Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series

by Robert Browning

  “The palace, the signorial privilege,

  “The pomp and pageantry were promised us?

  “For this have we exchanged our liberty,

  “Our competence, our darling of a child?

  “To house as spectres in a sepulchre

  “Under this black stone heap, the street’s disgrace,

  “Grimmest as that is of the gruesome town,

  “And here pick garbage on a pewter plate

  “Or cough at verjuice dripped from earthenware?

  “Oh Via Vittoria, oh the other place

  “I’ the Pauline, did we give you up for this?

  “Where’s the foregone housekeeping good and gay,

  “The neighbourliness, the companionship,

  “The treat and feast when holidays came round,

  “The daily feast that seemed no treat at all,

  “Called common by the uncommon fools we were!

  “Even the sun that used to shine at Rome,

  “Where is it? Robbed and starved and frozen too,

  “We will have justice, justice if there be!”

  Did not they shout, did not the town resound!

  Guido’s old lady-mother Beatrice,

  Who since her husband, Count Tommaso’s death,

  Had held sole sway i’ the house, — the doited crone

  Slow to acknowledge, curtsey and abdicate, —

  Was recognised of true novercal type,

  Dragon and devil. His brother Girolamo

  Came next in order: priest was he? The worse!

  No way of winning him to leave his mumps

  And help the laugh against old ancestry

  And formal habits long since out of date,

  Letting his youth be patterned on the mode

  Approved of where Violante laid down law.

  Or did he brighten up by way of change?

  Dispose himself for affability?

  The malapert, too complaisant by half

  To the alarmed young novice of a bride!

  Let him go buzz, betake himself elsewhere

  Nor singe his fly-wings in the candle-flame!

  Four months’ probation of this purgatory,

  Dog-snap and cat-claw, curse and counterblast,

  The devil’s self had been sick of his own din;

  And Pietro, after trumpeting huge wrongs

  At church and market-place, pillar and post,

  Square’s corner, street’s end, now the palace-step

  And now the wine-house bench — while, on her side,

  Violante up and down was voluble

  In whatsoever pair of ears would perk

  From goody, gossip, cater-cousin and sib,

  Curious to peep at the inside of things

  And catch in the act pretentious poverty

  At its wits’ end to keep appearance up,

  Make both ends meet, — nothing the vulgar loves

  Like what this couple pitched them right and left, —

  Then, their worst done that way, they struck tent, marched:

  — Renounced their share o’ the bargain, flung what dues

  Guido was bound to pay, in Guido’s face,

  Left their hearts’-darling, treasure of the twain

  And so forth, the poor inexperienced bride,

  To her own devices, bade Arezzo rot

  And the life signorial, and sought Rome once more.

  I see the comment ready on your lip,

  “The better fortune, Guido’s — free at least

  “By this defection of the foolish pair,

  “He could begin make profit in some sort

  “Of the young bride and the new quietness,

  “Lead his own life now, henceforth breathe unplagued.”

  Could he? You know the sex like Guido’s self.

  Learn the Violante-nature!

  Once in Rome,

  By way of helping Guido lead such life,

  Her first act to inaugurate return

  Was, she got pricked in conscience: Jubilee

  Gave her the hint. Our Pope, as kind as just,

  Attained his eighty years, announced a boon

  Should make us bless the fact, held Jubilee —

  Short shrift, prompt pardon for the light offence,

  And no rough dealing with the regular crime

  So this occasion were not suffered slip —

  Otherwise, sins commuted as before,

  Without the least abatement in the price.

  Now, who had thought it? All this while, it seems,

  Our sage Violante had a sin of a sort

  She must compound for now or not at all:

  Now be the ready riddance! She confessed

  Pompilia was a fable not a fact:

  She never bore a child in her whole life.

  Had this child been a changeling, that were grace

  In some degree, exchange is hardly theft;

  You take your stand on truth ere leap your lie:

  Here was all lie, no touch of truth at all,

  All the lie hers — not even Pietro guessed

  He was as childless still as twelve years since.

  The babe had been a find i’ the filth-heap, Sir,

  Catch from the kennel! There was found a Rome,

  Down in the deepest of our social dregs,

  A woman who professed the wanton’s trade

  Under the requisite thin coverture,

  Communis meretrix and washer-wife:

  The creature thus conditioned found by chance

  Motherhood like a jewel in the muck,

  And straightway either trafficked with her prize

  Or listened to the tempter and let be, —

  Made pact abolishing her place and part

  In womankind, beast-fellowship indeed —

  She sold this babe eight months before its birth

  To our Violante, Pietro’s honest spouse,

  Well-famed and widely-instanced as that crown

  To the husband, virtue in a woman’s shape.

  She it was, bought and paid for, passed the thing

  Off as the flesh and blood and child of her

  Despite the flagrant fifty years, — and why?

