Out in fire the strong pain of pent knowledge: | And, just because I was thrice as old but I fainted not, 320 And our paths in the world diverged so wide, For the Hand still impelled me at once and Each was naught to each, must I be told? We were fellow mortals, naught beside?

supported, suppressed

All the tumult, and quenched it with quiet, and holy behest,

Till the rapture was shut in itself, and the earth sank to rest.

Anon at the dawn, all that trouble had withered from earth

Not so much, but I saw it die out in the day's tender birth;

In the gathered intensity brought to the gray

of the hills;

No, indeed! for God above

24

Is great to grant, as mighty to make,
And creates the love to reward the love:
I claim you still, for my own love's sake!
Delayed it may be for more lives yet,
Through worlds I shall traverse, not a few:
Much is to learn, much to forget

Ere the time be come for taking you.

In the shuddering forests' held breath; in the But the time will come, at last it will,

sudden wind-thrills;

In the startled wild beasts that bore off, each with eye sidling still

Though averted with wonder and dread; in the birds stiff and chill

That rose heavily, as I approached them, made

stupid with awe:

330

32

E'en the serpent that slid away silent, he felt And what you would do with me, in fine, 39 In the new life come in the old one's stead.

the new law.

What, 't is past midnight, and you go the And his weapon in the other, yet unwiped!

rounds,

And here you catch me at an alley's end
Where sportive ladies leave their doors ajar?
The Carmine's my cloister: hunt it up.
Do, harry out, if you must show your zeal,
Whatever rat, there, haps on his wrong hole,
And nip each softling of a wee white mouse, 10
Weke, weke, that 's crept to keep him company!
Aha, you know your betters! Then, you'll take
Your hand away that's fiddling on my throat,
And please to know me likewise. Who am I?
Why, one, sir, who is lodging with a friend
Three streets off-he's a certain . . . how
ye call?

...

Master-a . . . Cosimo of the Medici,

were best!

40

It's not your chance to have a bit of chalk,
A wood-coal or the like? or you should see!
Yes, I'm the painter, since you style me so.
What, brother Lippo's doings, up and down,
You know them and they take you? like enough!
I saw the proper twinkle in your eye-
"Tell you, I liked your looks at very first.
Let's sit and set things straight now, hip to
haunch.

Here's spring come, and the nights one makes
up bands

To roam the town and sing out carnival, d'And I've been three weeks shut within my mew, A-painting for the great man, saints and saints And saints again. I could not paint all night

50

I' the house that caps the corner. Boh! you Ouf! I leaned out of window for fresh air.
There came a hurry of feet and little feet,
A sweep of lute strings, laughs, and whifts of
song,-
Flower o' the broom,

20

Remember and tell me, the day you're hanged,
How you affected such a gullet 's-gripe!
But you, sir, it concerns you that your knaves
Pick up a manner1 nor discredit you:
Zooks, are we pilchards,2 that they sweep the Flower o' the quince,
streets

Take away love, and our earth is a tomb!

I let Lisa go, and what good in life since?

And count fair prize what comes into their Flower o' the thyme-and so on. Round they net?

He's Judas to a tittle, that man is!

Just such a face! Why, sir, you make amends.
Lord, I'm not angry! Bid your hang-dogs go
Drink out this quarter-florin to the health
Of the munificent House that harbours me
(And many more beside, lads! more beside!) 30
And all's come square again. I'd like his
face-

Iis, elbowing on his comrade in the door
With the pike and lantern,-for the slave that
holds

John Baptist's head a-dangle by the hair
With one hand ("Look you, now," as who
should say)

1 mend a little

2 Mediterranean sardines.

went.3

70

On Jerome knocking at his poor old breast
With his great round stone to subdue the flesh,
You snap me of the sudden. Ah, I see!
Though your eye twinkles still, you shake your

head

If I've been merry, what matter who knows? And so as I was stealing back again the new spirit was manifested in the change To get to bed and have a bit of sleep from religious and symbolical subjects-haloed Ere I rise up to-morrow and go work saints and choiring angels-to portraits and scenes from human life and the world of nature, or to religious pictures thoroughly humanized. The poem was suggested by a picture of the "Coronation of the Virgin" (described in lines 347 ff.) which is in the Academy of Fine Arts at Florence; the incidents of the life of Fra Filippo Lippi (1406?1469) were obtained from Vasari's Lives of the Painters. He was first a monk, but he broke away from the Carmine, or Carmelite monastery, and came under the patronage of If Master Cosimo announced himself, Cosimo de' Medici the Elder, the great banker: Mum's the word naturally; but a monk! patron of art and literature, and practical ruler of the Forentine Republic. It is said Come, what am I a beast for? tell us, now! 80 that his patron once shut him up in his palace in order to restrain his roving propensities and keep him at work on some frescoes he was painting. The poem opens with his capture on this escapade by the watchmen.

Mine's shaved-a monk, you say-the sting's in that!

3 I. e., took up the song in turn.

4 The Church of San Lorenzo.

5 St. Jerome, one of the early church fathers.

All the Latin I construe is "amo," I love!
But, mind you, when a boy starves in the streets |
Eight years together, as my fortune was,
Watching folk's faces to know who will fling
The bit of half-stripped grape-bunch he desires,
And who will curse or kick him for his pains,-I
Which gentleman processionale and fine,
Holding a candle to the Sacrament,
Will wink and let him lift a plate and catch
The droppings of the wax to sell again,
Or holla for the Eight7 and have him whipped,-
How say I-nay, which dog bites, which lets
drop

It's . . . well, what matters talking, it's the I'm my own master, paint now as I pleasesoul!

Give us no more of body than shows soul!
Here's Giotto,14 with his Saint a-praising God,
That sets us praising, why not stop with him?
Why put all thoughts of praise out of our
head

191

With wonder at lines, colours, and what not?
Paint the soul, never mind the legs and arms!
Rub all out, try at it a second time.
Oh, that

Having a friend, you see, in the Corner-house!
Lord, it's fast holding by the rings in front-
Those great rings serve more purposes than just
To plant a flag in, or tie up a horse!
And yet the old schooling sticks, the old grave
eyes

230

Are peeping o'er my shoulder as I work,
The heads shake still—“It's art's decline, my
son!

white smallish female with the You're not of the true painters, great and old;
breasts,
Brother Angelico 's16 the man, you'll find;

.

.

She's just my niece Herodias,15 I would Brother Lorenzo17 stands his single peer: say,

Fag on at flesh, you'll never make the third!''

Who went and danced and got men's heads Flower o' the pine,

Don't you think they're the likeliest to know,
They with their Latin? So, I swallow my rage,
Clench my teeth, suck my lips in tight, and
paint

To please them-sometimes do and sometimes
don't;

For, doing most, there's pretty sure to come
A turn, some warm eve finds me at my saints--
A laugh, a cry, the business of the world-
(Flower o' the peach,

Death for us all, and his own life for each!)
And my whole soul revolves, the cup runs
over,

250

13 Frequently represented so in early paintings, The world and life's too big to pass for a e. g., in the "Triumph of Death," ascribed to Orcagna, in the Campo Santo of Pisa.

14 Sometimes called "the father of modern Italian art"; he flourished at the beginning of the 14th century.

15 It was not Herodias, but her daughter, Salome, who danced before Herod and obtained the head of John the Baptist. See Matthew, 14.

dream,

And I do these wild things in sheer despite,
16 Fra Angelico (1387-1415), who painted in the
earlier manner; famous for his paintings of
angels. Cp. what Ruskin says, p. 684.
17 Lorenzo Monaco, another contemporary painter.

And play the fooleries you catch me at,
In pure rage! The old mill-horse, out at grass
After hard years, throws up his stiff heels so,
Although the miller does not preach to him
The only good of grass is to make chaff.
What would men have? Do they like grass

or no

There's no advantage! you must beat her, then.".

For, don't you mark? we're made so that we love

300

First when we see them painted, things we have passed

Perhaps a hundred times nor cared to see;

May they or may n't they? all I want's the And so they are better, painted-better to us.

Which is the same thing. Art was given for
that;

God uses us to help each other so,
Lending our minds out. Have you noticed,

now,

Your cullion's hanging face? A bit of chalk,
And trust me but you should, though! How
much more,

If I drew higher things with the same truth!
That were to take the Prior's pulpit-place, 310
Interpret God to all of you! Oh, oh,

It makes me mad to see what men shall do
This world 's no blot

You understand me: I'm a beast, I know. 270 And we in our graves! But see, now-why, I see as certainly

As that the morning-star 's about to shine,

What will hap some day. We've a youngster
here

Comes to our convent, studies what I do,
Slouches and stares and lets no atom drop:
His name is Guidi18-he 'll not mind the
monks-

for us,

Nor blank; it means intensely, and means

good:

To find its meaning is my meat and drink.
"Ay, but you don't so instigate to prayer!"
Strikes in the Prior: "when your meaning 's
plain

It does not say to folk-remember matins,

They call him Hulking Tom, he lets them talk-Or, mind you fast next Friday!" Why, for this, He picks my practice up-he 'll paint apace.

What need of art at all? A skull and bones, 320
Two bits of stick nailed crosswise, or, what's
best,

A bell to chime the hour with, does as well.
I painted a Saint Laurence19 six months since

However, you 're my man, you 've seen the At Prato,20 splashed the fresco in fine style:

world

-The beauty and the wonder and the power,
The shapes of things, their colours, lights and
shades,

Changes, surprises,-and God made it all!
-For what? Do you feel thankful, ay or no,
For this fair town's face, yonder river's line,
The mountain round it and the sky above,
Much more the figures of man, woman, child,
These are the frame to? What's it all about?290
To be passed over, despised? or dwelt upon,
Wondered at? oh, this last of course!-you say.
But why not do as well as say,-paint these
Just as they are, careless what comes of it?
God's works-paint any one, and count it crime
To let a truth slip. Don't object, "His works
Are here already; nature is complete:

"How looks my painting, now the scaffold 's

down?"

I ask a brother: "Hugely," he returns-
"Already not one phiz of your three slaves
Who turn the Deacon off his toasted side,
But 's scratched and prodded to our heart's
content,

The pious people have so eased their own 330
With coming to say prayers there in a rage:
We get on fast to see the bricks beneath.
Expect another job this time next year,
For pity and religion grow i' the crowd-
Your painting serves its purpose!" Hang the
fools!

-That is you'll not mistake an idle word Spoke in a huff by a poor monk, God wot, air this spicy night which turns

Suppose you reproduce her—(which you can't) Tasting the

18 Tommaso Guidi, better known as Masaccio (i. e. Tommasaccio, "Careless Tom"), the great pioneer of the Renaissance period, and the master of Filippo Lippi, not the pupil.

19 A Christian martyr of the 3d century who was
roasted alive on a gridiron, or iron chair,
20 A town near Florence.