SAN LONDC 2& ; Phone folfi to coutiarpff . 2fnb; 2b$it) tf?p Hja affe com? aii? of (J-oob; vopo/ mri>?a0m0eQ<0f fpfucr/ hCfo aK (>tibet&? ^oufafitJ? qtiarfera of m p Otocw tr < / an&? Bate to Qpnja gecix at Ijr/^oCtytnfo t^ie fbme of . ujfjbrpf % f^oii? & trc^t off ^pd Cpf / an to fan) t tff moc^c brctc a tf?-of .2(tiJv l)ff fentt ^tt to vB;**/ el-tyrf Ic eom Higelaces hsebbe ic mserSa f ela Me wearS Grendles J>ing undyrne cuft. ' ' 1 There is no end-rhyme ; the lines are of varying length ; and there is a space in the middle of each line dividing it into two parts. It is, of course, alto- gether different from the poetry of, say, Ten- nyson or Poe. The unit is, not the line, but the half-line ; and the half-line is classi- fied, not by the num- ber of syllables it contains, but by the number and position of its accents. The two parts of the line are bound together by alliteration i.e., " the riming of the initial sounds of ... rhythmically accented syllables." 1 Free translation: "Hail to thee, Hrothgar! I am Hygelac's kins- man and retainer ; I did many great deeds in my youth. To me in my native land has come news of this affair of Grendel." (The symbols h and ft are equivalent to modern th ; ce is not a-\-e, but a separate vowel sounded nearly like o in modern at.) BEOWULF MANUSCRIPT. Facsimile of page 1. (British Museum.) 8 ENGLISH LITERATURE In the passage quoted from Beowulf the first line has rhythmical accents on " HrotSgar," " hal," and " Hygelaces ; " the second, on " maeg," " mago-," and " msertSa ; " the third, on "-gun-," " geogo}>e," and "Grendles;" the fourth (vowel-alliteration any vowel alliterating with any other), on the first syllables of " ebel-tyrf " and " undyrne." The first half of the first and second lines and the second half of the third have five syllables each ; the second half of the first and the first half of the fourth have six syllables ; the second half of the second and the first half of the third line have seven syllables ; and the second half of the fourth has four. (2) Subject-matter. The subject-matter of this poetry is very limited : it deals with religion or with heroes. Nature, except the sea, produces no outbursts of feeling from Anglo- Saxon poets. A sense of humor seems not to have been among their gifts. The emotion of love, which has occasioned so many of the greatest poems in all languages, finds no expression in their verse. (3) Style. The lack of these features does not, however, signify a lack of interest for the reader. Even in translation we may see the poet's fondness for striking figures of speech, especially metaphors, very frequently in the form of com- pound words. For example, the body is called the " bone- house," the dragon in Beowulf is a " twilight-flier," the sun is " God's bright candle," the sea is " the whale-road," the ship is a " wave-rider." The devotion of warriors to their leader, the bravery and magnanimity of the leader himself, the universal practice of hospitality, make a real appeal to the reader who is not entirely dominated by modern ideas of poetic art. The "Venerable" Beda. The earliest prose-writer of Saxon England wrote almost wholly in Latin ; and his one FROM BEGINNING TO NORMAN CONQUEST 9 work in Anglo-Saxon a translation of the Gospel of Saint John is not extant. This is Bede, or Beda, usually called the " Venerable " Beda, after the epitaph placed over his grave in Durham by a devoted admirer. His whole life (673-735) was spent in the county of Durham, most of it in the monastery of Jarrow, at the mouth of the river Tyne. DURHAM CATHEDRAL. Where Beda is buried. His most important work is Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorhm (" Ecclesiastical History of the English People "), which is our main dependence for the facts of English history from the time of Caesar's invasion (55 B.C.). The " Eccle- siastical History " holds a place in English literature by reason of its translation into Anglo-Saxon by Alfred a century and a half after Beda's death. 10 ENGLISH LITERATURE From North to South. Csedmon, Cynewulf, Beda, all lived in northern England, the country of the Angles. Here in the great monasteries had been gathered extensive libraries in connection with which schools were established. Their influence was felt not only in England but also on the con- tinent, whither some of the English scholars went, taking with them copies of the works treasured in the monastic libraries. 1 With, the ninth century, as a result of the Danish invasions, the chief home of England's literary activity shifted from north to south. Landing in the north, the Danes laid waste the country, ruthlessly destroying the monasteries, and threatening the entire land. That they were stopped before making a complete conquest was due to the bravery and effective leadership of Alfred, King of Wessex (i.e., of the West Saxons), called the Great. At Edington in Wiltshire in 878 the Danes were defeated, and shortly afterward, by the Treaty of Wedmore, acknowledged Alfred as chief ruler of the country. Alfred's Literary Labors. With the success of Alfred on the field of battle came the ascendency of his kingdom in literature as well as in politics. From the time of his ac- cession, seven years before the Treaty of Wedmore, he had set himself to arouse interest in education and religion, found- ing new religious houses and attracting scholars to them, translating many Latin works of interest and profit to Eng- lishmen. , Among the works put into English by Alfred himself or by men associated with him are : History of the World, by Orosius, a Spanish priest of the fifth century ; Consolations of Philosophy, by Boethius (pronounced B5 e'thi us), a Roman 1 All of these works were, of course, in manuscript. See page 36 ff. FROM BEGINNING TO NORMAN CONQUEST 11 who is supposed to have written the book while in prison for political crimes ; the Pastoral Care (a hand-book for priests), by Pope Gregory I ; and the Ecclesiastical History of Beda. The works are not always literally translated, the Consola- tions of Philosophy in particular showing great freedom in rendering, and containing many passages inserted by Alfred himself. In his Preface to the Pastoral Care King Alfred laments STATUE OF KING ALFRED, WINCHESTER. the decay of learning in England, and lays plans for the revival of it. Writing to his bishops, he says : "It has very often come into my mind what wise men there were formerly throughout England, both of sacred and secular orders ; and how happy times there were then throughout Eng- land. ... So general was the decay of learning in England that there were very few who could understand their rituals in English when I came to the throne. . . . Therefore it seems better to me, if ye think so, for us to translate some books which are most needful for men to know into the language which 12 ENGLISH LITERATURE we can all understand, and for you to do as we very easily can if we have tranquillity enough, that is that all the youth now in England of free men, who are rich enough to be able to devote themselves to it, be set to learn as long as they are not fit for any other occupation, until they are well able to read English writing ; and let those be afterward taught in the Latin language who are to continue learning and be promoted to a higher rank." ST. MARTIN'S CHURCH, NEAR CANTERBURY. On this site stood the first church in Britain used by Augustine. " The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle." - More important, all things considered, than any of these translations is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, begun under the inspiration of Al- fred's illustrious court at Winchester, if not under the direct supervision of the King. This work, based on Beda's history and the additions from various cathedrals and mon- asteries, was continued to the death of King Stephen in 1154, and is the basis of our knowledge of twelve centuries of British history. The entries vary greatly in length and importance. For the year 444, for example, the entire record is that " Saint Martin died ; " whereas for 449 there FROM BEGINNING TO NORMAN CONQUEST 13 is an account in much detail of the coming of the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes. For 774 we read : "In this year a red cross appeared in the heavens after sun- set; and in this year the Mercians and Kentish men fought at Otford, and wondrous serpents were seen in the South Saxons' land." Occasionally the simple prose of the Chronicle is broken by a spirited poem, of which the best are the Battle of Brunanburh, celebrating the victory of Alfred's grandson Athelstan over the Danes in 937 ; and the Battle of Maldon, recording the defeat in 991 of the Saxons under Byrhtnoth by the Danes. A good idea of the Battle of Brunanburh may be got from the concluding section of Tennyson's translation : "Never had huger Slaughter of heroes Slain by the sword-edge Such as old writers Have writ of in histories Hapt in this isle, since Up from the East hither Saxon and Angle from Over the broad billow Broke into Britain with Haughty war-workers who Harried the Welshman, when Earls that were lured by the Hunger of glory gat Hold of the land." * Decay of Anglo-Saxon Literature. With the passing of Alfred a great incentive to literary production passed ; and both the Anglo-Saxon literature and the Anglo-Saxon lan- 1 The translation gives a good idea of the form of Anglo-Saxon poetry. See pages 7-8. 14 ENGLISH LITERATURE guage underwent a rapid decay. During the century and a half between Alfred's death (901) and the Norman Con- quest (1066) it seems that no poetry was produced ; and the small amount of prose from the same period is not of high order. Besides the Chronicle the chief contributions to literature were sermons and saints' lives. Two writers of these are known to us by name ^Elfric, abbot of Eynsham near Oxford, and Wulfstan, Archbishop of York. Their interest for us to-day is very slight. It is merely, says Andrew Lang, " that they upheld a standard of learn- ing and of godly living, in evil times of fire and sword, and that English prose became a rather better literary instru- ment in their hands." Under Alfred's successors the Danes regained most of their lost territory ; and the decay of national life went along with, possibly helped to bring about, the decay of language and literature. The nation needed new life ; and this was brought to it by the great event the Norman Conquest with which our next chapter begins. CHAPTER II FROM THE NORMAN CONQUEST TO THE DEATH OF CHAUCER (1066-1400) Origin of the Normans. A few years after Alfred's death some Scandinavian pirates sailed southward and invaded what is now northern France. So bold and pressing were they that Charles the Simple ceded to them the duchy of Nor- mandy to stop their encroachments. The newcomers, called Nor- mans (that is, North- men), soon mixed with the natives, producing a new race having the strength and boldness of the North, and the grace and refinement of the South. In 1066 ,1 . , , -p, , , WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR. they invaded England, Statue at Falaise, his birthplace. and defeated Harold, the last of the Saxon kings, in the battle of Hastings. The coming of this new race was unquestionably beneficial in every way to the people of Britain. 15 16 ENGLISH LITERATURE Too much emphasis is usually laid upon the antagonism and separation between Saxons and Normans. In the popu- lar mind the picture in Ivanhoe fairly represents conditions at the end of the twelfth century; whereas the distinction between Norman and Saxon had virtually disappeared within half a century after the Conquest. When Henry I, third of the Norman sovereigns of England, married a direct de- scendant of Alfred the Great, there could be no further ground for calling a man superior or inferior because he was a Nor- man or a Saxon. Henry, moreover, was born and educated in England, and almost certainly learned the English lan- guage in school. Immediate Effect of Conquest on Language and Literature. The English began immediately to adopt many Norman- French words, though neither the written nor the spoken language became anything like French. The fact that even at the present time English has more words from other sources than from Anglo-Saxon does not signify that the native ele- ment of our vocabulary is small ; for of the words used often- est by us all, the Anglo-Saxon are far more numerous. For about a century and a half after the conquest, moreover, it does not appear that literature was greatly enriched by works in either Norman-French, English, or a mixture of the two. Latin was the literary language of Europe, and the meagre literary product of Britain was in the same language. Geoffrey of Monmouth : Arthurian Legends. This British literature in Latin is chiefly in the form of chronicles, of which the work most important to English literature is the Historia Regum Britannias (" History of the Kings of Britain"), written about 1135 by Geoffrey of Monmouth. Geoffrey, a Welsh priest, claimed that he compiled his his- tory from authentic sources ; but his learned contemporaries FROM THE CONQUEST TO CHAUCER'S DEATH 17 disputed his claim, and subsequent scholarship has not cer- tainly discovered authorities for any large portion of his work. Of Geoffrey's life we know almost nothing ; but neither his life nor his literary antecedents can add to or detract from his importance to English literature. It is to Geoffrey's History that we must trace the stories used by Shakspere in King Lear and Cymbeline; and more important even than these, the stories of King Arthur. Whether or not Geoffrey invented the romance of Arthur will probably never be known ; but the important fact to note is that Geoffrey first put the material into literary form. His work was soon done into French verse by one Wace, and from French into English about 1205 by Layamon. Parts of the legend were put into French by Chretien de Troyes and others, into German by Wolfram von Eschenbach, into numerous anonymous ro- mances, both prose and verse, in all the languages of Europe. A compilation from all sorts of sources was made toward the close of the fifteenth century by Malory ; l and from that day to our own the legend has attracted the pens of many poets, including Tennyson, Swinburne, Matthew Arnold, and William Morris. Other Romances. Besides Arthur and his knights other heroes were made the subjects of romances. Some of these deal with Charlemagne and his peers, others with Alexander the Great, still others with purely Germanic figures like Bevis of Hampton, Havelok the Dane, and King Horn. Of most of these romances versions exist in various other lan- guages, and it is usually impossible to say which is the original or whether the original is extant. Such a thing as literary property was unknown until very modern times ; and writers 1 See page 38. 18 ENGLISH LITERATURE of either fiction or history were at liberty to use any matter that came to their hands. Furthermore, in many cases the writers probably drew more largely from folk-tales current in all lands than from any written story. A possible example of this sort of procedure is the account of a hero's boyhood, of which the most famous RUINS OF MONASTERY AT GLASTONBURY. Where King Arthur was said to have been buried. is the story of Perceval, one of Arthur's knights. This is told in romances extant in English, French, German, and Welsh ; and in the opinion of most scholars it is impossible to determine whether any one of the four is the " original." The same sort of story, moreover, is told in folk-tales of al- most every country, and of numerous heroes, one of Finn, in an Irish manuscript da ting probably from the tenth century. FROM THE CONQUEST TO CHAUCER'S DEATH 19 " Sir Gawain and the Green Knight." One of the finest of the romances in English is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, a story belonging to the Arthurian cycle and dating in its extant form from the latter part of the fourteenth century. In this romance, as in many, two stories originally separate are brought together. The second deals with the testing of Gawain's purity. The first, regarding the origin and development of which a vigorous controversy between scholars has raged for years, deals with the testing of his bravery, and runs as follows : On New Year's Day, when Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table are just beginning a feast, a huge knight clad all in green and riding a horse of that color rides into the hall and demands a boon. In his hand he carries a huge axe ; and he desires that some knight give him a blow with the axe, and promise to seek the Green Knight a year from that time and take without resistance a similar blow. Gawain, Arthur's nephew and the most courteous of the Round Table, accepts the challenge. After the blow is given, the Green Knight takes up his head and rides out, the head calling upon Gawain to keep his ap- pointment next New Year's Day at the Green Chapel. Faithful to his word, Gawain reaches the chapel on the appointed day, and finds his antagonist awaiting him. The Green Knight makes only a feint of slaying Gawain, and then explains that the whole performance was planned merely to try "the most faultless knight that ever walked the earth." Religious Works. Side by side with the romances ap- peared from about the year 1200 numerous religious works, most of which can be called literature only by exercise of great courtesy. Of these the most famous are the Poema Morale, or Moral Ode ; Ormulum, a series of sermons in verse ; Ancren Riwle (pronounce Riwle as if written " Rula "), or Rule for Nuns, written for the guidance of three noble women who belonged to no order ; Cursor Mundi, relating in rhyme the whole " course of the world " from creation to 20 ENGLISH LITERATURE doomsday, and adding many legends to the Bible narrative. With the exception of Ormulum, which was so named " be- cause Orm composed it," we can attach no author's name to these works. From the great mass of religious writing, however, the names of two writers stand out prominently ; one by reason of his great influence, the other as producer of perhaps the most famous piece of " vision " literature in English. These writers are John Wiclif and William Langland. Wiclif. Although satisfactory evidence regarding many events in Wiclif's life is lacking, we are reasonably sure that he was born from fifteen to twenty years before Chau- cer ; and we know that he died in 1384 about the time that Chaucer was ma- turing the plan for The Canterbury Tales. He was educated at Oxford, and in 1360 was master (that is, president) of one of the colleges there, Balliol (Bal- yol). On becoming rector of a neighboring church not long after, he gave up his college position ; and to the end of his life he was a zeal- ous preacher and laborer for the good of the common JOHN WICLIF. _.. . , . people. Eight years betore his death he had been summoned before an ecclesiastical court to give account of his preaching ; and only the force of FROM THE CONQUEST TO CHAUCER'S DEATH 21 popular feeling in his favor prevented his being arrested on an order from the Pope. Wiclif' s Bible. Wiclif 's offences in the eyes of the church were his objection to various dogmas, and his un- sparing criticism of a self-indulgent priesthood. His con- tribution to literature was a direct result of the first of these : he brought about the translation into English of the entire Bible, that the people might read and interpret for them- selves, and that each individual might work out a rule of life for himself. Addressed chiefly to the uneducated, \Vic- lif's Bible is characterized by the simplicity and directness of style, and by the preference for homely, everyday language that characterized its great successor, the King James, or " Authorized " Version. The reformer had many able assistants, and it is not certain just how much of the trans- lation was done by Wiclif himself, and how much under his direction. Nearly the whole of the New Testament, how- ever, is believed to be his. Langland. We have named William Langland as the second great name connected with religious writing of this period. This name is given to the author of a work called the Vision of Piers the Plowman, written about 1362, and subsequently revised and extended. For a number of years a controversy has raged over the authorship of the Vision, some scholars believing that as many as five authors had a hand in writing it. 1 From the point of view of the average student this question is of little or no consequence. Piers the Plowman makes an appeal to all interested in the life of the Middle Ages, in the history of religious thought, or in allegorical and vision literature. 1 See Manly, in Cambridge History, vol. II, chap. I. 22 ENGLISH LITERATURE " Piers Plowman." In the " Prologue " the author rep- resents himself as falling asleep, one May morning, on a hill, and having a marvelous dream. In this dream he saw " a fair field of folk," folk of all social classes, all occupa- tions, all shades of character. There were farm-laborers, merchants, representatives of various religious orders, jesters and jugglers ("Judas children "), lawyers and beggars, butch- ers and barons. " All this I saw sleeping, and seven times more." The people, almost without exception, are engaged in occupations which are either positively harmful or else useless. Besides the persons named from their employ- ments there are numerous personified abstractions Truth, Falsehood, Guile, Duplicity, Meed, Theology, Conscience ; and in the very complicated allegory of the poem the abuses of the day are attacked and the people are exhorted to better living. On the formal side Piers Plowman is important because it was written in the alliterative, unrhymed metre of Anglo- Saxon verse. No English poem was written subsequently in this form modern English poetry has followed Chaucer, who adopted and modified the French form, characterized by end-rhyme and a regularly recurring accent or stress. Mandeville's " Travels." - Another work of the four- teenth century of interest to modern as well as mediaeval readers is a curious one known as the Travels of Sir John Mandemlle. This book " had been a household work in eleven languages and for five centuries before it was ascer- tained that Sir John never lived, that his travels never took place, and that his personal experiences, long the test of others' veracity, were compiled out of every possible authority, going back to Pliny, if not further." l 1 Cambridge History, II, 90. 23 It pretends to give the experiences of the author, an Eng- lish knight, on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, starting from St. Albans in Hertfordshire in 1322. It pretends to be a guide for other pilgrims, and hence has somewhat of a religious flavor; but its best claim to distinction now is as the first English prose work of which the aim is entertainment. Its effect comes chiefly from a trick used afterward with great success by Defoe and Swift, the use of ex- act figures and of numerous cir- cumstantial details in connec- tion with the wonders described. In a certain lake, for example, grow reeds thirty fathoms long ; and others apparently longer, at the roots of which are found precious stones of great virtues. A further evidence of his truth- fulness is the occasional admis- sion that he speaks from hear- say ; as when we read : " In the Isle of Lango is yet the daughter of Hippocras, in form and like- ness of a great dragon, that is a hundred fathoms in length, as men say; for I have not seen her." Or: "Of Paradise I cannot speak properly, for I was not there." That the work was immensely popular is shown by the existence to-day of some 300 manuscripts of it. Its setting forth what was accepted as fact by the best thinkers of Mandeville's time makes it worthy of attention to-day. Notable examples of this are his account of the cotton plant and his belief in the roundness of the earth. (It must be MANDEVILLE. From a drawing in a MS. in the British Museum. 24 ENGLISH LITERATURE remembered that he wrote a century before Columbus sailed westward for India.) The Travels is, moreover, written in an almost uniformly easy, smooth style : open the volume quite at random, and one will assuredly find interesting matter. GEOFFREY CHAUCER, 1340-1400 There remains to be treated in this period one writer whose fame rests on a far solider basis than any yet men- tioned. No concession need be made on historical or other grounds to place Chaucer high, not only among medieval poets, not only among English poets, but among poets of all times fi "ft V K an< ^ l anc k- Even Matthew Ar- ~j?^|^) nold, who denies Chaucer a po- sition among " the great clas- sics," admits that his poetry shows a " large, free, simple, clear yet kindly view of human life" ; that he is "a genuine source of joy and strength " ; and that he has " the power to survey the world from a central, a truly human point of view." l If these admissions are justified, the denial of " classic " standing to the poet must be due to a very re- stricted use of the term. We have, along with much uncertainty, more information regarding Chaucer's life than regarding any writer previously considered. For these additional facts we are indebted not at all to great appreciation in his day of his literary efforts, CHAUCER. From the Ellesmere MS. (British Museum.) 1 "The Study of Poetry," in Essays in Criticism, Second Series. FROM THE CONQUEST TO CHAUCER'S DEATH 25 but to his activity in public affairs. At various times he held a municipal appointment in London, sat in Parliament, served in the army, and performed diplomatic errands on the Continent. Early Life. Geoffrey Chaucer was a Londoner, the son of a wine merchant, who at one time, possibly but by no means surely at the time of the poet's birth, lived in Thames Street. The location gains interest from the fact that near at hand is the bridge across which pilgrims to Canterbury passed. The occupation of the poet's father was no hindrance to social aspirations ; and at the age of seventeen Geoffrey was attached to a royal household that of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, third son of Edward III. Although there is no evidence regarding the character or extent of his education, his writings show that he was well informed along all lines of interest in his day. His enjoyment of the King's favor is shown by the fact that, on his being captured while serv- ing in the army in France a few years later, Edward himself contributed to the fund for Chaucer's ransom. Continued in the Favor of the Great. Chaucer also profited by the favor of Edward's fourth son, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster. One of his earliest poems, The Death of Blanche the Duchess, was written in memory of John's first wife. It is thought by some that Philippa, the poet's wife, was a kinswoman of Gaunt. Finally, it is known that Gaunt's son, Henry IV, on his accession to the throne in 1399, restored to Chaucer the pension stopped in the last years of Richard's reign when Gaunt was out of the country. This continued association with great folk was of immense help as a preparation for his work. Even the Canterbury Tales, though none of the pilgrims are from the higher walks of life, are written, not for the uneducated, but for the cul- 26 ENGLISH LITERATURE tured. This fact becomes quite plain when one compares Chaucer's work with Wiclif s or with Piers Plowman. Under Italian Influence. With the exception of The Death of Blanche no work of Chaucer written prior to his THE OLD TABARD INN, SOUTHWARK. thirtieth year calls for mention here. Before his next im- portant work appeared he had visited various cities of Italy l 1 It should, perhaps, be remarked that the Life of St. Cecilia, assigned to the Second Nun in the Canterbury collection, was probably written about the time of the first Italian journey. The Knight's Tale also may be a revision of an earlier work of the poet. FROM THE CONQUEST TO CHAUCER'S DEATH 27 on government business, and had come under the influence of the great Italian writers, Boccaccio and Petrarch ; and that of Dante, who had been dead fifty years and who was already a literary saint. To this " period of Italian influence " belong The Parle- ment of Foules (Assembly of Birds), celebrating the betrothal of King Richard II in 1382 ; The House of Fame, an unfinished dream poem, the meaning of which is still in dispute ; Troilus and Criseyde, a very free adaptation of Boccaccio's version of the Trojan hero's love story ; and the Legend of Good Women, an apology (real or pretended) for earlier unfavorable presen- tations of women. " The Canterbury Tales " ; (i) The Form. While he was writing the Legend, Chaucer was probably planning his greatest work, The Canterbury Tales, of which the Prologue and most of the tales may be dated between his forty-fifth and fiftieth years. For a number of tales sources have been found ; for yet another number, close parallels ; for the col- lection as a whole no model has been suggested offering resemblances enough to be worth discussing. The idea of setting a number of stories in a " frame " is very old ; but Chaucer's pilgrimage is distinctly a frame of his own making, the material of which he obtained from personal experience. (2) The Plan. The plan of the Canterbury Tales, which should be read by all in Chaucer's own words, Prologue, lines 1-42, 715-858, is as follows : The poet stopping one April evening at the Tabard Inn in Southwark (south side of the Thames, just across the bridge from Thames Street) finds a party of twenty-nine "sundry folk" gathered, ready to start next day on a pilgrimage to Canterbury especially to the tomb of Thomas a Becket the martyr. He becomes one "of their fellowship" immediately, 28 ENGLISH LITERATURE and decides to accompany them. The Host of the Tabard, Harry Bailly, also decides to join the party ; and proposes that, in order to pass the time pleasantly, they tell stories on the road. Each pilgrim (except the Host) is to tell two stories on the way to Canterbury, and two on the way back ; and he who tells the best will have a supper at the Tabard at the expense of the rest Harry Bailly being the judge, and (though he does not call attention to the fact) the provider of the meal. (3) The Pilgrims. The portion of the Prologue from line 42 to line 715 contains descriptions of the pilgrims. This is the famous gallery of por- traits which justifies Ar- nold's words of praise quoted above. Of gentle folk there are a Knight, a Prioress, a Clerk (Scholar), a Lawyer, a Doctor; of tradespeople, a Shipman, a Woman from Bath, a Manciple (Steward), a Merchant ; of common people, a Miller, a Friar, a Summoner (a knavish offi- cial of the ecclesiastical court), a Cook, a Pardoner. Although in a sense these figures are types, they are strongly individualized. The poet has created persons representative of certain classes, yet with physical, mental, or moral pe- culiarities that distinguish each of them. The Lawyer, for example, was the busiest man one could find- "And yet he semed bisier than he was." The Cook was admirable in every part of his busi- ness ; but it was a great pity that he had a bad sore on CHAUCER'S PRIORESS. From the Ellesmere MS. FROM THE CONQUEST TO CHAUCER'S DEATH 29 his shin. The Squire was singing or playing the flute all day "He was as fresh as is the month of May." The Prioress had the daintiest table manners possible, and in addition "She wolde wepe, if that she sawe a mous Caught in a trappe, if it were deed or bledde. Of smale houndes had she, that she fedde With rosted flesh, or milk and wastel-breed. But sore weep she if oon of hem were deed, Or if men smoot it with a yerde smerte : And al was conscience and tendre herte." In contrast with the Prioress is the Wife of Bath, who, though she was " a worthy woman all her life," was nevertheless furious if any woman took precedence of her in church. Every student should know at least a few of these pictures exactly as the artist drew them. If the plan set forth in the Prologue had been carried out, there would be about 125 tales. . There are, in fact, only twenty-four, of which two are not finished (the Squire's, and Chaucer's own " Sir Thopas ") and a third (the Cook's) is not even well begun. To fulfil such a plan wculd require the whole of a long working life, and probably no poet at the outset of his career is capable of projecting so ambitious a work. (4) The Tales. Of the completed tales probably the company (which would judge, naturally, by standards of their day, not of ours) would have voted the Knight's to be the best. This tale of the brothers Palamon and Arcite and their love for Emily has a wealth of detail of chivalric custom, and many magnificent pictures. The pilgrims would doubtless have been highly entertained by the ribald tales of some of the commons, and touched by 30 ENGLISH LITERATURE the tragedy of Virginia as recounted by the Doctor. It is hard to think that they did more than endure the Parson's discourse on " The Seven Deadly Sins," eminently fitting though it was that he should choose such a theme. The appropriateness of tale to teller is further shown by the Nun's Priest's Cock and Fox story, with its wholesome mor- als of " never trust to flattery," and " never talk when you should hold your peace ; " by "Patient Griselda" from the Clerk, which he learned from Petrarch, " the laureate poet ; " by the Pardoner's story of the three " rioters " who met violent deaths at each other's hands because of their cupid- ity. Merits of the " Can- terbury Tales." - We must say, then, that, even with no other work before us than the Can- terbury Tales, the author is entitled to rank very high among literary artists for (1) the originality of his conception, (2) the wonderful group of human portraits, (3) the fitting of tale *to teller, and (4) his power as a story-teller. PLACE OF BECKET'S MARTYRDOM. In Canterbury Cathedral. FROM THE CONQUEST TO CHAUCER'S DEATH 31 Reversal of Fortune. When Chaucer was working at the Legend and planning the Canterbury Tales, he was still an official of the crown Controller of Customs in London. POETS' CORNER, WESTMINSTER ABBEY. The bust in the foreground is of Longfellow. In 1386 he represented the county of Kent in Parliament; but from now on his fortunes were at a low ebb for many years, probably through no incompetence, and through no 32 ENGLISH LITERATURE fault save his attachment to John of Gaunt. John lost his influence with the King, and Chaucer was deprived of his position. Not long after this Philippa Chaucer died, and her pension was discontinued. He was compelled to dispose of his own pensions for a fixed sum ; and after receiving in 1394 another pension of 20 a year had frequently to procure loans before the payments were due. During these years of financial em- barrassment he wrote little ; no long work except the Astro- labe, a prose treatise on astronomy written for " little Lewis my son," about whom we know nothing more. Last Days. With the accession of Henry IV in 1399, Chaucer's prospects improved. Another substantial pen- sion was granted to him, on the basis of which he leased a house in Westminster. Fate did not allow him a long resi- dence here : by the best information we have, it appears that he died in less than a year on October 25, 1400. He was the first poet to be buried in that portion of the Abbey now known as Poets' Corner. CHAPTER III FROM THE DEATH OF CHAUCER TO THE ACCESSION OF ELIZABETH (1400-1558) 1. THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY Fifteenth-century Literature. Fifteenth-century litera- ture was strikingly inferior to that of the fourteenth. No poet appeared who showed more than occasional traces of power. Chaucer's professed disciples, Lydgate and Occleve, failed utterly to give evidence of profit by study of their master. Some Scotch poets, notably William Dunbar and Gavin Douglas, showed talent of a somewhat higher order ; but they would scarcely deserve mention except in a rather barren period. With a single exception, Malory, no prose writer appeared who would be read with pleasure to-day ; and in the case of Malory our interest is rather in his sub- ject-matter and the use of his work by poets of later ages than in any great literary merit of his own. A Period of Unrest. The century was marked by much unrest, yet was without any great movement or accomplish- ment. The insurrection of the Percies and the religious per- secutions under Henry IV ; the war with France, begun by Henry V, and brought to an inglorious close under Henry VI ; Jack Cade's rebellion, under the last-named sovereign ; the Wars of the Roses, the civil conflict which distracted the country from 1455 to 1485 : these events occupied the people with other things than literature. 