  Partly to please old Pietro, fill his cup

  With wine at the late hour when lees are left,

  And send him from life’s feast rejoicingly, —

  Partly to cheat the rightful heirs, agape,

  Each uncle’s cousin’s brother’s son of him,

  For that same principal of the usufruct

  It vext him he must die and leave behind.

  Such was the sin had come to be confessed.

  Which of the tales, the first or last, was true?

  Did she so sin once, or, confessing now,

  Sin for the first time? Either way you will.

  One sees a reason for the cheat: one sees

  A reason for a cheat in owning cheat

  Where no cheat had been. What of the revenge?

  What prompted the contrition all at once,

  Made the avowal easy, the shame slight?

  Why, prove they but Pompilia not their child,

  No child, no dowry; this, supposed their child,

  Had claimed what this, shown alien to their blood,

  Claimed nowise: Guido’s claim was through his wife,

  Null then and void with hers. The biter bit,

  Do you see! For such repayment of the past,

  One might conceive the penitential pair

  Ready to bring their case before the courts,

  Publish their infamy to all the world

  And, arm in arm, go chuckling thence content.

  Is this your view? ‘Twas Guido’s anyhow

  And colourable: he came forward then,

  Protested in his very bride’s behalf

  Against this lie and all it led to, least

  Of all the loss o’ the dowry; no! From her

  And him alike he wou
ld expunge the blot,

  Erase the brand of such a bestial birth,

  Participate in no hideous heritage

  Gathered from the gutter to be garnered up

  And glorified in a palace. Peter and Paul!

  But that who likes may look upon the pair

  Exposed in yonder church, and show his skill

  By saying which is eye and which is mouth

  Thro’ those stabs thick and threefold, — but for that —

  A strong word on the liars and their lie

  Might crave expression and obtain it, Sir!

  — Though prematurely, since there’s more to come,

  More than will shake your confidence in things

  Your cousin tells you, — may I be so bold?

  This makes the first act of the farce, — anon

  The stealing sombre element comes in

  Till all is black or blood-red in the piece.

  Guido, thus made a laughing-stock abroad,

  A proverb for the market-place at home,

  Left alone with Pompilia now, this graft

  So reputable on his ancient stock,

  This plague-seed set to fester his sound flesh,

  What did the Count? Revenge him on his wife?

  Unfasten at all risks to rid himself

  The noisome lazar-badge, fall foul of fate,

  And, careless whether the poor rag was ware

  O’ the part it played, or helped unwittingly,

  Bid it go burn and leave his frayed flesh free?

  Plainly, did Guido open both doors wide,

  Spurn thence the cur-cast creature and clear scores

  As man might, tempted in extreme like this?

  No, birth and breeding, and compassion too

  Saved her such scandal. She was young, he thought,

  Not privy to the treason, punished most

  I’ the proclamation of it; why make her

  A party to the crime she suffered by?

  Then the black eyes were now her very own,

  Not any more Violante’s: let her live,

  Lose in a new air, under a new sun,

  The taint of the imputed parentage

  Truely or falsely, take no more the touch

  Of Pietro and his partner anyhow!

  All might go well yet.

  So she thought, herself,

  It seems, since what was her first act and deed

  When news came how these kindly ones at Rome

  Had stripped her naked to amuse the world

  With spots here, spots there, and spots everywhere?

  — For I should tell you that they noised abroad

  Not merely the main scandal of her birth,

  But slanders written, printed, published wide,

  Pamphlets which set forth all the pleasantry

  Of how the promised glory was a dream,

  The power a bubble and the wealth — why, dust.

  There was a picture, painted to the life,

  Of those rare doings, that superlative

  Initiation in magnificence

  Conferred on a poor Roman family

  By favour of Arezzo and her first

  And famousest, the Franceschini there.

  You had the Countship holding head aloft

  Bravely although bespattered, shifts and straits

  In keeping out o’ the way o’ the wheels o’ the world,

  The comic of those home-contrivances

  When the old lady-mother’s wit was taxed

  To find six clamorous mouths in food more real

  Than fruit plucked off the cobwebbed family-tree,

  Or acorns shed from its gilt mouldered frame —

  Cold glories served up with three-pauls’ worth’s sauce.

  What, I ask, — when the drunkenness of hate

  Hiccuped return for hospitality,

  Befouled the table they had feasted on,

  Or say, — God knows I’ll not prejudge the case, —

  Grievances thus distorted, magnified,

  Coloured by quarrel into calumny, —

  What side did our Pompilia first espouse?

  Her first deliberate measure was, she wrote,

  Pricked by some loyal impulse, straight to Rome

  And her husband’s brother the Abate there,

  Who, having managed to effect the match,

  Might take men’s censure for its ill success.

  She made a clean breast also in her turn;

  She qualified the couple handsomely!

  Since whose departure, hell, she said, was heaven,

  And the house, late distracted by their peals,

  Quiet as Carmel where the lilies live.

