Turned on its pillow of pain to gaze while she passed, for her presence
Fell on their hearts like a ray of the sun on the walls of a prison.
And, as she looked around, she saw how Death, the consoler,
Laying his hand upon many a heart, had healed it forever. 1340
Many familiar forms had disappeared in the night time;
Vacant their places were, or filled already by strangers.
Suddenly, as if arrested by fear or a feeling of wonder,
Still she stood, with her colorless lips apart, while a shudder
Ran through her frame, and, forgotten, the flowerets dropped from her fingers, 1345
And from her eyes and cheeks the light and bloom of the morning.
Then there escaped from her lips a cry of such terrible anguish,
That the dying heard it, and started up from their pillows.
On the pallet before her was stretched the form of an old man.
Long, and thin, and gray were the locks that shaded his temples; 1350
But, as he lay in the morning light, his face for a moment
Seemed to assume once more the forms of its earlier manhood;
So are wont to be changed the faces of those who are dying.
Hot and red on his lips still burned the flush of the fever,
As if life, like the Hebrew, with blood had besprinkled its portals, 1355
That the Angel of Death might see the sign, and pass over.
Motionless, senseless, dying, he lay, and his spirit exhausted
Seemed to be sinking down through infinite depths in the darkness,
Darkness of slumber and death, forever sinking and sinking.
Then through those realms of shade, in multiplied reverberations, 1360
Heard he that cry of pain, and through the hush that succeeded
Whispered a gentle voice, in accents tender and saint-like,
“Gabriel! O my beloved!” and died away into silence.
Then he beheld, in a dream, once more the home of his childhood;
Green Acadian meadows, with sylvan rivers among them, 1365
Village, and mountain, and woodlands; and, walking under their shadow,
As in the days of her youth, Evangeline rose in his vision.
Tears came into his eyes; and as slowly he lifted his eyelids,
Vanished the vision away, but Evangeline knelt by his bedside.
Vainly he strove to whisper her name, for the accents unuttered 1370
Died on his lips, and their motion revealed what his tongue would have spoken.
Vainly he strove to rise; and Evangeline, kneeling beside him,
Kissed his dying lips, and laid his head on her bosom.
Sweet was the light of his eyes; but it suddenly sank into darkness,
As when a lamp is blown out by a gust of wind at a casement. 1375
All was ended now, the hope, and the fear, and the sorrow,
All the aching of heart, the restless, unsatisfied longing,
All the dull, deep pain, and constant anguish of patience!
And, as she pressed once more the lifeless head to her bosom,
Meekly she bowed her own, and murmured, “Father, I thank thee!” 1380
Still stands the forest primeval; but far away from its shadow,
Side by side, in their nameless graves, the lovers are sleeping.
Under the humble walls of the little Catholic churchyard,
In the heart of the city, they lie, unknown and unnoticed.
Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flowing beside them, 1385
Thousands of throbbing hearts, where theirs are at rest and forever,
Thousands of aching brains, where theirs no longer are busy,
Thousands of toiling hands, where theirs have ceased from their labors,
Thousands of weary feet, where theirs have completed their journey!
Still stands the forest primeval; but under the shade of its branches 1390
Dwells another race, with other customs and language.
Only along the shore of the mournful and misty Atlantic
Linger a few Acadian peasants, whose fathers from exile
Wandered back to their native land to die in its bosom.
In the fisherman’s cot the wheel and the loom are still busy; 1395
Maidens still wear their Norman caps and their kirtles of homespun,
And by the evening fire repeat Evangeline’s story,
While from its rocky caverns the deep-voiced, neighboring ocean
Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.
THE SEASIDE AND THE FIRESIDE
CONTENTS
Dedication
BY THE SEASIDE.
The Building of the Ship
Seaweed
Chrysaor
The Secret of the Sea
Twilight
By the Seaside.
Sir Humphrey Gilbert
The Lighthouse
The Fire of Drift-Wood
BY THE FIRESIDE.
