Chapter X (7)

Said Ann to Matilda, "I wish that we knew
If what we've been reading of fairies be true.
Do you think that the poet himself had a sight of
The fairies he here does so prettily write of?
O what a sweet sight if he really had seen
The graceful Titania, the Fairy-land Queen!
If I had such dreams, I would sleep a whole year;
I would not wish to wake while a fairy was near.--
Now I'll fancy that I in my sleep have been seeing
A fine little delicate lady-like being,
Whose steps and whose motions so light were and airy,
I knew at one glance that she must be a fairy.
Her eyes they were blue, and her fine curling hair
Of the lightest of browns, her complexion more fair
Than I e'er saw a woman's; and then for her height,
I verily think that she measur'd not quite
Two feet, yet so justly proportion'd withal,
I was almost persuaded to think she was tall.
Her voice was the little thin note of a sprite--
There--d'ye think I have made out a fairy aright?
You'll confess, I believe, I've not done it amiss."
"Pardon me," said Matilda, "I find in all this
Fine description, you've only your young sister Mary
Been taking a copy of here for a fairy."

CONQUEST OF PREJUDICE

Unto a Yorkshire school was sent
A Negro youth to learn to write,
And the first day young Juba went
All gaz'd on him as a rare sight.

But soon with alter'd looks askance
They view his sable face and form,
When they perceive the scornful glance
Of the head boy, young Henry Orme.

He in the school was first in fame:
Said he, "It does to me appear
To be a great disgrace and shame
A black should be admitted here."

His words were quickly whisper'd round,
And every boy now looks offended;
The master saw the change, and found
That Orme a mutiny intended.

Said he to Orme, "This African
It seems is not by you approv'd;
I'll find a way, young Englishman,
To have this prejudice remov'd.

"Nearer acquaintance possibly
May make you tolerate his hue;
At least 'tis my intent to try
What a short month may chance to do."

Young Orme and Juba then he led
Into a room, in which there were
For each of the two boys a bed,
A table, and a wicker chair.

He lock'd them in, secur'd the key,
That all access to them was stopt;
They from without can nothing see;
Their food is through a sky-light dropt.

A month in this lone chamber Orme
Is sentenc'd during all that time
To view no other face or form
Than Juba's parch'd by Afric clime.

One word they neither of them spoke
The first three days of the first week;
On the fourth day the ice was broke;
Orme was the first that deign'd to speak.

The dreary silence o'er, both glad
To hear of human voice the sound,
The Negro and the English lad
Comfort in mutual converse found.

Of ships and seas, and foreign coast,
Juba can speak, for he has been
A voyager: and Orme can boast
He London's famous town has seen.

In eager talk they pass the day,
And borrow hours ev'n from the night;
So pleasantly time past away,
That they have lost their reckoning quite.

And when their master set them free,
They thought a week was sure remitted,
And thank'd him that their liberty
Had been before the time permitted.

Now Orme and Juba are good friends;
The school, by Orme's example won,
Contend who most shall make amends
For former slights to Afric's son.

THE GREAT GRANDFATHER

My father's grandfather lives still,
His age is fourscore years and ten;
He looks a monument of time,
The agedest of aged men.

Though years lie on him like a load,
A happier man you will not see
Than he, whenever he can get
His great grand-children on his knee.

When we our parents have displeas'd,
He stands between us as a screen;
By him our good deeds in the sun,
Our bad ones in the shade are seen.

His love's a line that's long drawn out,
Yet lasteth firm unto the end;
His heart is oak, yet unto us
It like the gentlest reed can bend.

A fighting soldier he has been--
Yet by his manners you would guess,
That he his whole long life had spent
In scenes of country quietness.

His talk is all of things long past,
For modern facts no pleasure yield--
Of the fam'd year of forty-five,
Of William, and Culloden's field.

The deeds of this eventful age,
Which princes from their thrones have hurl'd,
Can no more interest wake in him
Than stories of another world.

When I his length of days revolve,
How like a strong tree he hath stood,
It brings into my mind almost
Those patriarchs old before the flood.

THE SPARTAN BOY

When I the memory repeat
Of the heroic actions great,
Which, in contempt of pain and death,
Were done by men who drew their breath
In ages past, I find no deed
That can in fortitude exceed
The noble Boy, in Sparta bred,
Who in the temple minist'red.

By the sacrifice he stands,
The lighted incense in his hands.
Through the smoking censer's lid
Dropp'd a burning coal, which slid
Into his sleeve, and passed in
Between the folds ev'n to the skin.
Dire was the pain which then he prov'd;
But not for this his sleeve he mov'd,
Or would the scorching ember shake
Out from the folds, lest it should make
Any confusion, or excite
Disturbance at the sacred rite.
But close he kept the burning coal,
Till it eat itself a hole
In his flesh. The slanders by
Saw no sign, and heard no cry,
Of his pangs had no discerning,
Till they smell'd the flesh aburning
All this he did in noble scorn,
And for he was a Spartan born.

Young student, who this story readest,
And with the same thy thoughts now feedest,
Thy weaker nerves might thee forbid
To do the thing the Spartan did;
Thy feebler heart could not sustain
Such dire extremity of pain.
But in this story thou mayst see,
What may useful prove to thee.
By his example thou wilt find,
That to the ingenuous mind
Shame can greater anguish bring
Than the body's suffering;
That pain is not the worst of ills,
Not when it the body kills;
That in fair religion's cause,
For thy country, or the laws,
When occasion due shall offer
'Tis reproachful _not to suffer._
If thou shouldst a soldier be,
And a wound should trouble thee,
If without the soldier's fame
Thou to chance shouldst owe a maim,
Do not for a little pain
On thy manhood bring a stain;
But to keep thy spirits whole,
Think on the Spartan and the _coal._

QUEEN ORIANA'S DREAM

(_Text of 1818_)

On a bank with roses shaded,
Whose sweet scent the violets aided,
Violets whose breath alone
Yields but feeble smell or none,
(Sweeter bed Jove ne'er repos'd on
When his eyes Olympus closed on,)
While o'er head six slaves did hold
Canopy of cloth o' gold,
And two more did music keep,
Which might Juno lull to sleep,
Oriana who was queen
To the mighty Tamerlane,
That was lord of all the land
Between Thrace and Samarchand,
While the noon-tide fervor beam'd,
Mused herself to sleep, and _dream'd_.