33 34 ENGLISH LITERATURE War does, it is true, often bring out the best there is in a people, including fit record in prose and verse of their deeds ; but England's wars and fightings in the fifteenth century were not of that sort. The Percies fought because the King did not live up to his pre-coronation promises to them ; Henry V fought as a means of gaining wealth, and at the same time quieting his own dominions; the Wars of the Roses were the outcome of the disregard by Henry IV of the direct order of succession to the throne; Cade's rebel- lion, the result of restrictions of the franchise, was utterly lacking in heroic elements. Importance of the Period. It must not, however, be assumed that this period is unimportant in English liter- ature. A great number of those poems known as " popular " ballads (i.e., poems originating with the people, the folk), seem to have been committed to writing at this time, though many may have been composed earlier. An event of the greatest significance to literature took place about the middle of the century the invention of printing from movable types. The invention reached England about a quarter of a century later; and before the year 1500 nearly 400 books had been printed. The use that subsequent writers made of Malory's great work on the legends of Arthur has been mentioned. Through the century also the drama was making slow but sure progress. The " Popular " Ballad : (i) Definition. In taking up the ballads the first thing necessary is a definition. We are here not concerned with such poems as Tennyson's The Revenge (sub-title, " A Ballad of the Fleet ") ; or Kipling's Ballad of "East and West; or Oliver Wendell Holmes's Ballad of the Oysterman; or any of the poems in the volume of Words- worth and Coleridge called Lyrical Ballads. By " ballad " FROM CHAUCER TO ELIZABETH 35 in this book we mean a narrative poem of limited extent, unknown authorship, originally intended to be sung, and handed down among the folk by oral tradition. In the great collection of Professor Child are more than three hundred ballads, of which very few can be traced to a date earlier than 1400, and very few are believed to have originated after 1500. (2) Subjects. The subjects of the ballads are as varied as the interests of the age that produced them. Many deal with the outlaws, particularly Robin Hood and his " merry men," who robbed the rich and befriended the poor. Many deal with various aspects of the supernatural ; as Thomas Rymer, the hero of which was carried off by a fairy, or Kemp Owyne, telling a story of disenchantment by kissing. Great battles are the subjects of not a few, of which the most famous perhaps is The Battle of Otterburn. One of the best is Sir Patrick Spens, recounting the ready self-sacrifice of a Scotch sailor knight for his king. There is much more tragedy than comedy in the ballads, reflecting doubtless an age when love and hate were strong, when feuds were numerous, and when life was held not so dear. (3) Style. As to style, the ballads are notably direct and simple. They often begin abruptly, apparently assum- ing among the auditors knowledge of events or stories un- known to-day. The narrative is often so condensed that much reading between the lines is necessary ; and not sel- dom the ending is as abrupt as was the beginning of the story. Figures of speech are few, and the vocabulary is that of everyday conversation rather than of men of letters. Simple rhyme and stanza forms are the rule. Still another characteristic that even the casual reader of a few ballads would observe is repetition. In all five stanzas 36 ENGLISH LITERATURE of Lord Randal, for example, the four lines are partly alike ; the first line ends, " Lord Randal, my son " ; the second, " my handsome young man " ; the third, " mother, make my bed soon"; the fourth, "fain would lie down." The three stanzas of Bonnie George Campbell end with the line " But never cam he ! " (4) Communal Origin. Even so brief a treatment of ballads as this should not end without an addition to the definition given above. Not only is the typical ballad of un- known authorship : the theory finding almost universal acceptance to-day is that it is of " communal origin." By this is meant that the ballad has its beginning in the " com- munal dance," the meeting of the tribe ; and that the form of it we possess is due to a singer, " a skilful recording secre- tary, one might say, who stands between us and the com- munity." 1 Some modern writers Coleridge, for example have to some extent caught the trick of ballad writing; but The Ancient Mariner is clearly the work of one individual writing in a more or less literary language for distinctly educated readers. The gap, therefore, is wide between it and the genuine ballad, with its anonymous, collective authorship, and its uncultured audience. The introduction of printing may on first thought sound like a contradiction of the statement above that the fifteenth century was marked by no great accomplishment in Eng- 1 F. B. Gummere, Old English Ballads, page Ixviii. Other writings of Professor Gummere necessary to any extended study of ballads are : The Beginnings of Poetry, The Popular Ballad, and volume II, chapter XVII, of the Cambridge History of English Literature. Professor Kit- tredge's introduction to The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, Cam- bridge Edition, should also be read. FROM CHAUCER TO ELIZABETH 37 land. Since, however, the art was practised in seventy cities of eight other countries before the first press was set up in London, it does not seem necessary to modify our first state- ment. Nevertheless, the time when the first books in the English language were printed in England is worthy of note, as is the name of the first printer, William Caxton. CAXTON AND HIS PRINTERS READING HIS FIRST PROOF. From an old print. William Caxton (1422 7-1490) . Caxton was born in Kent about 1422. At the age of sixteen or seventeen he was apprenticed to a London cloth merchant. A few years later he went to the continent, and subsequently became head of an English trading company at Bruges (Bruzh). Leaving this business he entered the service of Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy, and there began the series of translations which 38 ENGLISH LITERATURE give him a place in literature as well as in the history of printing. At Cologne in 1471 he had his first sight of a press; and three or four years later, probably at Bruges, he turned out the first book printed in English The Recuyell (Collection) of the Histories of Troy, the first of the translations just men- tioned. In 1476 he set up a press in London, near West- minster Abbey; and the following year issued from this press the Dictes and Notable Wise Sayings of the Philosophers, the first book which we can certainly say was printed in England. During the fourteen years between this event and his death Caxton printed nearly one hundred works, of which a number were translations made by himself. He recog- nized the unfortunate condition of the English language arising from lack of uniformity, and in the preface to a version of the Mneid set forth in entertaining fashion the differences of dialect and the difficulties arising therefrom. Sir Thomas Malory. Among the works early printed by Caxton was Morte d" Arthur, 1485, the great work of Sir Thomas Malory already alluded to. Of Sir Thomas's life virtually nothing is known. Since the publication in 1897 of a paper by Professor Kittredge l it has seemed reasonable to identify the author of the Morte with a Sir Thomas Malory who represented Warwickshire in Parliament in 1445, and who died in 1470. "Morte d 'Arthur." -Whatever the facts regarding the author's life, his book is of intense and lasting interest. In it we are informed that the matter came from " the French book," as if it had but one source. Scholars have, however, 1 "Who was Sir Thomas Malory?" in [Harvard] Studies and Notes, vol. V. FROM CHAUCER TO ELIZABETH 39 discovered a number of sources, and it is properly described as " a mosaic of adaptations," a fact which explains the gaps in the narrative and other causes of confusion. For some parts no sources have been found, and for others Malory did not select what a compiler would to-day consider the best source. An example of the latter proceeding is his drawing of Sir Gawain along the lines of the French prose romances, in which he is a far from admirable character. In the verse romances he is " brave, chivalrous, loyally faithful to his plighted word, scrupulously' heedful of his own and others' honour " (J. L. Weston). We are indebted, however, to the Morte for many Arthur stories and versions of stories not extant elsewhere. In the opinion of many critics also we have from Malory the first piece of modern English prose, the first work showing " the rhythmical flow and gracious music of which our language is so richly capable." Though lacking a sense of humor, Malory possesses real power in the field of pathos. As a whole the Morte must be called a rambling book, but it contains many effective passages in a rapid and direct style. It is a real achievement to have made so excellent a compila- tion of such varied, extensive, and at times inharmonious materials. 2. THE RENAISSANCE The coming of the printing press was the first clear evidence that a new movement called the Renaissance 1 (i.e., "New Birth ") had reached England. This movement, which may be said to have had its beginning in Italy about the fourteenth century, spread over the whole of Western Europe during the two centuries following. Its main factor was, in the words of 1 A French word, from the verb renattre, meaning "to be born again." 40 ENGLISH LITERATURE Sidney Lee, l " a passion for extending the limits of human knowledge, and for employing man's capabilities to new and better advantage than of old." It manifested itself not only in literature, but in art (Michael Angelo, Raphael, Albert Diirer), in reli- gious thought (Luther), in science (Copernicus, Galileo), in exploration (Columbus, Vasco da Gama, Vespucci, Drake, Hawkins). Versatility the Key- note. Although in these pages we are in- terested chiefly in its manifestation in litera- ture, it should be re- membered that few great men of the Ren- aissance confined their efforts to one line. Michael Angelo was architect, engineer, and poet, as well as painter. " Versatility of interest and experience was the accepted token of hu- man excellence." Fran- cis Bacon's words " I have taken all knowledge for my prov- ince " form an appropriate motto for numerous others. THE RIVER CAM. Tower of St. John's College in the distance. Great Englishmen of the Sixteenth Century, page 3. FROM CHAUCER TO ELIZABETH 41 Beginnings. Nothing approaching an exact date for the beginning of the Renaissance can be given. Some say that the English Chaucer and Wiclif are as truly of the move- ment as are Luther and Spenser. Others are inclined to re- gard Dante (1265-1321) as the first to show the change in human thought and aspirations. Still others would find " forerunners " of the movement even in the twelfth century, as, for example, Abelard (1079-1142), and St. Francis of Assisi (1182-1226). From the point of view of influence on English literature of the sixteenth century we need not look further than fourteenth- century Italy to Petrarch, the sonnet-writer. The first English writers clearly to be called Renaissance figures are Sir Thomas Wyatt, and Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey. Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503- 1542). Wyatt was born in Kent in 1503. He attended St. John's College, Cam- bridge, from which he re- ceived a degree at the age of fifteen. He became a member of the household of Henry VIII, and was knighted. An extensive acquaintance with Europe came to him as a result of appointment on various embassies to France, Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands. Like most of Henry's followers he had periods of disfavor, was several times imprisoned, and quite possibly would have travelled HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY. 42 ENGLISH LITERATURE Henry's well-worn path from the prison to the block had not a natural death taken him off at the age of thirty-nine. Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (151 7 7-1547) . Surrey was born somewhat later than Wyatt about 1517, and was of noble blood. He, like Wyatt, visited Europe on gov- ernment business, not as diplomat, but as soldier. Shortly after a military reverse of his command he fell under the suspicion of the King, and was imprisoned and executed at the age of thirty. Wyatt and Surrey in " Tottel's Miscellany." Neither Wyatt's nor Surrey's poems were published by the writers. They were written for their " private friends," as were Shak- spere's " sugared sonnets " somewhat later. They appeared first in Tottel's Miscellany, a collection of poems by various authors, published in 1557, the year before Elizabeth came to the throne. Though, as is evident from the dates of their lives, Surrey's and Wyatt's poems were written from ten to twenty-five years before publication of the Miscellany, this volume is generally regarded as marking the beginning of the great Elizabethan Age, and, indeed of modern English poetry. Wyatt's Poetry. Wyatt's distinguished position in Eng- lish poetry is due to his introduction of the sonnet, a very restricted form of verse which had been highly developed by Petrarch. It consists of fourteen ten-syllable lines, falling into two parts of eight and six lines, and developing a single thought. Wyatt adopted the Italian's subject as well as his form. Nearly all his poems deal with love; and since they do so after a quite conventional fashion, one is led to the conclusion that behind them is no true or deep feeling. FROM CHAUCER TO ELIZABETH 43 Titles of some of Wyatt's sonnets will indicate the kind of subjects : " The Lover Waxeth Wiser, and Will not Die for Affection," " How the Lover Perisheth in his Delight, as the Fly in the Fire," " Description of the Contrarious Pas- sions in a Lover," " Complaint for True Love Unrequited." His rhymes are not always good, and his lines are frequently rough ; but he often shows real poetic thought and power of TOWER OF LONDON. Scene of execution of great numbers of political offenders in England. phrasing, which would give him a not unworthy place in literature apart from his great service in introducing the sonnet-form to English poets. Surrey's Poetry. While Surrey wrote sonnets superior in many respects to Wyatt's, his place in literature rests on other grounds. For his introduction of blank verse into English, and for his occasional realistic presentation of na- ture he merits a high place among the beginners of the English Renaissance. The latter is well illustrated by his 44 ENGLISH LITERATURE sonnet, " Description of Spring," and by some passages in the poem called " Prisoned in Windsor." Blank verse, like the sonnet, was not the invention of its first English user, but a borrowing from the Italian. While the Italian use of it is found, as is Surrey's, in a translation of the JEneid, the English form is not a mere imitation, but has undeniable individuality. When we try to imagine the Elizabethan drama in any other metrical form, we can realize our debt to Surrey for bringing it to his countrymen. Blank verse has also been used in most of the really great long poems in the language, from Milton's Paradise Lost to Tennyson's Idylls; and it is generally regarded as the most characteristic verse form of English. Indirect Italian Influence. Italy exerted a strong in- fluence in the Renaissance in England not only by such direct means as have been set forth above, but in indirect ways also. At the fall of Constantinople in 1453 Greek scholars fled to Italy with their precious manuscripts, which gave the West its first direct acquaintance with the Greek language and literature. Italian scholars were eagerly sought out by students visiting Italy, and one was induced before 1500 to begin teaching Greek at Oxford. The place in the Renaissance of this concern with the past is a large one, showing most readily to the young student, perhaps, in Shakspere's use of Plutarch in the Roman plays. Along with the interest in Greek antiquity went a similar interest in British antiquity, evident in Shakspere's Lear, Macbeth, Cymbeline, all based on legendary British history. Religious Aspect of the Renaissance. An important aspect of the English Renaissance not clearly due to any outside influence is the religious. Luther's defiance of the Pope antedated by seventeen years, it is true, Tyndale's FROM CHAUCER TO ELIZABETH 45 ' mcnc pet once agarnc cmrccrtD bt> ttnl- ! ii'.un nib-lit .- luijnt t>nio is abocD a ucfcflarpt Cablc:ll)lwrui cafclpano ugiueivt ntavc uc fountain' ho* ft>t Vontai'iiO ut tilt fourt rt)c3lftcsof;t)t rhc arwsof tbr Jlpoitics. translation of the Bible (1534) ; but the translator's plans were forming many years before, and it does not appear that Tyndale had any other inspiration or spur than his own " passion for ex- tending the limits of human knowledge" in a direction necessa- rily of benefit to man- kind. His translation served its religious pur- pose chiefly by being more accurate than any then existing. Its fur- ther contribution to the New Birth consisted in its merit as English, wherein it marks an important point in the history of English prose. Tyndale has been called by some " the father of modern English prose ; " a not undeserved title if, as one writer says, he " fixed the character of the English translations [of the Bible] forevermore." l 1 Professor Whitney, in Cambridge History, III, 48. It is only proper to state that scholars are not unanimous in crediting Tyndale with the superior merits of the translation bearing his name. To the present writer Tyndale's claims seem unquestionably the best. 3efns Go re mto all tljc U>0!itif -'anD p,'f att>t FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF TYNDALE'S TESTAMENT. (New York Public Library.) CHAPTER IV FROM THE ACCESSION OF ELIZABETH TO THE CLOSING OF THE THEATRES (165&-1642) Introduction. It must not be supposed by the student that the Elizabethan Age in English literature, often called the Golden Age, reached its high development early in Elizabeth's reign. Two full decades of preparation were yet to pass before the appearance of the first great creative works of the age Spenser's Shepherd's Calender and Lyly's Euphues. The Preparatory Period. Although this preparatory period was of significance in broadening the intellectual view of the whole nation, its greatest value consisted in its providing material for the drama, the most characteristic literary form of the time. Compilations of British chroni- cles, crude but valuable dramas built up on classic models, translations of noted works of antiquity and of current works of interest in several European languages, made accessible subject-matter for the dramatists which left the full force of their genius free to be expended on adaptation and re- shaping to suit English spirit and taste. Of the chroniclers the most noted during this time were Grafton, Stowe, Camden, and greatest of all, Ralph Holin- shed. Of the plays on classic models need be mentioned only the tragedy Gorboduc, and the comedy, Ralph Roister Doister. Before 1575 nine books of the Mneid had been put into 46 FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 47 English verse by Thomas Phaer; three tragedies of Seneca by Jasper Heywood and one by Neville ; the Metamorphoses of Ovid by Golding, and the Epistles by Turberville. The best-known collection of Continental stories (best- known because used by Shakspere) is Paynter's Palace of Pleasure, the alliterative title of which seems to have sug- gested one used later by Turberville Ten Tragical Tales out of Sundry Italians. (Verse collections similarly named are the Paradise of Dainty Devices and the Gorgeous Gallery of Gallant Inventions.} In the same year with The Shep- herd's Calender and Euphues appeared what is to the moderns perhaps the most important of all these translations Sir Thomas North's Plutarch's Lives, to which we owe Shak- spere s plays. Greek and Roman The Period of Splendor: (i) The Queen. The thirty- years following this prepara- tory period are made splendid not only by the literature produced, but by the develop- ment of an intense and vigor- ous national life. Elizabeth, the " man-minded offset " of Henry VIII, possessed the strength and talents needed to guide the nation through a troubled time. And the nation believed in her : to her sub- jects she seemed, says the historian J. R. Green," the em- bodiment of dauntless resolution." The reigns of her Protestant brother, Edward VI, and her Roman Catholic sister, Mary, had left the English peo- QUEEN ELIZABETH. 48 ENGLISH LITERATURE pie divided into two opposing parties, each suspicious of the other. Elizabeth set herself to bring them together ; and her efforts met with success when Philip II of Spain attempted to invade England. Then it was that " patriot- ism proved stronger than religious fanaticism in the hearts of the English Catholics ; " and their loyalty decided the fate of Philip's scheme. (2) The People. One result of the Renaissance was, natu- rally, a great advance of the people as a whole in knowledge and intelligence. Accompanying this was a great increase in prosperity and in freedom of individual action. A man's chances in life were no longer limited by his rank or his purse. A Yorkshire yeoman's son, Roger Ascham, devoted him- self to learning, and became tutor to the Queen. A boy of humble birth, apprenticed at an early age on a small coasting vessel, developed a passion for exploration, was aided by the Queen, and is known in history as Sir Francis Drake, Admiral, circumnavigator of the earth. A War- wickshire peasant, who in some way got to London when he was about twenty-one years old, obtained work of some sort in a theatre; and ten or twelve years later he was acknowledged the foremost writer of both comedies and tragedies in English. (3) Manner of Living. The national prosperity expressed itself in many ways. Houses were built more substantially. There was a great increase in the comforts of life ; and among all classes except the very poor there was a great variety of food, especially meats. Great care and expense were given to dress, even by yeomen and men of low rank. There was a great fondness for amusements and a widespread indulgence in them ; facts which doubtless did much to make the high development of the drama possible. FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 49 To summarize, it may be said that the chief national characteristic, found in all classes from the Queen and her advisers to the humblest peasants, was a " youthful exuber- ance of spirit." The Age of Elizabeth deserves the descrip- tion " Merry England " more than any period before or since. It is not surprising that from such a period came the nation's greatest literature. RUINS OF KENILWORTH CASTLE. Here one of the most splendid entertainments of Elizabeth took place. See Scott's Kenilworth. The first writer whom we are to take up is not one of the greatest. He fills only a small niche; but we should add that he fills it completely. This writer, whose field is that of prose, is John Lyly (i554?-i6o6?). John Lyly, one of whose works has been named as marking the end of the period of preparation, was born in Kent about the year 1554. Nothing is positively known of his life until he became a student at 50 ENGLISH LITERATURE Magdalen College (Maudlin), Oxford, from which he was graduated A.B. and A.M. In 1579, the year of the ap- pearance of Euphues, Lyly was connected with the uni- versity at Cambridge. Later he wrote nine comedies of the " romantic " type, the direct ancestors of Shakspere's A Midsummer Night's Dream and As You Like it. There are no other known facts about Lyly's life, though some have identified him with a man who served several years in Par- liament. It is generally believed that he died in 1606. Lyly's importance in literature arises from his romantic comedies, his lyrics, and his popularizing of the prose style known as " euphuism." One of his best-known and de- lightful lyrics is that appearing in his play, Alexander and Campaspe, and beginning: "Cupid and my Campaspe played At cards for kisses ; Cupid paid." " Euphues," and Euphuism. Euphues, or the Anatomy of Wit (1579), and its sequel, Euphues and His England, form together a sort of novel. The main story in the first is of a young Athenian, Euphues, who goes to Naples, becomes a great friend of one Philautus, falls in love with Lucilla, Philautus's betrothed, and is rejected by her. In the sequel Philautus and Euphues visit England, Philautus has an un- fortunate love affair and then a fortunate one, Euphues in- dulges in extravagant praise of England and Englishwomen (especially Elizabeth), and departs. The story, it will be seen, is slight, and the bare outline does not promise much entertainment. As a whole, Euphues is not what one would to-day call a " readable " book. Read in brief extracts, however, it is of not a little interest on the side of style, of which the striking features are alliter- ation, balanced phrases, and far-fetched figures. FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 51 Naples is said to be " a place of more pleasure than profit, and yet of more profit than piety." Elizabeth, we read, " was called from a prisoner to be a prince, from the castle to the crown." And later : " God for his mercy's sake, Christ for his merit's sake, the Holy Ghost for his name's sake" grant the Queen long life, because the writer saw her " to surpass all in beauty, and yet a virgin, to excel all in piety, and yet a prince, to be inferior to none in all the lineaments of the body, and yet superior to every one in all gifts of the mind." " I lived," says Euphues, " as the elephant doth by air, with the sight of my lady." Popularity of the Style. - This sort of writing be- came the fashion : almost every writer, sometimes consciously, sometimes un- consciously, drops into the style. Shakspere has not a few euphuistic speeches in his best comedies ; and it is by no means certain, as it was formerly said to be, that in Love's Labour's Lost he ridicules the popular style. SIR PHILIP SYDNEY. Most romantic figure of the Renais- sance in England. Sir Philip Sidney (1554?- 1586). An excellent example of the many-sided life lived by gifted Elizabethans is that of Sir Philip Sidney. Man of letters, distinguished in several lines, traveler, diplomat, and courtier, he crowded into a life of thirty-two years action and accomplishment enough for an average life twice as long. 52 ENGLISH LITERATURE He, like Lyly, was born in Kent, probably in the same year, but unlike Lyly, was of distinguished ancestry. After a preparatory course in one of the leading English schools, Sidney entered Christ Church College, Oxford, at the age of fourteen, not a con- spicuously early age for that day. An epidemic in Oxford caused him to leave without a de- gree, and he did not re- turn. For four years he travelled, visiting under the most ad- vantageous conditions France, Germany, Aus- tria, and Italy, and coming under the influ- ence of every expression of Renaissance spirit in the Continent. Varying Fortunes. Returning to England, he became a prominent figure at Court, and a year or so later was in- trusted with govern- mental business which took him to Vienna a second time, to Heidelberg, and to Antwerp. Falling into royal disfavor for a time, he retired to the country, and during his retirement wrote Arcadia, a pastoral romance, and De- fence of Poesy, a critical essay. In 1583 he was knighted, FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF THE ARCADIA. This copy belonged to Sidney's sister, the Countess of Pembroke, for whom he wrote it. (Widener Memorial Library, Harvard University.) FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 53 and married to the fourteen-year-old daughter of the Queen's secretary. It does not appear to have been a love match ; and it does appear that he had previously loved and been loved by Penelope Devereaux, daughter of the first Earl of Essex, and afterward the wife of Lord Rich. It was to Pe- nelope that Sidney addressed most of the hundred and odd sonnets entitled Astrophel and Stella. Heroism. In 1585 he went with an English party to help the Dutch against the Spanish, was mortally wounded the following year, and died within a month. The oft-re- peated story of his death is a classic incident of heroism and self-denial. Being very thirsty, he was about to drink, when seeing a poor soldier cast longing eyes at the liquid, Sidney passed it to him with the words : " Thy necessity is greater than mine." Sidney's Rank. It may well be doubted whether, with- out the glamour of his romantic career, Sidney's name would stand so high as it does in the annals of literature. As author, however, of the first English essay in literary criti- cism, of the first English pastoral romance, and of a sonnet- sequence which perhaps inspired the similar productions of Spenser and Shakspere, he has a clear title to a place all his own. EDMUND SPENSER, 1552-1599 The one great non-dramatic poet of the English Renais- sance holds no such position to-day as he held with his con- temporaries. In the words of a recent writer l and manifest lover of this poet : " Spenser is not a popular poet. He has never been in any marked degree even fashionable. . . . 1 Prof. C. G. Osgood, in preface to A Concordance to the Poems of Edmund Spenser. (The Carnegie Institution of Washington : 1915.) 