As the battle of feminism dragged its bloody way through all fields of
endeavor in the last century,

Some life of men unblest
He knew, which made him droop, and filled his head.
He went, his piping took a troubled sound
Of storms that rage outside our happy ground.
He could not wait their passing; he is dead.

In addition, the intense application that genius demands leaves its mark
upon the body. Recognition of this fact has doubtless been aided by
Dante's portrait, which Wilde has repainted in verse:

The calm, white brow, as calm as earliest morn,
The eyes that flashed with passionate love and scorn,
The lips that sang of Heaven and of Hell,
The almond face that Giotto drew so well,
The weary face of Dante.[Footnote: _Ravenna._]

Rossetti repeats the tradition that the composition of the
_Inferno_ so preyed upon Dante that the superstitious believed that
he had actually visited Hades and whispered to one another,

Behold him, how Hell's reek
Has crisped his beard and singed his cheek.
[Footnote: _Dante at Verona._]

A similar note is in Francis Thompson's description of Coventry Patmore: