective wives, husbands, sisters
and heterogeneous connections of the good Bellaires,
Met to discuss their affairs;
But the good Bellaires have so little understood their affairs
That now there is no one at all
Who can understand any affair of theirs. Yet
Fourteen hunters still eat in the stables of
The good Squire Bellaire;
But these may not suffer attainder,
For they may not belong to the good Squire Bellaire
But to his wife.
On the contrary, if they do not belong to his wife,
He will plead
A “freedom from attainder”
For twelve horses and also for twelve boarhounds
From Charles the Fourth;
And a further freedom for the remainder
Of horses, from Henry the Fourth.
But the judges,
Being free of mediæval scholarship,
Will pay no attention to this,
And there will be only the more confusion,
Replevin, estoppel, espavin and what not.

Nine lawyers, four counsels, etc.,
Met to discuss their affairs,
But the sole result was bills
From lawyers to whom no one was indebted,
And even the lawyers
Were uncertain who was supposed to be indebted to them.

Wherefore the good Squire Bellaire
Resides now at Agde and Biaucaire.
To Carcassonne, Pui, and Alais
He fareth from day to day,
Or takes the sea air
Between Marseilles
And Beziers.

And for all this I have considerable regret,
For the good Bellaires
Are very charming people.

Salvationists

I

Come, my songs, let us speak of perfection--
We shall get ourselves rather disliked.

II

Ah yes, my songs, let us resurrect
The very excellent term _Rusticus_.
Let us apply it in all its opprobrium
To those to whom it applies.
And you may decline to make them immortal.
For we shall consider them and their state
In delicate
Opulent silence.

III

Come, my songs,
Let us take arms against this sea of stupidities--
Beginning with Mumpodorus;
And against this sea of vulgarities--
Beginning with Nimmim;
And against this sea of imbeciles--
All the Bulmenian literati.

Arides

The bashful Arides
Has married an ugly wife,
He was bored with his manner of life,
Indifferent and discouraged he thought he might as
Well do this as anything else.

Saying within his heart, “I am no use to myself,
Let her, if she wants me, take me.”
He went to his doom.

The Bath Tub

As a bathtub lined with white porcelain,
When the hot water gives out or goes tepid,
So is the slow cooling of our chivalrous passion,
O my much praised but-not-altogether-satisfactory lady.

Amitiés

RIGHT
_Old friends the most._
W. B. Y.

I

_To one, on returning certain years after._

You wore the same quite correct clothing,
You took no pleasure at all in my triumphs,
You had the same old air of condescension
Mingled with a curious fear
That I, myself, might have enjoyed them.

_Te voilà, mon Bourrienne_, you also shall be immortal.

II

_To another._

And we say good-bye to you also,
For you seem never to have discovered
That your relationship is wholly parasitic;
Yet to our feasts you bring neither
Wit, nor good spirits, nor the pleasing attitudes
Of discipleship.

III

But you, _bos amic_, we keep on,
For to you we owe a real debt:
In spite of your obvious flaws,
You once discovered a moderate chop-house.