54 ENGLISH LITERATURE His materials, quality, and intention forbid that a multitude of readers should ever gather about him." According to Professor Osgood, however, one's attitude toward Spenser is a test of one's fitness to appreciate the higher things of life : " To all men of finer perceptions and sensibilities he is all things." If there be truth in this judgment, it is worth one's while to gain some knowledge of his work. Education. Edmund Spenser, like his great predecessor Chaucer, his great contemporary Bacon, and many illustrious writers since, was a Londoner by birth. Though his family were in poor circumstances, he managed to secure a good education, at the Merchant Tailors' School, and at Pembroke College, Cambridge. He came to be a close friend of men of standing and influence, through whom, after leaving die University as a Master of Arts, he became acquainted with Sidney and the Earl of Leicester. Three years after leaving the University he published The Shepherd's Calender, a pas- toral poem in twelve parts, " everywhere answering to the seasons of the twelve months." Drawing its inspiration from Theocritus and Virgil, it is another evidence of the in- terest in antiquity which was one of the distinctive marks of the Renaissance (see page 44). In Ireland. " The Faerie Queene." - Wishing political preferment, he secured a not very desirable appointment as private secretary to Lord Grey, deputy to Ireland. There he spent the greater part of the time till his death, being unable to secure a more congenial position in England. Among other rewards for his Irish service he received as a grant Kilcolman Castle, with an estate of about 3000 acres. At Kilcolman, Spenser was visited by Sir Walter Raleigh, who saw the first three books of The Faerie Queene, and advised the poet to bring them to the attention of Elizabeth. This Spenser did ; FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 55 but though the poem was pleasing to the Queen and met with a splendid popular reception, its prime object was not ac- complished. He received only a meagre pension, and no promotion. Last Years and Death. In 1594, three years after the publication just mentioned, Spenser married Elizabeth Boyle, of whose life and associa- tions nothing is known. To the marriage English liter- ature is indebted for an ex- cellent sonnet-series called Amoretti, and for what is universally acclaimed the greatest wedding hymn in the language, Epithalami- on. Two years afterward Spenser went again to Lon- don to publish the rest of The Faerie Queene. Some time after his return to Ireland, a new rebellion , , . EDMUND SPENSER. broke out in that part of the country, and Kilcolman Castle was destroyed. The poet escaped with his family to Cork, then to London, where, in January, 1599, after a month's illness he died. The " Amoretti." Although Spenser wrote other poems and one piece of prose which are extant, and nine comedies which are lost, the works having greatest general interest to-day are the Amoretti and The Faerie Queene. The sonnets of the Amoretti are an interesting example of the practice made fashionable by Sidney. While they certainly have basis in fact, being inspired by his courtship of Elizabeth 56 ENGLISH LITERATURE Boyle, they are full of the phraseology and figures belonging to that type of literature in his day. Spenser, however, invented a rhyme-scheme for himself as did Shakspere, in- stead of adopting Sidney's scheme, itself adopted from the Italian. " The Faerie Queene." The ambitious plan of the Faerie Queene is set forth in a letter to Raleigh prefixed to the publication of the first three books. The poet was to " fashion a gentleman," choosing as his model King Arthur, in whom he found exemplified " the twelve private moral virtues," and devoting a section (or " book ") of the poem to each virtue. The Faerie Queene herself he meant " for glory in general intention," but for Elizabeth " in particular." The queen's part in the fiction was this : she was to hold a feast for twelve days, on each of which an adventure happened ; each adventure was undertaken by a different Knight, and each made the subject of a book. The six books which Spen- ser completed relate the adventures of knights representing the virtues of Holiness, Temperance, Chastity, Friendship, Justice, Courtesy. The course of the story is interrupted by innumerable other stories, not always clearly connected with the main theme, and sometimes bearing evidence of having been separately composed. The deliberately archaic vocabulary is for many a deterrent to sympathetic reading. While it is probable that The Faerie Queene has been read entire by few but specialists, carefully made selections should interest a large circle of readers ; for the tone of moral earnestness, the charm of highly imaginative word-paintings, and the graceful music of the verse are ever-present sources of general appeal. The " Spenserian " Stanza. The Spenserian stanza de- serves examination by any reader of English poetry. It FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 57 contains nine lines, of which the first eight are iambic pen- tameter (i.e., made up of five feet, ten syllables, with the accent on the even-numbered syllables), and the ninth iambic hexameter (six feet, twelve syllables). These lines rhyme as follows : first and third ; second, fourth, fifth, and seventh ; sixth, eighth, and ninth (or, as rhyme-schemes are usually given ababbcbcc). It has been found an excellent meter for various kinds of poems of considerable length, among notable examples of which may be mentioned Shelley's Adonais (an elegy), Keats 's Eve of St. Agnes (a unified nar- rative), Byron's Childe Harold (a leisurely narrative and descriptive travel record), and the introduction to Tenny- son's Lotos-Eaters (a poetic picture). FRANCIS BACON, 1561-1626 Between the writings and the life of Francis Bacon there is a striking contradiction. " Wisdom for a man's self " (mean- ing "self-love"), he writes, "is, in many branches thereof, a depraved thing ; " yet when his own prospects seemed to be at stake, he, as attorney for the crown, prosecuted his best, once most influential, friend. Concerning judges he writes : " Above all things, integrity is their portion and proper virtue ; " yet at the age of sixty he pleaded guilty to the charge of corruption in accepting gifts of money from suitors in his court. He disclaimed ever having been influ- enced by a gift in making a decision ; but he apparently lacked the confidence in his disclaimer necessary to a reason- able defence. Life, to End of Elizabeth's Reign. He was born in Lon- don, January 22, 1561, the son of Elizabeth's Lord Keeper of the Great Seal. At the age of twelve he was sent to Trinity College, Cambridge, which he left three years later without 58 ENGLISH LITERATURE a degree. After a year's study of law at Gray's Inn, London, he spent three years in Paris as an attache of the English em- bassy, from which employment he was recalled by his father's death. He began the practice of law, and became a member of parliament ; but believing from the first that influence was necessary to advancement, he sought the favor of his kins- man, Lord Burghley. When Essex replaced Burghley in the Queen's good graces, Bacon promptly attached himself to Essex's following. The FACSIMILE OF BACON'S SIGNATURE. (British Museum.) patron was unable to advance the young lawyer's political fortunes, but presented him with a handsome estate. In 1597 appeared in print the first edition of Bacon's Essays, ten in all. The first blot on the page of the author's life came four years later, when, as special attorney, he aided in prosecuting Essex for treason, and was the chief instrument in sending him to the block. Rapid Rise to Fame. The time was at hand when Bacon's powers were to be recognized and his ambitions FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 59 gratified. Elizabeth died in 1603 without aiding in either of these; but under her successor, James, his recognition was prompt and his promotion rapid. In 1607 he became Solici- tor-General ; in 1613, Attorney-General; in 1617, Lord Keeper ; in 1619, Lord Chancellor. In 1618 he was raised to the peerage with the title of Baron Verulam : and in 1621 received his last honor the raising to higher rank as Vis- count St. Albans. Sudden Fall. His fall was sudden : within six months he was disgraced as a result of charges of corruption in his office as judge in the Court of Chancery. He was dismissed from office and declared incapable of holding office again, fined 40,000, sentenced to prison during the King's pleasure, and banished from Court forever. He was released after a few weeks' imprisonment, and his fine was remitted; but the remainder of the punishment was enforced. Death. Bacon then retired to his estate at St. Albans in Hertfordshire, and devoted the remaining five years of his life to writing and experimentation. The end came April 9, 1626. It has often been said that he died a martyr to science ; and it would be pleasant to think that, if " nothing in his life became him like the leaving it," at least the leav- ing was becoming even heroic. The original statement regarding his death, however, does not bear out this idea. He went out to gather snow with which to stuff a hen, in order to see whether cold would pre- serve flesh, and he died a few days later of bronchitis. The disease was brought on, however (according to his friend, the philosopher Thomas Hobbes), not by the exposure incident to the experiment, but by the dampness of the bed in which he was put. Indirectly, of course, the experiment caused his death, but hardly in heroic fashion. 60 ENGLISH LITERATURE Works of Minor Interest. Besides the essays Bacon wrote The Wisdom of the Ancients, an interpretation of my- thology ; The History of Henry VII; The New Atlantis, a picture of an ideal state ; and The Advancement of Learning, and Novum Organum, scientific works impor- tant not so much for their contents as for the author's insistence on the superiority of induction to deduction in -scientific investiga- tion. Most of the ad- vance in science since THE :ESSAYES O R, '//>/> C 0V NS E L S O F V1SCOVNT S'.AHAN. Jt WTH _g A Tabfe of the Colours, or Apparancej offct Goon and Evil r.,ar..f their Dcgrccj.as placet ^ of Pttfwifion, nd DVffwauJO) and their feeiall F4lx, jr.d the Elcnchei of them. fr(b tnltrgtd. ^ Printed byloHN B E A L E, FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF AN EARLY COM- PLETE EDITION OF BACON'S ESSAYS. (Swarthmore College Library.) Bacon's day is attrib- uted to the acceptance of this principle first emphasized by him. Greatness of the " Essays." - However valuable his scientific labors, they would give Bacon a small place in literature in compari- son with the place the Essays give him. The sense of the word essays used by Bacon he states in his dedi- cation " dispersed meditations ; " and later " certain brief notes set down rather significantly than curiously " that is, more for meaning than for style. With these char- acterizations in mind a reader is not surprised to find that the essays are not always coherent that the sentences, as FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 61 Carlyle said of Emerson's, do not always " rightly stick to their foregoers and their followers." The most memorable sentences are often terse ones which stand out by themselves as if not meant for parts of wholes. In the essay Of Adversity, for example, we read : " Pros- perity is not without many fears and distastes ; and ad- versity is not without comforts and hopes ; " this between a sentence dealing with the predominance of sadness over joy in the Old Testament, and one which by an unusual figure of speech suggests that we " judge of the pleasure of the heart by the pleasure of the eye." The essay Of Studies is really a collection of texts, upon any one of which an extended dis- course might well be written. In a period when long, in- volved sentences were the fashion, the directness and pithi- ness of Bacon's make his style especially noteworthy. The " Essays " and the Renaissance Spirit. The range of subjects treated in the Essays reflects the spirit of the Renaissance its unwillingness to endure any limitation of its inquiry, its ambition to extend knowledge, to take " all knowledge for [its] province." Matters of personal concern, such as Friendship, Honour and Reputation, Adversity ; mat- ters relating to government, such as Seditions and Troubles, Faction, The True Greatness of Kingdoms and Estates, Judicature; matters of concern to all mankind, such as Truth, Beauty, Deformity, Youth and Age : these topics give a hint of the fields of thought entered in the fifty- eight essays of the final edition (published in 1625). The fact that they cover subjects so clearly universal in their appeal, that, in the author's words, they " come home to men's business and bosoms," explains their interest for readers of to-day as well as for those of the seventeenth century. 62 ENGLISH LITERATURE THE DRAMA The glory of the Elizabethan period, and therefore of all English literature, is the drama. Before treating the lead- ing writers of drama in this period we shall trace the devel- opment of this form of literature somewhat in detail. Origin of Drama in the Church. The drama in Eng- land began soon after the Norman Conquest, with a com- position called the Play of St. Katharine. The connection between religion and the drama suggested by this title is very vital. Whoever has attended high mass in a Roman Catholic church to-day must on reflection realize the dra- matic elements in the service. The procession of priests and acolytes, the bowing before the altar, the elevation of the host, the chanted responses, the changing of the priest's costume, all these involve action making a defi- nite appeal to the eye, which is the distinguishing element in all drama. At Christmas and Easter there are in many churches additions to the setting and the service, such as the placing of a babe in an improvised manger in the chancel, and the unveiling of crucifixes hidden from sight for three days. " Miracle " Plays. In the olden time such additions were many, and resulted (as the clergy hoped they would) in increased attendance on the church services. Similar ex- tended services were held on saints' days. Before long crowds became too large for the church buildings, and ser- vices were then held outside the church porch serving as stage. Once outside the building the productions, called now Miracle or Mystery Plays, were rapidly secularized, that is, elements were added by no means chiefly religious, and others than priests and altar-boys performed. FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 63 Drama in Secular Hands. The next step took the Mir- acle Plays out of the hands of the clergy. So popular had they become that even the largest churchyard could not ac- commodate the crowds ; and the productions were now taken A PAGEANT CAR PERFORMANCE AT COVENTRY. From an old print. over by the guilds, the trades unions of the Middle Ages. Each of these organizations had a patron saint, and was accustomed to celebrate that saint's day in some public fashion. They made use of a moving stage, or pageant car, 64 ENGLISH LITERATURE upon which the play was produced in different parts of a city. Under their control were developed "cycles" of plays of which four containing from twenty-five to fifty plays each are extant those of Chester, Coventry, York, and Towne- ley. A "cycle" of Miracle Plays was a series depicting selected scenes from Creation to the Day of Judgment. Non-Scriptural Incidents in Plays. When these dramatic compositions had reached their full development (fourteenth or fifteenth century), they contained many incidents not found in the scriptural narrative or in the accepted lives of the saints. In a play called Noah's Flood, for example, a comic incident is introduced when Noah's wife, refusing to believe in the coming deluge, objects to entering the ark without her "gossips," or boon companions. When efforts at persuasion fail, Noah vigorously applies the lash and drives his partner unwillingly aboard. In a Play of the Shepherds, before the announcement of Christ's birth, one shepherd misses a sheep; the rest immediately suspect one Mak (who apparently has been in such scrapes before), and follow him to his home. After searching high and low and finding no sheep, the visitors feel rather guilty ; and as they are about to depart they decide to make a peace-offering to Mak's baby in the cradle. Examination shows, however, that the supposed baby is nothing else than the missing sheep. The shepherds toss Mak in a blanket till they are exhausted ; they then lie down in the field and sleep till they are aroused by the " Gloria in excelsis " of the Christmas angels. The comic element was further brought out in the antics of Herod, who was allowed to get down from the pageant car and circulate among the crowd playing practical jokes. FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 65 Rise o| the " Morality " Play. When the Miracle Plays passed from the control of the church .to that of the guilds, the secularizing process already mentioned went further. The plays, instead of containing some incidents not taken from Scripture, became chiefly non-scriptural in character. From this condition it was but a short step to the Morality Play, in which the characters are personified abstractions, representing virtues and vices, and qualities of the human mind. In the Morality of Everyman, for example, some of the characters are Death, Fellowship, Knowledge, Good-Deeds, Discretion. In Hycke-scorner (i.e., rascal, scoffer) we find Imagination, Pity, and Perseverance. Popular characters usually found are Vice and the Devil, who took the place of Herod as chief comic figures. Their part in the plays is alluded to in Shakspere's Twelfth Night, where the clown sings : "I'll be with you again, In a trice, Like to the old Vice, Your need to sustain ; Who with dagger of lath, In his rage and his wrath, Cries, aha! to the devil." The " Interlude." - It seems that Miracle Plays and Moralities ran side by side until nearly the end of the six- teenth century. A third form of dramatic entertainment that some think grew out of the Moralities is called the Interlude, from having originally been performed between the courses at a feast or between the acts of a serious and longer play. Whatever its origin, its contribution to the development of drama is important. Roughly speaking, we may say that, as the Miracle Play furnished the plot-ancestry of the drama, the Morality the character-ancestry, so the Interlude furnished the dialogue- 66 ENGLISH LITERATURE ancestry. In general, the Interlude had little plot, little characterization; the writer's aim was to write as clever dialogue as he could to write talk purely for talk's sake. An outline of one of the best-known interludes, The Four P's, by John Heywood, the most famous name that has come down to us connected with this form, will demonstrate this fact. A Palmer, a Potycary (= apothecary), and a Pardoner, 1 meeting by chance, decide to contest for the distinction of being the biggest liar ; and a Pedlar who chances to come along is asked to act as judge. After Palmer and Pardoner have told elaborate stories to show their power of mendacity, the Potycary wins the prize with a narrative of about twenty lines, concluding : "Yet in all places where I have been, Of all the women that I have seen, I never saw nor knew, in my conscience, Any one woman out of patience." Earliest Real Dramas. The first productions that are properly called dramas date from about 1550 to 1570. The first in time was King John, a sort of chronicle history. The next, Ralph Roister Doister, usually named as the first English comedy, is built on the model of the Latin comedies of Plautus. Although this play is quite un-English and ar- tificial, with type characters and with situations almost transferred from the Latin, it was of much value as a speci- men of well-constructed plot. The first genuine tragedy, written some ten years after the history and comedy just mentioned, was Gorboduc, or 1 A Palmer was a man who had been on some religious pilgrimage, usually to the Holy Land. A Pardoner had a special license from the Pope to enter any parish without permission, to preach, and to dispose of pardons, usually for money. Most pardoners were scoundrels, not a few palmers were, and apothecaries were under suspicion much oftener in the sixteenth century than they are now. 67 Ferrex and Porrex, based on British legendary history and modeled on the plays of the greatest Latin tragic writer, Seneca. Following this model Shakspere's great tragedies would have been impossible; for as in the Senecan tragedies always, the action takes place off the scene and is reported by messengers. Gorboduc, however, like the Latin INTERIOR OF AN ELIZABETHAN THEATRE. As reconstructed by Godfrey. comedy, helped in fixing for later writers the idea of con- struction. The last of these four early dramas, Gammer Gurton's Needle (Gammer means " Grandmother ") is a comedy as well constructed as Ralph Roister Doistcr, and far superior to that in substance. The plot is absurd the hunt for a lost needle, discovered at last by one of the characters in 68 ENGLISH LITERATURE the seat of his trousers ; but the characters and setting are English, and the dialogue is a faithful reproduction of peasant life of the day. The First Theatres. The interludes, and the early plays just described, were not performed on the pageant wagons of the later miracle plays. Until 1576 they were given in inn-yards, on public lands in towns, or in any kind of build- ing that could be had. In the year named the first building designed solely for the acting of plays was erected in London, and was called merely " The Theatre." When Shakspere left London some thirty years later, there were probably ten or twelve theatres, in two of which the Globe and the Blackfriars the dramatist was a shareholder. Structure of the Elizabethan Theatre. Continued re- search has brought out much information regarding the structure of these buildings, and the manner of presentation of plays in them about 1590-1610. There was no roof ex- cept over the stage and the balconies. In the pit, where now are the most desirable seats in a theatre, there were no seats, and the spectator had to stand unless he carried 'a box or stool along with him. Here would be found the laborers and servants, who not infrequently engaged in fist fights over choice positions or purloined seats. Balconies and Stage. The better classes of society had seats in the balconies extending around three sides of the building, though some of the young " sports " were allowed, on paying an extra fee, to sit on the stage. Instead of being shut off from the auditorium by a curtain such as is used to-day, the stage extended out into the room. At the rear was a raised portion used as Juliet's balcony, as the walls of a city, or as a hill from which a distant view might be had. FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 69 Costumes and Scenery. The actors' costumes, though often elaborate, made no pretence of appropriateness. Very little scenery was used ; a bed, a throne, a desk, or a few trees in wooden tubs indicated the place of the action. The absence of realistic appeals to the eye resulted in a greater demand on the imagination. To this situation, perhaps, are due many of the superb descriptions in Elizabethan drama, such, for example, as that of Dover Cliff in King Lear, or Duncan's description of Macbeth's castle. Since there was no artificial lighting in the house, per- formances were given in the afternoon. A flag flying from the roof was the notice that a performance was to take place ; but one had to come near enough to read the sign on the building to know what play was to be performed. Women in the Theatre. Probably the fact most surprising to an investigator is that there were few women in an Eliza- bethan theatre. Respectable women in the audience wore masks ; and more remarkable still, there were no women on the stage. Women's parts were taken by boys until after the middle of the seventeenth century ; and strange as it may seem to think of a boy playing Lady Macbeth or Portia or Ophelia, these parts w r ere apparently played with real success. Chief Dramatists before Shakspere. Of the chief drama- tists belonging to the two decades preceding the beginning of Shakspere's work (about 1570-1590) very brief mention is sufficient. George Peele wrote Edward I, worthy of note in the development of the chronicle-history play; and David and Bethsabe, based on the Biblical story, and con- taining passages of admirable poetry. Robert Greene's Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay is a pure English comedy carry- ing forward the tradition of Gammer Gurton's Needle; and 70 ENGLISH LITERATURE his James IV contains a theme worked out delightfully several times by Shakspere a heroine leaving home in the disguise of a man to avoid some unwelcome situation. Thomas Kyd, in his Spanish Tragedy, produced a play which has striking points of resemblance to Hamlet, and which one can but think the greater dramatist studied when writing his play. John Lyly's comedies have been men- tioned as important forerunners of the best type of Shak- sperean comedy. CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE, 1564-1593 Life. The greatest name in drama before Shakspere is Christopher Marlowe, son of a shoemaker, born a few months before Shakspere in Canterbury, County of Kent. By the aid of influential friends he attended Corpus Christi Col- lege, Cambridge, from which he was graduated in 1583. Four years later, at the early age of twenty-three, his first play was produced in London. In the six years between this and his death, Marlowe wrote six more plays, a few notable lyrics, and the intense love-narrative in verse, Hero and Leander. Like many of his profession in his day, he led a wild life; and his death in 1593 resulted from a tavern brawl. Character of Marlowe's Plays. Four of Marlowe's plays are, by general consent, assigned an important place in English dramatic history Tamburlaine, Doctor Faustus, The Jew of Malta, and Edward II. A feature common to them all is the presentation of a particular ambition in exaggerated form. Tamburlaine aspires to be the world's master ; and in each of nine acts (the play is in two parts) he conquers an empire. The ambition of Faustus is for knowl- edge, in the pursuit of which he sells his soul to the devil. 71 Barabbas the Jew, prototype of Shylock, desires wealth and commits a series of crimes to attain his desire. In Ed- ward II the ambition which causes the tragedy is for affec- tion, presumably received by the King from an unscrupulous follower and rewarded by power wrongly used. The device of making the action turn on one large central character helped to a unity of interest which preceding dramas had lacked. The high-sounding rhetorical style of Mar- CORPTS CHRISTI COLLEGE. lowe's plays what Ben Jonson called his " mighty line " gave an effect of dignity and substance most desirable for the drama at this time. Contributions to English Drama. For these two fea- tures unity of interest and forceful style Marlowe, despite the structural defects and over-emphasis of his plays, holds a high place in the development of the drama. It is manifest that he exerted a good influence on Shakspere ; and a graceful though slight acknowledgment of indebted- 72 ENGLISH LITERATURE ness is found in a passage in As You Like It (3. 5. 82), where Phebe says : "Dead shepherd, now I find thy saw of might, 'Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?'" The " saw " (i.e., saying) which Phebe found " of might " (i.e., true) is taken from Marlowe's Hero and Leander. SHAKSPERE'S BIRTHPLACE. WILLIAM SHAKSPERE, 1564-1616 Concerning the life and works of the greatest figure of the greatest literary period in English literature thousands of books and essays have .been written. Theories almost without number have been advanced which have very slight claims to consideration. In the sketch here given effort is made to state as facts only what are known to be such, and to. refrain from even a mention of many possibilities often mentioned, but resting on very slight evidence. FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 73 Early Life in Stratford. Shakspere ' was baptized in the Church of the Holy Trinity at Stratford on April 26, 1564 ; and what we know of the practice of baptism at that period leads us to suppose that he was less than a week old. Noth- ing is known of his boyhood, not even that he went to school. Though there is no record of his marriage, there is document- ary evidence making it certain that in November, 1582, he was married to Anne Hathaway, of the village of Shottery AX.VE HATHAWAY'S COTTAGE AT SHOTTERY. A most picturesque little house a short distance from Stratford. near Stratford. A daughter was baptized in 1583, and twins, son and daughter, in 1585. In London ; and First Appearances in Print. When Shakspere went to London and why, and how he first occu- 1 How the dramatist preferred to spell his name is not known. His father's name appears in the Stratford records in sixteen different forms, and the six authentic signatures of his own seem to show three forms. The spelling here adopted is used by Professors Dowden, Wendell, and Kittredge, and by the New Shakspere Society of London. 74 ENGLISH LITERATURE pied himself after his arrival there, are not known. By 1592 he had become successful enough at play -writing to arouse the jealousy of one Robert Greene. In a pamphlet called A Groatsworth of Wit Greene alludes to Shakspere as " an upstart crow," who has beautified himself with the feathers of Greene and other successful dramatists. The following year appeared the poet's first published work, the narrative poem Venus and Adonix, INTERIOR OF ANNE HATHAWAY'S COTTAGE. with a dedication signed with the poet's name ; and in 1594 came Lucrece. The next bit of fact comes from the Stratford records, from which we learn that the poet's only son died in August, 1596. The year following Shakspere bought the largest house in Stratford; and from this time to his death he was conspicuous in the life of the town, not so much because of his artistic as because of his financial success. FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 75 Early Recognition. Perhaps the best evidence that his contemporaries recognized his greatness is found in a publi- cation of the year 1598, called Palladis Tamia, or " Wit's Treasury," by Frances Meres (Merz). From a long pas- sage in this book we learn that Shakspere was "accounted " the best among the English in both comedy and tragedy; and that the poems of the " mellifluous and honey- tongued " were thought of as keeping alive " the sweet witty soul of Ovid." Six comedies and six tragedies are named as Shak- spere's. Success. In addition to being preeminent as playwright Shakspere was regarded before 1600 as, if not the best actor in his company, yet the best-known ; for his name heads the list of the " Lord Chamberlain's Servants," the company to which he had for some time belonged. By 1600 he was also one of the principal owners of the Globe and Blackfriars theatres ; and there are other indisputable evidences of his material prosperity. Last Years in Stratford. The poet's father died in 1601 ; his mother in 1608. That the poet himself spent his last years in Stratford is known from various references to him in the town records ; but when or why he retired per- manently from his London occupations of actor, playwright, and manager, is not known. In these references the ap- pelation of " Gentleman " is usually added to his name, a result of the granting of a coat of arms to his father in 1599. Shakspere was buried April 25, 1616, and the inscription on the memorial states that he died April 23. There is no record of his death, and we do not certainly know when the memorial was erected or who was authority for the date on it. 76 ENGLISH LITERATURE Text of the Plays. Of the thirty-seven plays included in Shakspere's complete works, only sixteen were published during his lifetime. There is no evidence that he sanctioned the publication of any one of them. If he did not do so, it was because his plays were written to be acted by his own company, and could be performed exclusively by it only so long as the text could be kept from rival compa- nies. For the remain- ing plays we are dependent on what is called the " First Folio," a collec- tion of the plays published in 1623, seven years after Shakspere's death. There is no manu- script of any play extant. This combination of circumstances indicates why many passages in the plays are either not entirely clear or are even quite unintelligible : the most accurate text we have is in books rather carelessly printed, which the author had no opportunity to correct or revise. THE DROESHOUT PORTRAIT OF SHAKSPERE. From the First Folio. Uncertainties regarding Elizabethan Writers. In six of the thirty-seven plays bearing Shakspere's name it is very FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 77 generally believed that a second writer had a hand ; in four, that Shakspere had only a small share. Nearly every play contains a passage or passages which some critics believe should be assigned to some other author. Any one disturbed by these uncertainties and led to doubt Shakspere's accom- plishment will find with even a superficial glance at the his- HOLY TRINITY CHURCH, STRATFORD-ON-AVON. Shakspere is buried in the chancel. tory of Elizabethan drama that such uncertainties exist in con- nection with many writers. A very little time spent in inves- tigation of the lives and work of Thomas Middleton, Thomas Heywood, John Marston, and John Webster (to cite only a few) will show that we have more information about Shakspere than about these, all of them noted playwrights of the day. After many years of thorough exploration of every byway likely to lead to a better understanding of Shakspere's work, 78 ENGLISH LITERATURE we are now able to say, with a fair approach to certainty, in what order the plays were written. Differences of opinion exist, it is true, regarding the place of individual works ; but four fairly well- defined periods are uni- versally recognized. Early Plays. In the first period, extending to about 1595 and called by Dowden l " In the Workshop," were pro- duced probably four comedies, three histo- ries, and one or two tragedies, which are plainly experimental, imitative. For exam- ple, Love's Labour's Lost and Two Gentlemen of Verona show clearly the influence of Lyly, the most successful writer of romantic comedy (see page 50). Richard III and Richard II are modeled upon plays of Marlowe. Romeo and Juliet is certainly in- debted for its dramatic manner to an earlier play on the subject (not extant) ; CHANCEL OF HOLY TRINITY CHUBCH, STRATFORD. The tablet and bust on the wall are a me- morial to Shakspere and the large tablet in the floor shows where he is buried. 