Thus far, in magnific strain,
A young poet sooth'd his vein,
But he had nor prose nor numbers
To express a princess' slumbers.--
Youthful Richard had strange fancies,
Was deep versed in old romances,
And could talk whole hours upon
The great Cham and Prester John,--
Tell the field in which the Sophi
From the Tartar won a trophy--
What he read with such delight of,
Thought he could as eas'ly write of--
But his over-young invention
Kept not pace with brave intention.
Twenty suns did rise and set,
And he could no further get;
But, unable to proceed,
Made a virtue out of need,
And, his labours wiselier deem'd of,
Did omit _what the queen dream'd of._

ON A PICTURE OF THE FINDING OF MOSES BY PHARAOH'S DAUGHTER

This Picture does the story express
Of Moses in the Bulrushes.
How livelily the painter's hand
By colours makes us understand!

Moses that little infant is.
This figure is his sister. This
Fine stately lady is no less
A personage than a princess,
Daughter of Pharaoh, Egypt's king;
Whom Providence did hither bring
This little Hebrew child to save.
See how near the perilous wave
He lies exposed in the ark,
His rushy cradle, his frail bark!
Pharaoh, king of Egypt land,
In his greatness gave command
To his slaves, they should destroy
Every new-born Hebrew boy.
This Moses was an Hebrew's son.
When he was born, his birth to none
His mother told, to none reveal'd,
But kept her goodly child conceal'd.
Three months she hid him; then she wrought
With Bulrushes this ark, and brought
Him in it to this river's side,
Carefully looking far and wide
To see that no Egyptian eye
Her ark-hid treasure should espy.
Among the river-flags she lays
The child. Near him his sister stays.
We may imagine her affright,
When the king's daughter is in sight.
Soon the princess will perceive
The ark among the flags, and give
Command to her attendant maid
That its contents shall be display'd.
Within the ark the child is found,
And now he utters mournful sound.
Behold he weeps, as if he were
Afraid of cruel Egypt's heir!
She speaks, she says, "This little one
I will protect, though he the son
Be of an Hebrew." Every word
She speaks is by the sister heard.
And now observe, this is the part
The painter chose to show his art.
Look at the sister's eager eye,
As here she seems advancing nigh.
Lowly she bends, says, "Shall I go
And call a nurse to thee? I know
A Hebrew woman liveth near,
Great lady, shall I bring her here?"
See! Pharaoh's daughter answers, "Go."--
No more the painter's art can show.
He cannot make his figures move.--
On the light wings of swiftest love
The girl will fly to bring the mother
To be the nurse, she'll bring no other.
To her will Pharaoh's daughter say,
"Take this child from me away:
For wages nurse him. To my home
At proper age this child may come.
When to our palace he is brought,
Wise masters shall for him be sought
To train him up, befitting one
I would protect as my own son.
And Moses be a name unto him,
Because I from the waters drew him."

DAVID

It is not always to the strong
Victorious battle shall belong.
This found Goliath huge and tall:
Mightiest giant of them all,
Who in the proud Philistian host
Defied Israel with boast.

With loud voice Goliath said:
"Hear, armed Israel, gathered,
And in array against us set:
Ye shall alone by me be met.
For am not I a Philistine?
What strength may be compar'd to mine?

"Chuse ye a man of greatest might:
And if he conquer me in fight,
Then we will all servants be,
King of Israel, unto thee.
But if I prove the victor, then
Shall Saul and all his armed men
Bend low beneath Philistian yoke."
Day by day these words he spoke,
Singly traversing the ground.
But not an Israelite was found
To combat man to man with him,
Who such prodigious force of limb
Display'd. Like to a weaver's beam
The pond'rous spear he held did seem.
In height six cubits he did pass,
And he was arm'd all o'er in brass.

Him we will leave awhile--and speak
Of one, the soft down on whose cheek
Of tender youth the tokens bare.
Ruddy he was and very fair.
David, the son of Jesse he,
Small-siz'd, yet beautiful to see.
Three brothers had he in the band
Of warriors under Saul's command;
Himself at home did private keep
In Bethlem's plains his father's sheep.

Jesse said to this his son:
"David, to thy brothers run,
Where in the camp they now abide,
And learn what of them may betide.
These presents for their captains take,
And of their fare inquiries make."
With joy the youth his sire obey'd.--
David was no whit dismay'd
When he arrived at the place
Where he beheld the strength and face
Of dread Goliath, and could hear
The challenge. Of the people near
Unmov'd he ask'd, what should be done
To him who slew that boasting one,
Whose words such mischiefs did forebode
To th' armies of the living God?

"The king," they unto David say,
"Most amply will that man repay,
He and his father's house shall be
Evermore in Israel free.
With mighty wealth Saul will endow
That man: and he has made a vow;
Whoever takes Goliath's life,
Shall have Saul's daughter for his wife."

His eldest brother, who had heard
His question, was to anger stirr'd
Against the youth: for (as he thought)
Things out of his young reach he sought.
Said he, "What mov'd thee to come here,
To question warlike men? say, where
And in whose care are those few sheep,
That in the wilderness you keep?
I know thy thoughts, how proud thou art:
In the naughtiness of thy heart,
Hoping a battle thou mayst see,
Thou comest hither down to me."

