In torment with the enemies of God."
"I swear," said Agatha, and kissed the rood; Then, taking each a hand, the attendant sisters Upraised her from her knees and one of them Drawing the gold hoop from her finger dropped it Ínto th' offertory held by the other;
Néxt from her head they undid the long white veil, And loosed and lét upon her shoulders fall
Her gólden lócks, then in their arms both raised her And laid her stretched at fúll length in the coffin, And the pall over her and the coffin spread, Leaving the head bare, and beyond the edge Of the coffin the dishevelled gold locks hanging; Then one of them the lócks held while the bishop Clean sheared them from the head, saying same time: "As these locks never to the head return,
So thoú returnest never to the world.”
Out of the coffin then the two attendants
Raised her together, and the long black veil
Threw over her, head, neck and shoulders covering Dówn to her waist behind; the bishop then Námed her Euphemia, and upon her finger Pútting the núptial ring and on her head
The nuptial crown, pronounced her Christ's affianced, The Lord's own spouse now and for ever more, And, having given into her hand the attested.
Áct of Profession and the Rules of the Order,
Rósary and prayerbook, raised both hands and blessed her And både her go in peace; then the abbess kissed her
And all the sisters kissed her one by one;
And having sung a hymn, all left the chapel : The novices before, the prior following,
And then the bishop, next the lady abbess Heading the black veils, with the last of whom
And youngest, tottering walked the new-professed, The white veils last, the great bell again tolling. The cloister court they round and up the stair Tó the refectory and collation frugal:
Sausage and cheese and bread, and each one glass Of Rüdesheimer four years in the cellar. The prior and bishop some short quarter hour Converse of things indifferent with the abbess; Take leave; the wicket again opens, closes; The patter of the mules' hoofs dies away; Each to her séparate cell the nuns retire,
And once more still as death 's Saint Ursula's cloister. Next day a messenger conveys the parents
Áll of their daughter that they now might claim: The golden ringlets sheared off by the bishop; And in one narrow cell from that day forth, Strictest and hóliest of Saint Ursula's nuns,
In pénitence and prayer lived Agatha, Except when morning, noon, or evening bell Called her to chapel, or her daily walk
She took the coúrt round or the high-walled garden,
Ór at long intervals in a sister's presence
Spoke sóme short moments through the parlour grating With some once dear friend of her former world.
So fórty years she lived and so she died,
And other Agathas walking where she walked
Her name read on a flag beneath their feet
As from the court they turn into the chapel.
Begun while walking from RIED to SANCT ANTON on the ADLERBERG (German TYROL), Sept. 4 - 5, 1854; finished at TEUFEN in Canton APPENZELL. Sept. 12, 1854.
I LIKE the Belgian cleanliness and comfort, The Bélgian liberty of thought and action, The ancient Belgian cities, full of churches With pointed windows and long Gothic aisles And vócal steeples that pour every hour Dówn from the clouds their lárklike melody; I love too the soft Belgian languages, Walloon and Flemish, and the Belgian song, And Bélgium's pictures chiefly thine, Van Eyck! Unéqualled colorist, and first who dipped
In oil the pencil. But I like not all, Múch though I like in Belgium; I like not Its hill-less, smoóth, unvariegated landscape, Where even the very rivers seem to languish; Still less I like its parallel, straight-cut roads Where seldom but to telescope-armed eye Discernible the further end or turning; And least of all I like him whóm Cologne, Proúd of a little, fain would call her own,
Though foreign-born, him of the broad, slouched hat, The painter who shades red and with red streaks And bloody blotches daubs the sprawling limbs Óf his fat Venuses and Medicis,
Susánnas, Ariadnes and Madonnas,
Álways except his sweetheart with the straw hat,
For whose sake I 'd forgive his sins though doubled But other lands invite me, farewell Belgium!
Thrice wélcome, Holland! refuge, in old times, Of persecuted virtue, wisdom, learning; Mighty Rhine-delta, I admire thy ports Fúll of tall másts, wayfarers of both oceans; Thy cabinets replenished with the riches. Of either Ind; thy dikes, canals, and sluices, And térritory from the deep sea won
Bý thy hard toil and skill and perseverance; Bút I like not thy smug, smooth-sháven faces, Sleék, methodistic hair, and white cravats, And swallowtailed black coats, and trowsers black; Still less I like the odour of thy streets
Ére by kind winter frózen, and the far more Than Jewish eagerness with which thou graspest At évery pound or penny fairly earned,
Or it may bé unfairly so I turn
Southward my pilgrim step, and say - "Farewell!"
Two Gérmanies there are, antipodistic
Each of the other, a Northern and a Southern: Stúrdy the one, and stiffnecked and reserved,
Cautious, suspicious, economical, prudent,
Indústrious, indefatigable, patient,
Stúdious and méditative and with art's
And literature's most noble spoils enriched, That raised, three hundred years ago, revolt's Audácious standard against mother church And from that day has lived and florished fair Without the help of Pope, Bull, or Indulgence, Ánd in its naked, shrineless temples worshipped Its unsubstantial notion of a God.
South Germany, less thoughtful, and preferring Eáse and known ways to toilsome innovation, Clings to its fóresires' creed, and only closer And clóser clings the more it 's shown to be Nónsense downright, hypocrisy and imposture. Bóth Germanies my diligent, plodding feet
From North to South from East to West have travelled, From filthy, rich, commercial, sensual Hamburg To the far Draúthal and the Ortelerspitz,
Ánd from where in the Moldau's wave reflected The minarets of Prague, to where broad Rhine, Frésh from Helvétia's Alps and glaciers, washes Básel's white walls and weak Erasmus' tomb, And I have found the German, in the main, A plain fair-dealer without second purpose And to his word true; seldom over-courteous, And always quite inquisitive enough
About your name, your country, your religion, Whence, whither, what and why and where and when; And take fair warning, reader! shouldst thou ever, Smit with the love of that coy spinster, Knowledge,
Vénture upon a German tour pedestrian,
Outside the limits of still courteous Schwarzwald, The watchdog all day long his iron chain Clánks on each boór's inhospitable threshold, And éven the inn door in the country opens Slówly and súllenly or not at all
To the beláted, tired and houseless stranger.
From Germany I turn into Tyról;
A kíndlier, friendlier land; where tired pedestrian Though he arrive late has no growl to fear Of súrly watchdog or more surly landlord, But greeted with "Willkommen!" and the smile
« PredošláPokračovať » |