1 These figurative titles are given in Dowden's Shakspere Primer, now somewhat out of date, but still an admirable book for the be- FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 79 just as for its story it is indebted to an extant novel and poem. The Great Comedies and Histories. The second period, " In the World," extends roughly from 1596 to 1601, and includes the great comedies Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, As You Like It; and the great histories Henry IV, in two parts, and Henry V. During these years Shak- spere worked in the fields in which he had made most of his experiments, leaving tragedy for the next division of his work. The result was a series of most entertaining poetic comedies, with the first three of Shakspere's wonderful gal- lery of charming women Portia, Viola, Rosalind. The Tragedies. The period from 1601 to about 1608, Dowden's " Out of the Depths," is the period of the tragedies, of which the greatest are known to almost every schoolboy Julius Caesar, Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth. Only in these years is Shakspere consistently serious; and an effort is usually made to explain the tone of this period by supposed events of the poet's life. Whatever the cause, the plays of this period picture the world's sorrows, and the working of the human soul under the stress of them. The Romances. In the closing period, which Dowden calls " On the Heights," were written three plays to which the designation " dramatic romances " is generally applied Cymbeline, Winter's Tale, The Tempest. These plays show the author again experimenting not, as in his first period, to discover whether he could write as well as others, but to create new problems which only a master's hand could solve. ginner. A recent (1913) small volume embodying the conclusions of Shak- sperean scholarship to date, Neilson and Thorndike's The Facts about Shakespeare, is perhaps the best single book for students of all ranks. 80 ENGLISH LITERATURE Interesting from every viewpoint, from none are they more so than in their additions to Shakspere's collection of hero- ines Imogen, Perdita, Miranda. Shakspere's Merits of Minor Interest. Scattered through the plays, from " When daisies pied and violets blue " of Love's Labour's Lost to " Where the bee sucks, there suck I " of The Tempest, are found a number of songs which place Shakspere as high among lyric poets as among dramatic. His blank verse and his prose, aside from their perfect adap- tation to use in drama, are not surpassed in the English language. Although there are many improbabilities in the GOOD FREND FOR lESYS SAKE FORBEARE, TO D1CG TH.E DVST ENCLOASED rARE. v . BLEST BE I MAN $ SPARES' TIES STONES, AND CVRST BE HE, ^ MOVES MY BONES- INSCRIPTION ON SHAKSPEHE'S TOMB. plays, and some apparent inconsistencies, Shakspere shows a mastery in construction of his plots unequaled by con- temporaries or successors. His Great Achievements : (i) Range of his Characters. Not in any of these aspects, however, is to be found the reason for Shakspere's preeminence in our literature : it is in his portrayal of human nature. Over two hundred definite personalities figure in the plays ; and it is hardly too much to say that he has left untouched no type of character or sit- uation. From the foolish servant Launcelot Gobbo to the superlatively subtle villain lago; from the bold, impulsive Hotspur " He that kills me some six or seven dozen of Scots at a breakfast, washes his hands, and says to his wife : 81 ' Fie upon this quiet life ! I want work ' to the vacil- lating, meditative, self -analyzing Hamlet ; from the modest, true, gentle Cordelia to the assertive, unscrupulous Lady Macbeth : the range of human emotions shown is as broad as life itself. (2) Universality of his Characters. The characters are, moreover, as in life, seldom perfectly simple and readily understood ; there is a mixture of motives and not infre- quently a lack of sufficient motive, just as there is in the persons and actions we see every day. Was Lady Macbeth spurred on solely by love of her husband? or did she too have an ambition for distinction? Did Queen Gertrude know of the plot against the elder Hamlet's life? or was she merely an intellectually and morally weak woman who became easy prey to the murderer? Is Antony merely a self-seeking politician ? (note his " Mischief, thou art afoot, Take thou what course thou wilt ! ") or does his espousal of Caesar's cause against Brutus arise from devotion to the dead and real belief in his cause? Had lago's diabolical plot against Othello no other motive than desire to avenge a small personal injury? Parallels to such questions can and always will be found by every man in contemplating the conduct of people coming under his observation. To the universal truth to nature of Shakspere's portraits is due his continued wide appeal. As his friend Ben Jonson said : "He was not of an age, but for all time." Chief Dramatists after Shakspere. As the drama was tlu- form of literature most favored by the Elizabethan Age, most writers wrote plays. Of the host of playwrights who came into prominence about 1600-1625, few require ex- tended treatment. John Ford is remembered for his 82 ENGLISH LITERATURE strength in pathetic scenes, and one of his tragedies, The Broken Heart, is still readable. Thomas Dekker wrote one realistic comedy, The Shoemakers' Holiday, which is still effec- tive on the stage. George Chapman, memorable as translator of Homer, wrote several rather bombastic dramas based on contemporary French history, of which Bussy d'Ambois is the best. John Webster excelled in portraying the terrible, and his Duchess of Malfi, though melodramatic, is a powerful play. More important than any of these are Francis Beaumont (1584-1616) and John Fletcher (1579-1625), each of whom wrote plays, but who are best known for plays they wrote in collaboration. Nearly all of the joint plays were written before Shakspere's retirement from London; but they be- long chiefly to the years following Shakspere's greatest period, that is, after the drama had passed its zenith. Of the fifty-two plays attributed to Beaumont and Fletcher the best are The Maid's Tragedy, Philaster, and A King and No King. Virtually none are acceptable to the modern stage or to modern readers because of their low moral tone and the authors' too frequent use of "common-place ex- travagances and theatrical tricks " (Hazlitt). BEN JONSON, 15737-1637 The greatest of all Shakspere's successors in the drama was Ben Jonson, already named as Shakspere's friend. He it was who said that the author of Julitis Caesar and Troiltis and Cressida had " small Latin and less Greek ; " and the phrase has by many been taken to mean that Shakspere was uneducated. That the words should not be so in- terpreted becomes clear when we learn that the expression is found in a poem by Ben Jonson ; for Ben Jonson was the most scholarly poet and dramatist of the age, and the advo- cate of the classic drama as model for the English. FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 83 Life. Ben Jonson was born in London about 1573. Of his early life we know merely that he was sent to Westminster School, and that he served a short time abroad in the British army. Though he seems not to have at- tended any university he received honorary degrees from both Ox- ford and Cambridge. By 1598 he was suffi- ciently well known to be named by Meres (see page 75) among the foremost writers of tragedy. He was a favorite with James I, who named him the first Poet' Laureate in 1616. Jonson was afflicted with disease all his life, and aggravated his trouble by high living. Though he re- ceived great sums from the King, he was prodigal with them, frequently got into debt, and died in poverty in 1637. He was buried in Westminster Abbey. His Dramas. Jonson's dramatic work stands out in strong contrast to Shakspere's. In two Roman tragedies, Sejanus and Catiline, his learning shows in the extreme ac- curacy with which he portrays the life of ancient Rome; but not a character in either play has the reality of five O RARE BEN JONSON." 84 ENGLISH LITERATURE or six in Julius Caesar, a very unscholarly play. His comedies show the same essential characteristics. The Alchemist, for example (the plot of which Coleridge called one of the three best in all literature), shows a minute knowl- edge of the processes and terminology of the so-called science which aimed to transmute base metals into gold ; but it suffers for lack of real people. Jonson's ideal comedy could scarcely show characters, as we use that word in dealing with Shakspere. He wrote ,^/ FACSIMILE OF JONSON'S AUTOGRAPH. (British Museum.) what has been called " humour " comedy, in which each person is known by a peculiarity, whim, idiosyncrasy. Each of his three best comedies, indeed, is given to setting forth the whim or " humour " of one person : Volpone, or The Fox, avarice ; The Alchemist, hypocrisy ; Epicoene, or The Silent Woman, hatred of noise. The method was well adapted to what he aimed at stripping " the ragged follies of the day ; " but apparently so many of these required his attention that his efforts at reform were unproductive. His Masks. - A form of dramatic composition in which Jonson particularly excelled is the mask. In this kind of FROM ELIZABETH TO CLOSING OF THEATRES 85 drama, usually given in noblemen's homes, music and dancing were prominent, and much care and expense were devoted to costumes and scenery. Both professional and amateur actors took part in them ; and the author, who was generally also the director of the performance, received large financial returns. Jonson was by far the most successful writer of masks in the day of their greatest popularity ; and the only really great specimen of the form written after him is Milton's Comus. Minor Works. Besides his dramatic work, Jonson wrote a discursive prose work called Timber, or Discoveries Made upon Men and Matter. Doubtless the passage in this work most interesting to modern readers is the criticism of Shak- spere, concluding : " I loved the man and honor his memory, on this side idolatry, as much as any." Another field in which Jonson wrote much, and some of considerable merit, is lyric poetry. His best-known song is that beginning: "Drink to me only with thine eyes," to the popularity of which the fine old musical setting has certainly contributed. The King James Bible. With all their claims to dis- tinction, the writings of Spenser, Bacon, even Shakspere, are of less importance than the translation of the Bible made under King James and first published in 1611. Vari- ous editions had appeared in the half-century after Tyn- dale's, and all met with a considerable measure of success. The superiority of the King James, or " Authorized " Ver- sion, to its predecessors, however, soon became apparent; and the superiority of its style is still unquestioned. Its in- fluence on the English language is incalculable : its influence on the styles of our greatest prose writers is hardly less. CHAPTER V FROM THE CLOSING OF THE THEATRES TO THE RESTORATION OF CHARLES II (1642-1660) Rise of the Puritans. The period upon which we are about to enter is usually called the " Puritan Age," because the literature and the social, civil, and political life of the time were dominated by the ideals of the Puritans. The name Puritan was applied in derision first about the middle of the sixteenth century to a party within the Church of England who sought to " purify " it of its unscriptural forms and ceremonies. As they grew in numbers and influence, they became more and more intolerant of the so-called popish abuses, and finally seceded from the Church of England and formed an independent sect. Independence in religious belief was soon accompanied by independence in political belief. Opposition to the Stuart doctrine of " divine right of kings," and to the autocratic carrying out of the doctrine by Charles I, turned their ac- tivity toward purification of the government. In addition to reform of State and Church they attempted the reforma- tion of mankind, by setting before each individual a picture of that other world to come for which (in their belief) this world was merely a preparation. The Puritans and Literature. This otherworldliness could have no good effect on literature. One of the prin- 86 PURITAN AND CAVALIER 87 cipal objects of literature always has been to give pleasure ; and if the chief business of men is to prepare for a life after death, there is little reason for seeking to give or gain pleas- ure in this life before death. The Bible, the hymn-book, and the two-hour sermon were all the Puritan needed for in- tellectual food. These have value, though that of the seventeenth-cen- tury sermon is not quite clear to the twentieth- century reader, and there are comparatively few hymns that com- bine the poetical and the pious. Cardinal Newman's Lead, Kind- ly Light, for example, belongs to quite an- other school of thought : it is a great poem as well as a popular hymn. The greatest litera- ture of the Elizabethan Age the drama, since CROMWELL. After the portrait by Sir Peter Lely. its only aim was pleasure, very naturally met with Puritan disfavor, which brought about the closing of the theatres. Milton, indeed, who is undoubtedly the greatest writer produced by the Puritans, was by no means typical of the party. The poem of his old age, written to " justify the ways of God to man," doubtless satisfied Puritan desires ; but the same cannot be said of that poem of his young manhood in which he summoned Mirth and her crew to keep him company : 88 ENGLISH LITERATURE "Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee Jest and youthful Jollity, Quips and Cranks and wanton Wiles, Nods and Becks and wreathed Smiles." Nor is it likely that they would have agreed with Milton's estimate of Shakspere "That kings for such a tomb would wish to die." The Royalists and Literature. It should be noted also that, while the period was dominated by Puritan ideals, by ^r~^ no means all the literature from Elizabeth's time to the Restoration was of a Puritan cast. The cause of the Stuarts never lacked followers and sym- pathizers; and among these were not a few who regarded literature as a fine art, and devoted themselves to writing with aims quite opposed to those of the ruling party. In Masterman's Age of Mil- ton, a small handbook, are treated seven royalist theolo- After one of Van Dyck's numer- gi a ns who used their pens to ous portraits. , j-/> better purpose than edifica- tion of the elect by long-winded sermons. Besides these there were the philosophers, whose investigations almost invariably put them into an attitude never characterized by the Puritans as less than sceptical. More important than either of these classes are the lyrists, nearly all of whom threw in their lot with the royalist or " cavalier " cause, and the greatest of whom Carew, Lovelace, Suck- CHARLES I. PURITAN AND CAVALIER 89 ling, and Herrick are commonly referred to as the Cavalier poets. Instead of the designation " Puritan Age," or the " Age of Milton," then, it is more accurate to call this the " Age of Cavalier and Puritan," to indicate that the literature of the time is the product of two opposed theories of government and attitudes toward life. The lover of literature would not wish to dispense with either portion. Overlapping of Periods. Not all the writers and works treated in this chapter come within the dates given on the first page. Milton's minor poems (except some of his son- nets) were written before 1642, as were many of the songs of Herrick and Lovelace; Suckling died in 1642, Carew in 1638. Milton was born eight years before the death of Shakspere, Herrick about the time when Shakspere was beginning to write ; and both Herrick and Milton lived fourteen years after the Restoration. Sir Thomas Browne, the antiquarian doctor who requires a place here, was born three years before Milton, and outlived the poet eight years. It is, nevertheless, proper to separate the writers of the present chapter from the Elizabethan period on one side and the Restoration on the other. Few of them possessed the dramatic gift, none were so intent on the new and untried, none so much the captive of an unfettered imagination, as were the Elizabethans. Yet imagination in no -small degree is evident in these poets, delicacy of feeling and expression is found not universally but in a large number of poems, and the prose is marked by dignity and formality qualities at variance with much the larger part of Restoration lit- erature. 90 ENGLISH LITERATURE THE CAVALIER POETS We have remarked above that many of the lyric poets of the early seventeenth century adhered to the Cavalier cause, and were therefore called " Cavalier " poets. They are also referred to as " Caroline " poets, from their close association with the court of Charles I. (" Caroline " is from Carolus, RECEPTION HALL IN A TYPICAL CAVALIER MANSION. Home of Sir Edward Giles, Herrick's most distinguished parishioner. Latin for Charles.) The four named as greatest we are now to study somewhat at length: Thomas Carew (1598?- 1638?), Sir John Suckling (1609-1642), Richard Lovelace (1618-1658), and Robert Herrick (1591-1674). Common Characteristics. While their writings show many individual traits, and while they are of by no means equal rank, they show characteristics enough in common to PURITAN AND CAVALIER 91 justify our considering them briefly together. All four were born in the vicinity of the " City; " all except Herrick be- longed to prominent families ; all came in early manhood to enjoy the favor of Charles; all were university men; all except Herrick seem to have indulged in the evil life of the Court circle ; and only Herrick lived past the age of forty. Writers of "Society Verse." -The best poems of all (except Herrick's religious verse, which need not concern us here) belong to a type known as " society verse." It is ad- mirably characterized by Professor Schelling : " This variety of the lyric recognizes in the highly complex conditions of modern society fitting themes for poetry, and makes out of the conventions of social life a subject for art. ... It makes demand not only on the poet's breeding and intimate acquaintance with the usages and varieties of conduct and carriage which distinguish his time ; it demands also control, ease, elegance of manner, delicacy of touch, . . . perfection of technique and finish." 1 Faults of this Kind of Poetry. It will readily be seen that the satisfying of these demands requires no little skill ; and it will not surprise one to discover that few successful writers of " society verse " avoid altogether certain faults belong- ing to the type. It is charged with a lack of seriousness, and we declare it guilty on finding many poems of the tone of this from Suckling : "Out upon it, I have loved Three whole days together And am like to love three more, If it prove fair weather." The charge of trivial subjects seems to be sustained by numerous titles such as To My Inconstant Mistress (Carew), 1 The English Lyric, pages 91-92. 92 ENGLISH LITERATURE Upon Julia's Hair Fill'd with Dew (Herrick), Ellinda's Glove (Lovelace). The fault of too many " conceits " (i.e., thoughts " far-fetched and ingenious rather than natural and obvious ") is frequent, and not seldom ridiculous. Suck- ling writes : "Her feet beneath her petticoat Like little mice stole in and out." Herrick matches this with : "Her pretty feet Like snails did creep A little out, and then, As if they started at bo-peep, Did soon draw in again." Ellinda's glove is thus addressed by the poet : "Thou snowy farm with thy five tenements!" And Carew surpasses them all : "No more the frost Candies the grass, or casts an icy cream Upon the silver lake or crystal stream." Lovelace. Of the merits of this school of poetry the words " ease," " elegance," " delicacy," and " finish " in Professor Schelling's definition are the best indication. Of the four Lovelace is perhaps the least a poet ; yet two of his poems To Lucasta, On Going to the Wars, and To Althea, from Prison would certainly be selected for any English anthology. The first contains two lines familiar to all : "I could not love thee, dear, so much, Loved I not honour more ; " and the whole poem is equally worthy of remembrance. In the second are found also two lines that have met universal and deserved favor: PURITAN AND CAVALIER 93 "Stone walls do not a prison make, Nor iron bars a cage." Suckling. Carew and Suckling were closely associated in life, and more continuously in the Court circle than the rest of the group. Though Suckling was far inferior to his friend in accomplishment, his genius shows, according to Edmund Gosse, in his great influence on succeeding seven- teenth-century writers of love songs. Very few of his poems show the best of which he was capable he reproved Carew for spending too much time in polishing. Constancy, from which a stanza has been quoted (page 91), and the facetious Why so pale and wan, fond lover? are fair represen- tatives of Suckling's skill. Carew. Carew's work is often marred by overemphasis of the sensual, which it should be remembered, however, was no offence in the eyes of his contemporaries. It is said on a fair basis of probability that in his last years Carew reformed, and sincerely repented the wildness of his life and early verse. Disregarding those he condemned we find many poems of Carew that are delightful reading, such as Disdain Returned, beginning : "He that loves a rosy cheek," and "Would you know what's sort? " and In Praise of his Mistress, which might almost be set up as a model of what a love-tribute in verse should be. ROBERT HERRICK, 1591-1674 Robert Herrick was so greatly the superior of his fellows that no apology is needed for giving him fuller treatment. In our introductory paragraph we noted that he was dif- 94 ENGLISH LITERATURE ferent from them in the circumstance of birth, and in his relation to the life of the Court circle. He was also the only one of the group to complete his university course; and his life-work, the ministry, was far removed from theirs of soldier, courtier, diplomat, "fine gentleman." Life. Herrick was the son of a London goldsmith, and was born in London in 1591. Upon the death of his father ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. Attended by Herrick, also by Wyatt, Ascham, Jonson, and Wordsworth. in the following year, his mother removed to the village of Hampton, about twelve miles away, where she and her son remained until his sixteenth year. Apprenticed then to his uncle, he spent six years at the goldsmith's trade in the City, during which time he met Ben Jonson and wrote some poems. In 1613, at the very late age (for those days com- pare Bacon, page 57) of twenty-two, Herrick entered the university at Cambridge, from which he received the Mas- ter's degree four years later. Of his life for the succeeding ten years little is known ; but in 1627 he entered the minis- PURITAN AND CAVALIER 95 try, and in 1629 was made by Charles I rector of the church at Dean Prior, a village in Devonshire. It was an easy, comfortable position for a man of letters ; and for eighteen years (i.e., until removed by Cromwell's government), in addition to performing satisfactorily his clerical duties, he gave much time to " wooing the muse." When turned out of his pulpit, he had composed over 1200 poems, which DEAN PRIOR CHURCH. were published shortly after in London with the title Hes- perides. No important incident of his subsequent life is recorded. Soon after the Restoration he was reap- pointed to his position at Dean Prior, and lived there till 1674. Range of His Poetry. One respect in which Herrick's work surpasses that of the other Cavaliers is range of subjects, a range claimed by the author in the opening poem of the Hesperides: 96 ENGLISH LITERATURE "I sing of brooks, of blossoms, birds and bowers; Of April, May, of June, and July flowers. I sing of May-poles, hock-carts, 1 wassails, wakes ; Of bride-grooms, brides, and of their bridal-cakes, I write of youth, of love, .... I sing of dews, of rains, I write of groves, of twilights, and I sing The court of Mab, and of the Fairy-king. I write of hell ; I sing, and ever shall Of heaven, and hope to have it after all." This poem suggests that he drew on every portion of his experience for subjects : and it is clear that his experience was far broader than that of his companions in " society verse." His long residence in Devonshire is responsible for his verses dealing with the various aspects of nature, and his vocation naturally led to meditation on the future life. That he aimed as did hardly another (unless Carew) at " perfection of technique and finish " is shown by His Re- quest to Julia: "Julia, if I chance to die Ere I print my poetry, I most humbly thee desire To commit it to the fire : Better 'twere my book were dead, Than to live not perfected." Pastoral Poems. Judged by an absolute standard, if such a thing be possible, Herrick is probably more the artist in his poems to Julia, Silvia, Sapho, in How Roses Came Red, To the Virgins to Make Much of Time, and other 1 The hock-cart (for "hockey-cart") was the last cart loaded at harvest. PURITAN AND CAVALIER 97 little masterpieces in the field of " society verse." The most competent critics agree, however, that his country poems, his " English pastorals," are altogether admirable. Corinna's Going a-Maying is a charming picture of one phase of life in a Devonshire village, idealized, it is true, but none the less charming for that reason. The song, To Phillis, beginning "Live, live with me, and thou shall see The pleasures I'll prepare for thee," does not suffer by comparison with Marlowe's "Come, live with me, and be my love," and is not without merit when set over against L' Allegro. Herrick's Limitations. With all his merits Herrick can not be called a poet of the first rank. We demand of our great poets something more than good taste, elegance, ease, finish : we demand something vital in the content of their work, something that touches deep chords in human ex- perience, something that points the way to better things. This no one will find in Herrick. Not only are his poems of the earth earthy : they are of the earth of Charles the First's England, an unusually earthy time. He was in entire harmony with his sur- roundings, and these neither gave rise to nor desired HEST THE WORKS BOTH HUMANE & DIVINE O F Ro BERT HERRICK Ejt. Ov i D. ai'idis Carmint ncjfr* Sows. FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF Hesperides. 9S ENGLISH LITERATURE literature which should uplift or inspire. The utter world- liness of this literature, reflecting the time, gives us a clew to the progress of the Puritan movement and to the final (though temporary) triumph of the " otherworldliness " to which reference has been made. The chief representative of the triumphant spirit was JOHN MILTON, 160S-1674 The opinion has been expressed above that Milton was not typical of Puritanism, and that certain sentiments in his early poems can hardly have met with Puritan ap- proval. His whole-souled devotion to literature as an art, except during the time of his government service, is another characteristic that shows lack of sympathy with his sect. His attitude to- ward life and toward his work is remote, indeed, from that of the Cavalier poets; but it is almost equally remote from any- thing expressed in literature by members of the oppo- site party. The mirth of L' Allegro is not of close kin to that of Charles the First's poets ; and the melancholy of II Penseroso has equally slight resemblance to that of the followers of Cromwell. The former is always under the control of a cultured mind ; the latter shows no trace of the long face or the whine of the Protector's psalm-singing " Ironsides." MILTON. PURITAN AND CAVALIER 99 Periods of Milton's Life. Milton's life and writings fall into three clearly defined periods : first, his education and foreign travel, and his minor poems; second, his secretary- ship for foreign tongues under Cromwell, and his prose works; third, his retirement from public view, and his major poems. MILTON-'S MULBERRY. In Christ's College Gardens said to have been planted by Milton in 1632. Early Life and Education. The poet was born in London, December 9, 1608, in a house which came to be a literary shrine, but which was destroyed in the great fire of 1666. His father was a scrivener, an occupation combining duties of a lawyer and broker. Of his mother virtually nothing is known. After a careful preliminary training under tutors and at St. Paul's School, London, Milton entered Christ's College, Cambridge, at the age of seventeen. There he re- mained seven years, receiving the degrees of A.B. and A.M. 100 ENGLISH LITERATURE Partly from his delicate beauty, partly from the correctness of his life, probably not at all from any effeminacy or exces- sive display of religion, he was nicknamed at the University " The Lady of Christ's." He himself expresses satisfaction at the " more than ordinary respect " shown him in his College. Retirement at Horton ; and Foreign Travel. Though from an early age Milton had been designed for the ministry, >he was not disposed, on graduation, to enter that calling. He was, in fact, not disposed to take up any remunerative occupation ; and with his father's full consent, he spent the succeeding five years in self-directed study at Horton, a country place some twenty miles from London, where his father had settled on retiring from business. A desire to complete his education in accepted fashion led him to make a tour on the Continent. With excellent in- troductions to literary and learned circles, he left England in April, 1638, and spent sixteen months abroad, visiting Paris, Genoa, Florence, Rome, Naples, and meeting Grotius, the famous Swedish diplomat, and Galileo. Milton's original itinerary included Sicily and Greece ; but at Naples, he re- ceived news of impending civil war in England, and turned back. " For I considered it base," said he, " that, while my countrymen were fighting at home for liberty, I should be travelling abroad at ease for intellectual culture." Poems of the First Period. With his landing in England in August, 1639, the first period of Milton's life ends. His writings during this time include some poems in Latin and Italian, paraphrases of two of the Psalms, two sonnets, and seventeen other English poems. Of these the most worthy of notice are L' Allegro and 77 Penseroso, the companion pieces on mirth and melancholy already mentioned ; On the Morn- PURITAN AND CAVALIER 101 ing of Christ's Nativity; the mask of Comus; and the pastoral, memorial poem Lycidas. The Nativity ode was composed while he was still at the University ; Comus and Lycidas belong to the Horton years ; and all the available evidence justifies us in assigning L' Allegro and 77 Penseroso also to Horton. " Comus." Comus is considered by Masson l the most important of Milton's minor poems. It is, as has been said, 2 the only great mask written after the time of Ben Jonson. A mask usually inculcated a moral ; and Milton's moral is quite suited to the Puritan. Comus, the god of sensual pleasure, after being withstood for a time by youth- ful innocence, is finally routed by an Attendant Spirit sent from heaven. The closing lines of the poem express the moral in a speech by the Spirit : "Mortals, that would follow me, Love Virtue ; she alone is free. She can teach ye how to climb Higher than the sphery chime ; Or, if Virtue feeble were, Heaven itself would stoop to her." " Lycidas." Lycidas was written for a collection of poems in memory of Edward King, a college friend of Milton, who was drowned in the Irish Sea. The name Lycidas is common in classic and pastoral poetry, and was used by Milton because King was ambitious "To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd's trade," that is, to write poetry. It is full of classical allusions and imagery, but is amply worth any effort necessary to under- 1 David Masson is the authority on Milton's life, and wrote an ex- haustive biography in six volumes. He also edited Milton's poetical works in three volumes, with extensive introductions and notes. 2 See page 85. 