“These play with men and take them off our hands.
“Did I come, counsel with some cut-beard gruff
“Or rather this sleek young-old barberess?
“Go, brother, stand you rapt in the ante- room
“Of Her Efficacity my Cardinal (470)
“For an hour,—he likes to have lord-suitors lounge,—
“While I betake myself to the grey mare,
“The better horse,—how wise the people’s word!—
“And wait on Madam Violante.”
He was at Via Vittoria in three skips:
Proposed at once to fill up the one want
O’ the burgess- family which, wealthy enough,
And comfortable to heart’s desire, yet crouched
Outside a gate to heaven,—locked, bolted, barred, (480)
Whereof Count Guido had a key he kept
Under his pillow, but Pompilia’s hand
Might slide behind his neck and pilfer thence.
The key was fairy; mention of it made
Violante feel the thing shoot one sharp ray
That reached the heart o’ the woman. “I assent:
“Yours be Pompilia, hers and ours that key
“To all the glories of the greater life!
“There’s Pietro to convince: leave that to me!”
Did Pietro make demand and get response
That in the Countship was a truth, but in
The counting up of the Count’s cash, a lie:
He thereupon stroked grave his chin, looked great,
Declined the honour. Then the wife wiped one—
Winked with the other eye turned Paolo-ward,
Whispered Pompilia, stole to church at eve,
Found Guido there and got the marriage done,
And finally begged pardon at the feet
Of her dear lord and master. Whereupon (500)
Quoth Pietro—“Let us make the best of things!”
“I knew your love would licence us,” quoth she:
Quoth Paolo once more, “Mothers, wives, and maids,
“These be the tools wherewith priests manage men.”
Decoyed the other into clapnet? Who
Was fool, who knave? Neither and both, perchance.
There was a bargain mentally proposed
On each side, straight and plain and fair enough;
Mind knew its own mind: but when mind must speak, (510)
The bargain have expression in plain terms,
There was the blunder incident to words,
And in the clumsy process, fair turned foul,
The straight backbone-thought of the crooked speech
Were just—“I Guido truck my name and rank
“For so much money and youth and female charms.”—
“We Pietro and Violante give our child
“And wealth to you for a rise i’ the world thereby.”
Such naked truth while chambered in the brain
Shocks nowise: walk it forth by way of tongue,— (520)
Out on the cynical unseemliness!
Hence was the need, on either side, of a lie
To serve as decent wrappage: so, Guido gives
Money for money,—and they, bride for groom,
Having, he, not a doit, they, not a child
Honestly theirs, but this poor waif and stray.
According to the words, each cheated each;
But in the inexpressive barter of thoughts,
Each did give and did take the thing designed,
The rank on this side and the cash on that— (530)
Attained the object of the traffic, so.
The way of the world, the daily bargain struck
In the first market! Why sells Jack his ware?
“For the sake of serving an old customer.”
Why does Jill buy it? “Simply not to break
“A custom, pass the old stall the first time.”
Why, you know where the gist is of the exchange:
Each sees a profit, throws the fine words in.
Don’t be too hard o’ the pair! Had each pretence
Been simultaneously discovered, stripped (540)
From off the body o’ the transaction, just
As when a cook … will Excellency forgive?
Strips away those long loose superfluous legs
From either side the crayfish, leaving folk
A meal all meat henceforth, no garnishry,
(With your respect, Prince!)—balance had been kept,
No party blamed the other,—so, starting fair,
All subsequent fence of wrong returned by wrong
I’ the matrimonial thrust and parry, at least
Had followed on equal terms. But, as it chanced, (550)
One party had the advantage, saw the cheat
Of the other first and kept its own concealed:
And the luck o’ the first discovery fell, beside,
To the least adroit and self-possessed o’ the pair.
’Twas foolish Pietro and his wife saw first
The nobleman was penniless, and screamed
“We are cheated!”
Angers at all times: but when those who plague,
Do it from inside your own house and home, (560)
Gnats which yourself have closed the curtain round,
Noise goes too near the brain and makes you mad.
The gnats say, Guido used the candle flame
Unfairly,—worsened that first bad of his,
By practise of all kind of cruelty
To oust them and suppress the wail and whine,—
That speedily he so scared and bullied them,
Fain were they, long before five months were out,
To beg him grant, from what was once their wealth,
Just so much as would help them back to Rome (570)
Where, when they had finished paying the last doit
O’ the dowry, they might beg from door to door.
So say the Comparini—as if it were
In pure resentment for this worse than bad,
That then Violante, feeling conscience prick,
Confessed
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