Pippa Passes: Part Iv: Night Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: A B CCD C A B A C E B F C D B D C B B D C E B D C C B D C E B G C F B D C E B A C A B A C H B H C B B B C I B C C J DCCKKAACJJJCCAAEE A BL A C MANAAAAACACAAAAACECE CCAAAABBOBBBOOOCBCBB BBBCCBFCCFCCDDCC HIHIJJAAHHAAACCDDCPJ CAACC CCCCAQQQAACACAAACRKA CKACCCCSSAATCCCCC

Scene Inside the Palace by the Duomo Monsignor dismissing his Attendants	A
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Monsignor	B
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Thanks friends many thanks I chiefly desire life now that I may recompense every one of you Most I know something of already What a repast prepared Benedicto benedicatur ugh ugh Where was I Oh as you were remarking Ugo the weather is mild very unlike winter weather but I am a Sicilian you know and shiver in your Julys here To be sure when 't was full summer at Messina as we priests used to cross in procession the great square on Assumption Day you might see our thickest yellow tapers twist suddenly in two each like a falling star or sink down on themselves in a gore of wax But go my friends but go To the Intendant	C
Not you Ugo The others leave the apartment	C
I have long wanted to converse with you Ugo	D
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Intendant	C
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Uguccio	A
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Monsignor	B
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'guccio Stefani man of Ascoli Fermo and Fossombruno what I do need instructing about are these accounts of your administration of my poor brother's affairs Ugh I shall never get through a third part of your accounts take some of these dainties before we attempt it however Are you bashful to that degree For me a crust and water suffice	A
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Intendant	C
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Do you choose this especial night to question me	E
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Monsignor	B
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This night Ugo You have managed my late brother's affairs since the death of our elder brother fourteen years and a month all but three days On the Third of December I find him	F
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Intendant	C
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If you have so intimate an acquaintance with your brother's affairs you will be tender of turning so far back they will hardly bear looking into so far back	D
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Monsignor	B
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Ay ay ugh ugh nothing but disappointments here below I remark a considerable payment made to yourself on this Third of December Talk of disappointments There was a young fellow here Jules a foreign sculptor I did my utmost to advance that the Church might be a gainer by us both he was going on hopefully enough and of a sudden he notifies to me some marvellous change that has happened in his notions of Art Here's his letter He never had a clearly conceived Ideal within his brain till to day Yet since his hand could manage a chisel he has practised expressing other men's Ideals and in the very perfection he has attained to he foresees an ultimate failure his unconscious hand will pursue its prescribed course of old years and will reproduce with a fatal expertness the ancient types let the novel one appear never so palpably to his spirit There is but one method of escape confiding the virgin type to as chaste a hand he will turn painter instead of sculptor and paint not carve its characteristics strike out I dare say a school like Correggio how think you Ugo	D
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Intendant	C
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Is Correggio a painter	B
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Monsignor	B
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Foolish Jules and yet after all why foolish He may probably will fail egregiously but if there should arise a new painter will it not be in some such way by a poet now or a musician spirits who have conceived and perfected an Ideal through some other channel transferring it to this and escaping our conventional roads by pure ignorance of them eh Ugo If you have no appetite talk at least Ugo	D
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Intendant	C
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Sir I can submit no longer to this course of yours First you select the group of which I formed one next you thin it gradually always retaining me with your smile and so do you proceed till you have fairly got me alone with you between four stone walls And now then Let this farce this chatter end now what is it you want with me	E
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Monsignor	B
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Ugo	D
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Intendant	C
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From the instant you arrived I felt your smile on me as you questioned me about this and the other article in those papers why your brother should have given me this villa that podere and your nod at the end meant what	C
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Monsignor	B
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Possibly that I wished for no loud talk here If once you set me coughing Ugo	D
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Intendant	C
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I have your brother's hand and seal to all I possess now ask me what for what service I did him ask me	E
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Monsignor	B
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I would better not I should rip up old disgraces let out my poor brother's weaknesses By the way Maffeo of Forli which I forgot to observe is your true name was the interdict ever taken off you for robbing that church at Cesena	G
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Intendant	C
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No nor needs be for when I murdered your brother's friend Pasquale for him	F
