| |
| ONCE, in old Amsterdam, as noon | |
| Shone over noisy dock and square, | |
| And sluggish stretch of still lagoon, | |
| A wealthy barge, well-oared and fleet, | |
| Slid smoothly down the watery street, | 5 |
| With pennon streaming in the air; | |
| And by its stern a merchant old,— | |
| With raisin-colored cap, and chain | |
| That crossed his garment’s velvet fold,— | |
| With clear brown eye of wrinkled glee, | 10 |
| And cheek still red, though tropic-tanned | |
| With voyage,—full-veined, courteous hand, | |
| And air of antique bonhommie,— | |
| Sat calmly; for that day his brain | |
| Forgot awhile the fight for gold, | 15 |
| And all his ventures on the main. | |
| |
| “Good master, whither shall we row?” | |
| It was the bluff old steersman spoke. | |
| The merchant turned: “To-day, good folk, | |
| I mean to pass all leisurely | 20 |
| With Meister Rembrandt, whom I know,— | |
| A famous portrait-painter he, | |
| Late come from Leyden, as they tell, | |
| To fill his purse with us, and dwell | |
| In our old town a year or so: | 25 |
| Fair be his chances with us; well | |
| His craft deserves of all: for me, | |
| I hail his presence joyously; | |
| For, as the sands of life will pass, | |
| However tight we grasp the glass, | 30 |
| ’T is time, methinks, that my old Hall | |
| Should wear my picture on its wall. | |
| What think you?” “God withhold the day!” | |
| The oarsmen echoed one and all, | |
| “That takes that kindly face away.” | 35 |
| |
| “Yet must it come.” The rowers swept | |
| In silence down; broad flashed the sun | |
| Along the glittering path that spun | |
| In whirls behind: by wharf and quay, | |
| With cask and bale redundant heaped, | 40 |
| Tall merchant-barques at moorings lay, | |
| With streamers floating from each mast; | |
| Groups gathered in the leafy screen | |
| Of summer tree rows, dusty green; | |
| And busy bridges, as they passed, | 45 |
| Gloomed o’er them for a second’s space; | |
| Now oped some quaint wide market-place, | |
| All bustle, glare, and merchant talk, | |
| And heaped with motley merchant ware; | |
| Now some cathedral’s gilded clock | 50 |
| Sprinkled its chimes through the clear air, | |
| Merrily ringing o’er their way, | |
| As it were making holiday. | |
| |
| At length the river broadened forth, | |
| And sunk the noisy town behind, | 55 |
| And swept the breezy billows by, | |
| Fresh foaming from the distant sky, | |
| Where hosted shipping round the North, | |
| Full breasted in the steady wind, | |
| Came courtesying along the sea | 60 |
| From the blue spacing Zuyder-Zee. | |
| In slanting drifts the city’s smoke | |
| Curtained the sinking spires, and o’er | |
| The sidelong stretch of shelving shore | |
| In bursts the sunlit surges broke; | 65 |
| Upon each passing headland’s height | |
| Fantastic windmills quaint and brown | |
| Whirred busily; and, poised in light, | |
| The gull with red eye peering down: | |
| Thus on, until at length they reached | 70 |
| A watery suburb, where they beached. | |
| |
| Above them, girt by gnarled trees, | |
| Arose an antique mansion, tall | |
| And lonely; down each mouldering wall, | |
| Jutted with drowsy balconies, | 75 |
| Dim trailers drooping from the eaves, | |
| Hooded with glossy ivy leaves, | |
| O’er gable quaint and window small | |
| Festooned their wind-swung draperies. | |
| Around its portal gray the sun | 80 |
| Played slumbrously, and swooned the air | |
| Up from the glimmering lowland there, | |
| In languid pulses; while upon | |
| Its tortuous stairs of aged stone | |
| The sea-sand gathered in each nook,— | 85 |
| The flaggers waved, the salt grass shook. | |
| |
| Into its hall the merchant paced, | |
| And from his sunny doze, beside | |
| A window looking o’er the tide, | |
| A quaint old varlet rose in haste; | 90 |
| And, bowing brows of scattered gray, | |
| Along the creaking dusty floors | |
| And through the echoing corridors | |
| And noiseless chambers led the way: | |
| The room is reached, the lock is turned, | 95 |
| The painter flings his brush aside, | |
| And by the lamp’s red glow, that burned | |
| Beside his picture, sees the friend | |
| Of vanished summers o’er him bend; | |
| While hands are clasped, and on each brow | 100 |
| Dead memories kindle, as they say, | |
| In cordial chorus, “Well, and how— | |
| How hast thou been this many a day?” | |
| |
| “’T is twenty years since we have met,” | |
| The burgomaster cried; “and yet | 105 |
| As hale and hearty, God be blessed, | |
| Are we as when, in summers past, | |
| We gave our life-sail to the blast. | |
| What matters it, if silvered brows | |
| Bring golden purses, and our thrift | 110 |
| Secures us plenty as we drift | |
| To harbor in the sunless west? | |
| Mine are the merchant’s views of time; | |
| Content to pass my day in trade, | |
| Content at night if I have made | 115 |
| The means to entertain a guest: | |
| A narrow view, a sordid strife, | |
| More selfish, comrade, than sublime | |
| This same,—and your good years, I trow, | |
| Are kindled with a nobler glow.” * * * * * | 120 |
| Dark is the chamber, though ’t is day; | |
| Curtained and lighted from the blue | |
| By one thin streaming ray that through | |
| The domed roof falls splendrously: | |
| Unlike the gloried studios | 125 |
| By Tiber’s yellow wave, or where, | |
| Through alder rows and banks aglare, | |
| The sunny rippled Arno flows. | |
| No Grecian bust or statue shows | |
| Its pure ideal outline there; | 130 |
| No Cupid smiles, no Venus glows | |
| Voluptuous languors through the air; | |
| But duskily the light streams o’er | |
| Rich turbans tumbled on the floor. | |
| Around the stretch of shadowing walls, | 135 |
| Gloomy as Eblis’ palace halls, | |
| Hang garbs of many a distant land. | |
| Great giant armor, casque and brand, | |
| Inlaid with subtlest traceries, | |
| Send forth a dim uncertain sheen | 140 |
| Beneath the skirt of ebon palls, | |
| Swart cowls, and Jewish gabardine, | |
| Long Moorish cloaks, and Persian shawls: | |
| Nor there of instruments of pain | |
| And iron anguish, screw and rack | 145 |
| Blood-rusted, seemed there any lack; | |
| While draped across a mirror’s disk | |
| The cincture of some Odalisque | |
| Glimmered amid a motley train | |
| Of skins, and mighty ocean bones, | 150 |
| And plumages from burning zones, | |
| Skulls, shells, and arid skeletons, | |
| O’erstrewn with aureate draperies. | |
| |
| Then for a time the painter dashed | |
| His canvas o’er with many a hue; | 155 |
| Broad shadow-masses fell, and flashed | |
| The keen lights over lip and eye, | |
| As glowingly and steadily | |
| The face beneath his pencil grew; | |
| Through the half-open curtain slid | 160 |
| The silent lights, and sunnily | |
| Without the casement voyaged the bee | |
| With busy hum along, or hid | |
| In wallflowers streaked with gold and brown; | |
| The skylark o’er the island sang; | 165 |
| Till faintly from the distant town | |
| The bell through smoky steeples rang | |
| The hour of silent afternoon. * * * * * | |
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