102 ENGLISH LITERATURE stand it. Perhaps the finest and certainly the most memo- rable passages in Lycidas are those dealing with the low state l6o$ <& a. *f MILTON'S BIBLE. The first six entries are believed to be in his handwriting. (British Museum.) of contemporary poetry (lines 64-83) and the corruption in the clergy (lines 108-131). Although, as has been often PURITAN AND CAVALIER 103 said, these passages are in a sense digressions, they are justified by the facts that King wrote poetry and that he was destined for the ministry. " L'Allegro " and " II Penseroso." U Allegro and II Penseroso are constructed on exactly the same plan, be- ginning with the exorcism (in ten lines) of the opposing spirit in L' Allegro, "Hence, loathed Melancholy, Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born ; " in II Penseroso, "Hence, vain, deluding Joys, The brood of Folly without father bred!" Then follows the invitation to the congenial spirit in L' Allegro, "But come, thou Goddess fair and free In heaven yclept Euphrosyne, And by men heart-easing Mirth ; " in II Penseroso, "But, hail ! thou Goddess sage and holy ! Hail, divinest Melancholy!" A list of characters (mostly personified figures) desired for company is given ; and the remainder of each poem out- lines an ideal day. The day of L'Allegro, that is, of the mirthful or cheerful man, begins with the lark's song before dawn, proceeds through a series of rural occupations till bed- time, and then removes to "towered cities," where after attending " high triumphs " (elaborate entertainments) for a time: 104 ENGLISH LITERATURE "Then to the well- trod stage anon, If Jonson's learned sock 1 be on, Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child, Warble his native wood-notes wild." The day of 77 Penseroso, that is, of the thoughtful or con- templative 2 man, begins at evening, with the nightingale's song, spends the night in study or quiet recreations ; and WINDSOR CASTLE. The " towers and battlements " of L' Allegro. when the sun comes up, seeks protection from its beams in groves or the " studious cloister's pale." Milton's Prose Period. We resume now the account of Milton's life, which we interrupted at the time of his return from the Continent in 1639. The storm of the Civil War did not burst immediately, and Milton set up as schoolmaster 1 The socfc stands for comedy. * These adjectives express better the idea of Milton than does "mel- ancholy." PURITAN AND CAVALIER 105 primarily to teach two nephews, but taking other pupils in addition. Partly as a result of this experience, he wrote a treatise on education, the first of the works written with his " left hand " (as he himself described his prose works). Other prose works belonging to this period, of which we need not give even the titles, were attacks on the church as it had come to be conducted under Charles's unprincipled assistant, Archbishop Laud ; and a series of papers defend- ing divorce. Papers on Divorce. The occasion of these last was his marriage to Mary Powell, a girl about hah* his age; and her virtual desertion of him in two months. She went os- tensibly for a short visit to her parents ; and when she did not return at the appointed time, or yet after several requests by her husband, he wrote his first divorce paper, in which he showed no personal interest. In three following papers, however, he made a vigorous argument for divorce ; and in the last intimated that, if his wife did not return, he might marry again, with the sanction of the law or without. Not many months afterward Mary Powell Milton again took up her residence with the poet, after an absence of two years. She lived until 1653, and was survived by three daughters. "Areopagitica." -Milton's one essay in prose which is still of interest to the general reader is Areopagitica, a plea for the liberty of the press ; that is, for the liberty of pub- lishing books without authority of the censor. When Mil- ton said that in writing prose he had the use of only his left hand, he meant that prose was not his proper vehicle of expression; and this fact is apparent even in Areopagitica, great as are its merits. Sentences of more than a hundred words are frequent ; and he uses an involved sentence struc- 106 ENGLISH LITERATURE ture that sounds like literal translation from Latin. When we think, however, of what the world would be to-day without freedom of the press, we realize the interest an eloquent plea for that freedom is likely to have for us. This of Milton's has, moreover, many passages so forceful and every way admirable that they have passed into common speech : " Opinion in good men is but knowledge in the making." "As good almost kill a man as kill a good book: who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God's image ; but he who de- stroys a good book, kills reason itself, kills the image of God, as it were in the eye." " Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely, above all other liberties." Papers on the Execution of Charles. The remainder of Milton's prose is occupied with a defence of the Puritans for their execution of Charles. The papers are all contro- versial, and are marred by undignified and harsh language that one would wish to think not natural to the writer. In 1656 Milton married Catherine Woodcock, with whom (if we may judge from his twenty-third sonnet) he lived not unhappily until her death, fifteen months afterward. Since 1652 he had been totally blind, a result, doubtless, of ex- cessive use of his eyes. On the subject of his blindness he wrote one of his greatest sonnets, closing with the memorable line, "They also serve who only stand and wait." Milton's Sonnets. A word should be said regarding Milton's contribution to the development of the English sonnet. In the words of Mark Pattison : " Milton emanci- pated the sonnet as to subject-matter." The Elizabethan sonnet, we have seen, was usually concerned with love; and Shakspere, Sidney, Spenser, and the rest wrote sonnet PURITAN AND CAVALIER 107 sequences in praise of their beloveds. Not a single one of Milton's twenty-three sonnets deals with love. Besides On His Blindness, some other titles are : When the Assault was Intended to the City, On the Lord General Fairfax, To the Lord General Cromwell, On the Late Massacre in Piedmont. After him the sonnet fell into disuse for a century and a LIBRARY OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. Depository of Milton manuscripts. quarter; and it is open to question whether Wordsworth, innovator that he was, would have been impelled to so fre- quent use of the form had not Milton pointed the way to its use in other service than that of love. Life after the Restoration. While much is to be said of Milton's writings after the Restoration, little need be said of his life. When the change in government came, he, like all others who had been prominent in the Commonwealth, was 108 ENGLISH LITERATURE in grave danger. For a short time he was imprisoned, and for some time after release it was necessary for him to re- main in hiding. In 1667 Paradise Lost was published ; in 1671, Paradise Regained, and the dramatic poem Samson Agonistes. He died in 1674, so peacefully that those in the room were not aware when he ac- tually breathed his last. " Paradise Lost " : (i) Its Influence. - The influence of Para- dise Lost upon the thought of English- speaking people has been perhaps greater than that of any other poem, the most impor- tant phase of the in- fluence being the doctrine of creation. Huxley, in the first of his lectures on evolution, delivered in America in 1876, attacked what he called the "Miltonic hypothesis " of crea- tion. He asserted that, although he did not know the mean- ing of the first chapter of Genesis, and although Hebrew scholars were not agreed as to its meaning, Milton's inter- pretation in the seventh book of Paradise Lost is quite clear, and is also clearly the interpretation " instilled into every one of us in our childhood." Wherever the truth may lie, it is surely a great accomplishment to have formulated a great doctrine for so large a portion of mankind. (2) Its Planning and Maturing. The actual composition of Paradise Lost appears to have occupied Milton for eight MEMORIAL TO MILTOX. In the Church at St. Giles. PURITAN AND CAVALIER 109 years, beginning in 1657 and ending in 1665, two years be- fore it was published. The intention to write a long poem had been in his mind for at least twenty years. When he re- turned from his foreign tour, he indicated a plan for an epic of King Arthur, although he was considering about a hundred other subjects at the same time some from the Bible, some from British his- tory, and a few from Scottish. (The list in his own handwriting is preserved in Trinity College Library, Cam- bridge.) While he was weigh- ing these subjects, he expressed in a pamphlet the hope that he " might perhaps leave some- thing so written to aftertimes as they should not willingly let it die." How soon he determined on subject and form we cannot say. His nephew says that the speech of Satan in Book IV, beginning : "O, thou that with surpassing glory crowned," was recited to him by the poet as the beginning of his poem ; and it is thought by some that these lines date from 1640- FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF Paradise Lost. Under the portrait of this edition (Ton- son's, 1688) are Dryden's famous lines, beginning, "Three poets in three distant ages born." 110 ENGLISH LITERATURE 1642. Through long years full of hindrances and uncongenial employment under the Commonwealth he cherished the de- sign for a great literary work which later times would value. (3) Theme of the Poem. The theme of Paradise Lost has been stated above (page 87). The invocation to the Spirit at the beginning of the poem concludes : . . . "what in me is dark Illumine, what is low, raise and support : That to the highth of this great argument, I may assert Eternal Providence, And justify the ways of God to man." (4) Outline. The action (but not the poem) begins in Heaven before the creation of the world, the fall of Lucifer, or the begetting of the Son. In Book V we learn that Raphael has been sent to warn Adam of his enemy's approach ; and from the narrative of Raphael to Adam we learn how the jealousy of Lucifer and his rebellion occurred. In Book VI we are told how the forces of Lucifer (now called Satan), after two days of drawn battles with God's legions are routed the third day by the Messiah, and sent down to Hell. In Book IX comes the temptation and fall of Adam and Eve; and at the close of the last Book (XII) they are led out of Eden by the Archangel Michael, with the fiery sword of God behind them: "They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld Of Paradise, so late their happy seat, Waved over by that flaming brand ; the gate With dreadful faces thronged and fiery arms. Some natural tears they dropped, but wiped them soon ; The world was all before them, where to choose Their place of rest, and Providence their guide. They, hand in hand, with wandering steps and slow, Through Eden took their solitary wajf." PURITAN AND CAVALIER 111 (5) The Sublimity of the Poem. A stupendous task, truly, the poet set himself; and the nature of his subject was such that, if he attained a measure of suceess in handling it, the epithet " sublime " would properly attach to it ; and the " sublimity " of Paradise Lost has been repeatedly dwelt upon. Of no other work of literature is the word more fittingly used. The speeches of Satan deserve it no less than those of Uriel and Raphael ; as, for example, that in Book II (lines 119-225) containing among many memorable passages this: "And that must end us ; that must be our cure To be no more. Sad cure ! for who would lose, Though full of pain, this intellectual being, Those thoughts that wander through eternity, To perish rather, swallowed up and lost In the wide womb of -uncreated Night Devoid of sense and motion?" The many " muster-rolls of names," as Macaulay calls them, almost equally deserve the epithet (cf. I, 392 ff., be- ginning, " First, Moloch, horrid king "). The elaborate similes, so numerous in the poem, are like- wise worthy to be called sublime ; such as the famous one in Book IX (lines 445 ff.), beginning "As one who, long in populous city pent." The faults of Paradise Lost it is not worth while to men- tion here : compared with its merits, they sink almost into insignificance. When everything possible by way of criti- cism has been said, it is still universally admitted that the poem has " a sustained magnificence of poetic conception, and of poetic treatment in the solemn and serious way " possessed by no other English poem and by not more than two or three of the world's poems. 112 ENGLISH LITERATURE "Paradise Regained." - Tradition, powerfully aided by Macaulay, says that Milton preferred Paradise Regained, sequel of Paradise Lost, to its predecessor. The idea seems to be traceable to a statement of one of the poet's nephews, who merely said that Milton " could not hear with patience " the second epic criticised as inferior to the first. Both critical MILTON DICTATING PARADISE LOST. From the painting by Munkacsy. and uncritical opinion in general believes that Paradise Re- gained is inferior, though enthusiasts (Masson and Saints- bury, for example) assert that the difference between them is rather of kind than of degree of merit. "Samson Agonistes." -Milton's last work was Samson Agonistes, a tragedy in verse built on the classic model in- stead of on the English, and not intended to be staged. It derives some interest from the parallelism of Samson's story PURITAN AND CAVALIER 113 (see the sixteenth chapter of Judges) with Milton's own. The poem has unquestionably noble passages; but dramatic blank verse should be of a different kind from epic, and it cannot be said without qualification that Samson is a great English poem. Some have thought that in one speech of Samson's (lines 594-596) the writer voices his own con- sciousness of something very like failure : "So much I feel my genial spirits droop, My hopes all flat : Nature within me seems In all her functions weary of herself." A Soul Dwelling Apart. Xoble and glorious as is Mil- ton's career in many aspects, in none is it more so than in that which considers the work of his last years beside the work turned out to meet a popular demand. A dissolute and debauched Court called for and obtained a literature as dissolute and debauched as any nation can show, of which more must be said in our next chapter. It was in such an environment, and utterly regardless of the reception ac-. corded them, that Milton produced the three great poems just discussed. In the language of Wordsworth's sonnet : "Thy soul was like a star and dwelt apart : Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea : Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free, So didst thou travel on life's common way, In cheerful godliness ; and yet thy heart The lowliest duties on herself did lay." l SIR THOMAS BROWNE, 1605-1682 A Seventeenth-century Neutral. During the great conflict which shook England in the seventeenth century 1 The sonnet is entitled London 1802, and begins "Milton! thou shouldst be living at this hour." 114 ENGLISH LITERATURE few men of force remained aloof. Whether they joined whole- souled one side or the other, most men felt it necessary to ally themselves with Puritans or Royalists. Among those who pursued the even tenor of their way was Thomas Browne, physician, antiquarian, and mas- ter of a sonorous and finely rhetorical English prose. Had he felt with Macaulay x that it was a " conflict between Oro- masdes and Arimanes, 1 liberty and despotism, reason and pre- judice," we do not imagine he would have hesitated to place his allegiance. Possessing a SIR THOMAS BKOWNE. s i ngu larly well-balanced mind, he could see even at close range that there was " a good deal of Arimanes on both sides " (Matthew Arnold). Hence he did not join either of the contending parties, but lived his long life in the peaceful practice of his profession and the indulgence of his passion for the strange and the ancient. Life. He was born in London in 1605, son of a pros- perous merchant. After attending school in Winchester, he entered at the age of eighteen Pembroke College, Oxford, from which he was graduated A.B. and A.M. He then traveled on the Continent, studying at several famous medical schools, and receiving his first medical degree from Leyden in 1633. On his return he took up residence in a hamlet in Yorkshire, and began the practice of his profession. Four years later he received his M.D. from Oxford, and then moved to Norwich, county of Norfolk, where he spent the 1 These are the names of the spirit of good and the spirit of evil in Persian mythology. The more usual forms are Ormazd and Ahriman. PURITAN AND CAVALIER 115 HYDRIOTAPHIA remaining forty-five years of his life. Of him and the lady whom he married it was said that " they seemed to come together by a kind of mutual magnetism." They reared twelve children, of whom, however, only four outlived their father. In 1671 Charles II, while on a visit to Norwich, recognized the learned doctor of the city by knighting him. Sir Thomas died in 1682. Four works of Browne appeared during his life- time : Religio Medici (" Religion of a Physi- cian ") ; Pseudodoxia Epidemica, or Enquiries into Vulgar Errors; H ydriotaphia, or Urn- Burial; and The Gar- den of Cyrus. A vol- ume on Christian Mor- als, and some letters, were published after his death. Though Urn- Burial is by the learned proclaimed to be Browne's best work, Religio Medici is certainly of more general interest. " Religio Medici." - In the preface we are informed that the author did not write his confession of faith for publica- O R, A Difcourfe of the Sepulchral) ; Urnes lately found in JA( R > L \. Togctkeririth The Garden of f T ft V S, OR THE Qumcunciall, Lozenge, or Net- \\orkllantations of the An- cients, Artificially, Naturally, Myftically ConiiJcreJ. With Sundry Obl'crvatiom. By Thomas Brownt D.of Phyfick, L o ^ T) o N, ' **^- Prmtcil for Hen. Krpmt at the Signcof the Gun in lvi-l.-.*e. 1658.- FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF HYDRIOTA- PHIA, FIRST EDITION. (New York Public Library'.) 116 ENGLISH LITERATURE tion. It was, instead, written, he says, " for my private exercise and satisfaction ; . . . and being a private exercise directed to myself, what is delivered therein was rather a memorial unto me than an example or rule unto any other." Circulated in manuscript, it was copied by many ; and finally got into print " in a most depraved copy." In order to justify himself he published in the following year an au- thorized edition. How Religio Medici could have been a " rule " to many is difficult to see. It contains a curious mixture of so-called orthodoxy and heresy, of the most conventional thinking and the most progressive. He accepts the doctrine of eternal punishment, but rejects the doctrine of a hell of fire : " I feel sometimes a hell within myself ; Lucifer keeps his Court in my breast." His belief in miracles would satisfy the ex- tremest Puritan ; but he also believed that " many are saved who to men seem reprobated, and many are reprobated who in the opinion and sentence of man stand elected " a belief to which scarcely a follower of Cromwell would assent. The second part of the book is devoted to the " virtue of charity," with which the author's contemporaries were so slightly blessed, and the author himself so richly. Nothing could show better than does this section Browne's lack of sympathy with his time "I am of a constitution so gen- eral," he says, " that it consorts and sympathiseth with all things." And again : " In all disputes, so much as there is of passion, so much there is of nothing to the purpose ; for then reason, like a bad hound, spends upon a false scent, and forsakes the question first started." What a commentary on this sentiment is the action of Parliament in conferring virtually absolute power on Cromwell just seven years after it had executed Charles for exercising power no more ab- solute 1 PURITAN AND CAVALIER 117 A typical passage, showing the characteristics of his vocabulary and his sentence-structure, is a fine one on music, which in DeQuincey's opinion is one of the two things " said adequately on the subject of music in all literature." 1 " It is my temper, and I like it the better, to affect all harmony ; and sure there is music even in the beauty, and the silent note which Cupid strikes, far sweeter than the sound of an instrument. For there is music wherever there is a harmony, order, or proportion ; and thus far we may maintain the music of the spheres; for those well- ordered motions and regular paces, though they give no sound unto the ear, yet to the understanding they strike a note most full of harmony. Whosoever is harmonically composed delights in harmony ; which makes me much dis- trust the symmetry of those heads which declaim against all church music. For myself, not only from my obedience, but my particular genius, I do embrace it ; for even that vulgar and tavern music, which makes one man merry, another mad, strikes in me a deep fit of devotion, and a profound contemplation of the First Composer." 1 The other cited by DeQuincey is in Twelfth Night, I, i. CHAPTER VI FROM THE RESTORATION OF CHARLES II TO THE DEATH OF DRYDEN (1660-1700) Puritan Repression. It will be readily inferred from what has been said in the preceding chapter that life under Puritan government was not happy. A certain sort of people will perhaps always derive a certain sort of pleasure from a life of repression, self-denial, and prohibition of all forms of amusement; but the class is never numerous, and it is likely to decrease when the period of repression is too long extended. It must be kept in mind that in this instance the prohibitions arose not because of the effect on the amusers, but because of that on the amused. The Puri- tans prohibited bear baiting, not because it gave pain to the bears but because it gave pleasure to the spectators. The Change in Government. The great majority of Englishmen had doubtless wearied of the Puritan regime long before the end came. Cromwell, however, by his overmastering personality, became autocrat in fact if not in name in 1653 ; and he forced the distasteful life on the people for five years longer. At his death his son Richard succeeded to the title of Lord Protector ; but having no ability or taste for leadership, he resigned in six months. After about nine months of a pretence of government by the military leaders, General Monk gained control of London, and brought about the election of a " free Parliament," which immedi- ately invited Charles II to return and take his kingdom. 118 FROM THE RESTORATION TO DRYDEN 119 The Change in Life. Charles and his followers had been in exile on the Continent, chiefly in France, during the Com- monwealth. They were a pleasure-loving, extravagant lot, who had been entertained almost to satiety by the gay nation. On reaching England they set to work to make over the na- tion on a French pattern ; and it was not long before French standards pervaded the life of the City, and the literature of England. The literature most in demand was drama, and a host of writers appeared to give the Court and the City what was demanded. Life at least that of the theatre- going circles was on an exceedingly low moral plane, and it was accurately reflected in Restoration drama, especially comedy. Restoration Comedy. Of the comic writers of this period it is difficult to speak too severely, and unnecessary here to speak at length. They not only made no effort at originality : they did not even travel far for their models and materials. They worked over the greatest of French dramas, chiefly the comedies of Moliere, according to French dramatic theory. They remade Shakspere and other Elizabethans to suit the taste of an age not so " barbarous." Worse, however, than lack of originality, is the unblushing immoral- ity of Restoration drama, which constantly pictures vice triumphant, which " laughs not merely indulgently at vice, but harshly at the semblance of virtue." 1 The Swing of the Pendulum. That this standard was allowed to remain for forty years recalls the fact that a pendu- lum swings as far in one direction as the other. An enforced seriousness, morality, restraint, gave way to a deliberately sought levity, immorality, licence. If people thought of sin 1 Nettleton, English Drama of the Restoration, page 7. 120 ENGLISH LITERATURE at all, they took the position expressed by one of the Cavalier poets, that sin consists, not in doing wrong, but in being found out. Not that the entire nation fell to this low level : there were many exceptions. But the upper class in state and society was morally down, and this class determined the literature of the period. Before studying the greatest writer of the day it will be well to look briefly at a work which admirably supplements Restoration comedy in picturing the life of the time. This work is the Diary of Samuel Pepys. 1 SAMUEL PEPYS, 1633-1703 Life. Pepys was born in London, the son of a tailor. He attended St. Paul's School in the City, and Magdalene College, Cambridge, being graduated in 1650. At the age of twenty-two, without occupation or prospects, he married ; and of his life for the succeeding four or five years we have no information. Having, however, secured the favor and patronage of his distant kinsman, Sir Edward Montagu, an influential man in the Restoration, Pepys became in 1660 Clerk of the Acts of the Navy Board. Soon afterward he became Secretary of the Admiralty; and to him, it is said, much credit is due for improvements in administration of the navy. The Diary, begun in 1660, Pepys was compelled to dis- continue in 1669 because of the weakness of his eyes. He was an early member of the Royal Society and became its presi- 1 According to H. B. Wheatley, authority on Pepys, the most usual pronunciation of the name to-day is Peps, though most bearers of the name say Peeps, and one branch of the family has said Pep-pis for at least a hundred years. Mr. Wheatley thinks the pronunciation of the diarist's own day was undoubtedly Peeps. See Samuel Pepys and the World He Lived In, second edition, preface. FROM THE RESTORATION TO DRYDEX 121 dent in 1684. With the Revolution of 1688 he lost his posi- tion in the Admiralty, and spent his last fifteen years in a suburb of London, maintaining acquaintance and corre- spondence with prominent men, including Christopher Wren the architect, and Isaac Newton the philosopher and scientist. He also in these last years kept up an active interest in many public affairs. PEPYS. Character Revealed in the Diary. The character of the author, revealed on every page almost in every entry of the Diary, is most interesting. The manuscript is in short- hand ; and that it was writ- ten with not the remotest thought of publication, is clear. He shows the weaknesses and vices of the day : avarice, with no great scruples in grati- fying it ; love of amusement, satisfied by the typical amuse- ments of the Restoration ; love of wine, indulgence in which caused him inconvenience, and therefore, pain ; vanity, which led him, while complaining of even the small expendi- tures of his wife, to lay out great sums for attire for himself. " Up, and make myself as fine as I could, with the linen stockings on and wide canons [i.e., ornamental rolls around the bottom of his trousers] that I bought the other day at Hague." (May 24, 1660.) The list of plays which he saw, many of them over and over again, numbers nearly one hundred and fifty, and there were frequent merry-makings, 122 ENGLISH LITERATURE not all of unquestionable character, at his own and friends' houses, and at taverns of all kinds. A Business Man. On the other hand, he certainly de- voted himself faithfully to the business of his office, with benefit to the service, as has been mentioned. For many a day the entry is as brief as the following : " At the office all the morning, and merry at noon, at dinner; and after dinner to the office, where all the afternoon, doing much business, late." (Nov. 15, 1668.) That he earnestly wished FACSIMILE OF PEPYS'S SIGNATURE. (British Museum.) to be freed from his bad habits is evidenced by the number of times he " prays " that he may overcome them. Some- times in a sentence he seems rightly to estimate a business acquaintance : " I thought it dangerous to be free with him, for I do not think he can keep counsel ; because he blabs to me of what hath passed between other people and him." (Aug. 13, 1666.) Life of the Time Pictured. The satisfaction of the people with the new government appears from two passages for 1660. On March 6 he writes : " Everybody now drinks the King's health without any fear, whereas before it was very private (i.e., secretly) that a man dare do it ; " and on FROM THE RESTORATION TO DRYDEN 123 October 13 : "I went out to Charing Cross, to see Major- General Harrison l hanged, drawn, and quartered. . . . He was presently cut down, and his head and heart shown to the people, at which time there were great shouts of joy." The most famous long entry is that describing the great fire of 1666, containing much of interest regarding phases of Restoration London which a regular historian would have ignored. The Supreme Diarist. As Boswell (see page 184) is the world's greatest biographer, Samuel Pepys is its greatest diarist. His Diary, says Richard Garnett, is " a model to which not only no one ever will attain, but to which no one will endeavor to attain." As indicating the difficulty of accomplishing what Pepys accomplished Garnett adds : " He is as supreme in his own sphere as Milton in his ; and another Milton is more likely to appear than another Pepys." JOHN DRYDEN, 1631-1700 The dominant literary figure of the age was John Dry- den, who possessed skill much above the average writer, but lacked the force of character necessary to raise the tone of the literature. His life of sixty-nine years stretched over the period of the Commonwealth and those of four sovereigns the two Charleses, -lames II, and William and Mary. His literary life, which began at the death of Cromwell, shows a series of changes in standards and theories of writing ; and his writings show great changes in thought, particularly religious thought. Regarding all these changes a controversy has lasted to the present day; and scholars are not yet agreed whether greater praise or blame is due him. 1 A Puritan officer who signed Charles the First's death warrant. 124 ENGLISH LITERATURE Life to the End of the Commonwealth. Dryden was born in a Northamptonshire village about eighty miles north of London, August 9, 1631. He attended Westminster School under Doctor Busby (who, it will be remembered, once whipped Sir Roger de Coverley's grandfather see The Spectator, No. 329), and Trinity College, Cam- bridge. Though he did not obtain a fellow- ship, he remained in Cambridge for three years after his gradua- tion in 1654, apparently engaged in study. On the death of his father he inherited property enough to support him ; and from .Cam- bridge he moved to London, which from that time was his res- idence. DRYDEN. After the portrait by Sir Godfrey Kneller. First Poems. At the death of Cromwell Dryden published his first poem Heroic Stanzas, Consecrated to the Memory of His Highness, Oliver, Late Lord Protector of this Commonwealth. The poet's an- cestry was Puritan in sympathy, and this poem is quite orthodox, saying: "His grandeur he derived from Heaven alone, For he was great, ere Fortune made him so." FROM THE RESTORATION TO DRYDEN 125 The concluding stanza reads : "His ashes in a peaceful urn shall rest; His name a great example stands to show How strangely high endeavors may be blessed Where piety and valour jointly go." Less than two years later appeared from the same pen AstrcBa Redux, a Poem on the Happy Restoration and Return of His Sacred Majesty Charles the Second. This is the first of Dry den's changes and the easiest to explain. In the words of Doctor Johnson : " If he changed, he changed with the nation." Why and to what extent the nation changed, has been stated above. In passing we should note that Astrcea Redux is written in heroic couplets, 1 the measure which Dryden was to fix as the standard measure for Eng- lish poetry for more than a century. First Plays and Essays. In the third year of Charles II, Dryden produced The Wild Gallant and The Rival Ladies, the first of a long list of plays of little merit and of the tone he believed to be in demand by Restoration play-goers. Four years later came a work of dramatic criticism of more importance to English literature than all his plays Essay of Dramatic Poesy, in which he argues for the use of rhyme in tragedy. Although the subject of the essay is of no im- portance, the essay itself deserves high place as the first composition in what is called modern prose. By this term is meant prose employed " as an instrument for promoting 1 The heroic couplet consists of two rhymed lines of iambic pentam- eter. Examples from Astrcea Redux : " How shall I speak of that triumphant day, When you renewed the expiring pomp of May, A month that owns an interest in your namo ; You and the flowers are its peculiar claim." 126 ENGLISH LITERATURE . .&Aer rry X"-.-..' JttHltr/n2 i*J tithsaJfJ w'SjjM A../ ^/^t&W"-* ffl i^^S^< titter. 4tffW&*&>frZ^* ctosUj"" 4t&-- ^^^ Sr> ! ^ ; f&+te'y> p *%%& fi&J'Aavn M fiwfy {fa-*?