  Herself had oftentimes complained: but why?

  All her complaints had been their prompting, tales

  Trumped up, devices to this very end.

  Their game had been to thwart her husband’s love

  And cross his will, malign his words and ways,

  So reach this issue, furnish this pretence

  For impudent withdrawal from their bond, —

  Theft, indeed murder, since they meant no less

  Whose last injunction to her simple self

  Had been — what parents’-precept do you think?

  That she should follow after with all speed,

  Fly from her husband’s house clandestinely,

  Join them at Rome again, but first of all

  Pick up a fresh companion in her flight,

  Putting so youth and beauty to fit use,

  Some gay, dare-devil, cloak-and-rapier spark

  Capable of adventure, — helped by whom

  She, some fine eve when lutes were in the air,

  Having put poison in the posset-cup,

  Laid hands on money, jewels, and the like,

  And, to conceal the thing with more effect,

  By way of parting benediction too,

  Fired the house, — one would finish famously

  I’ the tumult, slip out, scurry off and away

  And turn up merrily at home once more.

  Fact this, and not a dream o’ the devil, Sir!

  And more than this, a fact none dare dispute,

  Word for word, such a letter did she write.

  And such the Abate read, nor simply read

  But gave all Rome to ruminate upon,

  In answer to such charges as, I say,

  The couple sought to be beforehand with.

  The cause thus carried to the courts at Rome,

  Guido away, the Abate had no choice

  But stand forth, take his absent brother’s part,

  Defend the honour of himself beside.

  He made what head he might against the pair,

  Maintained Pompilia’s birth legitimate

  And all her rights intact — hers, Guido’s now —

  And so far by his tactics turned their flank,

  The enemy being beforehand in the place,

  That, though the courts allowed the cheat for fact,

  Suffered Violante to parade her shame,

  Publish her infamy to heart’s content,

  And let the tale o’ the feigned birth pass for proved, —

  Yet they stopped there, refused to intervene

  And dispossess the innocents, befooled

  By gifts o’ the guilty, at guilt’s new caprice:

  They would not take away the dowry now

  Wrongfully given at first, nor bar at all

  Succession to the aforesaid usufruct,

  Established on a fraud, nor play the game

  Of Pietro’s child and now not Pietro’s child

  As it might suit the gamester’s purpose. Thus

  Was justice ever ridiculed in Rome:

  Such be the double verdicts favoured here

  Which send away both parties to a suit

  Nor puffed up nor cast down, — for each a crumb

  Of right, for neither of them the whole lo
af.

  Whence, on the Comparini’s part, appeal —

  Counter-appeal on Guido’s, — that’s the game:

  And so the matter stands, even to this hour,

  Bandied as balls are in a tennis-court,

  And so might stand, unless some heart broke first,

  Till doomsday.

  Leave it thus, and now revert

  To the old Arezzo whence we moved to Rome.

  We’ve had enough o’ the parents, false or true,

  Now for a touch o’ the daughter’s quality.

  The start’s fair henceforth — every obstacle

  Out of the young wife’s footpath — she’s alone —

  Left to walk warily now: how does she walk?

  Why, once a dwelling’s doorpost marked and crossed

  In rubric by the enemy on his rounds

  As eligible, as fit place of prey,

  Baffle him henceforth, keep him out who can!

  Stop up the door at the first hint of hoof,

  Presently at the window taps a horn,

  And Satan’s by your fireside, never fear!

  Pompilia, left alone now, found herself;

  Found herself young too, sprightly, fair enough,

  Matched with a husband old beyond his age

  (Though that was something like four times her own)

  Because of cares past, present, and to come:

  Found too the house dull and its inmates dead,

  So, looked outside for light and life.

  And lo

  There in a trice did turn up life and light,

  The man with the aureole, sympathy made flesh,

  The all-consoling Caponsacchi, Sir!

  A priest — what else should the consoler be?

  With goodly shoulderblade and proper leg,

  A portly make and a symmetric shape,

  And curls that clustered to the tonsure quite.

  This was a bishop in the bud, and now

  A canon full-blown so far: priest, and priest

  Nowise exorbitantly overworked,

  The courtly Christian, not so much Saint Paul

  As a saint of Cæsar’s household: there posed he

  Sending his god-glance after his shot shaft,

  Apollos turned Apollo, while the snake

  Pompilia writhed transfixed through all her spires.

  He, not a visitor at Guido’s house,

  Scarce an acquaintance, but in prime request

  With the magnates of Arezzo, was seen here,

  Heard there, felt everywhere in Guido’s path

  If Guido’s wife’s path be her husband’s too.

  Now he threw comfits at the theatre

  Into her lap, — what harm in Carnival?

  Now he pressed close till his foot touched her gown,

  His hand brushed hers, — how help on promenade?

  And, ever on weighty business, found his steps