Resignation
The Builders
Sand of the Desert in an Hour-Glass
The Open Window
King Witlaf’s Drinking-Horn
Gaspar Becerra
Pegasus in Pound
Tegnér’s Drapa
Sonnet, on Mrs. Kemble’s Readings from Shakespeare
The Singers
Suspiria
Hymn for my Brother’s Ordination
Introductory Note
AFTER the publication of Evangeline, there was a period when Mr. Longfellow’s mood was not a poetic one. He pleased himself with writing the tale of Kavanagh, out there are frequent laments in his diary at his unproductiveness; that the golden days of October, usually so fruitful in verse, faded away and left no lines written; that his growing fame brought him numberless interruptions, and that the routine of his college work was becoming intolerable. Now and then a poem came to him, and he even made headway with a dramatic romance of the age of Louis XIV., but abandoned the work finally. It was two years after finishing Evangeline before he had accumulated sufficient material to warrant him in planning a new volume of poems. The Seaside and the Fireside was published in November, 1849, with The Building of the Ship as the leading piece. 1
The form of the poem was clearly suggested by Schiller’s Song of the Bell, which has more than once served poets as a model. Schiller may be said to have introduced a new artistic form, and Mr. Longfellow, in adopting the general scheme, showed his apprehension of its capacity by the skill with which he moved from one passage to another, using the short lines to express the quicker, more sudden, or hurried action, the longer to indicate lingering, moderate action or reflection. The oratorical character of the poem, so to speak, has always caught the ear, and it is interesting to read in the poet’s diary shortly after the publication of the book, this entry: — 2
“February 12, 1850. In the evening Mrs. Kemble read before the Mercantile Library Association, to an audience of more than three thousand, portions of As You Like It; then The Building of the Ship, standing out upon the platform, book in hand, trembling, palpitating, and weeping, and giving every word its true weight and emphasis. She prefaced the recital by a few words, to this effect; that when she first saw the poem, she desired to read it before a Boston audience; and she hoped she would be able to make every word audible to that great multitude.” 3
By this graceful action Mrs. Kemble may well have thrown into concrete form the lines with which Mr. Longfellow closed the sonnet commemorating her readings, —
O happy Poet!…
How must thy listening spirit now rejoice
To be interpreted by such a voice!
But it is to be suspected that the vast multitude was stirred to its depths not so much by the artistic completeness of the rendition, as by the impassioned burst with which the poem closes, and which fell upon no listless ears in the deep agitation of the ev
entful year 1850. Mr. Noah Brooks in his paper on Lincoln’s Imagination (Scribner’s Monthly, August, 1879) mentions that he found the President one day attracted by these stanzas, quoted in a political speech. “Knowing the whole poem,” he adds, “as one of my early exercises in recitation, I began, at his request, with the description of the launch of the ship, and repeated it to the end. As he listened to the last lines, his eyes filled with tears, and his cheeks were wet. He did not speak for some minutes, but finally said, with simplicity: ‘It is a wonderful gift to be able to stir men like that.’” Dr. William Everett, in his remarks before the Massachusetts Historical Society, after the death of Mr. Longfellow, called attention to the striking contrast in these spirited, hopeful lines to Horace’s timid, tremulous O navis. 4
In his diary, under date of March 23, 1850, Mr. Longfellow writes: “Cast lead flat-irons for the children, to their great delight. C. in great and joyous excitement, which he showed by the most voluble speech. E. showed his only in his eyes, and looked on in silence. The casting was to them as grand as the casting of a bell to grown-up children. Why not write for them a Song of the Lead Flat-Iron?” 5
Dedication
AS one who, walking in the twilight gloom,
Hears round about him voices as it darkens,
And seeing not the forms from which they come,
Pauses from time to time, and turns and hearkens;
So walking here in twilight, O my friends! 5
I hear your voices, softened by the distance,
And pause, and turn to listen, as each sends
His words of friendship, comfort, and assistance.
If any thought of mine, or sung or told,
Has ever given delight or consolation, 10
Ye have repaid me back a thousand-fold,
By every friendly sign and salutation.
Thanks for the sympathies that ye have shown!
Thanks for each kindly word, each silent token,
That teaches me, when seeming most alone, 15
Friends are around us, though no word be spoken.
Kind messages, that pass from land to land;
Kind letters, that betray the heart’s deep history,
In which we feel the pressure of a hand, —
One touch of fire, — and all the rest is mystery! 20
The pleasant books, that silently among
Our household treasures take familiar places,
And are to us as if a living tongue
Spake from the printed leaves or pictured faces!
Perhaps on earth I never shall behold, 25
With eye of sense, your outward form and semblance;
Therefore to me ye never will grow old,
But live forever young in my remembrance!
Never grow old, nor change, nor pass away!
Your gentle voices will flow on forever, 30
When life grows bare and tarnished with decay,
As through a leafless landscape flows a river.
Not chance of birth or place has made us friends,
Being oftentimes of different tongues and nations,
But the endeavor for the selfsame ends, 35
With the same hopes, and fears, and aspirations.
Therefore I hope to join your seaside walk,
Saddened, and mostly silent, with emotion;
Not interrupting with intrusive talk
The grand, majestic symphonies of ocean. 40
Therefore I hope, as no unwelcome guest,
At your warm fireside, when the lamps are lighted,
To have my place reserved among the rest,
Nor stand as one unsought and uninvited!
