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THE PRINCESS

by Alfred Lord Tennyson




PROLOGUE


   Sir Walter Vivian all a summer's day
   Gave his broad lawns until the set of sun
   Up to the people:  thither flocked at noon
   His tenants, wife and child, and thither half
   The neighbouring borough with their Institute
   Of which he was the patron.  I was there
   From college, visiting the son,--the son
   A Walter too,--with others of our set,
   Five others:  we were seven at Vivian-place.

        And me that morning Walter showed the house,
   Greek, set with busts:  from vases in the hall
   Flowers of all heavens, and lovelier than their names,
   Grew side by side; and on the pavement lay
   Carved stones of the Abbey-ruin in the park,
   Huge Ammonites, and the first bones of Time;
   And on the tables every clime and age
   Jumbled together; celts and calumets,
   Claymore and snowshoe, toys in lava, fans
   Of sandal, amber, ancient rosaries,
   Laborious orient ivory sphere in sphere,
   The cursed Malayan crease, and battle-clubs
   From the isles of palm:  and higher on the walls,
   Betwixt the monstrous horns of elk and deer,
   His own forefathers' arms and armour hung.

        And 'this' he said 'was Hugh's at Agincourt;
   And that was old Sir Ralph's at Ascalon:
   A good knight he! we keep a chronicle
   With all about him'--which he brought, and I
   Dived in a hoard of tales that dealt with knights,
   Half-legend, half-historic, counts and kings
   Who laid about them at their wills and died;
   And mixt with these, a lady, one that armed
   Her own fair head, and sallying through the gate,
   Had beat her foes with slaughter from her walls.

        'O miracle of women,' said the book,
   'O noble heart who, being strait-besieged
   By this wild king to force her to his wish,
   Nor bent, nor broke, nor shunned a soldier's death,
   But now when all was lost or seemed as lost--
   Her stature more than mortal in the burst
   Of sunrise, her arm lifted, eyes on fire--
   Brake with a blast of trumpets from the gate,
   And, falling on them like a thunderbolt,
   She trampled some beneath her horses' heels,
   And some were whelmed with missiles of the wall,
   And some were pushed with lances from the rock,
   And part were drowned within the whirling brook:
   O miracle of noble womanhood!'

        So sang the gallant glorious chronicle;
   And, I all rapt in this, 'Come out,' he said,
   'To the Abbey: there is Aunt Elizabeth
   And sister Lilia with the rest.'  We went
   (I kept the book and had my finger in it)
   Down through the park:  strange was the sight to me;
   For all the sloping pasture murmured, sown
   With happy faces and with holiday.
   There moved the multitude, a thousand heads:
   The patient leaders of their Institute
   Taught them with facts.  One reared a font of stone
   And drew, from butts of water on the <DW72>,
   The fountain of the moment, playing, now
   A twisted snake, and now a rain of pearls,
   Or steep-up spout whereon the gilded ball
   Danced like a wisp:  and somewhat lower down
   A man with knobs and wires and vials fired
   A cannon:  Echo answered in her sleep
   From hollow fields:  and here were telescopes
   For azure views; and there a group of girls
   In circle waited, whom the electric shock
   Dislinked with shrieks and laughter:  round the lake
   A little clock-work steamer paddling plied
   And shook the lilies:  perched about the knolls
   A dozen angry models jetted steam:
   A petty railway ran:  a fire-balloon
   Rose gem-like up before the dusky groves
   And dropt a fairy parachute and past:
   And there through twenty posts of telegraph
   They flashed a saucy message to and fro
   Between the mimic stations; so that sport
   Went hand in hand with Science; otherwhere
   Pure sport; a herd of boys with clamour bowled
   And stumped the wicket; babies rolled about
   Like tumbled fruit in grass; and men and maids
   Arranged a country dance, and flew through light
   And shadow, while the twangling violin
   Struck up with Soldier-laddie, and overhead
   The broad ambrosial aisles of lofty lime