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Monsignor	B
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Ah he employed you in that business did he Well I must let you keep as you say this villa and that podere for fear the world should find out my relations were of so indifferent a stamp Maffeo my family is the oldest in Messina and century after century have my progenitors gone on polluting themselves with every wickedness under heaven my own father rest his soul I have I know a chapel to support that it may rest my dear two dead brothers were what you know tolerably well I the youngest might have rivalled them in vice if not in wealth but from my boyhood I came out from among them and so am not partaker of their plagues My glory springs from another source or if from this by contrast only for I the bishop am the brother of your employers Ugo I hope to repair some of their wrong however so far as my brothers' illgotten treasure reverts to me I can stop the consequences of his crime and not one soldo shall escape me Maffec the sword we quiet men spurn away you shrewd knaves pick up and commit murders with what opportunities the virtuous forego the villanous seize Because to pleasure myself apart from other considerations my food would be millet cake my dress sackcloth and my couch straw am I therefore to let you the offscouring of the earth seduce the poor and ignorant by appropriating a pomp these will be sure to think lessens the abominations so unaccountably and exclusively associated with it Must I let villas and poderi go to you a murderer and thief that you may beget by means of them other murderers and thieves No if my cough would but allow me to speak	D
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Intendant	C
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What am I to expect You are going to punish me	E
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Monsignor	B
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Must punish you Maffeo I cannot afford to cast away a chance I have whole centuries of sin to redeem and only a month or two of life to it in How should I dare to say	A
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Intendant	C
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Forgive us our trespasses	A
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Monsignor	B
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My friend it is because I avow myself a very worm sinful beyond measure that I reject a line of conduct you would applaud perhaps Shall I proceed as it were a pardoning I who have no symptom of reason to assume that aught less than my strenuousest efforts will keep myself out of mortal sin much less keep others out No I do trespass but will not double that by allowing you to trespass	A
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Intendant	C
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And suppose the villas are not your brother's to give nor yours to take Oh you are hasty enough just now	H
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Monsignor	B
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I No ay can you read the substance of a letter No I have received from Rome It is precisely on the ground there mentioned of the suspicion I have that a certain child of my late elder brother who would have succeeded to his estates was murdered in infancy by you Maffeo at the instigation of my late younger brother that the Pontiff enjoins on me not merely the bringing that Maffeo to condign punishment but the taking all pains as guardian of the infant's heritage for the Church to recover it parcel by parcel howsoever whensoever and wheresoever While you are now gnawing those fingers the police are engaged in sealing up your papers Maffeo and the mere raising my voice brings my people from the next room to dispose of yourself But I want you to confess quietly and save me raising my voice Why man do I not know the old story The heir between the succeeding heir and this heir's ruffianly instrument and their complot's effect and the life of fear and bribes and ominous smiling silence Did you throttle or stab my brother's infant Come now	H
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Intendant	C
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So old a story and tell it no better When did such an instrument ever produce such an effect Either the child smiles in his face or most likely he is not fool enough to put himself in the employer's power so thoroughly the child is always ready to produce as you say howsoever wheresoever and whensoever	B
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Monsignor	B
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Liar	B
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Intendant	C
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Strike me Ah so might a father chastise I shall sleep soundly to night at least though the gallows await me to morrow for what a life did I lead Carlo of Cesena reminds me of his connivance every time I pay his annuity which happens commonly thrice a year If I remonstrate he will confess all to the good bishop you	I
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Monsignor	B
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I see through the trick caitiff I would you spoke truth for once All shall be sifted however seven times sifted	C
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Intendant	C
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And how my absurd riches encumbered me I dared not lay claim to above half my possessions Let me but once unbosom myself glorify Heaven and die Sir you are no brutal dastardly idiot like your brother I frightened to death let us understand one another Sir I will make away with her for you the girl here close at hand not the stupid obvious kind of killing do not speak know nothing of her nor of me I see her every day saw her this morning of course there is to be no killing but at Rome the courtesans perish off every three years and I can entice her thither have indeed begun operations already There's a certain lusty blue eyed florid complexioned English knave I and the Police employ occasionally You assent I perceive no that's not it assent I do not say but you will let me convert my present havings and holdings into cash and give me time to cross the Alps 'T is but a little black eyed pretty singing Felippa gay silk winding girl I have kept her out of harm's way up to this present for I always intended to make your life a plague to you with her 'T is as well settled once and for ever Some women I have procured will pass Bluphocks my handsome scoundrel off for somebody and once Pippa entangled you conceive Through her singing Is it a bargain	J