Then answer'd Jesse's youngest son
In these words: "What have I done?
Is there not cause?" Some there which heard,
And at the manner of his word
Admir'd, report this to the king.
By his command they David bring
Into his presence. Fearless then,
Before the king and his chief men,
He shews his confident design
To combat with the Philistine.
Saul with wonder heard the youth,
And thus address'd him: "Of a truth,
No pow'r thy untried sinew hath
To cope with this great man of Gath."

Lowly David bow'd his head,
And with firm voice the stripling said:
"Thy servant kept his father's sheep.--
Rushing from a mountain steep
There came a lion, and a bear,
The firstlings of my flock to tear.
Thy servant hath that lion kill'd,
And kill'd that bear, when from the field
Two young lambs by force they seiz'd.
The Lord was mercifully pleas'd
Me to deliver from the paw
Of the fierce bear, and cruel jaw
Of the strong lion. I shall slay
Th' unrighteous Philistine this day,
If God deliver him also
To me." He ceas'd. The king said, "Go:
Thy God, the God of Israel, be
In the battle still with thee."

David departs, unarmed, save
A staff in hand he chanc'd to have.
Nothing to the fight he took,
Save five smooth stones from out a brook;
These in his shepherd's scrip he plac'd,
That was fasten'd round his waist.
With staff and sling alone he meets
The armed giant, who him greets
With nought but scorn. Looking askance
On the fair ruddy countenance
Of his young enemy--"Am I
A dog, that thou com'st here to try
Thy strength upon me with a staff--?"
Goliath said with scornful laugh.
"Thou com'st with sword, with spear, with shield,
Yet thou to me this day must yield.
The Lord of Hosts is on my side,
Whose armies boastful thou'st defied.
All nations of the earth shall hear
He saveth not with shield and spear."

Thus David spake, and nigher went,
Then chusing from his scrip, he sent
Out of his slender sling a stone.--
The giant utter'd fearful moan.
The stone though small had pierced deep
Into his forehead, endless sleep
Giving Goliath--and thus died
Of Philistines the strength and pride.

DAVID IN THE CAVE OF ADULLAM

(_Text of 1818_)

David and his three captains bold
Kept ambush once within a hold.
It was in Adullam's cave,
Nigh which no water they could have,
Nor spring, nor running brook was near
To quench the thirst that parch'd them there.
Then David, king of Israel,
Strait bethought him of a well,
Which stood beside the city gate,
At Bethlem; where, before his state
Of kingly dignity, he had
Oft drunk his fill, a shepherd lad;
But now his fierce Philistine foe
Encamp'd before it he does know.
Yet ne'er the less, with heat opprest,
Those three bold captains he addrest,
And wish'd that one to him would bring
Some water from his native spring.
His valiant captains instantly
To execute his will did fly.
The mighty Three the ranks broke through
Of armed foes, and water drew
For David, their beloved king,
At his own sweet native spring.
Back through their armed foes they haste,
With the hard earn'd treasure graced.
But when the good king David found
What they had done, he on the ground
The water pour'd. "Because," said he,
"That it was at the jeopardy
Of your three lives this thing ye did,
That I should drink it, God forbid."

THREE POEMS NOT IN _POETRY FOR CHILDREN_

SUMMER FRIENDS

The Swallow is a summer bird;
He in our chimneys, when the weather
Is fine and warm, may then be heard
Chirping his notes for weeks together.

Come there but one cold wintry day,
Away will fly our guest the Swallow:
And much like him we find the way
Which many a gay young friend will follow.

In dreary days of snow and frost
Closer to Man will cling the Sparrow:
Old friends, although in life we're crost,
Their hearts to us will never narrow.

Give me the bird--'give me the friend--
Will sing in frost--will love in sorrow--
Whate'er mischance to-day may send,
Will greet me with his sight to-morrow.

A BIRTH-DAY THOUGHT

Can I, all gracious Providence!
Can I deserve thy care:
Ah! no; I've not the least pretence
To bounties which I share.

Have I not been defended still
From dangers and from death;
Been safe preserv'd from ev'ry ill
E'er since thou gav'st me breath?

I live once more to see the day
That brought me first to light;
Oh! teach my willing heart the way
To take thy mercies right!

Tho' dazzling splendour, pomp, and show,
My fortune has denied,
Yet more than grandeur can bestow,
Content hath well supplied.

I envy no one's birth or fame,
Their titles, train, or dress;
Nor has my pride e'er stretched its aim
Beyond what I possess.

I ask and wish not to appear
More beauteous, rich, or gay:
Lord, make me wiser every year,
And better every day.

THE BOY, THE MOTHER, AND THE BUTTERFLY

[1827]

Young William held the Butterfly in chase,
And it was pretty to observe the race
Betwixt the Fly and Child, who nigh had caught him
But for a merry jest his Mother taught him.
"My valiant Huntsman, fie!" she said, "for shame,
You are too big a match for so small game,
To catch the Hare, or nimble Squirrel try,
Remember, William, He is BUT A FLY."

Not always is Humanity imprest
By serious schooling; a light word or jest
Will sometimes leave a moral sting behind
When graver lessons vanish out of mind.

PRINCE DORUS

OR

FLATTERY PUT OUT OF COUNTENANCE

A POETICAL VERSION OF AN ANCIENT TALK

In days of yore, as Ancient Stories tell,
A King in love with a great Princess fell.
Long at her feet submiss the Monarch sigh'd,
While she with stern repulse his suit denied.
Yet was he form'd by birth to please the fair,
Dress'd, danc'd, and courted with a Monarch's air;
But Magic Spells her frozen breast had steel'd
With stubborn pride, that knew not how to yield.

This to the King' a courteous Fairy told,
And bade the Monarch in his suit be bold;
For he that would the charming Princess wed,
Had only on her cat's black tail to tread,
When straight the Spell would vanish into air,
And he enjoy for life the yielding fair.

