Stories there are in the world which make the heart ache with their sadness,
Stories of war and of want, stories of horror and death,
Parting of lovers forever, wrongs ending only in madness,
Mourning of mothers for those who scarce knew the sweetness of breath.
Not such a story as any of these is the tale I shall tell you,
Through chains or conspiracies here nobody suffers or dies,
Simple it is, my child, as anything ever befell you,
And yet when I chance to recall it I find there are tears in my eyes
Ah, there are chains full as strong as dungeon chains binding the prisoner,
But none hear them clank when remorse comes to murder the peace,
Nor torture is worse than the still small voice that makes you a listener,
That seldom in all a long life gave the one that I speak of release.
Strong was the sun in Uttoxeter Market and sharp were the showers there,
Where the poor bookseller held his stall upon fairing days;
Making his two-penny bargains many and long were the hours there
Spent by the debt-ridden man, worn with the world and its ways.
Books of the day were about him, and books that were ancient and far-fet,
All a good company, golden and silvern their words,
Yet hushed were their voices when fair-day came in Uttoxeter Market,
Stilled by the bleating of calves and the lowing of herds.
What would the good-wife with warble of Shakespeare or speech of Sylvester,
Bouncing about on her pillion, with butter and eggs on her lap —
Better her pocket-piece tossed to the tumbling clown or the jester,
She with an eye to a ribbon, she to a grogram, mayhap!
What would the yeoman with blackletter folio, or pages of Latin,
Tales of Venetian adventurers, troublous to spell —
He had his filly to brag of, shining and sleeker than satin,
He had his little black pigs and his yearlings to sell!
Hard was the task then, believe me, to earn the poor shilling so needed,
Sore ached the old bookseller's back, and sore ached his pride,
Yet often and often he thought how lightly the time would have speeded
If he could only have had there his son by his side.
Dear was the boy to his heart, dearer perhaps that disaster
Had scarred his sad face with the evil that good Queen Anne's touch had not stayed —
Was there a work on his shelves of which the boy was not yet master?
Was there a lad in all Litchfield not by his booklore dismayed?
Oft the old father turned over some scheme that should send him to college,
Surely with barely a crust were he and the mother content,
Bitter the trial to think they must starve this yearning for knowledge
While gold all over the kingdom for frivolous pleasure was spent.
Strong was the sun on that day when all of his ails so oppressed him,
Long and laborious the walk, and heavy his heart with his care —
Could the boy go in his place, for once, how kindly 'twould rest him,
Could he but linger, for once, at home in his easy-chair!
Did the boy hear him aright? He go to Uttoxeter Market?
He with his tremors and scars, he with his beggarly clothes,
He with his purblind eyes, for every wit's sally a target,
He to hawk ballads for ribalds and boors with their laughter and oaths?
Betimes, were there not at the door every morning three lads out of many,
One bowing the back to receive him, the others supporting his state?
Was he not first in the classes? Did they compare him with any?
He, who had writ Greek pentameters to stand in a stall and to wait?
Yet oft on the long-withdrawn highway the sight of a tired old man walking,
As sunshine and sunshower succeeded, that morning swam o'er the boy's eyes,
With the call of the doves overhead came the sound of a voice that was hawking
Wares that few wanted, a weary old voice that was quavering with sighs.
That was the morning when, climbing for apples, he came across Petrarch,
And nothing to him was the world then for hour after hour,
Nothing was bookworm or beggar, nothing was Caesar or Tetrarch,
He in Italian gardens lost like a bee in a flower!
But seeing again the white face, out of which life and courage were sinking,
Did his heart smite him to meet there the tender reproach of that gaze?
When at nightfall, all sore and disheartened, the father sat dreaming and thinking,
Did there not cross the boy's fancy the difference between their two days?
One in the heat and the hurry of barter, the crying and calling,
Dizzy and dazed with the noise, longing for twilight's relief —
One in green coolness and shadow, with murmurous waters soft falling,
And sweet was the melody round him, and sweet was the myrtle's crushed leaf!
All at once such a warmth of affection, such flood of regretting,
Rushed to the heart of the boy, with such fervor of pity and grief —
Ah, if he only had spoken it, then had been space for forgetting,
Nor of sorrows to haunt a whole lifetime had that been the chief!
" Unfilial, undutiful child, " his words went repeating, repeating,
And still, as the tone of the gong in the isles of the orient wrought,
Touched with the tap of a finger, rolls mightily swelling and beating
Till it fills the whole sky with its sound, were those words in his thought.