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From without is heard the voice of Pippa singing	D
Overhead the tree tops meet	C
Flowers and grass spring 'neath one's feet	C
There was nought above me nought below	K
My childhood had not learned to know	K
For what are the voices of birds	A
Ay and of beasts but words our words	A
Only so much more sweet	C
The knowledge of that with my life begun	J
But I had so near made out the sun	J
And counted your stars the seven and one	J
Like the fingers of my hand	C
Nay I could all but understand	C
Wherefore through heaven the white moon ranges	A
And just when out of her soft fifty changes	A
No unfamiliar face might overlook me	E
Suddenly God took me	E
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Pippa passes	A
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Monsignor	B
springing up	L
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My people one and all all within there Gag this villain tie him hand and foot He dares I know not half he dares but remove him quick Miserere mei Domine Quick I say	A
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Scene Pippa's chamber again She enters it	C
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The bee with his comb	M
The mouse at her dray	A
The grub in his tomb	N
Wile winter away	A
But the fire fly and hedge shrew and lob worm I pray	A
How fare they	A
Ha ha thanks for your counsel my Zanze	A
Feast upon lampreys quaff Breganze	A
The summer of life so easy to spend	C
And care for to morrow so soon put away	A
But winter hastens at summer's end	C
And fire fly hedge shrew lob worm pray	A
How fare they	A
No bidding me then to what did Zanze say	A
Pare your nails pearlwise get your small feet shoes	A
More like what said she and less like canoes	A
How pert that girl was would I be those pert	C
Impudent staring women It had done me	E
However surely no such mighty hurt	C
To learn his name who passed that jest upon me	E
No foreigner that I can recollect	C
Came as she says a month since to inspect	C
Our silk mills none with blue eyes and thick rings	A
Of raw silk coloured hair at all events	A
Well if old Luca keep his good intents	A
We shall do better see what next year brings	A
I may buy shoes my Zanze not appear	B
More destitute than you perhaps next year	B
Bluph something I had caught the uncouth name	O
But for Monsignor's people's sudden clatter	B
Above us bound to spoil such idle chatter	B
As ours it were indeed a serious matter	B
If silly talk like ours should put to shame	O
The pious man the man devoid of blame	O
The ah but ah but all the same	O
No mere mortal has a right	C
To carry that exalted air	B
Best people are not angels quite	C
While not the worst of people's doings scare	B
The devil so there's that proud look to spare	B
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Which is mere counsel to myself mind for	B
I have just been the holy Monsignor	B
And I was you too Luigi's gentle mother	B
And you too Luigi how that Luigi started	C
Out of the turret doubtlessly departed	C
On some good errand or another	B
For he passed just now in a traveller's trim	F
And the sullen company that prowled	C
About his path I noticed scowled	C
As if they had lost a prey in him	F
And I was Jules the sculptor's bride	C
And I was Ottima beside	C
And now what am I tired of fooling	D
Day for folly night for schooling	D
New year's day is over and spent	C
Ill or well I must be content	C
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Even my lily's asleep I vow	H
Wake up here's a friend I've plucked you	I
Call this flower a heart's ease now	H
Something rare let me instruct you	I
Is this with petals triply swollen	J
Three times spotted thrice the pollen	J
While the leaves and parts that witness	A
Old proportions and their fitness	A
Here remain unchanged unmoved now	H
Call this pampered thing improved now	H
Suppose there's a king of the flowers	A
And a girl show held in his bowers	A
Look ye buds this growth of ours	A
Says he Zanze from the Brenta	C
I have made her gorge polenta	C
Till both cheeks are near as bouncing	D
As her name there's no pronouncing	D
See this heightened colour too	C
For she swilled Breganze wine	P
Till her nose turned deep carmine	J
'T was but white when wild she grew	C
And only by this Zanze's eyes	A
Of which we could not change the size	A
The magnitude of all achieved	C
Otherwise may be perceived	C
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Oh what a drear dark close to my poor day	C
How could that red sun drop in that black cloud	C
Ah Pippa morning's rule is moved away	C
Dispensed with never more to be allowed	C
Day's turn is over now arrives the night's	A
Oh lark be day's apostle	Q
To mavis merle and throstle	Q
Bid them their betters jostle	Q
From day and its delights	A
But at night brother howlet over the woods	A
Toll the world to thy chantry	C
Sing to the bats' sleek sisterhoods	A
Full complines with gallantry	C
Then owls and bats	A
Cowls and twats	A
Monks and nuns in a cloister's moods	A
Adjourn to the oak stump pantry	C
After she has begun to undress herself	R
Now one thing I should like to really know	K
How near I ever might approach all these	A
I only fancied being this long day	C
Approach I mean so as to touch them so	K
As to in some way move them if you please	A
Do good or evil to them some slight way	C
For instance if I wind	C
Silk to morrow my silk may bind	C
Sitting on the bedside	C
And border Ottima's cloak's hem	S
Ah me and my important part with them	S
This morning's hymn half promised when I rose	A
True in some sense or other I suppose	A
As she lies down	T
God bless me I can pray no more to night	C
No doubt some way or other hymns say right	C
All service ranks the same with God	C
With God whose puppets best and worst	C
Are we there is no last nor first	C

Robert Browning

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