Complete Works of Thomas Hardy (Illustrated) (962 page)

“And while I worked it made me think
Of timber’s varied doom;
One inch where people eat and drink,
The next inch in a tomb.

“But why do you look so white, my dear,
And turn aside your face?
You knew not that good lad, I fear,
Though he came from your native place?”

“How could I know that good young man,
Though he came from my native town,
When he must have left there earlier than
I was a woman grown?”

“Ah no. I should have understood!
It shocked you that I gave
To you one end of a piece of wood
Whose other is in a grave?”

“Don’t, dear, despise my intellect,
Mere accidental things
Of that sort never have effect
On my imaginings.”

Yet still her lips were limp and wan,
Her face still held aside,
As if she had known not only John,
But known of what he died.

THE SACRILEGE

A BALLAD-TRAGEDY
(Circa 182-)

PART I

“I have a Love I love too well
Where Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor;
I have a Love I love too well,
   To whom, ere she was mine,
‘Such is my love for you,’ I said,
‘That you shall have to hood your head
A silken kerchief crimson-red,
   Wove finest of the fine.’

“And since this Love, for one mad moon,
On Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor,
Since this my Love for one mad moon
   Did clasp me as her king,
I snatched a silk-piece red and rare
From off a stall at Priddy Fair,
For handkerchief to hood her hair
   When we went gallanting.

“Full soon the four weeks neared their end
Where Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor;
And when the four weeks neared their end,
   And their swift sweets outwore,
I said, ‘What shall I do to own
Those beauties bright as tulips blown,
And keep you here with me alone
   As mine for evermore?’

“And as she drowsed within my van
On Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor -
And as she drowsed within my van,
   And dawning turned to day,
She heavily raised her sloe-black eyes
And murmured back in softest wise,
‘One more thing, and the charms you prize
   Are yours henceforth for aye.

“‘And swear I will I’ll never go
While Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor
To meet the Cornish Wrestler Joe
   For dance and dallyings.
If you’ll to yon cathedral shrine,
And finger from the chest divine
Treasure to buy me ear-drops fine,
   And richly jewelled rings.’

“I said: ‘I am one who has gathered gear
From Marlbury Downs to Dunkery Tor,
Who has gathered gear for many a year
   From mansion, mart and fair;
But at God’s house I’ve stayed my hand,
Hearing within me some command -
Curbed by a law not of the land
   From doing damage there.’

“Whereat she pouts, this Love of mine,
As Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor,
And still she pouts, this Love of mine,
   So cityward I go.
But ere I start to do the thing,
And speed my soul’s imperilling
For one who is my ravishing
   And all the joy I know,

“I come to lay this charge on thee -
On Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor -
I come to lay this charge on thee
   With solemn speech and sign:
Should things go ill, and my life pay
For botchery in this rash assay,
You are to take hers likewise — yea,
   The month the law takes mine.

“For should my rival, Wrestler Joe,
Where Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor -
My reckless rival, Wrestler Joe,
   My Love’s possessor be,
My tortured spirit would not rest,
But wander weary and distrest
Throughout the world in wild protest:
   The thought nigh maddens me!”

PART II

Thus did he speak — this brother of mine -
On Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor,
Born at my birth of mother of mine,
   And forthwith went his way
To dare the deed some coming night . . .
I kept the watch with shaking sight,
The moon at moments breaking bright,
   At others glooming gray.

For three full days I heard no sound
Where Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor,
I heard no sound at all around
   Whether his fay prevailed,
Or one malign the master were,
Till some afoot did tidings bear
How that, for all his practised care,
   He had been caught and jailed.

They had heard a crash when twelve had chimed
By Mendip east of Dunkery Tor,
When twelve had chimed and moonlight climbed;
   They watched, and he was tracked
By arch and aisle and saint and knight
Of sculptured stonework sheeted white
In the cathedral’s ghostly light,
   And captured in the act.

Yes; for this Love he loved too well
Where Dunkery sights the Severn shore,
All for this Love he loved too well
   He burst the holy bars,
Seized golden vessels from the chest
To buy her ornaments of the best,
At her ill-witchery’s request
   And lure of eyes like stars . . .

When blustering March confused the sky
In Toneborough Town by Exon Moor,
When blustering March confused the sky
   They stretched him; and he died.
Down in the crowd where I, to see
The end of him, stood silently,
With a set face he lipped to me -
   ”Remember.” “Ay!” I cried.

By night and day I shadowed her
From Toneborough Deane to Dunkery Tor,
I shadowed her asleep, astir,
   And yet I could not bear -
Till Wrestler Joe anon began
To figure as her chosen man,
And took her to his shining van -
   To doom a form so fair!

He made it handsome for her sake -
And Dunkery smiled to Exon Moor -
He made it handsome for her sake,
   Painting it out and in;
And on the door of apple-green
A bright brass knocker soon was seen,
And window-curtains white and clean
   For her to sit within.

And all could see she clave to him
As cleaves a cloud to Dunkery Tor,
Yea, all could see she clave to him,
   And every day I said,
“A pity it seems to part those two
That hourly grow to love more true:
Yet she’s the wanton woman who
   Sent one to swing till dead!”

That blew to blazing all my hate,
While Dunkery frowned on Exon Moor,
And when the river swelled, her fate
   Came to her pitilessly . . .
I dogged her, crying: “Across that plank
They use as bridge to reach yon bank
A coat and hat lie limp and dank;
   Your goodman’s, can they be?”

