Manager of a Strolling Company.—Stage-poet—Merryfellow.

Manager. Ye twain, in good and evil day So oft my solace and my stay,>Say, have ye heard sure word, or wandering rumor How our new scheme affects the public humor? Without the multitude we cannot thrive, Their maxim is to live and to let live. The posts are up, the planks are fastened, and Each man’s agog for something gay and grand. With arched eyebrows they sit already there, Gaping for something new to make them stare. I know the public taste, and profit by it; But still to-day I’ve fears of our succeeding: ’Tis true they’re customed to no dainty diet, But they’ve gone through an awful breadth of reading. How shall we make our pieces fresh and new, And with some meaning in them, pleasing too? In sooth, I like to see the people pouring Into our booth, like storm and tempest roaring, While, as the waving impulse onward heaves them, The narrow gate of grace at length receives them, When, long ere it be dark, with lusty knocks They fight their way on to the money-box, And like a starving crowd around a baker’s door, For tickets as for bread they roar. So wonder-working is the poet’s sway O’er every heart—so may it work to-day!

Poet. O mention not that motley throng to me, Which only seen makes frighted genius pause; Hide from my view that wild and whirling sea That sucks me in, and deep and downward draws. No! let some noiseless nook of refuge be My heaven, remote from boisterous rude applause, Where Love and Friendship, as a God inspires, Create and fan the pure heart’s chastened fires.

Alas! what there the shaping thought did rear, And scarce the trembling lip might lisping say, To Nature’s rounded type not always near, The greedy moment rudely sweeps away. Oft-times a work, through many a patient year Must toil to reach its finished fair display; The glittering gaud may fix the passing gaze, But the pure gem gains Time’s enduring praise.

Merryfellow. Pshaw! Time will reap his own; but in our power The moment lies, and we must use the hour. The Future, no doubt, is the Present’s heir, But we who live must first enjoy our share. Methinks the present of a goodly boy Has something that the wisest might enjoy. Whose ready lips with easy lightness brim, The people’s humor need not trouble him; He courts a crowd the surer to impart The quickening word that stirs the kindred heart. Quit ye like men, be honest bards and true, Let Fancy with her many-sounding chorus, Reason, Sense, Feeling, Passion, move before us, But, mark me well—a spice of folly too!

Manager. Give what you please, so that you give but plenty; They come to see, and you must feed their eyes; Scene upon scene, each act may have its twenty, To keep them gaping still in fresh surprise: This is the royal road to public favor; You snatch it thus, and it is yours for ever. A mass of things alone the mass secures; Each comes at last and culls his own from yours. Bring much, and every one is sure to find, In your rich nosegay, something to his mind. You give a piece, give it at once in pieces; Such a ragout each taste and temper pleases, And spares, if only they were wise to know it, Much fruitless toil to player and to poet. In vain into an artful whole you glue it; The public in the long run will undo it.

Poet. What? feel you not the vileness of this trade? How much the genuine artist ye degrade? The bungling practice of our hasty school You raise into a maxim and a rule.

Manager. All very well!—but when a man Has forged a scheme, and sketched a plan He must have sense to use the tool The best that for the job is fit. Consider what soft wood you have to split, And who the people are for whom you write. One comes to kill a few hours o’ the night; Another, with his drowsy wits oppressed, An over-sated banquet to digest; And not a few, whom least of all we choose, Come to the play from reading the Reviews. They drift to us as to a masquerade; Mere curiosity wings their paces; The ladies show themselves, and show their silks and laces, And play their parts well, though they are not paid. What dream you of, on your poetic height? A crowded house, forsooth, gives you delight! Look at your patrons as you should, You’ll find them one-half cold, and one-half crude. One leaves the play to spend the night Upon a wench’s breast in wild delight; Another sets him down to cards, or calls For rattling dice, or clicking billiard balls. For such like hearers, and for ends like these Why should a bard the gentle Muses tease? I tell you, give them more, and ever more, and still A little more, if you would prove your skill. And since they can’t discern the finer quality, Confound them with broad sweep of triviality— But what’s the matter?—pain or ravishment?