He thank'd the Fairy for her kind advice.--
Thought he, "If this be all, I'll not be nice;
Rather than in my courtship I will fail
I will to mince-meat tread Minon's black tail."

To the Princess's court repairing strait,
He sought the cat that must decide his fate;
But when he found her, how the creature stared!
How her back bristled, and her great eyes glared!
That [tail] which he so fondly hop'd his prize,
Was swell'd by wrath to twice its usual size;
And all her cattish gestures plainly spoke
She thought the affair he came upon, no joke.
With wary step the cautious King draws near,
And slyly means to attack her in her rear;
But when he thinks upon her tail to pounce,
Whisk--off she skips--three yards upon a bounce--
Again he tries, again his efforts fail--
Minon's a witch--the deuce is in her tail--

The anxious chase for weeks the Monarch tried,
Till courage fail'd, and hope within him died.
A desperate suit 'twas useless to prefer,
Or hope to catch a tail of quicksilver.--
When on a day, beyond his hopes, he found
Minon, his foe, asleep upon the ground;
Her ample tail behind her lay outspread,
Full to the eye, and tempting to the tread.
The King with rapture the occasion bless'd.
And with quick foot the fatal part he press'd.
Loud squalls were heard, like howlings of a storm,
And sad he gazed on Minon's altered form,--
No more a cat, but chang'd into a man
Of giant size, who frown'd, and thus began:

"Rash King, that dared with impious design
To violate that tail, that once was mine;
What though the spell be broke, and burst the charms,
That kept the Princess from thy longing arms,--
Not unrevenged shall thou my fury dare,
For by that violated tail I swear,
From your unhappy nuptials shall be born
A Prince, whose Nose shall be thy subjects' scorn.
Bless'd in his love thy son shall never be,
Till he his foul deformity shall see,
Till he with tears his blemish shall confess,
Discern its odious length, and wish it less!"

This said, he vanish'd; and the King awhile
Mused at his words, then answer'd with a smile
"Give me a child in happy wedlock born,
And let his Nose be made like a French horn;
His knowledge of the fact I ne'er can doubt,--
If he have eyes, or hands, he'll find it out."

So spake the King, self-flatter'd in his thought,
Then with impatient step the Princess sought.
His urgent suit no longer she withstands,
But links with him in Hymen's knot her hands.

Almost as soon a widow as a bride,
Within a year the King her husband died;
And shortly after he was dead and gone,
She was deliver'd of a little son,
The prettiest babe, with lips as red as rose,
And eyes like little stars--but such a nose--
The tender Mother fondly took the boy
Into her arms, and would have kiss'd her joy;
His luckless nose forbade the fond embrace--
He thrust the hideous feature in her face.

Then all her Maids of Honour tried in turn,
And for a Prince's kiss in envy burn;
By sad experience taught, their hopes they miss'd,
And mourn'd a Prince that never could be kiss'd.

In silent tears the Queen confess'd her grief,
Till kindest Flattery came to her relief.
Her maids, as each one takes him in her arms,
Expatiate freely o'er his world of charms--
His eyes, lips, mouth--his forehead was divine--
And for the nose--they called it Aquiline--
Declared that Cæsar, who the world subdued,
Had such a one--just of that longitude--
That Kings like him compelled folks to adore them,
And drove the short-nos'd sons of men before them--
That length of nose portended length of days,
And was a great advantage many ways--
To mourn the gifts of Providence was wrong--
Besides, _the Nose was not so very long_.--

These arguments in part her grief redrest,
A mother's partial fondness did the rest;
And Time, that all things reconciles by use,
Did in her notions such a change produce.
That, as she views her babe, with favour blind,
She thinks him handsomest of human kind.

Meantime in spite of his disfigured face,
Dorus (for so he's call'd) grew up apace;
In fair proportion all his features rose,
Save that most prominent of all--his Nose.
That Nose, which in the infant could annoy,
Was grown a perfect nuisance in the boy.
Whene'er he walk'd, his Handle went before,
Long as the snout of Ferret, or Wild Boar;
Or like the Staff, with which on holy day
The solemn Parish Beadle clears the way.

But from their cradle to their latest year,
How seldom Truth can reach a Prince's ear!
To keep th' unwelcome knowledge out of view,
His lesson well each flattering Courtier knew;
The hoary Tutor, and the wily Page,
Unmeet confederates! dupe his tender age.
They taught him that whate'er vain mortals boast--
Strength, Courage, Wisdom--all they value most--
Whate'er on human life distinction throws--
Was all comprised--in what?--a length of nose!
Ev'n Virtue's self (by some suppos'd chief merit)
In short-nosed folks was only want of spirit.

While doctrines such as these his guides instill'd,
His Palace was with long-nosed people fill'd;
At Court, whoever ventured to appear
With a short nose, was treated with a sneer.
Each courtier's wife, that with a babe is blest,
Moulds its young nose betimes; and does her best,
By pulls, and hauls, and twists, and lugs and pinches,
To stretch it to the standard of the Prince's.

Dup'd by these arts, Dorus to manhood rose,
Nor dream'd of aught more comely than his Nose,
Till Love, whose pow'r ev'n Princes have confest,
Claim'd the soft empire o'er his youthful breast.
Fair Claribel was she who caused his care;
A neighb'ring Monarch's daughter, and sole heir.
For beauteous Claribel his bosom burn'd;
The beauteous Claribel his flame return'd;
Deign'd with kind words his passion to approve,
Met his soft vows, and yielded love for love.
If in her mind some female pangs arose
At sight (and who can blame her?) of his Nose.
Affection made her willing to be blind;
She loved him for the beauties of his mind;
And in his lustre, and his royal race,
Contented sunk--one feature of his face.