She paled, and went, I close behind -
And Exon frowned to Dunkery Tor,
She went, and I came up behind
   And tipped the plank that bore
Her, fleetly flitting across to eye
What such might bode. She slid awry;
And from the current came a cry,
   A gurgle; and no more.

How that befell no mortal knew
From Marlbury Downs to Exon Moor;
No mortal knew that deed undue
   But he who schemed the crime,
Which night still covers . . . But in dream
Those ropes of hair upon the stream
He sees, and he will hear that scream
   Until his judgment-time.

THE ABBEY MASON

(Inventor of the “Perpendicular” Style of Gothic Architecture)

The new-vamped Abbey shaped apace
In the fourteenth century of grace;

(The church which, at an after date,
Acquired cathedral rank and state.)

Panel and circumscribing wall
Of latest feature, trim and tall,

Rose roundabout the Norman core
In prouder pose than theretofore,

Encasing magically the old
With parpend ashlars manifold.

The trowels rang out, and tracery
Appeared where blanks had used to be.

Men toiled for pleasure more than pay,
And all went smoothly day by day,

Till, in due course, the transept part
Engrossed the master-mason’s art.

- Home-coming thence he tossed and turned
Throughout the night till the new sun burned.

“What fearful visions have inspired
These gaingivings?” his wife inquired;

“As if your tools were in your hand
You have hammered, fitted, muttered, planned;

“You have thumped as you were working hard:
I might have found me bruised and scarred.

“What then’s amiss. What eating care
Looms nigh, whereof I am unaware?”

He answered not, but churchward went,
Viewing his draughts with discontent;

And fumbled there the livelong day
Till, hollow-eyed, he came away.

- ‘Twas said, “The master-mason’s ill!”
And all the abbey works stood still.

Quoth Abbot Wygmore: “Why, O why
Distress yourself? You’ll surely die!”

The mason answered, trouble-torn,
“This long-vogued style is quite outworn!

“The upper archmould nohow serves
To meet the lower tracery curves:

“The ogees bend too far away
To give the flexures interplay.

“This it is causes my distress . . .
So it will ever be unless

“New forms be found to supersede
The circle when occasions need.

“To carry it out I have tried and toiled,
And now perforce must own me foiled!

“Jeerers will say: ‘Here was a man
Who could not end what he began!’“

- So passed that day, the next, the next;
The abbot scanned the task, perplexed;

The townsmen mustered all their wit
To fathom how to compass it,

But no raw artistries availed
Where practice in the craft had failed . . .

- One night he tossed, all open-eyed,
And early left his helpmeet’s side.

Scattering the rushes of the floor
He wandered from the chamber door

And sought the sizing pile, whereon
Struck dimly a cadaverous dawn

Through freezing rain, that drenched the board
Of diagram-lines he last had scored -

Chalked phantasies in vain begot
To knife the architectural knot -

In front of which he dully stood,
Regarding them in hopeless mood.

He closelier looked; then looked again:
The chalk-scratched draught-board faced the rain,

Whose icicled drops deformed the lines
Innumerous of his lame designs,

So that they streamed in small white threads
From the upper segments to the heads

Of arcs below, uniting them
Each by a stalactitic stem.

- At once, with eyes that struck out sparks,
He adds accessory cusping-marks,

Then laughs aloud. The thing was done
So long assayed from sun to sun . . .

- Now in his joy he grew aware
Of one behind him standing there,

And, turning, saw the abbot, who
The weather’s whim was watching too.

Onward to Prime the abbot went,
Tacit upon the incident.

- Men now discerned as days revolved
The ogive riddle had been solved;

Templates were cut, fresh lines were chalked
Where lines had been defaced and balked,

And the work swelled and mounted higher,
Achievement distancing desire;

Here jambs with transoms fixed between,
Where never the like before had been -

There little mullions thinly sawn
Where meeting circles once were drawn.

“We knew,” men said, “the thing would go
After his craft-wit got aglow,

“And, once fulfilled what he has designed,
We’ll honour him and his great mind!”

When matters stood thus poised awhile,
And all surroundings shed a smile,

The master-mason on an eve
Homed to his wife and seemed to grieve . . .

- “The abbot spoke to me to-day:
He hangs about the works alway.

“He knows the source as well as I
Of the new style men magnify.

“He said: ‘You pride yourself too much
On your creation. Is it such?

“‘Surely the hand of God it is
That conjured so, and only His! -

“‘Disclosing by the frost and rain
Forms your invention chased in vain;

“‘Hence the devices deemed so great
You copied, and did not create.’

“I feel the abbot’s words are just,
And that all thanks renounce I must.

“Can a man welcome praise and pelf
For hatching art that hatched itself? . . .

“So, I shall own the deft design
Is Heaven’s outshaping, and not mine.”

“What!” said she. “Praise your works ensure
To throw away, and quite obscure

“Your beaming and beneficent star?
Better you leave things as they are!

“Why, think awhile. Had not your zest
In your loved craft curtailed your rest -

“Had you not gone there ere the day
The sun had melted all away!”

- But, though his good wife argued so,
The mason let the people know

That not unaided sprang the thought
Whereby the glorious fane was wrought,

But that by frost when dawn was dim
The method was disclosed to him.

“Yet,” said the townspeople thereat,
“‘Tis your own doing, even with that!”

But he — chafed, childlike, in extremes -
The temperament of men of dreams -

Aloofly scrupled to admit
That he did aught but borrow it,

And diffidently made request
That with the abbot all should rest.

- As none could doubt the abbot’s word,
Or question what the church averred,

The mason was at length believed
Of no more count than he conceived,