Love, how it sells poor bliss But we, though soon they fall, Which ours we call. III. Whilst skies are blue and bright, Whilst eyes that change ere night Whilst yet the calm hours creep, SONNET. POLITICAL GREATNESS. NOR happiness, nor majesty, nor fame, Nor peace, nor strength, nor skill in arms or arts, Of their own likeness. What are numbers knit THE AZIOLA.1 I. "Do you not hear the Aziola cry? Said Mary, as we sate In dusk, ere stars were lit, or candles brought; This Aziola was some tedious woman, Asked, "Who is Aziola?" How elate And laughed, and said, "Disquiet yourself not; II. Sad Aziola! many an eventide Thy music I had heard By wood and stream, meadow and mountain side, And fields and marshes wide, Such as nor voice, nor lute, nor wind, nor bird, The soul ever stirred; Unlike and far sweeter than them all. Sad Aziola! from that moment I Loved thee and thy sad cry. 1 Published in The Keepsake for 1829. 2 This line is certainly right as printed in The Keepsake, which I have followed. In Mrs. Shelley's and Mr. Rossetti's editions, the word the is introduced before stars. 3 Here again I think The Keepsake VOL. IV. G is right in reading or: Mrs. Shelley and Mr. Rossetti read and. 4 So in The Keepsake, but they in the collected editions. Mr. Garnett suggests that them should be inserted after Unlike, -a very tempting emendation, for which I should be glad to find authority. A LAMENT.1 I. Он, world! oh, life! oh, time! On whose last steps I climb Trembling at that where I had stood before; When will return the glory of your prime? No more- -O, never more! II. Out of the day and night A joy has taken flight; Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar,2 Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight No more-0, never more! REMEMBRANCE.3 I. SWIFTER far than summer's flight- 1 First given by Mrs. Shelley in the Posthumous Poems. Mr. Rossetti introduces the word autumn after summer. 3 First given by Mrs. Shelley in the Posthumous Poems, with the title A Lament. Mr. Rossetti substituted the title Remembrance, obtained from a MS. in the possession of Mr. Trelawny, which varies considerably from the received version. Mr. Rossetti says the song was sent to Mrs. Williams with the following "lines of message":"Dear Jane, If this melancholy old song suits any of your tunes, How or any that humour of the moment may dictate, you are welcome to it. Do not say it is mine to anyone, even if you think so: indeed, it is from the torn leaf of a book out of date. are you to-day, and how is Williams? Tell him that I dreamed of nothing but sailing, and fishing up coral. Your ever affectionate, P. B. S." Every change shewn by that MS. of the song seems to me a distinct deterioration; and I have not the slightest doubt that this, like many other poems, was written by Shelley several times, and improved each time. It is incon Swifter far than happy night,1 Art thou come and gone As the wood when leaves are shed,2 I am left lone, alone. II. The swallow summer comes again- To fly with thee, false as thou.- III. Lilies for a bridal bed--- ceivable that the perfect poem as printed by Mrs. Shelley in 1824 can have been varied from Mr. Trelawny's MS. on Mrs. Shelley's own authority: she must have had a MS. shewing the variations; but Mr. Rossetti, while giving one line not in Mr. Trelawny's MS., on the authority of a letter of Mrs. Shelley's wherein the line is quoted, thought it safer to "abide by the MS." elsewhere in the poem. Fortunately MS. authority exists for Mrs. Shelley's version,-or rather for what is a slight advance upon that. Lord Houghton has a copy of Adonais, on the fly-leaf of which this poem has been written by Shelley; and the version printed above is, by his Lordship's kindness, given verbatim et literatim from this copy. The following notes will shew in what respects it varies from Mrs. Shelley's and Mr. Rossetti's editions. I have specified every variation except those in punctuation. 1 This line and the last change places in Mr. Rossetti's edition. 2 In Mrs. Shelley's and Mr. Rossetti's editions this and the two following lines read thus: As the earth when leaves are dead, but I think it will be obvious at once that Lord Houghton's copy shews developement. I take it that Shelley observed the unfitness of the Earth covered with dead leaves for a symbol of a forsaken state, and substituted that of the stripped wood. It seems to me impossible that the alteration can have been in the other direction. 3 In Mrs. Shelley's and Mr. Rossetti's editions, her. 4 In Mr. Rossetti's edition this line reads My heart to-day desires to-morrow; and this, again, is I think inferior metrically and in force of expression to the line of the text. Violets for a maiden dead Pansies let my flowers be:1 On the living grave I bear Let no friend, however dear, Waste one hope, one fear for me.2 TO EDWARD WILLIAMS. 3 I. THE serpent is shut out from paradise. The wounded deer must seek the herb no more In which its heart-cure lies: The widowed dove must cease to haunt a bower Like that from which its mate with feigned sighs Fled in the April hour. I too must seldom seek again. Near happy friends a mitigated pain. 1 In Mr. Trelawny's MS. there is a wholly different line in place of this, namely, Sadder flowers find for me: another proof, I think, that it was a less mature version than Lord Houghton's, the line being over alliterative and faulty in point of rhyme. 2 In Mr. Rossetti's edition Waste a hope, a fear, for me. 3 Mrs. Shelley first gave these lines, addressed to Edward Williams, in the first edition of 1839, headed simply STANZAS. Where they originally appeared, I have not yet succeeded in finding out; but I have little doubt that they were published in some periodical or Annual before the issue of Ascham's edition of 1834,-a piratical collected edition of Shelley's poetry which contains these stanzas to Williams, as well as the three pieces from The Keepsake for 1829. It seems a letter from Shelley, thus: "My dear Williams, Looking over the portfolio in which my friend used to keep his verses and in which those I sent you the other day were found, I have lit upon these; which, as they are too dismal for me to keep, I send you. If any of the stanzas should please you, you may read them to Jane, but to no one else. And yet, on second thoughts, I had rather you would not. Yours ever affectionately, P. B. S." In this case, again, I suspect Mrs. Shelley worked from a different MS. |