-,,/? /i fa 3*. {^S^X ^^ FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF DRYDEN. (British Museum.) FROM THE RESTORATION TO DRYDEN 127 social intercourse and refinement " as distinguished from that used " for the various purposes of instruction." l This was followed by Defence of the Essay of Dramatic Poesy, and by various other defences, prefaces, and dedications, which taken together naming " Father English justify our Dryden the of Modern Prose." Dryden was made Poet Laureate in 1670, and held the position until the Revolution (1688). Eight years later, in All for Love, an imitation and ad- aptation of Shakspere's Antony and Cleopatra, he abandoned rhyme for blank verse in trag- edy; another of his changes of standard, which he felt it neces- sary to " defend " in a preface. The Medall. A S AT Y R E AGAINST SEDITION- By the Authourof Alfalom and Acbitofbtl. Ft i Gr.iiiim f:-fuk-s, mtdi\tyur pfr Elidis Vrtm lint mam i Divjnifw^M fofcela Honcres. LONDON, 1'cinied lor Ja^l i'iaft, at the JuJge's Head in ClMi.cerj-Une, near Fket-flrtet. liSa. _ FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF DRYDEN'S THE MEDAL. (New York Public Library.) Satirical Poems. Neither Dryden's plays nor his critical essays, however, could have given him the position he occu- pied in Restoration life and literature. That position at the top came to him as a result chiefly of another sort of writ- ing, begun when he was fifty years old political satire. The first of his satirical poems was Absalom and Achitophel, 1 Courthope, in Craik's English Prose, III. 139. 128 ENGLISH LITERATURE directed against the Earl of Shaftesbury, who favored the Protestant Duke of Monmouth as Charles's successor rather than the Roman Catholic Duke of York (afterwards James II). When Shaftesbury was tried for high treason and acquitted, and his friends had a medal struck in commemora- tion of the event, Dryden wrote another satire with the same aim, entitled The Medal. "Mac Flecknoe." Among the replies was one by Thomas Shadwell, whose taking part in the wit-combat would be quite forgotten but for Dryden's rejoinder to it. It may almost be said that Shadwell's very name would be forgotten but for Dryden's Mac Flecknoe, a poem in which Shadwell is made successor to the throne of dulness. Such lines as the following were quite beyond Shadwell, and they hit hard : "Shadwell alone, of all my 1 sons is he Who stands confirmed in full stupidity. The rest to some faint meaning make pretence, But Shadwell never deviates into sense. So Shadwell swore, nor should his vow be vain, That he till death true dulness would maintain ; And in his father's right, and realm's defence, Ne'er to have peace with wit, nor truce with sense." Religious Poems. The year of the Shadwell poem was signalized by a venture of Dryden's into a field entirely new to him religion. This venture was Religio Laid (" Reli- gion of a Layman "), a poem setting forth the fallacy of the Roman Catholic doctrine of infallibility. After the acces- sion of James II appeared The Hind and the Panther, an allegorical satire in verse proving the Roman Church to be the true and only church. This was the last of those changes Flecknoe, King of Nonsense, is speaking. FROM THE RESTORATION TO DRYDEN 129 of which mention was made in our introductory paragraph on Dryden ; and it seems probable that he was at heart more a Catholic than anything else. In the poem various sects are represented by animals, from the Church of Rome (" the milk-white Hind ") and that of England (the Panther " fairest creature of the spotted kind ") to the Baptist (" the bristled Boar ") and the Quaker (the Hare that " Professed neutrality, but would not swear"). Last Years. With the exile of James at the Revolution and the accession of the Protestants William and Mary (1688-1689), Dryden lost the position of laureate ; and from that time until his death in 1700 he suffered from physical ills and from lack of income to relieve them. What is by some, however, considered his best work was written in the last ten years of his life : translations, including the JEncid of Virgil ; the Fables, including translations from Ovid and Boccaccio, and modernizations of Chaucer; and the ode called Alexander's Feast. JOHN BUNYAN, 1628-1688 Although John Bunyan was a Puritan of Puritans, it seems more correct to assign him to the Restoration period for two reasons. In the first place all of his works that have any claim on our consideration were written after 1660; and in the second, it is very doubtful whether his great works would ever have been written had it not been for the religious perse- cution he suffered under Charles's government. Birth and Education. Bunyan was born in Elstow, Bed- fordshire, in 1628, " of a low and inconsiderable generation," as he himself says. His father, Thomas Bunyan, who called himself a " brazier," was called by the son's first biographer a " tinker," that is, " a mender of pots and kettles ; " and 130 ENGLISH LITERATURE the son followed the same trade. His schooling must have been very limited, but his literary training was of the best. " The Bible," says Froude, " is a literature in itself the rarest and richest in all departments of thought or imagina- tion which exists ; " and Bunyan knew his Bible. Foxe's Book of Martyrs is said to be the only other book with which he was at all well acquainted. Conversion ; and Marriage. According to his own narra- tive after his conversion, he was a very wicked youth and young man, the chief of sinners ; but it is now very generally believed that he exaggerated, quite unconsciously, his early wickedness. In the great ardor of his changed life, very slight lapses from propriety seemed to him the blackest of crimes against his Maker. For three years he served in the army, on the side of Parliament, as is now established. 1 Shortly after his release he married. His wife brought as her dowry two religious books, which he took pleasure in reading with her, but which had no effect on his life. His change resulted from a new and sympathetic reading of the Bible ; he joined a dissenting sect in 1653 ; and three years later was regularly engaged in preaching. Works Written while in Prison. Six months after the Restoration of Charles and of the Established Church, Bun- yan, with many other dissenting preachers, was arrested ; and on his refusal to discontinue preaching, was imprisoned. During the twelve years of his confinement he wrote a num- ber of books, including one of " the four outstanding crea- tions of his genius " Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, his autobiography. It is in this volume that he charges himself with the extreme sinfulness already referred 1 See Cambridge History, VII, 192. FROM THE RESTORATION TO DRYDEN 131 to. Released from prison in 1672, Bunyan became pastor of the Bedford church; but after a service of only three years he was again arrested and imprisoned. This second imprisonment of six months is for the world the most impor- tant episode in Bunyan's life ; for it was then that he wrote the first part of The Pilgrim's Progress. " The Pilgrim's Progress." - The Pilgrim's Progress from This World to that which is to Come is " delivered under the JAIL ON BEDFORD BRIDGE. Here Bunyan was imprisoned for years. similitude of a dream." The author of Piers Plowman, it will be recalled (see page 22), lay down on Malvern Hills one morning, and had a dream in which appeared a " field full of folk." So Bunyan says he lay down in a " den " (i.e., Bedford Jail), and dreamed. At the end of the story, he " awoke, and behold it was a dream." The story is of Christian, who, reading in a Book (the Bible) that his city was to be destroyed by fire, set out for a place of safety. Evangelist gives him directions ; his 132 ENGLISH LITERATURE neighbors, Obstinate and Pliable, follow him and try to turn him back. Christian, however, refuses to return, and after a long and toilsome journey is conducted by two Shining Ones into the Celestial City. In striving to reach his goal he has experienced many and distressing hindrances. Among them are the Slough of Despond, into which he falls ; the Hill of Difficulty ; Doubt- ing Castle, the home of Giant Despair ; the Valley of Humilia- tion, where he has to fight the fiend Apollyon ; the town of Vanity, where he and a companion named Faithful are tried for disturbing the peace by talking against a fair to be held in the town. He is enabled to overcome these hindrances by the aid of the shepherds Knowledge, Experience, and Sin- cere, dwellers in the Delectable Mountains ; an Interpreter, who has a house on the road ; the porter Watchful, and the damsels Prudence, Piety, and Charity, who occupy the Palace Beautiful ; and Hopeful, who joins Christian after the execution of Faithful at Vanity Fair, and accompanies him to the end of the journey. The reception accorded The Pilgrim's Progress is shown by the appearance of fifty-nine editions in the hundred years following its publication. Before 1700 it was translated into French, German, and Dutch ; and at the present time ver- sions exist in more than one hundred languages and dialects. Later Works. The period between the release from his second imprisonment and his death was a happy and pros- perous one for Bunyan. The second part of The Pilgrim's Progress, setting forth the journey of Christian's wife, Chris- tiana, and their children, appeared ; and though unquestion- ably inferior to the first part, it met with a most cordial reception. Two more of his great works were published The Life and Death of Mr. B adman, a reversal of Christian's FROM THE RESTORATION TO DRYDEX 133 journey and less interesting because of the simple char- acter of the central figure ; and The Holy War, an allegory the idea of which is plainly taken from Paradise Lost, and in which the banished spirits, led by Diabolus (Satan), attack the forces of Em- manuel (Christ), defend- ing the town of Mansoul. In addition to attaining great fame as a writer, Bunyan had now come to be recognized as a great preacher. Offers of more prominent and more lucrative positions came to him, but he de- clined to leave Bedford permanently, though he made an annual visit to London and preached to large and enthusiastic audiences. BUNYAX. From a portrait by Sadler. Death. He gave him- self freely to humanity, and his death resulted from exposure on a journey that he certainly would have called one of Christian duty. The journey was to bring about a reconciliation between a father and son, and was successful. Riding afterward to London in a heavy rain, he caught cold, which developed into fever. In about ten days he died, and was buried in London. A Humble Man. In view of Bunyan's phenomenal success, especially with such an unpromising start in life, no 134 ENGLISH LITERATURE characteristic is more noteworthy than his humility. A single incident will illustrate this. A member of his congregation once complimented him on a sermon he had preached, call- ing it a " sweet " sermon. The great man, to whose imagi- nation the forces of evil were very real and always present, replied : " You need not tell me that, for the devil whis- pered it to me before I was well out of the pulpit." A Noteworthy Pamphlet. This chapter should not end without mention of a publication that had a great effect on the drama of this period, and incidentally upon the moral tone of the literature as a whole. This was a pamphlet entitled, Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage, by Jeremy Collier, a dissenting clergy- man. It appeared in 1698, two years, that is, before Dry- den's death ; and it was very specific as to names of both authors and plays, Dryden receiving a due share of condem- nation. He differed from other offenders in admitting the justice of the charges, and making a feeble apology. That such a spectacle as the comedy of the Restoration must have come to an end in time is doubtless true ; but it is also true that the reform was hastened by the clergyman's blast. While the pamphlet is an absolutely uncritical per- formance, it appeared at a moment when merely a vigorous statement of the situation would contribute much toward a removal of the evil. CHAPTER VII FROM THE DEATH OF DRYDEN TO THE PUBLICATION OF THE " LYRICAL BALLADS " (1700-1798) General Character of Eighteenth-century Literature. Despite repeated assertions to the contrary, Matthew Arnold's characterization of the eighteenth century as " our age of prose and reason " remains the most accurate brief characterization yet offered. The objectors to the phrase apparently labor under the impression that the critic was disparaging the age, overlooking the fact that he also described it as " excellent and indispensable." After Chaucer, Shakspere, and Milton (to name only the greatest poets before 1700) English literature could well afford an entire century for perfecting its prose. An Age of Prose. Even an age of prose may produce poets, and Arnold counts Gray a classic and Burns a poet of great power. In the opinion of most students it requires no indulgence to add the names of Thomson, Cowper, Collins, and Goldsmith to the list of real poets. When all is said, however, the fact stands out that not by reason of all six of these names does the eighteenth century hold its high place in our literary annals. That place is due to a number of prose writers of the highest merit Defoe and Swift, Addison and Steele, Johnson and Goldsmith, Boswell and Burke; to the founders of the novel 1 Richardson, 1 The novelists are separated from other prose writers because their contribution is to the establishment of a literary form rather than "a fit prose" style. 135 136 ENGLISH LITERATURE Fielding, Smollett, Sterne ; and to one poet Pope who, as we shall presently see, treated in metrical form just the sort of subjects treated by the others in prose and in a not dissimilar fashion. An Age of Reason. It was an age of reason in that the appeal of its writers was largely to the intellect and slightly to the imagination or to the emotions. This assertion may be disputed by one who recalls that Gulliver's Travels, Robinson Crusoe, and Sir Roger de Covcrley belong to the first half of the century. But the De Coverley Papers were popular because readers found in them so much of the life of their own day ; and Robinson Crusoe was read not as a creation of the imagination, but as sober narrative of real experiences. Swift's object in Gulliver's Travels was not to entertain, but to satirize politics, religion, learning, and well nigh every phase of life. Even the titles of Pope's poems show lack of imagination and feeling, qualities inseparably connected in most minds with any poetry worthy the name. He wrote an Essay on Criticism, Essay on Man, Moral Essays, Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot (his closest friend), Epistle on Taste, Satires (imitations of Horace), The Dunciad (a long series of spiteful, personal attacks on contemporaries). Although some characteristics run through the literature of the entire century, certain differences between the first half of the century and the second half make a subdivision desirable. It is convenient to name these subdivisions from the men whose influence dominated each : the age of Pope (to his death in 1744), and the age of Johnson. THE AGE OF POPE The "Augustan" Age. The age of Pope is sometimes called the " Augustan " age, because of some resemblances FROM DRYDEX TO LYRICAL BALLADS 137 between conditions in England at the time and conditions in Rome under the Emperor Augustus. " The parallel between the two eras," says Professor Sellar, 1 " consists in the relation which poets and writers held to men eminent in the State, and also in the finished execution and moderation of tone common to both." Statesmen vied with each other in the encouragement and substantial patronage of men of LONDON AXP VICINITY SCALE OF UltES Cobhamo . Kpsnm MAP OF LONDON AND VICINITY. Augustan writers were interested chiefly in city life. Places connected with writers of other periods may be noted. letters. Great emphasis was laid on literary " finish," on elegance. Said Dryden: "Polish, repolish, every color lay, And sometimes add, but oftener take away." Following Dryden's example, the early eighteenth-century writers busied themselves much with theories of poetry The Roman Poets of the Augustan Age: Virgil, 3d ed., page 5. 138 ENGLISH LITERATURE and were greatly influenced by the Latin writer Horace. " There was never an age in which great writers trained themselves so carefully for their office, strove so much to con- form to recognized principles of art, reflected so much on the plan and purpose of their compositions, or used more patient industry in bringing their conceptions to maturity." An im- portant difference between the two Augustan ages is that the Roman age followed Rome's greatest prose period, and was almost wholly devoted to poetry. The prose of Caesar, Sal- lust, and Cicero preceded the poetry of Virgil and Horace. Subject-matter and Treatment. On the side of subject- matter and treatment the literature of the age of Pope is very largely satiric, moral, and didactic. Satire was its heritage from Dryden, and was the form naturally favored by men writing " for the critics in the coffee-houses, for the noblemen from whom they expected patronage, and for the political party they were pledged to support." Why an age so far from moral should show partiality to moral treatises is perhaps not quite clear; but partial to them it was. Pope's lines, "Honor and shame from no condition rise ; Act well your part, there all the honor lies," found no exemplification in the author's life or in the lives of many of his notable contemporaries ; yet it is the kind of sentiment applauded on all sides in Pope's day. His con- temporaries enjoyed repeating "Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man," even though the object of most men's study (notably of Pope's) was to find the weak points in their adversaries with a view to verbal attack. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 139 Widespread Writing in Verse. Nearly every discussion of the eighteenth century undertakes to decide whether Pope and his followers are or are not poets. No such effort will be made here. The terms " poet " and " poetry " are used with such a variety of meanings that there is no common ground for classifying a writer like Pope. We may avoid committing ourselves by saying that virtually every writer of the time did on occasion express himself in verse. Of the eight chief prose writers named at the beginning of this chapter, six also wrote compositions which their contem- poraries had no hesitancy in calling poems. Conclusion. In concluding this general characterization of the eighteenth century three points must be mentioned : First, the average writer was a better writer than was the average in the preceding century. Second, there were more writers above the average. Third, no writer approached in greatness the three chief figures of the seventeenth century Shakspere, Bacon, Milton. As some one has put it, there are more mountains in the eighteenth-century literature than in the seventeenth ; but there are none whose summits reach the heights of the earlier time. There is no clearly logical order in which to study the writers of the Augustan age. We shall, therefore, make a purely arbitrary choice, beginning with Swift because his Tale of a Tub (1704) is the first really great book of the cen- tury. It should, however, be kept in mind that in the same year Defoe began his Review, the first of the illustrious list of periodicals ; and Addison wrote The Campaign, a poem celebrating a great victory in war which gained for its author the first noteworthy recognition of literature by government. 140 ENGLISH LITERATURE JONATHAN SWIFT, 1667-1745 Swift Not an Irishman. Swift was born in Ireland ; grew up and received his entire education in Ireland ; spent the greater part of his seventy-eight years in Ireland; and died in Ireland. Yet Swift was not an Irishman. He himself said that his being born in that country was " a perfect acci- dent ; " adding : "I was a year old before I left it, and to my sorrow did not die before I came back to it." According to Thackeray l (and the critics unanimously assent) : " Swift's heart was English and in Eng- land, his habits English, his logic eminently English." In such a situation a man's life is not likely to be happy and Swift's life had very little happiness in it. Continually, even when enjoying the favor of the great, he was at enmity with the human race ; and his fierce irony spared none. In his own Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift, he writes : "Yet malice never was his aim; He lashed the vice, but spared the name ; No individuals could resent, Where thousands equally were meant." This " lashing of thousands " increased with his years. Of one of his later works it has been said, that in his effort to express his disgust with humanity, Swift becomes himself disgusting. 1 In The English Humorists of the Eighteenth Century. JONATHAN SWIFT. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 141 Life Up to First Writings. He was horn in Dublin in 1667. In consequence of the death of his father and the financial disability of his mother, Swift was brought up by a wealthy uncle, who sent him to Kilkenny, one of the best preparatory schools in Ireland. At the age of fourteen he entered Trinity College, Dublin; and he was graduated TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN. The famous Alma Mater of Swift, Goldsmith, and Burke. from there in due time. Two years later Swift went to England and secured a position as secretary-companion to a Sir William Temple, of Moor Park, Surrey, some twenty-five miles southwest of London. The Temple connection, though far from satisfactory to the ambitious young man, he con- tinued until Sir William's death in 1699. During this period and under Temple's influence, Swift received the 142 ENGLISH LITERATURE master's degree from Oxford, and was ordained into the ministry of the Church of England. Beginnings of Authorship : (i) " The Battle of the Books." Swift began his career as author toward the close of his stay with Temple. The retired statesman became involved in a controversy with the great scholar, Bentley, as to the relative merits of ancient and modern writers. Swift came to the assistance of his patron with A Full and True Account of the Battle Fought Last Friday between the Ancient and the Modern Books in St. James's Library, generally known as The Battle of the Books. The author had apparently little interest in the con- troversy, and took the side of the ancients merely because Temple was on that side and needed help. The most enter- taining portion of the work is the fable of the spider and the bee. In this is championed Sir William's idea that the moderns (represented by the spider) get their material from inside themselves, whereas the ancients (represented by the bee) got theirs direct from nature. (2) "The Tale of a Tub." -About the same time (probably 1697) Swift wrote The Tale of a Tub, a satire on religious dissensions, in the form of an allegory. Three brothers, Martin, Peter, and Jack (standing for Martin Luther or the Established Church, the Apostle Peter or the Church of Rome, and John Calvin or the Dissenters), get into a quarrel over the meaning of their father's will (the Bible), in which are " instructions in every particular con- cerning the wearing and management " of their coats (the Christian faith). Disagreement as to the interpretation of the will leads to alterations of the coats (that is, the addition of various doctrines), and to the increase of feeling between the sects. The Tale did not, as the author hoped it would, FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 143 advance his fortunes in the Church ; for although he made clear enough the shortcomings of Peter and Jack, his way of looking at life prevented his making clear the virtues of Martin, as a clergyman in the Established Church was naturally expected to do. Swift at Laracor. For some reason not quite apparent neither The Battle of the Books nor The Tale of a Tub was published immediately. Both appeared in 1704, when Swift had returned to Ireland and begun the life of a country parson at Laracor, twenty miles from Dublin. Laracor was nominally his home from 1700 to 1710, though he spent much time in London. The " Joke " on Partridge, During one of these visits to the metropolis Swift indulged in a typical piece of satire. Under the name of "-Isaac Bickerstaff " he predicted that one Partridge, an almanac-maker, himself given to pre- dicting, would die at a definite hour on a day some weeks off. The day after the date set, Bickerstaff (Swift) pub- lished a letter to a prominent person, stating that Partridge had fulfilled the prediction. Partridge then published a new almanac, saying, as Mark Twain once said, that the report of his death was grossly exaggerated. Bickerstaff replied that Partridge's writing another almanac was no proof at all that he was still alive, and that he was, in fact, unquestionably dead. Swift's (Bickerstaff's) victim could not thereafter get a hearing. "An Argument against Abolishing Christianity." -The same visit was made notable by An Argument against Abolish- ing Christianity, in which Swift assumes that the nation has unanimously determined upon abolishment. In a perfectly serious tone and in a carefully constructed and 144 ENGLISH LITERATURE orderly essay, he sets forth many arguments against abolish- ment ; as, the necessity of " a nominal religion," the useful- ness of one day in seven for various things that would hinder business on other days, the value of Christianity for the dis- play of the freethinker's abilities in attacking it. The satire is directed not only at the " heretical " thinking of the day, but also at the superficial, conventional thinking of the so-called " orthodox." Politics; and " The Examiner." The decade of Swift's residence at Laracor was marked by the rise of political parties in England, and the increase in the power of the ministry ; and Swift was seeking political favor to better his position in the Church. For some years he was a Whig ; but differing from the party on a vital principle, he left it before it lost control of government. When in November, 1710, the Tories gained control, it seemed that Swift's hour had arrived. The leaders were not slow to enlist the aid of his pen for their cause ; and he wielded it vigorously for the four years (to the death of Queen Anne) they remained in power. His most useful political writing was in The Examiner, a party journal edited by him in 1710-1711. De- spite the fact that The Examiner was primarily a plea for support of the ministry, Swift's numbers are not a blindly partisan plea. They show, indeed, in the opinion of Swift's latest editor 1 " a noble spirit of wide-eyed patriotism, and a distinguished grasp of the meaning of national greatness and national integrity." " Dean " Swift. Always ambitious, Swift had felt con- fident that nothing less than a bishopric would be given him for his services to the government ; but no bishopric was 1 Temple Scott. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 145 forthcoming. About a year before the downfall of the Tories the deanery of Saint Patrick's, Dublin, was tendered to him ; and he accepted on the assumption that a deanery was a more comfortable place of abode than a country parsonage. It is not evident that Swift was especially successful or in any way notable in his new position ; but some title, ap- SAINT PATRICK'S CATHEDRAL, DUBLIN. parently, the public thought due him, and as " Dean " Swift he has been known ever since. Return to Ireland. With the change in government, only Saint Patrick's and Ireland had anything to offer Swift. So to Ireland he returned in 1714; and in the country of his birth but not of his home he spent the re- mainder of his life. It was at the age of fifty-nine that he published the work by which he is most generally known 146 ENGLISH LITERATURE Gulliver's Travels, described above as a sort of universal satire. The Story of " Gulliver's Travels." - This book narrates the experiences in four strange countries of Lemuel Gulliver, Englishman, " first a surgeon, and then a captain of several ships," who had been " condemned by nature and fortune to an active and restless life." He is shipwrecked in Lilliput, where the inhabitants measure by inches instead of by feet, and where all things buildings, animals, etc. are in proportion. He is accidentally left on shore in Brobdingnag, the inhabitants of which measure by English feet as if they were inches, and all things, again, are in proportion. On a third voyage, after being captured by pirates and set adrift in a canoe, he lands in Laputa; and on a fourth, he is the victim of a conspiracy among his men and is landed in the country of the Houyhnhnms. 1 Among the inhabitants of the last two countries are very repulsive beings called Struldbrugs and Yahoos ; and the last two parts of the book are much less attractive in every way than the first two. The Satire in " Gulliver's Travels." Though Swift made Gulliver's Travels a story interesting to both young and old, his object in the volume was certainly not entertainment. According to the author the book is an expression of his hatred of mankind. In the " Voyage to Lilliput " he shows how contemptible war is by showing these six-inch creatures at war. He shows how insignificant are the causes of political controversy by picturing the Lilliputians as divided on the subject of breaking eggs whether they should be broken at the big end or the little end. 1 This name is, apparently, to be pronounced "Whinnems," in imi- tation of the neighing of a horse. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 147 In the " Voyage to Brobdingnag " Gulliver (typifying, of course, humanity) excites the profound contempt of the king " The bulk of your natives," says he, " appear to me to be the most pernicious race of little odious vermin that Nature ever suffered to crawl upon the face of the earth." The king's dwarf, says Gulliver, was " of the lowest stature that was ever in that country (for I verily think he was not full thirty feet high)." How insignificant and contemptible must man be if there are found in the world such powerful beings as the Brobdingnagians, and such finely-developed beings as the Lilliputians ! Writings on Ireland: " Drapier's Letters." Of the ten other works written after his appointment to Saint Patrick's only two need be mentioned here, both concerned with the misgovernment, ignorance, and poverty of Ireland. The first is the Drapier's Letters, essays pretending to be addressed by a tradesman to the " tradesmen, shopkeepers, farmers, and country-people in general," urging them to declare their virtual independence of England by refusing a debased currency which the mother country was trying to force upon them. "A Modest Proposal." The other work in behalf of Ireland, showing probably the utmost extreme to which satire can go, is called : A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People in Ireland from being a Burden to their Parents or Country, and for Making Them Beneficial to the Public. This proposal, " humbly " set forth in an absolutely cool and serious manner, is that the superfluous children be used as food. " It is not improbable," says the Dean, " that some scrupulous people might be apt to censure such a practice as a little bordering on cruelty." This kind of food " will be somewhat dear," he admits ; but for this very 148 ENGLISH LITERATURE reason it will be " very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children." The only objection he can think of to his proposal is, " that the number of people will be thereby much lessened in the kingdom," and this, he freely owns, " was one principal design in offering it to the world." Extreme satire, irony, this is, but it is not truly harsh or savage : it merely shows in what the author con- of ''" tv "[ FACSIMILE OF MANUSCRIPT OF SWIFT. (British Museum.) siders the most effective way the utter helplessness of the Irish people. Insanity. About the time when Swift wrote The Modest Proposal a great sorrow came into his life the death of Esther Johnson, from which he never recovered. He fell into a state of melancholy, which soon developed into insanity; and this in the last few years of his life took a violent form. His estate, valued at about 12,000 (equivalent to perhaps $500,000 to-day), he left to establish a hospital FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 149 for the insane ; or, as he put it in the Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift, already mentioned : "He gave the little wealth he had To build a house for fools and mad; And showed by one satiric touch No nation needed it so much." Swift's Relations with Women. One other . phase of Swift's life must be touched upon, though briefly; viz., his relations with women. Amid a great deal of speculation, most of which is quite without interest or value, a few facts stand out. The names of three women figure prominently in Swift's biography Miss Waring, or " Varina," sister of a college friend ; Esther Johnson, or " Stella," a dependent of Sir William Temple ; and Hester Vanhomrigh, or " Vanessa," daughter of a rich neighbor of Swift's when he lived in London and wrote essays for the Tory ministry. " Varina " and " Vanessa." The last-named, who was thirty years younger than Swift, conceived an extreme passion for him ; and pursued him both by letter and in person for some fifteen years. It does not appear to the present writer that Swift seriously cared for her, or ever really encouraged her attentions. Varina, it appears, he sincerely admired; and he would have married her, despite her ill-health and his poor financial situation. At the time, however, she thought these drawbacks too great; and when, several years later, she changed her mind, Swift had changed his also. " Stella." Between Swift and Stella there existed, without doubt, a strong attachment. There is a story to the effect that Stella, in a letter to Vanessa, admitted her secret marriage to Swift. There is another story to the effect that Swift never saw Stella except in the presence of a third 150 ENGLISH LITERATURE person. Either or both may be true, but neither story rests on unquestionable evidence. Swift's Personality. The great Dean does not appear as an attractive* person. Addison, it is true, described him as " the most agreeable companion, the truest friend ; " and the friendship of the two men survived years of political controversy when they led on opposite sides. Other men not easy to be friends with Alexander Pope, for instance retained and valued Swift's friendship ; but few could long tolerate his ironical tongue and his imperious temper. When Thackeray asks, " Would you have liked to be a friend of the great Dean? " most of us are forced to answer, as the great novelist implies that he himself would, in the negative. Swift's Literary Art. Of the Dean's intellect, of his literary powers the extent of his vocabulary, the clear- ness and simplicity of his sentences, the logical structure of his essays there can be only one opinion. If he does not occupy a pinnacle alone among the prose-writers of his day, there is not more than one who can dispute his preeminence. Even the reader who dislikes his irony, his bitterness, his hatred of mankind, must rise from the reading of Swift feeling that here indeed is a master of style. Quotations in brief can show little; but wherever one dips into his pages, one finds literary art in its finest form, and in a form admirable as a model. DANIEL DEFOE, 1659-1731 Defoe a Newspaper Man. Defoe was the first newspaper man to attain a position in literature. By this is not meant that he was connected with a newspaper there were no newspapers for him to be connected with, but that his FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 151 writings are essentially the work of a skilful reporter with a knack for polishing up occurrences of the day. The Journal of the Plague Year, The Apparition of Mrs. Veal, Robinson Crusoe, all, in fact, of what may be called his major works, were based on real events, and were accepted as true accounts by the reading public of his day. Besides these literary ventures with journalistic flavor, Defoe wrote the entire contents for several years of the first newspaper, The Review, and a large portion of several other periodicals. A third field in which he produced a great number of works is that of pamphleteering. Early Years. The sub- ject of ihis sketch was born Foe, and did not until late in life adopt the prefix now always used. His father, James Foe, was a butcher and a Nonconformist, .two facts constituting serious handi- caps to the son's success in any public occupation. Both social position and regularity in religion were highly desirable for advancement in the England of William and Mary and of Anne. James Foe planned to put his son into the min- istry; but the son, not being interested in the plan, left school at the age of seventeen and went into business. Government Reward for Services. His interest in poli- tics and his skill in writing led to a neglect of his business, and to failure for a large amount in 1692. Ranging himself DANIEL DEFOE. 