Blooming to sight, and lovely to behold,
Herself was cast in Beauty's richest mould;
Sweet female majesty her person deck'd,
Her face an angel's--save for one defect--
Wise Nature, who to Dorus over kind,
A length of nose too liberal had assign'd,
As if with us poor mortals to make sport,
Had giv'n to Claribel a nose too short:
But turned up with a sort of modest grace;
It took not much of beauty from her face;
And subtle Courtiers, who their Prince's mind
Still watch'd, and turned about with every wind,
Assur'd the Prince, that though man's beauty owes
Its charm to a majestic length of nose,
The excellence of Woman (softer creature)
Consisted in the shortness of that feature.
Few arguments were wanted to convince
The already more than half persuaded Prince;
Truths, which we hate, with slowness we receive,
But what we wish to credit, soon believe.

The Princess's affections being gain'd,
What but her Sire's approval now remain'd?
Ambassadors with solemn pomp are sent
To win the aged Monarch to consent
(Seeing their States already were allied)
That Dorus might have Claribel to bride.
Her Royal Sire, who wisely understood
The match propos'd was for both kingdoms' good,
Gave his consent; and gentle Claribel
With weeping bids her Father's court farewell.

With gallant pomp, and numerous array,
Dorus went forth to meet her on her way;
But when the Princely pair of lovers met,
Their hearts on mutual gratulations set,
Sudden the Enchanter from the ground arose,
(The same who prophesied the Prince's nose)
And with rude grasp, unconscious of her charms,
Snatch'd up the lovely Princess in his arms,
Then bore her out of reach of human eyes,
Up in the pathless regions of the skies.

Bereft of her that was his only care,
Dorus resign'd his soul to wild despair;
Resolv'd to leave the land that gave him birth,
And seek fair Claribel throughout the earth.
Mounting his horse, he gives the beast the reins,
And wanders lonely through the desert plains;
With fearless heart the savage heath explores,
Where the wolf prowls, and where the tiger roars,
Nor wolf, nor tiger, dare his way oppose;
The wildest creatures see, and shun, his NOSE.
Ev'n lions fear! the elephant alone
Surveys with pride a trunk so like his own.
At length he to a shady forest came,
Where in a cavern lived an aged dame;
A reverend Fairy, on whose silver head
A hundred years their downy snows had shed.
Here ent'ring in, the Mistress of the place
Bespoke him welcome with a cheerful grace,
Fetch'd forth her dainties, spread her social board
With all the Store her dwelling could afford.
The Prince with toil and hunger sore opprest,
Gladly accepts, and deigns to be her guest.
But when the first civilities were paid,
The dishes rang'd, and Grace in order said;
The Fairy, who had leisure now to view
Her guest more closely, from her pocket drew
Her spectacles, and wip'd them from the dust,
Then on her nose endeavour'd to adjust;
With difficulty she could find a place
To hang them on in her unshapely face;
For if the Princess's was somewhat small,
This Fairy scarce had any nose at all.
But when by help of spectacles the Crone
Discern'd a Nose so different from her own,
What peals of laughter shook her aged sides!
While with sharp jests the Prince she thus derides.

FAIRY

"Welcome, great Prince of Noses, to my cell;
'Tis a poor place,--but thus we Fairies dwell.
Pray, let me ask you, if from far you come--
And don't you sometimes find it cumbersome?"

PRINCE

"Find what?"

FAIRY

"Your Nose--."

PRINCE

"My Nose, Ma'am!"

FAIRY

"No offence.--
The King your Father was a man of sense,
A handsome man (but lived not to be old)
And had a Nose cast in the common mould.
Ev'n I myself, that now with age am grey,
Was thought to have some beauty in my day,
And am the Daughter of a King. Your sire
In this poor face saw something to admire--
And I to shew my gratitude made shift--
Have stood his friend--and help'd him at a lift--
'Twas I that, when his hopes began to fail,
Shew'd him the spell that lurk'd in Minon's tail--
Perhaps you have heard--but come, Sir, you don't eat--
That Nose of yours requires both wine and meat--
Fall to, and welcome, without more ado--
You see your fare--what shall I help you to?
This dish the tongues of nightingales contains;
This, eyes of peacocks; and that, linnets' brains;
That next you is a Bird of Paradise--
We fairies in our food are somewhat nice.--
And pray, Sir, while your hunger is supplied,
Do lean your Nose a little on one side;
The shadow, which it casts upon the meat,
Darkens my plate, I see not what I eat "--

The Prince on dainty after dainty feeding,
Felt inly shock'd at the old Fairy's breeding;
And held it want of manners in the Dame,
And did her country education blame.
One thing he only wonder'd at,--what she
So very comic in his nose could see.
Hers, it must be confest, was somewhat short,
And time and shrinking age accounted for't;
But for his own, thank heaven, he could not tell
That it was ever thought remarkable;
A decent nose, of reasonable size,
And handsome thought, rather than otherwise.
But that which most of all his wonder paid,
Was to observe the Fairy's waiting Maid;
How at each word the aged Dame let fall
She courtsied low, and smil'd assent to all;
But chiefly when the rev'rend Grannam told
Of conquests, which her beauty made of old.--
He smiled to see how Flattery sway'd the Dame,
Nor knew himself was open to the same!
He finds her raillery now increase so fast,
That making hasty end of his repast,
Glad to escape her tongue, he bids farewell
To the old Fairy, and her friendly cell.

But his kind Hostess, who had vainly tried
The force of ridicule to cure his pride,
Fertile in plans, a surer method chose,
To make him see the error of his nose;
For till he view'd that feature with remorse,
The Enchanter's direful spell must be in force.