BY THE SEASIDE.
The Building of the Ship
“BUILD me straight, O worthy Master!
Stanch and strong, a goodly vessel,
That shall laugh at all disaster,
And with wave and whirlwind wrestle!”
The merchant’s word 5
Delighted the Master heard;
For his heart was in his work, and the heart
Giveth grace unto every Art.
A quiet smile played round his lips,
As the eddies and dimples of the tide 10
Play round the bows of ships,
That steadily at anchor ride.
And with a voice that was full of glee,
He answered, “Erelong we will launch
A vessel as goodly, and strong, and stanch, 15
As ever weathered a wintry sea!”
And first with nicest skill and art,
Perfect and finished in every part,
A little model the Master wrought,
Which should be to the larger plan 20
What the child is to the man,
Its counterpart in miniature;
That with a hand more swift and sure
The greater labor might be brought
To answer to his inward thought. 25
And as he labored, his mind ran o’er
The various ships that were built of yore,
And above them all, and strangest of all
Towered the Great Harry, crank and tall,
Whose picture was hanging on the wall, 30
With bows and stern raised high in air,
And balconies hanging here and there,
And signal lanterns and flags afloat,
And eight round towers, like those that frown
From some old castle, looking down 35
Upon the drawbridge and the moat.
And he said with a smile, “Our ship, I wis,
Shall be of another form than this!”
It was of another form, indeed;
Built for freight, and yet for speed, 40
A beautiful and gallant craft;
Broad in the beam, that the stress of the blast,
Pressing down upon sail and mast,
Might not the sharp bows overwhelm;
Broad in the beam, but sloping aft 45
With graceful curve and slow degrees,
That she might be docile to the helm,
And that the currents of parted seas,
Closing behind, with mighty force,
Might aid and not impede her course. 50
In the ship-yard stood the Master,
With the model of the vessel,
That should laugh at all disaster,
And with wave and whirlwind wrestle!
Covering many a rood of ground, 55
Lay the timber piled around;
Timber of chestnut, and elm, and oak,
And scattered here and there, with these,
The knarred and crooked cedar knees;
Brought from regions far away, 60
From Pascagoula’s sunny bay,
And the banks of the roaring Roanoke!
Ah! what a wondrous thing it is
To note how many wheels of toil
One thought, one word, can set in motion! 65
There’s not a ship that sails the ocean,
But every climate, every soil,
Must bring its tribute, great or small,
And help to build the wooden wall!
The sun was rising o’er the sea, 70
And long the level shadows lay,
As if they, too, the beams would be
Of some great, airy argosy,
Framed and launched in a single day.
That silent architect, the sun, 75
Had hewn and laid them every one,
Ere the work of man was yet begun.
Beside the Master, when he spoke,
A youth, against an anchor leaning,
Listened, to catch his slightest meaning. 80
Only the long waves, as they broke
In ripples on the pebbly beach,
Interrupted the old man’s speech.
Beautiful they were, in sooth,
The old man and the fiery youth! 85
The old man, in whose busy brain
M
any a ship that sailed the main
Was modelled o’er and o’er again; —
The fiery youth, who was to be
The heir of his dexterity, 90
The heir of his house, and his daughter’s hand,
When he had built and launched from land
What the elder head had planned.
“Thus,” said he, “will we build this ship!
Lay square the blocks upon the slip, 95
And follow well this plan of mine.
Choose the timbers with greatest care;
Of all that is unsound beware;
For only what is sound and strong
To this vessel shall belong. 100
Cedar of Maine and Georgia pine
Here together shall combine.
A goodly frame, and a goodly fame,
And the UNION be her name!
For the day that gives her to the sea 105
Shall give my daughter unto thee!”
The Master’s word
Enraptured the young man heard;
And as he turned his face aside,
With a look of joy and a thrill of pride 110
Standing before
Her father’s door,
He saw the form of his promised bride.
The sun shone on her golden hair,
And her cheek was glowing fresh and fair, 115
With the breath of morn and the soft sea air.
Like a beauteous barge was she,
Still at rest on the sandy beach,
Just beyond the billow’s reach;
But he 120
Was the restless, seething, stormy sea!
Ah, how skilful grows the hand
That obeyeth Love’s command!
It is the heart, and not the brain,
That to the highest doth attain, 125
And he who followeth Love’s behest
Far excelleth all the rest!
Thus with the rising of the sun
Was the noble task begun,
And soon throughout the ship-yard’s bounds 130
Delphi Complete Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Delphi Poets Series Book 13) Page 30
