Classic Poem

Paganini was always followed about
By a Spiritus Familiaris,
Who was now a dog, and now assumed
The form of the late George Harris.

On Napoleon, at every critical hour,
A man in scarlet waited;
And Socrates had his dæmon too—
No vision brain-created.

And I, myself, when at work by night
Have seen, his features hidden
By a sinister mask, behind my chair,
A mysterious guest unbidden.

He had something concealed beneath his cloak,
Which at times, when the light would catch it,
Glinted and gleamed in the strangest way,
Like an executioner's hatchet.

He was square and short, his eyes were as bright
As stars, and as keen as sabres.
He kept his distance, and held his tongue,
And never disturbed my labours.

This singular fellow had vanished for years,
And who would have thought he'd find me
In the town of Cologne, in the moonlit street,
Where he suddenly stood behind me?

I noted him dogging my every step,
As I sauntered dreamily musing;
If I stood for a moment he came to a halt,
Like a shadow, without my choosing.

He would stand as if waiting, and when I moved on
Once more, would follow me closely.
And so we reached the Cathedral square,
When I turned at last morosely—

For I found it beyond endurance—and said
With excusable irritation,
“Why doggest thou thus my steps through the night?
I demand an explanation.

“We always meet when my heart is thrilled,
And vast emotions stir it;
When through my brain in splendour flash
The lightnings of the spirit.

“O wherefore is thy gaze so fixed?
With what design intrudst thou?
And what hast thou gleaming beneath thy cloak?
Who art thou, and what wouldst thou?”

With the utmost coolness he made reply,—
He was even a trifle phlegmatic,—
“Adjure me not, for Heaven's sake,
And please to be less emphatic.

“I am no ghost of an age gone by,
No spectre pale and dusty,
I was never appealed to by rhetoric.
My philosophy's rather rusty.

“Nor am I practical—rather was
For a quiet life and a still meant,
Yet know, that whatever thy soul conceives,
I am charged with its fulfilment.

“The years may drift, but I never rest
Till thy thoughts have been translated
Into deeds. 'Tis thine to think; I act.
Each does as it was fated.

“In Rome, in advance of the consul they bore
An axe, let me remind thee;
To-day thou hast thy lictor too,
But the axe is borne behind thee.

“I am thy lictor and walk in thy wake
With the hatchet brightly gleaming.
I am the deed evolved at last
From thy musing and thy dreaming.”