Midway the road by which the Prince must pass,
She rais'd by magic art a House of Glass;
No mason's hand appear'd, nor work of wood;
Compact of glass the wondrous fabric stood.
Its stately pillars, glittering in the sun,
Conspicuous from afar, like silver, shone.
Here, snatch'd and rescued from th' Enchanter's might,
She placed the beauteous Claribel in sight.
The admiring Prince the chrystal dome survey'd,
And sought access unto his lovely Maid;
But, strange to tell, in all that mansion's bound,
Nor door, nor casement, was there to be found.
Enrag'd, he took up massy stones, and flung
With such a force, that all the palace rung;
But made no more impression on the glass,
Than if the solid structure had been brass.
To comfort his despair, the lovely maid
Her snowy hand against her window laid;
But when with eager haste he thought to kiss,
His Nose stood out, and robb'd him of the bliss.
Thrice he essay'd th' impracticable feat;
The window and his lips can never meet.

The painful Truth, which Flattery long conceal'd,
Rush'd on his mind, and "O!" he cried, "I yield;
Wisest of Fairies, thou wert right, I wrong--
_I own, I own, I have a Nose too long_."

The frank confession was no sooner spoke,
But into shivers all the palace broke,
His Nose of monstrous length, to his surprise
Shrunk to the limits of a common size;
And Claribel with joy her Lover view'd,
Now grown as beautiful as he was good.
The aged Fairy in their presence stands,
Confirms their mutual vows, and joins their hands.
The Prince with rapture hails the happy hour,
That rescued him from self-delusion's power;
And trains of blessings crown the future life
Of Dorus, and of Claribel, his wife.

NOTES

CHARLES LAMB AND BOOKS FOR CHILDREN

Charles Lamb's activities as a writer for children seem to have begun and ended in the service of Godwin. The earliest effort in this direction of which we have any knowledge is _The King and Queen of Hearts_, 1805, and the latest _Prince Dorus_, 1810 or 1811, unless we count _Beauty and the Beast_, possibly 1811, which in my opinion he did not write.

Lamb first met William Godwin (1756-1836), the philosopher, probably through the instrumentality of their mutual friend Thomas Holcroft, not long after Gillray had satirised Lamb and Lloyd, in his plate in the first number of _The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine_, August, 1798, as a frog and a toad, seated in the vicinity of Coleridge and Southey and reading together a volume labelled "Blank Verse, by Toad and Frog." "Pray, Mr. Lamb," said Godwin when he first made Lamb's acquaintance, "are you toad or frog?" It was feared that trouble might ensue, but Lamb and Godwin were found the next morning at breakfast together and they became good, though never very intimate, friends.

Godwin, who had been for a while a minister at Ware, in Hertfordshire, came to London in 1779, and took up literature as a profession seriously in 1783. His _Political Justice_ was published in 1793, _Caleb Williams_ in 1794, and _St. Leon_ in 1799. After loving at a distance Mrs. Opie and Mrs. Inchbald, Godwin married Mary Wollstonecraft in 1797. Their daughter afterwards became Mrs. Shelley, the wife of the poet. Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin died in the year of her marriage, and in 1801 Godwin married again, a Mrs. Clairmont, a widow. Lamb detested her. None the less it was she who took to publishing and who incited him and his sister to write the charming children's books in this volume.

Lamb helped Godwin with other literary ventures before the publishing business was started. In 1800 he wrote an epilogue to his tragedy of "Antonio" (see the essay in Vol. II., "The Old Actors," for a description of the luckless first night), and he advised him in the composition of "Faulkener," another tragedy, which failed in 1807 and which also had a prologue by Lamb. And a letter is extant showing Lamb toiling at a review of Godwin's _Chaucer_ in 1803, but the review itself is not forthcoming.

The publishing business was started in 1805 on Mrs. Godwin's initiative. At first, owing to the undesirability of connecting the name of a political and moral firebrand like Godwin with books for children, it was arranged that the business, which was in Hanway Street, Oxford Street, should bear the name of the manager, Thomas Hodgkins, while the books contributed by Godwin were to be signed Edward Baldwin. In 1806, however, Mrs. Godwin opened a shop at 41 Skinner Street, Snow Hill (now demolished), and published in her own name as M.J. Godwin & Co., at The Children's Library.

For her the Lambs wrote _The King and Queen of Hearts_ (by Charles Lamb), 1805; _Tales from Shakespear_, 1807; _The Adventures of Ulysses_ (by Charles Lamb), 1808; _Mrs. Leicester's School and Poetry for Children_, 1809; and _Prince Dorus_ (by Charles Lamb), 1811. Mrs. Godwin translated tales from the French, Godwin contributed _Baldwin's Fables_, _Baldwin's Pantheon_, and histories of Greece, England and Rome, and Hazlitt wrote an English Grammar. The principal illustrator to the firm was William Mulready.

Although Lamb had the most cordial disliking for Mrs. Godwin, he always stood by his old friend her husband. Between 1811 and 1821 the two men seem to have had little to do with each other; but in 1822 Lamb came to Godwin's assistance to much purpose. The title to Godwin's house in Skinner Street was successfully contested in that year, and Godwin became a bankrupt. A fund was therefore set on foot for him by Lamb and others, Lamb's own contribution being £50. Godwin, however, never rightly rallied, and thenceforward lived very quietly, wrote the _History of the Commonwealth_ and _Lives of the Necromancers_, and died in 1836. Mrs. Godwin survived him until 1841.

Knowing what we do--from Dowden's _Shelley_ and other sources--it is not possible greatly to admire Godwin's character, nor is the second Mrs. Godwin a subject for enthusiasm; but the part played by them in the Lambs' literary life was extremely valuable. Charles Lamb had, it is true, other stimulus, and without his work for children, sweet though it is, his name would still be a household word; but Mary Lamb might, but for the Godwins, have gone almost silent to the grave. Her writings, with their sweet gravity and tender simplicity, were called forth wholly by the Bad Baby, as Lamb called Mrs. Godwin.

