Page:The poems of George Eliot (Crowell, 1884).djvu/436

 400 POEMS OF GEORGE ELIOT.

Where they should pay their gold, and where they pay There they find merit — take your tow for flax, And hold the flax uulabelled with your name. Too coarse for sufferance."

Antonio then : "I like the gold — well, yes — but not for meals. And as my stomach, so my eye and hand. And inward sense that works along with both, Have hunger that can never feed on coin. Who draws a line and satisfies his soul, Making it crooked where it should be straight ? An idiot with an oyster-shell may draw His lines along the sand, all wavering. Fixing no point or pathway to a point ; An idiot one remove may choose his line,- Straggle and be content ; but God be praised, Antonio Stradivari has an eye That winces at false work and loves the true. With hand and arm that play upon the tool As willingly as any singing bird Sets him to sing his morning roundelay, Because he likes to sing and likes the song.

Then Xaldo : " 'T is a petty kind^of fame At best, that comes of making violins ; And saves no masses, either. Thou wilt go To purgatory none the less."

But he : " 'T were purgatory here to make them ill ; And for my fame — when any master holds 'Twixt chin and hand a violin of mine, He will be glad that Stradivari lived, Made violins, and made them of the best. The masters only know whose work is good : They will choose mine, and while God gives them skill