Classic Poem

I see Rudolpho, cross our honest fields,
Collapsed with thought, cool as the Stagyrite
At intellectual problems; mastering
Day after day part of the world's concern.
Still adding to his list, beetle and bee,—
Of what the Vireo builds a pensile nest,
And why the Peetweet drops her giant egg
In wheezing meadows, odorous with sweet brake.
Nor welcome dawns, nor shrinking nights him menace,
Still girt about for observation, yet
Keen to pursue the devious lanes that lead
To knowledge oft so dearly bought.
For ne'er
Can nature give her secrets without toil,
And long inquiry and an anxious heart;
So that Rudolpho, like the midnight watch,
With eye and ear each strained to their full tension,
Thought and feeling bent keen on one purpose,
Who wonders that the flesh declines to grow
Along his sallow pits, or that his life
To social pleasure careless, pines away
In dry seclusion and unfruitful shade?
Martyr! for eye too sharp and ear too fine,
Hero of facts, who fills his pouch with all
Such life can furnish to a surface-fly,
I must admire thy brave apprenticeship,
To these dry forages, if the worldling
Laugh in his sleeve at thy compelled devotion,
And declare, an accidental stroke
Surpassed whole æons of Rudolpho's file.
Press out the cream of learning, cast away
The nicer sensibilities that fret
The o'er-passioned heart, and eat thy crust
Of brown unleavened dough off platters pine,
Wherewith a grosser cook might light his fire;—
Dust off the film of flattery and ambition,
Drown old conventions in thy acid wit,
Nor leave a peg whereon to hang the times!
So shalt thou learn, Rudolpho, as thou walk'st,
More from the winding lanes where nature leaves
Her unaspiring creatures, and surpass
In some fine saunter her declivity.
Why beats that court-bell on the liquid air
Of June's translucent prime, what caitiffs hold
Base trials in the smug design of wood,
Where sallow prisoners haled from grated walls,—
Dark cells and close confines of misery
Blink at the open daylight unconfined,
Or callous to their doom demand contempt?
Was it for this, he grew, yon thick-browed Murderer
In his mother's arms, nurst in her road-side
Cottage 'neath old elms, umbrageous place,—
And there his boyish days brought to the lore
That liberal nature shares amid the poor,—
Gave to a parent's heart its pulse of joy,
Bade elders smile to mark his urchin trick,
Promise fair for virtue; and for this, he
Walked along the adult's path and took
Another to his side as wife and friend,—
To end in this, felled in the dust ere dead?
Driven by the slave-whip, in dark passion's power,
He struck his bosom friend a murderous blow,
And now where's human sympathy? Will one
Lament, when the dread sentence from the mouth
Of some oblivious Judge, slow-falling, shears
Away ere dead, his once delightful form?
Yes! still in another heart, he lives, a life
Incessant; a simple girl, bride in her soul,
Wears faithfully her crown, and fears his name
Lest on his children's ear its presage fall.
And should not jar the ear that brassy peal,
Summoning these fearful woes to human hearts?