Lamb's views on the literature of the nursery had crystallised long before he began to write children's books himself. In a letter to Coleridge, October 23,1802, he had said:--

"'Goody Two Shoes' is almost out of print. Mrs. Barbauld's stuff has banished all the old classics of the nursery; and the shopman at Newberry's hardly deigned to reach them off an old exploded corner of a shelf, when Mary asked for them. Mrs. B.'s and Mrs. Trimmer's nonsense lay in piles about. Knowledge insignificant and vapid as Mrs. Barbauld's books convey, it seems, must come to a child in the _shape of knowledge_, and his empty noddle must be turned with conceit of his own powers when he has learnt, that a horse is an animal, and Billy is better than a horse, and such like; instead of that beautiful interest in wild tales, which made the child a man, while all the while he suspected himself to be no bigger than a child. Science has succeeded to poetry no less in the little walks of children than with men. Is there no possibility of averting this sore evil? Think what you would have been now, if, instead of being fed with tales and old wives' fables in childhood, you had been crammed with geography and natural history!"

Hence when the time came Lamb was all ready with a nursery method of his own.

* * * * *

Page 1. TALES FROM SHAKESPEAR.

Mary Lamb was asked to write the _Tales from Shakespear_, with help from her brother, in the spring of 1806 or the winter of 1805. I have seen the statement that this was at the instigation of Hazlitt, but Lamb does not say so. The first mention of the work is in Lamb's letter to Manning, May 10, 1806:--

"She [Mary] says you saw her writings about the other day, and she wishes you should know what they are. She is doing for Godwin's bookseller twenty of Shakspeare's plays, to be made into children's tales. Six are already done by her, to wit, 'The Tempest,' 'Winter's Tale,' 'Midsummer Night,' 'Much Ado,' 'Two Gentlemen of Verona,' and 'Cymbeline'; and the 'Merchant of Venice' is in forwardness. I have done 'Othello' and 'Macbeth,' and mean to do all the tragedies. I think it will be popular among the little people, besides money. It's to bring in sixty guineas. Mary has done them capitally, I think, you'd think. These are the humble amusements we propose, while you are gone to plant the cross of Christ among barbarous pagan anthropophagi. Quam homo homini præstat! but then, perhaps, you'll get murdered, and we shall die in our beds with a fair literary reputation."

Mary Lamb's letters to Sarah Stoddart (afterwards Sarah Hazlitt), continue the story. This is on June 2, 1806:--

My _Tales_ are to be published in separate story-books; I mean, in single stories, like the children's little shilling books. I cannot send you them in Manuscript, because they are all in the Godwins' hands; but one will be published very soon, and then you shall have it _all in print_. I go on very well, and have no doubt but I shall always be able to hit upon some such kind of job to keep going on. I think I shall get fifty pounds a year at the lowest calculation; but as I have not yet seen any _money_ of my own earning, for we do not expect to be paid till Christmas, I do not feel the good fortune, that has so unexpectedly befallen me, half so much as I ought to do. But another year, no doubt, I shall perceive it.

When I write again, you will hear tidings of the farce, for Charles is to go in a few days to the Managers to inquire about it. But that must now be a next-year's business too, even if it does succeed; so it's all looking forward, and no prospect of present gain. But that's better than no hopes at all, either for present or future times.

Charles has written Macbeth, Othello, King Lear, and has begun Hamlet; you would like to see us, as we often sit writing on one table (but not on one cushion sitting), like Hermia and Helena in the Midsummer Night's Dream; or, rather, like an old literary Darby and Joan: I taking snuff; and he groaning all the while, and saying he can make nothing of it, which he always says till he has finished, and then he finds out he has made something of it....

Martin [Burney] has just been here. My Tales (_again_) and Charles's Farce has made the boy mad to turn Author; and he has written a Farce, and he has made the Winter's Tale into a story; but what Charles says of himself is really true of Martin, for _he can make nothing at all of it_; and I have been talking very eloquently this morning, to convince him that nobody can write farces, &c., under thirty years of age. And so I suppose he will go home and new model his farce.

A little later, June 26, Lamb writes to Wordsworth:--

"Mary is just stuck fast in All's Well that Ends Well. She complains of having to set forth so many female characters in boy's clothes. She begins to think Shakspear must have wanted Imagination. I to encourage her, for she often faints in the prosecution of her great work, flatter her with telling how well such and such a play is done. But she is stuck fast and I have been obliged to promise to assist her."

Then we have Mary Lamb to Sarah Stoddart again (early in July, 1806): "I am in good spirits just at this present time, for Charles has been reading over the _Tale_ I told you plagued me so much, and he thinks it one of the very best: it is 'All's Well that Ends Well.'"

The work was finished in the autumn of 1806 and published at the end of the year, dated 1807. Lamb sent Wordsworth a copy on January 29, 1807, with the following letter:--

"We have book'd off from Swan and Two Necks, Lad Lane, this day
(per Coach) the Tales from Shakespear. You will forgive the
plates, when I tell you they were left to the direction of Godwin,
who left the choice of subjects to the bad baby, who from mischief
(I suppose) has chosen one from damn'd beastly vulgarity (vide
'Merch. Venice'), where no atom of authority was in the tale to
justify it--to another has given a name which exists not in the
tale, Nic Bottom, and which she thought would be funny, though in
this I suspect _his_ hand, for I guess her reading does not reach
far enough to know Bottom's Christian name--and one of Hamlet, and
Grave digging, a scene which is not hinted at in the story, and
you might as well have put King Canute the Great reproving his
courtiers--the rest are Giants and Giantesses. Suffice it, to save
our taste and damn our folly, that we left it all to a friend W.G.
who in the first place cheated me into putting a name to them,
which I did not mean, but do not repent, and then wrote a puff
about their _simplicity_, &c., to go with the advertisement as in
my name! Enough of this egregious dupery. I will try to abstract
the load of teazing circumstances from the Stories and tell you
that I am answerable for Lear, Macbeth, Timon, Romeo, Hamlet,
Othello, for occasionally a tail piece or correction of grammar,
for none of the cuts and all of the spelling. The rest is my
Sister's.--We think Pericles of hers the best, and Othello of
mine--but I hope all have some good. As You Like It, we like
least.