Still did they sigh in his thought, when the father had sought his long slumber,
And he in his nest of singing-birds, in the old university town,
Filled night with revel and madcap pranks, or days without number
Bathed in Castalian waters, and gathered the bays for his crown.
Still they resounded about him, in all the ripe years, with their grieving,
Hid in his work, while the murmur of fame babbled on like a brook,
Work that grew glorious what time the evergreen chaplet was weaving —
Ah, what a fragrance those bays have to-day, though pressed in a book!
Umpire of scholars at last, and heir of all learning owned loudly,
Poets, and painters, and players, confessed to his mastery each,
Princes and statesmen inquired of him, even the king sought him proudly —
He the king of the people, and he the king of their speech!
But still through his plaudits resounded the words once so long ago uttered,
" Unfilial, undutiful child, " till no more could he bear his own sighs,
And whenever the leaves of his book he dreamily fingered and fluttered
Swam there the white old face with the tender reproach of its eyes.
Sharp fell the showers then, one fair-day, across the Uttoxeter Market,
And, jostled and hustled and chided, another old man trod its ways;
Eager the crowd and the cries as of yore, while he stood there the target
For every wit's sally, the magnet for every lout's gaze.
Where once was the bookseller's stall, stood the burly old fellow,
Purblind, unwieldy, bare-headed in all of the rain,
Sharing the, gape of the rustics with smart Punchinello,
Half like a Caliban, half like a demigod writhing in pain.
Naught of the flout and the fleer did he know, or the jibes that were spoken,
Old memories, old forms thronged about him, there in the market-place,
Old voices fell sweet on his ear till his heart was half broken,
Prayers parted his lips, I think, and tears poured down over his face.
Perchance he was doing a penance with strange superstition,
Erst he refused the deed in the strength of his selfish shame,
Now, fifty long years and more gone, in impassioned contrition,
Known the world over, he stood there, and humbled his pride and his fame.
Let wild Hebrew chief or Greek King offer up his heart's treasure —
Better than sacrifice, once said the prophet, it is to obey —
Yet costly as any, the name and the glory, I measure,
Offered up on the shrine of Uttoxeter Market that day!
Stories of war and of want, stories of horror and death,
Parting of lovers forever, wrongs ending only in madness,
Mourning of mothers for those who scarce knew the sweetness of breath.
Not such a story as any of these is the tale I shall tell you,
Through chains or conspiracies here nobody suffers or dies,
Simple it is, my child, as anything ever befell you,
And yet when I chance to recall it I find there are tears in my eyes
Ah, there are chains full as strong as dungeon chains binding the prisoner,
But none hear them clank when remorse comes to murder the peace,
Nor torture is worse than the still small voice that makes you a listener,
That seldom in all a long life gave the one that I speak of release.
Strong was the sun in Uttoxeter Market and sharp were the showers there,
Where the poor bookseller held his stall upon fairing days;
Making his two-penny bargains many and long were the hours there
Spent by the debt-ridden man, worn with the world and its ways.
Books of the day were about him, and books that were ancient and far-fet,
All a good company, golden and silvern their words,
Yet hushed were their voices when fair-day came in Uttoxeter Market,
Stilled by the bleating of calves and the lowing of herds.
What would the good-wife with warble of Shakespeare or speech of Sylvester,
Bouncing about on her pillion, with butter and eggs on her lap —
Better her pocket-piece tossed to the tumbling clown or the jester,
She with an eye to a ribbon, she to a grogram, mayhap!
What would the yeoman with blackletter folio, or pages of Latin,
Tales of Venetian adventurers, troublous to spell —
He had his filly to brag of, shining and sleeker than satin,
He had his little black pigs and his yearlings to sell!
Hard was the task then, believe me, to earn the poor shilling so needed,
Sore ached the old bookseller's back, and sore ached his pride,
Yet often and often he thought how lightly the time would have speeded
If he could only have had there his son by his side.
Dear was the boy to his heart, dearer perhaps that disaster
Had scarred his sad face with the evil that good Queen Anne's touch had not stayed —
Was there a work on his shelves of which the boy was not yet master?
Was there a lad in all Litchfield not by his booklore dismayed?
Oft the old father turned over some scheme that should send him to college,
Surely with barely a crust were he and the mother content,
Bitter the trial to think they must starve this yearning for knowledge
While gold all over the kingdom for frivolous pleasure was spent.