Poet. If such your service, you must be content With other servants who will take your pay! Shall then the bard his noblest right betray? The right of man, which Nature’s gift imparts, For brainless plaudits basely jest away? What gives him power to move all hearts, Each stubborn element to sway, What but the harmony, his being’s inmost tone, That charms all feelings back into his own? Where listless Nature, her eternal thread, The unwilling spindle twists around, And hostile shocks of things that will not wed With jarring dissonance resound, Who guides with living pulse the rhythmic flow Of powers that make sweet music as they go? Who consecrates each separate limb and soul To beat in glorious concert with the whole? Who makes the surgy-swelling billow Heave with the wildly heaving breast, And on the evening’s rosy pillow, Invites the brooding heart to rest? Who scatters spring’s most lovely blooms upon The path of the belovèd one? Who plaits the leaves that unregarded grow Into a crown to deck the honored brow? Who charms the gods? who makes Olympos yield? The power of man in poet’s art revealed.

Merryfellow. Then learn such subtle powers to wield, And on the poet’s business enter As one does on a love-adventure. They meet by chance, are pleased, and stay On being pressed, just for a day; Then hours to hours are sweetly linked in chain, Till net-caught by degrees, they find retreat is vain. At first the sky is bright, then darkly lowers; To-day, fine thrilling rapture wings the hours, To-morrow, doubts and anguish have their chance, And, ere one knows, they’re deep in a romance. A play like this both praise and profit brings. Plunge yourself boldly in the stream of things— What’s lived by all, but known to few— And bring up something fresh and new, No matter what; just use your eyes, And all will praise what all can prize; Strange motley pictures in a misty mirror, A spark of truth in a thick cloud of error; ’Tis thus we brew the genuine beverage, To edify and to refresh the age. The bloom of youth in eager expectation, With gaping ears drinks in your revelation; Each tender sentimental disposition Sucks from your art sweet woe-be-gone nutrition; Each hears a part of what his own heart says, While over all your quickening sceptre sways. These younglings follow where you bid them go. Lightly to laughter stirred, or turned to woe, They love the show, and with an easy swing, Follow the lordly wafture of your wing; Your made-up man looks cold on everything, But growing minds take in what makes them grow.

Poet. Then give me back the years again, When mine own spirit too was growing, When my whole being was a vein Of thronging songs within me flowing! Then slept the world in misty blue, Each bud the nascent wonder cherished, And all for me the flowerets grew, That on each meadow richly flourished. Though I had nothing then, I had a treasure, The thirst for truth, and in illusion pleasure. Give me the free, unshackled pinion, The height of joy, the depth of pain, Strong hate, and stronger love’s dominion; O give me back my youth again!

Merryfellow. The fire of youth, good friend, you need, of course, Into the hostile ranks to break, Or, when the loveliest damsels hang by force, With amorous clinging, from your neck, When swift your wingèd steps advance To where the racer’s prize invites you, Or, after hours of whirling dance, The nightly deep carouse invites you. But to awake the well-known lyre With graceful touch that tempers fire, And to a self-appointed goal, With tuneful rambling on to roll, Such are your duties, aged sirs; nor we Less honor pay for this, nor stint your fee; Old age, not childish, makes the old; but they Are genuine children of a mellower day.

Manager. Enough of words: ’tis time that we Were come to deeds; while you are spinning Fine airy phrases, fancy-free, We might have made some good beginning. What stuff you talk of being in the vein! A lazy man is never in the vein. If once your names are on the poet’s roll, The Muses should be under your control. You know our want; a good stiff liquor To make their creeping blood flow quicker; Then brew the brews without delay; What was not done to-day, to-morrow Will leave undone for greater sorrow. Don’t stand, and stare, and block the way, But with a firm, set purpose lay Hold of your bright thoughts as they rise to view,

And bid them stay; Once caught, they will not lightly run away, Till they have done what in them lies to do.

Among the sons of German play, Each tries his hand at what he may; Therefore be brilliant in your scenery, And spare no cost on your machinery. Let sun and moon be at your call, And scatter stars on stars around; Let water, fire, and rocky wall, And bird and beast and fish abound. Thus in your narrow booth mete forth The wide creation’s flaming girth, And wing your progress, pondered well, From heaven to earth, from earth to hell.