"So much, only begging you to tear out the cuts and give them to
Johnny, as 'Mrs. Godwin's fancy'.

"C.L.

"_Our love to all_.

"I had almost forgot, My part of the Preface begins in the middle
of a sentence, in last but one page, after a colon, thus:--

":--_which if they be happily so done_, &c. (see page 2, line 7
from foot).

The former part hath a more feminine turn and does hold me up
something as an instructor to young ladies: but upon my modesty's
honour I wrote it not.

"Godwin told my Sister that the Baby chose the subjects: a fact in
taste."

This letter not only tells us how the preface was written--the first part, I take it, by William Godwin--but what Lamb himself thought of the pictures; which I reproduce in the large edition. It is customary to attribute the designs to Mulready and the engraving to William Blake.

I have set up the _Tales_ from the second edition, 1809, because it embodies certain corrections and was probably the last edition in which the Lambs took any interest. The changes of word are few. I note the more important; Page 5, line 1, "recollection" was "remembrance" in the first edition; page 10, line 27, "voracious" was "ugly" in the first edition; page 15, line 21, "vessel" was "churn"; page 42, line 30, "continued" was in the first edition "remained"; page 108, foot, "But she being a woman" had run in the first edition, "But she being a bad ambitious woman." I leave other minute differences to the Bibliographer.

The second edition was issued in two forms: one similar to the first edition and one with only frontispiece, a portrait of Shakespear, and the following foreword from the pen, I imagine, of Mr. Godwin:--

ADVERTISEMENT TO THE SECOND EDITION

The Proprietors of this work willingly pay obedience to the voice
of the public. It has been the general sentiment, that the style
in which these Tales are written, is not so precisely adapted for
the amusement of mere children, as for an acceptable and improving
present to young ladies advancing to the state of womanhood.
They therefore now offer to the public an edition prepared with
suitable elegance. In the former impression they gave twenty
prints, illustrative of the twenty tales which compose these
volumes, for they knew that it was a grievous thing and a
disappointment to a child, to find some tales without the
recommendation of a print, which the others possessed. The prints
were therefore made from spirited designs, but did not pretend to
high finishing in the execution. To this edition they have annexed
merely a beautiful head of our immortal Dramatist, from a much
admired painting by Zoust.--They are satisfied that every reader
of taste will thank them for not suppressing the former Preface,
though not exactly applicable on the present occasion.

N.B.--A few copies have been worked off on the plan of the former
impression, for the use of those who rather coincide in the
original conception of the writer, than in the opinion above
stated.

Lamb, we may be sure, had no hand in this manifesto, but whatever protest he may have made was unsuccessful. It reappears in the third edition, while the preface there has the general alteration of the first person singular to the first person plural: "our young readers" for "my young readers," and so forth. But this was probably Godwinian work.

The Godwins also issued some or all of the _Tales_ separately at sixpence each (the two ordinary volumes cost eight shillings) with three plates to each, of a different design from those in the two-volume edition. These little books are exceedingly rare, but copies have been discovered both plain and coloured. The plates are attributed to Blake.

The Lambs' _Tales from Shakespear_ were not, Mr. Bertram Dobell has pointed out, the first experiment of the kind. In 1783 was published in Paris _Contes Moraux, Amusans et Instructifs, à l'usage de la Jeunesse tirés des Tragédies de Shakespear_. Par M. Perrin. The Lambs did not, however, borrow anything from M. Perrin, even if they were aware of his work. The _Tales_ are peculiarly their own.

The _Tales from Shakespear_ are, and probably will continue to be, the most widely distributed of all the Lambs' work. In England it may be that _Elia_ has had as many readers; but abroad the _Tales from Shakespear_ easily lead. In the British Museum catalogue I find translations in French, German, Swedish, Spanish, and Polish. (No complete translation of _Elia_ into any language is known, not even in French, although a selection of the essays will be found at the end of Depret's monograph, _De L'Humeur Littéraire en Angleterre_, 1877.) In England almost every Christmas brings a new edition of the _Tales_ and often an imitation.

Although Mary Lamb was the true author of the book, as of _Mrs. Leicester's School_ and of _Poetry for Children_, her share being much greater than her brother's in all of these, she was not until many years later associated publicly with any of them. The _Tales_ were attributed to Charles Lamb, presumably against his wish, as we see from a sentence in the letter to Wordsworth quoted above, and the other two books had no name attached to them at all. Why Mary Lamb preserved such strict anonymity we do not now know; but it was probably from a natural shrinking from any kind of publicity after the unhappy publicity which she had once gained by her misfortune.

* * * * *

Page 240. THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES.

Lamb must have been as busy in the years 1806-1808 as in any of his life; for he then not only had his India House work, but wrote his share of the _Tales from Shakespear_, _Mrs. Leicester's School_ and _Poetry for Children_, wrote all of _The Adventures of Ulysses_, and finally prepared his _Dramatic Specimens_. Moreover in 1806 he had the harassment of the alterations and impending production of "Mr. H."

On February 26, 1808, he tells Manning that he has just finished _The Adventures of Ulysses_ and the _Specimens_, describing _The Adventures of Ulysses_ as "intended to be an introduction to the reading of Telemachus! it is done out of the Odyssey, not from the Greek. I would not mislead you: nor yet from Pope's Odyssey, but from an older translation of one Chapman. The 'Shakspeare Tales' suggested the doing it." Many years after Lamb wrote to Barton (August 10, 1827): "Did you ever read my 'Adventures of Ulysses,' founded on Chapman's old translation of it? for children or _men_. Ch. is divine, and my abridgment has not quite emptied him of his divinity."