Strong was the sun on that day when all of his ails so oppressed him,
Long and laborious the walk, and heavy his heart with his care —
Could the boy go in his place, for once, how kindly 'twould rest him,
Could he but linger, for once, at home in his easy-chair!
Did the boy hear him aright? He go to Uttoxeter Market?
He with his tremors and scars, he with his beggarly clothes,
He with his purblind eyes, for every wit's sally a target,
He to hawk ballads for ribalds and boors with their laughter and oaths?
Betimes, were there not at the door every morning three lads out of many,
One bowing the back to receive him, the others supporting his state?
Was he not first in the classes? Did they compare him with any?
He, who had writ Greek pentameters to stand in a stall and to wait?
Yet oft on the long-withdrawn highway the sight of a tired old man walking,
As sunshine and sunshower succeeded, that morning swam o'er the boy's eyes,
With the call of the doves overhead came the sound of a voice that was hawking
Wares that few wanted, a weary old voice that was quavering with sighs.
That was the morning when, climbing for apples, he came across Petrarch,
And nothing to him was the world then for hour after hour,
Nothing was bookworm or beggar, nothing was Caesar or Tetrarch,
He in Italian gardens lost like a bee in a flower!
But seeing again the white face, out of which life and courage were sinking,
Did his heart smite him to meet there the tender reproach of that gaze?
When at nightfall, all sore and disheartened, the father sat dreaming and thinking,
Did there not cross the boy's fancy the difference between their two days?
One in the heat and the hurry of barter, the crying and calling,
Dizzy and dazed with the noise, longing for twilight's relief —
One in green coolness and shadow, with murmurous waters soft falling,
And sweet was the melody round him, and sweet was the myrtle's crushed leaf!
All at once such a warmth of affection, such flood of regretting,
Rushed to the heart of the boy, with such fervor of pity and grief —
Ah, if he only had spoken it, then had been space for forgetting,
Nor of sorrows to haunt a whole lifetime had that been the chief!
" Unfilial, undutiful child, " his words went repeating, repeating,
And still, as the tone of the gong in the isles of the orient wrought,
Touched with the tap of a finger, rolls mightily swelling and beating
Till it fills the whole sky with its sound, were those words in his thought.
Still did they sigh in his thought, when the father had sought his long slumber,
And he in his nest of singing-birds, in the old university town,
Filled night with revel and madcap pranks, or days without number
Bathed in Castalian waters, and gathered the bays for his crown.
Still they resounded about him, in all the ripe years, with their grieving,
Hid in his work, while the murmur of fame babbled on like a brook,
Work that grew glorious what time the evergreen chaplet was weaving —
Ah, what a fragrance those bays have to-day, though pressed in a book!
Umpire of scholars at last, and heir of all learning owned loudly,
Poets, and painters, and players, confessed to his mastery each,
Princes and statesmen inquired of him, even the king sought him proudly —
He the king of the people, and he the king of their speech!
But still through his plaudits resounded the words once so long ago uttered,
" Unfilial, undutiful child, " till no more could he bear his own sighs,
And whenever the leaves of his book he dreamily fingered and fluttered
Swam there the white old face with the tender reproach of its eyes.
Sharp fell the showers then, one fair-day, across the Uttoxeter Market,
And, jostled and hustled and chided, another old man trod its ways;
Eager the crowd and the cries as of yore, while he stood there the target
For every wit's sally, the magnet for every lout's gaze.
Where once was the bookseller's stall, stood the burly old fellow,
Purblind, unwieldy, bare-headed in all of the rain,
Sharing the, gape of the rustics with smart Punchinello,
Half like a Caliban, half like a demigod writhing in pain.
Naught of the flout and the fleer did he know, or the jibes that were spoken,
Old memories, old forms thronged about him, there in the market-place,
Old voices fell sweet on his ear till his heart was half broken,
Prayers parted his lips, I think, and tears poured down over his face.
Perchance he was doing a penance with strange superstition,
Erst he refused the deed in the strength of his selfish shame,
Now, fifty long years and more gone, in impassioned contrition,
Known the world over, he stood there, and humbled his pride and his fame.
Let wild Hebrew chief or Greek King offer up his heart's treasure —
Better than sacrifice, once said the prophet, it is to obey —
Yet costly as any, the name and the glory, I measure,
Offered up on the shrine of Uttoxeter Market that day!