152 ENGLISH LITERATURE on the side "of King William, Defoe wrote in support of that monarch's right to the throne a number of pamphlets, and one composition in verse, The True-born Englishman. The writer's services were recognized by an appointment under the government ; and he seems to have been in good financial circumstances until the death of William in 1702, and the accession of Anne and the choice of a Tory ministry. A Famous Pamphlet. In this year Defoe published one of his most famous pamphlets, The Shortest Way with the Dissenters, which pretended to take the position of the extreme Tories and High-Churchmen, but was meant to arouse opposition to these by exaggeration of their opinions. The author pretended to advocate " rooting out " the Dissenters, and treating their ministers as if guilty of a capital offence. Defoe, taken seriously at first, was con- demned by Dissenters, and approved by not a few Tories. When the pamphlet was rightly understood, the leaders of the Dissenters were beyond pacifying, and the Tories were furious. The government felt it necessary to punish Defoe severely, and he was fined, sentenced to stand in the pillory, and to be imprisoned during the Queen's pleasure. His ex- posure in the pillory was anything but a punishment ; for the rank and file of the people liked him for his verses (especially The True-born Englishman), and admired him for his defiance of the government. In Prison. " The Review." Defoe's prison term of something more than a year was scarcely more of a punish- ment than was his exposure in the pillory. He had much liberty; he used it largely in writing; and the authorities saw fit not to prevent him from publishing. The Review was begun during this time ; and the freedom of his mind is well shown by the range of subjects in the periodical FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 153 " from piracy and highway robberies to suicide and the divinity of Christ." A Spy. The release from prison came directly from the government, which desired Defoe's aid. The manner in DEFOE IN THE PILLORY. From an old print. which he rendered this aid laid him liable to misunderstand- ing at the time, and has proved a stumbling-block to friendly biographers since. However much we may be disposed to give a favorable name to his position, we are forced at last to admit that he was a spy. Such service may be at times indispensable and even patriotic ; but it does not appear that Defoe was always actuated by high motives. 154 ENGLISH LITERATURE THE Publication of "Robinson Crusoe." Defoe found him. self almost as late in life as did Swift. Defoe the journalist, the pamphleteer, the poet of the populace, would call forth small space in the his- tory of English litera- ture. In 1719, how- ever, at the age of sixty, he published The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner, by which he may be said to have founded the modern novel, and thereby secured for himself an illustrious place in not only Eng- L I F E AND STRANGE SURPRIZING ADVENTURES ROBINSON CRUSOE, Of TORK, MARINER: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an un-uihabited Hhnd on the Ccft of AMERICA, near the Mouth of the Greit River of OROONOQ.UEJ Having beencaft on Shore by Shipwreck, where- in ill the Men pcriOicd but himi'cll. WITH Ah Account how he wa< at laft as ftringtly deli- vc.-'u by PY RATES. Wnttn t, ffmftlf. LONDON. Printed for W. T A v I o at the -ftp in Paier-Nc/ter- A.--. MDCCXIX. land's, but the world's, literature. Secret of Its Power. It would be un- reasonable to give a summary of Robinson Crusoe. The story of the English sailor who, wrecked and capt ashore on a desert island, makes for him- self all the necessaries of life and lives in reasonable con- tentment for about thirty years, has been a universal favorite for two centuries. In the preface we learn that " the Editor believes the thing to be a just history FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE OF ROBINSON CRUSOE, FIRST EDITION, 1719. (Widener Memorial Library, Harvard University.) FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 155 of fact ; " and as such it has been read by countless thousands. That a man should have had such an experience would doubtless have seemed quite improbable to Defoe's con- temporaries, or even to the young folks since, who accept it on the theory that " faith is believing things you know aren't so." But when the adventures are narrated by a definite person, who had a definite life-history, and who narrates the adventures as having happened to him, the result is much more convincing. It is to the perfect simplicity, naturalness, and straightforwardness of the narrative that Robinson Crusoe owes its lasting power. Other Stories by Defoe. Defoe followed Robinson Crusoe with other " adventure " stories Moll Flanders, Colonel Jack, Captain Singleton. These deal with characters from the lower ranks of society, thieves, pirates, and such; and while no one rises to the level of Robinson Crusoe in interest or art, all have in some degree the same char- acteristics that have given this book so long a life. Last Years. For some years following the publication of his masterpiece, during which he wrote many works of many kinds besides the stories named above, Defoe seems to have been highly prosperous. About 1726 his fortune appears to have changed ; and though the circumstances of his remain- ing five years and of his death are rather obscure, he certainly did not die in physical or mental comfort. He continued writing, however, almost to the end ; and the complete list of his works numbers over two hundred and fifty. RICHARD STEELE, 1672-1729; JOSEPH ADDISON, 1672-1719 A Question of Precedence ? The names of two writers of the Augustan age invariably come together in one's 156 ENGLISH LITERATURE mind Richard Steele and Joseph Addison. To the second is all but universally assigned the higher place in our litera- ture ; yet without the incentive supplied by Steele, Addison would not have been sure of a place among writers of the first rank. The fame of both rests on their productions in the field of the periodical essay ; more specifically, of the character-essay. Now their first venture in this line, The Taller, was conceived and carried out by Steele, Addison contributing a number of essays at Steele's request; and Sir Roger de Coverley, the lovable old knight so closely associated with Addison's name, originated in Steele's brain. Perhaps it is idle to call either superior to the other. In view, however, of the fact that from Macaulay's time to the present Addison has generally been magnified at the expense of Steele, the credit due to the latter's invention should be recorded. Says one great voice in dissent from the chorus : " While Steele might under very inferior conditions have produced the Toiler and Spectator without Addison, it is highly improbable that Addison, as an essayist, would have existed without Steele." 1 Although it is well-nigh impossible to consider the work of these two apart, it is possible and desirable to record separately the chief events of their lives. Each will, of course, at times invade the other's narrative. Ireland, London, Oxford, the Army. Steele was Addison's elder by three months. He was born in Dublin, and certainly inherited more personal qualities from his Irish mother than from his English father. The first really important expe- rience of his life was his entrance at the Charterhouse School, London, at the age of twelve ; for it was there that two years later he made the acquaintance of Addison. From Charter- 1 Dennis, The Age of Pope, page 125. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 157 house, Steele went to Merton College, Oxford ; and though he remained four years, he was not graduated. The call of the war with France was too strong ; and instead of taking a degree at Oxford, he enlisted in the life-guards. A few years later a commission came to him; and he was always there- after referred to as " Captain Dick." Beginning of the Periodical Essay. After writing a religious work called The Christian Hero, which gave him a THE CHARTERHOUSE SCHOOL. reputation for piety neither desired nor deserved, he wrote a number of plays. In 1701 he began his career in the line of work which was to make him famous journalism, becom- ing editor of The Gazette. Seeing possibilities in periodical writing, but finding government control irksome, he started The Taller in 1709. Addison contributed forty-two of the 271 numbers of this journal, which appeared three times a week for nearly two years. Two months after the dis- continuance of The Taller, The Spectator appeared under the 158 ENGLISH LITERATURE same editors, and was published daily until December 6, 1712. In this second venture Addison took a larger hand, contributing 274 papers to Steele's 236; and though the idea was again Steele's, The Spectator is generally said to show the ascendancy of Addison. In 1713 Steele was elected to Parliament, and in the following year was expelled for favoring the succession of the House of Hanover. On the accession of George I Steele was reflected to Par- liament, received a lucra- tive appointment, and was knighted. STEELE. The Quarrel with Addi- son. The most unfortu- nate event of Steele's life took place in 1719, when he and Addison became involved on opposite sides in a po- litical controversy. Sharp words were used by both; and when Addison died a few months afterward no reconciliation had occurred. The es- trangement led Dr. Johnson to moralize in these words : " Every reader surely must regret that these two illus- trious friends, after so many years passed in confidence and endearment, in unity of interest, conformity of opin- ion, and fellowship of study, should finally par! in acri- monious opposition. . . . Why could not faction find other advocates? but among the uncertainties of the human state, we are doomed to number the instability of friendship." FROM DRYDEX TO LYRICAL BALLADS 159 Extravagant, but Attractive. Steele was twice married. His first wife, who lived something more than a year, seems to have counted for little in his life beyond the help afforded by her small fortune. His second wife, the " Prue " of some remarkable letters, he apparently loved in a warm, impulsive Irish fashion. She, like her predecessor, brought Captain Dick that is, Sir Richard a fortune. He, however, was so good a spender and kept up so elegant an establishment that even two fortunes and the salaries of two good positions could not pay the bills. Even if we had no evidence beyond Steele's letters to his wife, affectionate though they are, we should be forced to conclude that her ten years of married life were not altogether happy and un- ruffled. He was a far less " prudent " man than his friend Addison; but all the evidence indicates that he was an exceedingly lovable one. Thackeray's Tribute. Among many for whom his attractive personality has a special appeal is Thackeray, who celebrates his virtues in his novel Henry Esmond, and in one of his lectures on The English Humorists. Says Thackeray : " I own to liking Dick Steele the man, and Dick Steele the author, much better than much better men and much better authors." Steele outlived Addison ten years. He died in Wales, whither he had gone, say many, to escape importunate creditors. Others more charitable believe it was to escape the overwhelming expense of his London home, and with the money thus saved, to pay his creditors. His Father's Son. Addison was born in a small town in Wiltshire (southern England), the eldest son of the Royalist rector of the place. If Steele's personality seems chiefly due 160 ENGLISH LITERATURE to his mother, Addison's seems equally due to his learned, highly-respected, self-sufficient, literary father. What is generally regarded as nearly a portrait of himself is found in number one of The Spectator, in which " The Spectator in- troduces himself." "ADDISON'S WALK." In Magdalen College Grounds. School and College. Addison first attended schools near home ; then in Salisbury, where his father had received an appointment in the cathedral ; then in Lichfield, where his father had been made dean. At the age of fourteen he entered Charterhouse, and at the age of fifteen, Queen's College, Oxford. His work at Queen's brought him a scholarship at Magdalen, the college from which he was FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 161 graduated Master of Arts in 1693, and with which his name is inseparably connected. A beautiful shaded lane along the Cherwell, said to have been his favorite haunt, is now called " Addison's Walk." Elected a Fellow of Magdalen some years after graduation, he held the title for about fifteen years. A Travelling Fellowship and Its Outcome. Attracted by Addison's possibilities in the field of politics, the Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1699 presented the young man with a munificent travelling fellowship. He spent four years on the Continent; and soon after his return wrote a poem which, in the opinion of the ministry, doubtless demonstrated the wisdom of the investment. This poem was The Cam- paign, celebrating Marlborough's victory at Blenheim, and containing one notable passage beginning : " 'Twas then great Marlborough's mighty soul was proved." It brought the author some fame, and a comfortable, position under the government ; but it did not prove Addison a poet. Hymns and Plays. His connection with The Taller and The Spectator, and the consequent discovery of his power as an essayist, have been recorded. Besides his contributions to these and to several other journals, Addison wrote a number of hymns and some plays. Although we must deny him even much skill as a versifier, the hymn, " The spacious firmament on high,'' deserves to be remembered. Hardly as much can be said for any of his dramatic work, though his tragedy, Goto, had great success, chiefly because it was viewed as a political document supporting the Whig party. 162 ENGLISH LITERATURE Marriage. Addison held various political positions, rising, in 1717, to be Secretary of State. In 1716 he married the Countess (Dowager) of Warwick, who according to common tradition made him a far from ideal mate. At present one had better say that the evidence on this point seems entirely inconclusive. The Death Scene. 111 health forced him to resign his secre- taryship after a year; and a year after his resignation he died. Probably no historian or biographer would dare conclude a sketch of Addison without re- lating that on his death- bed he called in the wild young Earl of Warwick, and said to him : " See how a Christian can die." Most of those telling this incident seem to imply that it is a model scene for such occasions. One can appreciate Addison's value to his time as a moral force without subscribing fully to such a panegyric as Macaulay pronounced upon him ; and however highly one may regard his character, he was too truly a product of his age to be a model Christian. By mentioning the difficulty of considering the work of Steele and Addison separately we have not meant that the essays of the two are not really distinguishable. Outside of the periodicals there is, of course, no difficulty ; and only a few numbers of The Toiler and The Spectator are of doubtful authorship. ADDISON. FROM DRYDEX TO LYRICAL BALLADS 163 The De Coverley Papers. What is meant by the state- ment above may be indicated by noting the facts regarding the writing of the De Coverley Papers. Although Sir Roger or some member of his household is frequently referred to, the Baronet himself is really characterized in only twenty- five papers, of which Steele wrote eight and Addison seven- teen. On the basis of numbers Sir Roger seems to be Addison's. On the other hand, the character was conceived, as has been said, in Steele's brain. Furthermore : the first two pictures of the Worcestershire squire are from Steele ( The Spectator, numbers 2 and 6) ; not until number 34 did Addison find an interest in Sir Roger ; and the characteriza- tion would be very incomplete without Steele's essays on "Sir Roger in Love," '" The Family Portraits," and some others. "The Spectator" Modeled on "The Tatler." Without undervaluing The Tatler, we may say with reason that it formed an excellent training school for the writers of The Spectator. The effort to show striking differences between the journals, and to attribute these to the change in the domi- nating spirit, is not fruitful. The Spectator Club is much like the Trumpet Club (The Tatler, no. 132) in conception. The latter contains a knight, Sir Geoffrey Notch, and an army man, Major Matchlock; the former contains Sir Roger and Captain Sentry. " The Editor's Troubles " (The Tatler, no. 164) is virtually presented to us in improved form in "The Club Again" (The Spectator, no. 34). The story of the beautiful rivals, " Clarinda and Chloe " ( The Tatler, no. 94), is paralleled by " Brunetta and Phillis " (The Spectator, no. 80). "The Vision of Justice" (The Ta*ler, nos. 100, 102) is similar to " The Vision of Mirzah " (The Spectator, no. 159). 164 ENGLISH LITERATURE Pictures of London Life. The interest of both periodicals to-day comes from the presentation of the England, more particularly the London, of Queen Anne the social, political, moral, and aesthetic life of the time. Since the most distinc- tive institution of the time was the coffee-house, establish- ments of this class fill a large place in The Taller and The Spectator. An early issue of the latter (no. 49) is given wholly to discussion of coffee-houses ; and in both journals there is a pretence of dating the publication from some specific house. Influence of the Periodicals. The aim of the earlier paper, as stated in its " Advertisement," was " to offer something whereby [certain] worthy and well-affected members of the commonwealth may be instructed, after their reading, what to think ; " that is, its aim was moral. That of the later paper (set forth in no. 10) was " to enliven morality with wit, and to temper wit with morality." The influence of the two, particularly that of The Spectator, on the age is as noteworthy as is their picture of the age. This influence is universally attributed to Addison; and in the words of Mr. Gosse, " It was out of proportion with the mere outcome of his literary genius." Whether or not we to-day consider his last words as beautiful, they reflect what Addison was to his time. The influence of The Spectator in curbing, not merely open immorality, but the emptiness and little vices of everyday life, was great, and was due chiefly to the popular conception of the man who had most weight in fixing the character of its pages. ALEXANDER POPE, 1688-1744 Pope's Power. It is of profound significance that Pope's poetry influenced Lord Byron, a poet of revolt, more than half a century after Pope's death. Such an influence by a FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 165 man with frail body and without the aid of patronage argues real power; and the power is to be found in the perfected couplet of which we spoke at the beginning of this chapter. In the words of Arnold 1 the characteristic features of Pope's poetry are " regularity, uniformity, precision, balance ; " features likely at all times to carry weight. His skill in condensation is little short of marvelous said Swift : "In Pope I cannot read a line, But with a sigh I wish it mine ; When he can in one couplet fix More sense than I can do in six." Pope's Weakness. Yet the readers who to-day give Pope high rank as a poet are not numerous. We may admit the truth and force of "Words are like leaves; and where they most abound, Much fruit of sense beneath is seldom found;" or of "Order is heaven's first law; and this confessed, Some are, and must be, greater than the rest," and yet refuse the name of great poet to the writer of the lines. They are entirely typical of Pope's best; and they are almost entirely lacking in imagination and feeling. " There are no depths in Pope and there are no heights ; he has neither eye for the beauties of nature, nor ear for her harmonies." Disadvantages and their Result. Pope was born with two of the same disadvantages as Defoe humble birth and Nonconformity. His father was a linen-draper and a Roman Catholic; and the son, though he rose in the social scale, never wavered in his religious faith. He labored under a 1 Essay on Johnson's " Chief Lives of the Poets." 166 ENGLISH LITERATURE third disadvantage, already mentioned, a frail body. Thus there was closed to him every calling requiring physical strength ; and since Nonconformists were not then admitted to the universities, higher education was also beyond his reach. With these limitations he definitely set out for a career in the profession of let- ters, an uncommon thing at the time. Beginnings of Authorship. Before the publication of his Pastorals in 1709 Pope had be- gun to cultivate men of letters, and repeatedly endeavored to use their judgment in place of the university training he had missed. This first volume shows that the writer was already able to write smooth and effective verse. An Essay on Criticism (1711) established Pope's posi- tion with his contemporaries as a great poet. It does not aim to be original, but to be a setting forth in the best form of what the world had long known ; exemplifying a couplet in the poem : "True wit is nature to advantage dressed, What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed." "The Rape of the Lock." --In 1712 appeared the work by which Pope is most generally known outside of academic or literary circles, The Rape of the Lock. This mock-heroic poem attempted to restore friendly relations between a fashionable young lady and a young lord who had cut a lock of her hair. It shows some advance in versifying power, POPE. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 167 and the discovery by the author that fashionable society is a suitable subject for certain kinds of poetry. Pope's Homer. Three years after The Rape the first volume of a work appeared which proved to be a great financial success the translation of Homer's Iliad. A1-* though it was highly esteemed throughout the eighteenth and well into the nineteenth century, it is not a good trans- lation. A great scholar of the day said : " It is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you mustn't call it Homer." The supposed translator knew little Greek, and depended largely on the assistance of friends and on a comparison of previous transla- tions. The Iliad was completed in 1720; and five years later appeared the first volume of the Odyssey. No matter what merit it may possess as an English poem, it is equally with its predecessor an inaccurate and unsatisfactory rep- resentation of Homer. A single illustration will make this clear. Near the begin- ning of Book VI Pope has Nausicaa address Alcinous thus : "Will my dread sire his ear regardful deign, And may his child the royal car obtain? Say, with my garments shall I bend my way Where through the vales the mazy waters stray?" A nearly literal translation (Butcher and Lang's) runs as follows : "Father dear, couldst thou not lend me a high wagon with strong wheels, that I may take the goodly raiment to the river to wash, so much as I have lying soiled?" Twickenham. Since the publication of the first portions of the Iliad, Pope had been a wealthy man ; and a large portion of his wealth he expended on an estate at Twicken- ham, on the Thames a few miles above London. Here for twenty-five years he held court, and was visited by the great 168 ENGLISH LITERATURE of his day men and women, politicians and literary folk, English and French. His gardens were laid out after the French fashion, and were, like his poetry, models of "reg- ularity, uniformity, precision, balance." . "The Dunciad." Another work which involved great and continued labor, which was little suited to Pope's abili- ties, but which was financially a successful venture, appeared TWICKENHAM FERRY ON THE THAMES. Site of Pope's famous villa. in the same year as the Odyssey his edition of Shakspere. It cannot be said that Pope added greatly to our under- standing or appreciation of the great dramatist. His edition was, however, responsible for his most important work in his most effective field, The Dunciad, or " Epic of Dunces." l Lewis Theobald (Tibbald), the best Shakspere scholar of his day, published a volume pointing out Pope's numerous errors. Pope came back with his " epic," of which Theobald was the 1 Compare with Dryden's Mac Fleknoe, above, page 128. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 169 hero. Virtually every other writer who had in any way in- curred the satirist's displeasure and they were legion was also lashed in the poem, and it caught the public at once. So great was its success that it was considerably ex- tended in succeeding editions; and in one of these, Theo- bald, who had been sufficiently punished, yielded the place of hero to Colley Gibber, Poet Laureate, new offender of the " wicked wasp of Twickenham." Late Works. Two other works of Pope's should be mentioned which belong to his last years Imitations of Horace (commonly called Satires), and Essay on Man. In these we have the poet's best satire and his best verse. If one is not pleased by the little dashes of personal spite in the Satires, one can still find entertainment and food for thought in reading that Shakspere "For gain, not glory, wing'd his roving flight, And grew immortal in his own despite." The Satires are full of pleasant passages, of which the follow- ing is typical : "Of little use the man you may suppose Who says in verse what others say in prose ; Yet let me show, a poet's of some weight, And (tho' no soldier) useful to the state. What will a child learn sooner than a song? What better teach a foreigner the tongue ? What's long or short, each accent where to place, And speak in public with some sort of grace? I scarce can think him such a worthless thing, Unless he praise some monster of a king ; Or virtue, or religion, turn to sport, To please a lewd, or unbelieving Court." The Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot, or Prologue to the Satires, aside from unjust characterizations of Addison and other 170 ENGLISH LITERATURE contemporaries, presents an amusing picture of Pope's position. A literary power, he is sought by all, and the result is not agreeable : "Is there a parson much bemused in beer, A maudlin poetess, a rhyming peer, A clerk foredoom'd his father's soul to cross, Who pens a stanza, when he should engross ? Is there, who lock'd from ink and paper, scrawls With desp'rate charcoal round his darken'd walls? All fly to Twit'nam, and in humble strain Apply to me, to keep them mad or vain. Seized and tied down to judge, how wretched I Who can't be silent, and who will not lie." " Essay on Man." - The Essay on Man is perhaps Pope's most ambitious work. It is a long philosophical poem on the text. "Whatever is, is right;" and seeks, using a phrase very similar to Milton's, to "vindicate the ways of God to man." As a whole, it cannot be understood without some knowledge of a great religious controversy of its day; but like all Pope's works, it is full of clean-cut, polished, quotable couplets. "Oh blindness to the future! kindly giv'n, That each may fill the circle mark'd by Heaven." ******* "Know then this truth (enough for man to know) : ' Virtue alone is happiness below.'" It is in the perfected workmanship of detached passages that Pope's real merit is found. End of the " Long Disease." Pope's life was embittered by many quarrels, mostly, it would seem, provoked by him FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 171 and without sufficient cause. Much is still not clear regard- ing these ; and even if the worst aspect of them be true, they are somewhat pardonable. " This long disease " he called his life; and his day was hardly capable of producing a Stevenson to cope with lifelong infirmity. If, moreover, he made many enemies, he made many and true friends. During his last illness these friends were frequently at Twickenham, and had the satisfaction of seeing him face death peacefully and not unhappily. He died May 30, 1744, and was buried, according to his own wish, in Twick- enham Church. T-vy f<.y/t, merous portraits. though it raised Johnson S reputation immensely, it did not make him financially comfortable, for the reason that the large sum due him for his labor had been drawn in ad- vance of publication. The dictionary had many short- comings. It showed the author's prejudices (" oats, a grain which in England is given to horses, but in Scotland sup- ports the people ") ; it showed the compiler's fondness for high-sounding words (" network, anything reticulated or decussated at equal distances, with interstices between the intersections ") ; it showed the author's ignorance of the Teutonic languages, from which so much of the English V*~ Af FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 181 vocabulary is derived. It was, however, a great improve- ment over its predecessors ; and Johnson clearly deserves all the fame it brought him. Lord Chesterfield. A by-product of the dictionary is one of the most delightful things Johnson wrote a letter to Lord Chesterfield. When the work was first undertaken, John- son, on advice, sought this nobleman's patron- age. Discouraged in his advances, he desisted. Just before the work appeared, Chesterfield realized its importance, and wrote two advance notices commending the author. The latter would have none of his commendation, and ad- dressed to Chesterfield a note which for exqui- sitely polite and scath- ing satire has never been surpassed. " Is not a patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water, and when he has reached the ground en- cumbers him with help ? " So writes the " writer of dic- tionaries, a harmless drudge," l and signs himself " Your Lordship's most humble, most obedient servant." FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF SAMUEL JOHNSON. (New York Public Library.) 