"I should li-i-ike," she said.
Tom laid himself back a little in his chair, with the sheet of
music in his hand, closed his eyes, and repeated as follows--he
knew all his own verses by heart:
"Lovely lady, sweet disdain!
Prithee keep thy Love at home;
Bind him with a tressed chain;
Do not let the mischief roam.
"In the jewel-cave, thine eye,
In the tangles of thy hair,
It is well the imp should lie--
There his home, his heaven is there.
"But for pity's sake, forbid
Beauty's wasp at me to fly;
Sure the child should not be chid,
And his mother standing by.
"For if once the villain came
To my house, too well I know
He would set it all aflame--
To the winds its ashes blow.
"Prithee keep thy Love at home;
Net him up or he will start;
And if once the mischief roam,
Straight he'll wing him to my heart."
What there might be in verse like this to touch with faintest
emotion, let him say who cultivates art for art's sake. Doubtless
there is that in rhythm and rhyme and cadence which will touch
the pericardium when the heart itself is not to be reached by
divinest harmony; but, whether such women as Hesper feel this
touch or only admire a song as they admire the church-prayers and
Shakespeare, or whether, imagining in it some _tour de
force_ of which they are themselves incapable, they therefore
look upon it as a mighty thing, I am at a loss to determine.
Pages:
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300