1 His definition of "lexicographer." 182 ENGLISH LITERATURE Johnson's edition of Shakspere and his Lives of the Poets appeared in 1765 and 1779-1781. The Lives, despite the critical bias already mentioned (see page 177), are valuable because of facts not elsewhere accessible, and because of the generally sane criticism of the greater poets dealt with. The Shakspere has no independent value, either for text or comment. " Rasselas." One other work, written somewhat earlier, may be noticed at this point. This is Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia, characterized above as a " didactic treatise in the form of a novel." In theme it resembles his Vanity of Human Wishes, stated thus at the close of Chapter XI of Rasselas : "Human life is everywhere a state in which much is to be endured and little to be enjoyed." The book as a whole is Johnson's answer to the boundless optimism of his day. The philosopher Imlac, whom one is often tempted to identify with Johnson, deals interestingly with many problems ; and curiously anticipates some, as, for example, the problem of artificial flight in Chapter VI. An incidental interest attaches to Rasselas from the fact that it was com- posed in the evenings of a single week, to defray the expenses of his mother's funeral. A Pensioner. After the publication of the dictionary Johnson's financial condition was never uncomfortable. It was further improved soon after the accession of George III by a pension of 300 a year. Since in his dictionary he had defined pension as "pay given to a state hireling for treason to his country," he was in many quarters condemned for accepting the gift. No stain, however, could possibly attach to his conduct; for he had been assured that the pension was in recognition of past services, and not in anti- cipation of future ones. One sentence in his letter of FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 183 acceptance to the Prime Minister, should put the situation beyond question : " You have conferred your favors on a man who has neither alliance nor interest, who has not merited them by services, nor courted them by officiousness ; you have spared him the shame of solicitation and the anxiety of suspense." Boswell and " The Club." - In the year following the granting of the pension James Boswell came into Johnson's life ; and in the year following this (1764) "The Club" was formed. This famous organi- zation included in its member- ship Johnson, Boswell, Gold- smith, Burke the statesman, Reynolds the painter, Garrick the actor, and other leaders in every important walk of Eng- lish life. The group were influ- ential in many ways for a quar- ter of a century, and Johnson was their leader to the day of his death. GARRICK. " Doctor " Johnson. Though universally known as " Doc- tor " Johnson, the title was not his until his fifty-sixth year, when Dublin University gave it to him. Oxford did the same ten years later. Tour of the Hebrides. The only other event of John- son's life calling for mention is a tour of the Hebrides, in company with Boswell, in 1773. Two years afterward he published an account of the tour under the title, A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland; not at all a guide-book, 184 . ENGLISH LITERATURE but a series of observations on a people and a civilization altogether new to him. Character and Personality. Johnson died in London, December 13, 1784, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. His character and personality are better and more widely known than those of any other English man of letters. Bos- well has told the whole story, sparing none, himself least of all. Johnson was blunt, rough, prejudiced, dictatorial, slovenly in dress and table manners, given to queer per- formances, like touching every lamp post as he went down town. He was, on the other hand, a stanch friend, a very wise as well as a learned man, devoutly religious, and con- siderate of those who needed his consideration. JAMES BOSWELL, 1740-1795 Johnson's biographer was born in Edinburgh, of a good family. Against his will he prepared for his father's profes- sion of law. During a tour on the Continent he sought and obtained a meeting with Paoli, the hero of Corsica, then struggling for its freedom. On his return he wrote an Ac- count of Corsica, sang the praises of the island, its people, and its leader; and according to his own story, was known in Edinburgh as " Paoli Boswell." Macaulay says " he was the laughing-stock of the whole of that brilliant society which has owed to him the greater part of its fame." Two Views of Boswell. Boswell was ever a seeker of notoriety, a worshipper of heroes ; and Macaulay makes much of this characteristic. " He was always laying himself at the feet of some eminent man, and begging to be spit and trampled upon." Carlyle, in an essay which is largely a reply to Macaulay's, points out that somehow Boswell never Towards Johnson, his FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 185 attached himself to an unworthy "eminent man." If noth- ing but vanity inspired Boswell, says Carlyle, " was Samuel Johnson the man of men to whom he must attach himself? " And again : " Boswell wrote a good book because he had a heart and an eye to discern wisdom, . . . because of his love and childlike open-mindedness. . . . feeling was . . . reverence, which is the highest of human feelings." The Life of Johnson appeared in 1791, and met with immediate suc- cess. The author enjoyed his fame but four years, dying at the compar- atively early age of fifty-five. Boswell' s Place in Literature. In a second passage dealing with Johnson and Boswell, 1 Carlyle ex- tends his praise of his fellow- countryman. " We will take the liberty," says he, " to deny alto- gether that saying of the witty Frenchman, that no man is a Hero to his valet. Or if so, it is not the Hero's blame, but the Valet's : that his soul, namely, is a mean valet-soul ! . . . The Valet does not know a Hero when he sees him ! Alas no : it requires a kind of Hero to do that. . . . On the whole, shall we not say, that Bos- well's admiration was well bestowed ? " Add to this not quite impartial estimate the fact that Johnson certainly valued Boswell's friendship greatly, and we have no need to make apologies for Boswell the man. He might be nick- named, after the manner of another friend of Johnson's BOSWELL. 1 Heroes and Hero Worship, "The Hero as Man of Letters." 186 ENGLISH LITERATURE (" Single-Speech " Hamilton), " Single-Book " Boswell, and yet be worthy of a higher place in the annals of literature than many men having numerous volumes to their credit. OLIVER GOLDSMITH, 1728-1774 Boswefl's Attitude toward Goldsmith. Two portraits of Goldsmith have been familiar for many years : Boswell's and that of other people. When Boswell is stating facts, we may accept them as such, though a recent biographer of Goldsmith 1 questions both Boswell's accuracy and his good faith. When, however, Johnson's worshipper ventures upon a judgment of Goldsmith, implicit confidence cannot be placed in his statements. He was extremely jealous of every one favored by his idol; and his envy of Goldsmith appears to have been as great as he thought Goldsmith's envy of Johnson was. Personality. Yet there is, in Boswell's estimate of Goldsmith, one word which seems the most adequate possible to characterize the man. It is the word " singular." Gold- smith was truly " singular " in appearance, dress, manage- ment (or mismanagement) of finances, manner of talking, and above all, in manner of writing. These singularities are given an unfavorable twist by Boswell ; but this has been more than counteracted by the favorable interpreta- tions of Washington Irving and many subsequent critics. The general estimate is well put in Irving's opening sentence : " There are few writers for whom the reader feels such per- sonal kindness as for Oliver Goldsmith, for few have so eminently possessed the magic gift of identifying themselves with their writings." To know Johnson one must go to 1 F. F. Moore (1911). FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 187 Boswell : to know Goldsmith, one need not add a line to the works bearing his own name. Birth and Schooling Irish. He was the fourth child of an Irish village preacher, and was born in an Irish vil- lage (name and location still in dispute), November 10, 1728. Of several schools and masters figuring in his early life, the only one to be remembered is Thomas (better known as " Paddy ") Byrne, a much-travelled retired soldier, who filled Oliver's head with stories and ballads of many lands. " Paddy " is immortalized in those lines of The Deserted Village, beginning: "Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way," of which perhaps the most famous line is : "For e'en though vanquished, he could argue still." In College in Ireland. The family finances did not permit of Oliver's attending college; but through the aid of an uncle, Rev. Mr. Contarine, he was admitted to Trinity College, Dublin, in 1744. One of the stories told of his col- lege days indicates why we feel for him the " personal kind- ness " mentioned by Irving. A friend who called for him on the way to breakfast one day found Goldsmith unable to rise. The night before he had given his blankets to a poor woman, had crawled into the bed-ticking for warmth, and in the morning found difficulty in freeing himself. This was not the only occasion with Goldsmith when, as did the parson in his Deserted Village, "His pity gave ere charity began." The Ministry ; Law ; Medicine. After graduation from college he was persuaded to prepare for the ministry, but was refused when he applied to the bishop to be ordained. Uncle Contarine then advised him to study law, and sup- 188 ENGLISH LITERATURE plied funds for the purpose. By some misadventure he lost his money before reaching London, and returned home. Some months later Uncle Contarine, hearing an esteemed friend say that Oliver would make a good doctor, again found funds to send the boy to Edinburgh. Having failed to make connection with the church and the bar, Goldsmith was now to try the last of the " learned professions." FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF GOLDSMITH.' (New York Public Library.) /Travel on the Continent. After a year and a half in Edinburgh, he decided that it would be better to continue his medical studies on the Continent, and wrote his generous uncle to that effect. The uncle again filled his purse, and Goldsmith spent a year in travel, returning to England with (according to his own unsupported assertion) a medical de- gree. It is very generally believed that the travels of George Primrose, in Chapter XX of The Vicar of Wakcfield, repre- sent not inaccurately the author's own experiences. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 189 First Literary Associations. Mr. Contarine was dead when Goldsmith reached England, and no other of his kin would help him in any way. Somehow he got to London, and for a time was hard pushed to keep soul and body to- gether. While practising medicine on a very small scale, he became acquainted with the novelist-printer, Samuel Richardson, and through Richardson with other literary men. After various bits of hackwork for the publishers, GOLDSMITH AND JOHNSON. Examining the MS. of The Vicar, to decide whether it will sell and get Goldsmith out of debt. Goldsmith's first work under his own name, Inquiry into the Present State of Polite Learning in Europe, appeared in 1759. Two years later he met Johnson, through whose aid he rapidly enlarged his circle of literary friends, and became one of the original members of " The Club." " The Vicar of Wakefield." Probably the most familiar and the. most interesting incident connecting Johnson and Goldsmith is that of the discovery of The Vicar. Receiving 190 ENGLISH LITERATURE one morning an urgent call from his young friend, Johnson went to his rooms and found him under arrest for non-pay- ment of rent. The manuscript of The Vicar of Wakeficld was produced as a possible asset, Johnson saw its merit at a glance, and succeeded in selling it for sixty pounds. The Vicar was not published, however, until the poem called The Traveller had made the author's fame secure. Last Years. Goldsmith lived but ten years after the publication of The Traveller, dying at the age of forty-six. They were busy years ; they were well-paid years ; they brought many happy experiences to Goldsmith ; but they were not peaceful, contented years. Still like the preacher in his Deserted Village, he was "More skilled to raise the wretched than to rise." Of Goldsmith it might also be said : "The long-remembered beggar was his guest. ****** Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow, And quite forgot their vices in their woe. ****** Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, And e'en his failings leaned to virtue's side." If he had a guinea in his pocket, and was solicited by an apparently deserving person, he was likely to give the whole, though it left him without provision for his next meal. After his death, we are told, the stairway to his lodging was filled with weeping poor folk whom he had befriended. Five Chief Works. Goldsmith's fame as a man of let- ters rests on five works written in the last decadje of his life. Three of these have been mentioned a novel, The FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 191 Vicar of Wakefield, and two poems, The Traveller and The Deserted Village. The other two works are plays, The Good-Natured Man, and She Stoops to Conquer. Of two of these, The Vicar and The Deserted Village, something has been said to bear out living's remark about his iden- tifying himself with his writings. The schoolmaster in The Deserted Village is largely a portrait of "Paddy" Byrne ; the preacher is apparently a composite of Goldsmith's father, brother, Uncle Contarine, and a touch of himself. Many features of the village itself have caused it to be iden- tified with Lissoy, where the author spent his childhood. George Primrose, in various chapters of The Vicar, bears a strong resemblance to his creator ; and the Vicar himself, Dr. Primrose, had an original similar to that of the village preacher. In The Traveller; or, A Prospect of Society, and in She Stoops to Conquer; or, The Mistakes of a Night, Goldsmith drew directly on his own experiences. The former describes in verse the scenes viewed by him on his European tour, and sets forth the sentiments and philosophic speculations aroused by them. The latter pictures a practical joke played upon him in his youth, when he was sent to a private home under the impression that it was an inn, and conducted him- self with the freedom proper to the supposed situation. Goldsmith the " Lovable." While the stairway to Gold- smith's death chamber was crowded with poor friends whom he had helped, creditors were estimating the value of his scanty possessions. Though for many years well paid, he was always in debt. Not only did he give unwisely; he spent unwisely and extravagantly upon himself, lived in better quarters and wore better clothes than he could af- ford. It is recorded of the tradesmen, however, that they 192 ENGLISH LITERATURE showed no hard feelings toward him, and that nearly all ex- pressed belief in his honesty and integrity. Two sisters to whom he was indebted, on hearing of his financial troubles, said : " Sooner persuade him to let us work for him gratis than apply to any other; we are sure he will pay us when he can." GOLDSMITH'S GRAVE. In. the Middle Temple, London. "Let not his frailties be remembered," said Johnson; " he was a very great man." To this it should be added that probably no other English author is so often described as lovable. EDMUND BURKE, 1729-1797 A Contrast with Goldsmith. There could scarcely be found a greater contrast between personalities than between Goldsmith and Burke. No one thinks of calling Burke " lovable ; " his " frailties " are not apparent ; while there FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 193 may have been grief at his death, there was very little sor- row such as affected Goldsmith's wide acquaintance so deeply. " That fellow calls forth all my powers," said Johnson ; and it was nearly always Burke's intellect that impressed people. Burke, like Goldsmith, was an Irishman by birth and edu- cation; like Goldsmith, too, he belonged to the circle of Johnson's intimates included in the original membership of "The Club." He was most not- ably unlike his fellow-country- man in his handling of money: he was not conspicuous as a giver, and he acquired a large estate, which he kept up in elaborate style. So strongly did he impress his age that shortly after his death a great statesman said : " There is but one event, but that is an event for the world Burke is dead." BURKE. After a portrait by Romney. Public Career. From his thirtieth year Burke was in public life, as secretary to cabinet ministers, member of Parliament, prosecutor of Warren Hastings, and Paymaster of Forces. In his public career he was occupied with three great questions : troubles with America, British misgovern- ment in India, and the French Revolution. After champion- ing the cause of liberty on the first two, he seemed to many to be a turncoat on the third. But the truth is, that he was disheartened by the excesses of the Reign of Terror, and did not understand the real nature of the Revolution. Those who could see beneath the surface of that fearful upheaval 194 ENGLISH LITERATURE comprehended clearly its causes and aims as almost identical with those of America. Had Burke so understood it, he would beyond a doubt have arrayed himself on the side of the people. Burke and America. Burke's conduct regarding America must ever be the brightest chapter in his life. The fact that the main basis of his appeal for the colonies was not legal right, but expediency, does not in the least dim its lustre. In the speech On Conciliation he eloquently set forth why the American colonists were jealous of their rights as English- men; why, in the light of similar cases, they naturally ex- pected conciliation ; and why, in the very nature of the case, they must triumph. In addition to his speeches on America, Burke dealt with the subject in one notable document, Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol (1777), the constituency which he was representing in Parliament. Here, without the heat of debate, and with a careful marshalling of facts and reason- ing, he reaches the conclusion as to the war with America, that " its continuance, or its ending in any way but that of an honourable and liberal accommodation," are " the greatest evils which can befall us." A Great Intellect. Just as it was Burke's intellect that impressed those who knew him in the flesh, so it is with those who know him only in the printed page. Perhaps the high- est compliment ever paid him is one often quoted from the pen of John Morley. Speaking of the three pieces on the American Revolution (speeches On Taxation and On Con- ciliation, and Letter to the Sheriffs) Morley says : " It is no exaggeration to say that they compose the most perfect manual in our literature, or in any literature, for one who approaches the study of public questions, whether for knowledge or for practice." FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 195 Having followed Johnson and his circle of prose masters through, we must turn back in time and study some poets who did not belong to the " School of Pope." Thomson, the forerunner of Romanticism, was not an isolated figure. Other poets were inwardly rebelling against the domination of the polished couplet, the satiric muse, and the pictures in verse of London society. Three of these stand out prom- inently Collins, Gray, and Cowper. FACSIMILE OF BURKE'S AUTOGRAPH. (New York Public Library.) WILLIAM COLLINS, 1721-1759 Life through College. Of Collins's short and by no means happy life, few facts are known. He was born in Chichester, county of Sussex, near the end of the year 1721 ; tradition says on Christmas Day. At Winchester for seven years he prepared for Oxford, and entered Queen's College at the age of nineteen. The next year he moved to Magdalen, and was graduated from that college two years later. Virtually nothing is known of his college days, or of his reasons for leaving the university without even applying for a fellow- ship. Later Life, and Death. From 1743 to 1749 he lived in London, and wrote most of his best poetry. He made the acquaintance of Johnson and some of his associates, and as 196 ENGLISH LITERATURE has been noted, that of James Thomson. Toward the end of his London period Collins took lodgings in Richmond, and became intimate with Thomson, upon whose death he wrote the fine ode, beginning " In yonder grave a druid lies." In 1749 the poet inherited a comfortable fortune from an uncle, and in the same year returned to his native town to live. Not long afterwards he became the victim of melan- cholia, which developed into insanity, necessitating his confinement for a time and bringing about his death in Chichester in his thirty-eighth year. In Spirit a Romanticist. The volume of Collins's poetry is small, less than 2000 lines ; and even this small product is not uniformly excellent. Five poems belong almost in the first rank : How Sleep the Brave, Ode to Evening, The Pas- sions, On the Death of Thomson, and An Ode on the Popular Superstitions of the Highlands of Scotland. The mere titles indicate his lack of sympathy with the poetic standards of his day. His importance in the Romantic movement arises from his interest in natural scenes and in subjects remote in place or time, and from the subjective character of his whole product. THOMAS GRAY, 1716-1771 Gray's life was almost as uneventful as was Collins's. He was a lonely scholar; and from 1734 till his death, with the exception of two years spent on the Continent and two years in London while studying manuscripts in the British Museum, he lived a recluse in Cambridge. Basis of Gray's Popular Fame. Although he was born in London and spent most of his life in the university town, FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 197 Gray's name is inseparably connected with a spot quite re- moved from both these places Stoke Poges Churchyard, near Windsor and Eton. In the minds of most English readers, Gray stands out as the author of Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, and only that. Besides this, he wrote STOKE POGES. Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College, containing the proverbial lines : "Where ignorance is bliss, 'Tis folly to be wise." Add to these two other titles, The Progress of Poesy, and The Bard, with the familiar opening lines of the latter, "Ruin seize thee, ruthless King! Confusion on thy banners wait,". 198 ENGLISH LITERATURE and we have practically all that is known of Gray even among the well educated. Historical Importance. More should be known of him if we are to recognize his historical importance. Utterly out of sympathy with conventional verse, he sought and found inspiration in the literatures of the past. The Bard and The Progress of Poesy are said to be the best Pindaric odes ever written; and even a glance at one of these will show the author's met- rical skill. The Progress of Poesy is in three stanzas, each containing forty-one lines ; each stanza is in three parts strophe, antistrophe, and epode as in the odes of Pindar; and the three strophes are identical in construction, as are the GRAY IN SILHOUETTE. ,, ,. , three antistrophes, and the three epodes. Such learning as Gray's had not expressed itself in verse since Milton. Later he became interested in old Scandinavian literature, under the influence of which he wrote The Fatal Sisters and The Descent of Odin. Study of early English poetry and of Celtic also influenced his writing. Greatness of the " Elegy." - The Elegy calls for notice in valuing Gray both historically and intrinsically. It is the greatest of a number of poems of the time striking the note of melancholy, and its popularity is well attested by the number of phrases it has given to proverbial speech : " mute inglorious Milton," " village Hampden," " the short and simple annals of the poor," " the noiseless tenor of their way." Even whole stanzas are all but universally remem- bered, such as : *w - FACSIMILE OF GRAY'S MS. OF THE A remarkably clear and even hand. (British Museum.) 200 ENGLISH LITERATURE "Full many a gem of purest ray serene, The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear : Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air." A Classic. Despite his small poetic output Gray's position as a classic is established. Arnold says he is the poetical classic of the eighteenth century; many regard him as the greatest English poet between Milton and Words- worth ; and virtually all allow him the preeminence between Pope and Wordsworth. WILLIAM COWPER, 1731-1800 Characteristics of Cowper's Verse. The last of the fore- runners of Romanticism to be considered here is William Cowper. One critic says that he was " not romantic in any sense ; " another, that " he stands, so to speak, at the parting of the ways : half a disciple of the old order, half, indeed more than half, a standard bearer of the new." The tendency of his longest poem, as stated by Cowper, " to dis- courage the modern enthusiasm after a London life and to recommend rural ease and leisure as friendly to the cause of piety and virtue," certainly marks a clear separation from the tradition of Pope. His love of nature, moreover, and his many descriptive passages ; his almost uniform sincerity of expression; his humor; these characteristics seem to make clear that he was not only separated from the old, but closely allied with the new. It would require little effort to make a lengthy chronicle of Cowper's life ; but his poetry may be understood and enjoyed with few facts of his life as a background. Many events may be omitted as without significance, and many of slight significance may be passed briefly. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 201 Schooling. He was born at Great Berkhamstead, Hert- fordshire, about thirty miles northwest of London ; and though portions of his life were spent in half a dozen different places, he never travelled more than fifty miles from London. At one school which he attended he suffered greatly from the school bully, an experience to which may be due in some measure the emphasizing of his sensitive nature and of his ten- dency to melancholy. He did not attend any university ; and, though he studied law in Lon- don and was called to the bar, he never practised. A Troubled Life. For a time he lived the life of a London so- ciety man, to which he was drawn by love for a cousin. The affair was summarily stopped by her father. About this time Cowper was nominated for a lucrative clerical position in the COWPER. House of Lords ; but the dread of a public examination overwhelmed him, and brooding over it led to an attack of insanity. After a period of confinement he was released as cured; but he was there- after almost always a victim of religious melancholy. In 1765 he took up his residence with a family of Unwins, first in Huntingdon, later in Olney. Mr. Unwin died in 1767, and Cowper made his home with the widow until her death in 1796. The record of their friendship is a beautiful and spotless one. He nursed her through her last illness ; and after her death seemed unable to triumph 202 ENGLISH LITERATURE over his recurring ailment, dying himself less than four years after her. Letter-writer and Hymn- writer. A word should be said of Cowper as a letter-writer and a hymn-writer. In the first field he is unsurpassed, not a few saying that his letters entitle him to be ranked among great English prose writers. His hymns, although they can scarcely be called *S &*&-*-lS- <=W-y^ tt>T-t-^- CB?" /*- edl*- *./)_*-. FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF COWPEB. (New York Public Library.) great poems, have an assured place with all sects, particu- larly " There is a fountain filled with blood," " Oh for a closer walk with God," " God moves in a mysterious way." These served the useful purpose of showing Cowper that in poetic composition he could escape from his pursuing melancholy. Lady Austen. Besides Mrs. Unwin, another woman is important in Cowper's life Lady Austen, whom he met in 1781. From her he heard the story which he versified so delightfully as The Diverting History of John Gilpin FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 203 "John Gilpin was a citizen Of credit and renown, A train-band captain eke was he Of famous London town." From her also he got the start on his most ambitious poem, The Task, the one composition on which Cowper's fame as a poet almost wholly rests. When he asked a subject for a blank-verse poem, Lady Austen replied : " You can write on anything take the sofa." So The Task begins : "I sing the Sofa. I who lately sang Truth, Hope, and Charity, and touched with awe The solemn chords, and with a trembling hand Escaped with pain from that adventurous flight, Now seek repose upon an humble theme ; The theme though humble, yet august and proud The occasion for the Fair commands the song." " The Task." Even if it is admitted that The Task has, as Cowper asserts, one " tendency," it cannot be admitted that it has unity. It is perhaps best known by its descrip- tive passages, such as : "A cottage, whither oft we since repair : 'Tis perched upon the green hill-top, but close Environed with a ring of branching elms That overhang the hatch, itself unseen, Peeps at the vale below." There is, however, much reflection, meditation, speculation ; and there are occasional bits of humor. Cowper in many places suggests the sort of conventional phraseology established by Pope ; for example, in speaking of Lady Austen regularly as "the Fair," of balloon ascensions as " aethereal journeys," of sheep as the " fleecy tenants " of the sheepfold. In this respect he may be said to be look- ing backward. In his descriptive, humorous, and reflective 204 ENGLISH LITERATURE passages, however, he is clearly looking forward and holds an important place among the Romantic predecessors of Wordsworth. ROBERT BURNS, 1759-1796 Burns a Romanticist. If we judge by the character of his poetry, Burns surely does not belong among the follow- ers of Pope. The heroic couplet finds small place in Burns's verse, though nearly every familiar metre is there represented, and though there are not a few metres of his own. There is no extended satire in Burns ; there is nothing of fashionable city life. If we class poets as Romanticists, as some are inclined to, only when their Romanti- cism is a deliberate choice, Burns is not among them. Whether, with Pope's knowledge of the foibles and frivolities of society, and with Pope's tendency to make enemies and then punish them, Burns would still have written about mice and daisies and village inns and " cronies " and gentle streams, is a question. It is certain that he had not the equipment to deal with such subjects as Pope dealt with. In effect and influence he is undoubtedly of the school of Wordsworth, Coleridge, and the rest of that glorious company who gave such distinction to the next age. "BOBBY" BURNS. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 205 As regards the man himself, it must be admitted that there are dark moments in Burns 's life, for which he himself was chiefly responsible ; but nothing is gained by dwelling upon them, either for extenuation or apology. The only reason- able ground for studying a poet's life is as a means to a better understanding of his poetry. THE BURNS COTTAGE AT AYR. Scotland's best-loved shrine. A Shrine in Ayrshire. Little did William Burns imagine, when he built a two-room clay cottage near Ayr, in south- western Scotland, that the building would some day be set apart as a shrine. That such a thing has happened is due solely to the fact that his first child, Robert, was born there. The father's fame is secure in the lines of The Cotter's Sat- urday Night "The priest-like father reads the sacred page," as is that of the household of which he, " the toil-worn cot- ter," was head. 206 ENGLISH LITERATURE A Hard Life for a Poet. There were six children besides Robert, and the family went through a continuous struggle for existence in several different locations in Ayrshire. Having to do farm-work enough for a man, Robert got little education. When the father died in 1784, Robert and a brother undertook to run a hundred-acre farm at Mossgiel, but failed in two years " the first year," according to the poet, " from unfortunately buying bad seed ; the second, INTERIOR OF BURNS'S BIRTHPLACE AT AYR. from a late harvest." During these two trying years Burns composed much, admittedly under the influence of two Scotch poets, Allan Ramsay and Robert Ferguson. Among the famous poems belonging to the Mossgiel period are To a Mouse, To a Mountain Daisy, and The Cotter's Saturday Night. First Publication. The publication of Burns's first vol- ume, at Kilmarnock, 1786, was to procure money for a busi- ness venture. The poet, finding farming unremunerative, FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 207 "-t //'.:" -. \" r ^' '' V_aV^vf<> v< ' '*, , \ ~\ \r f/f\tsv / f : "-V.^.i / A - / //, (f,', ,1 : ^ ;' KVU >> ' ^,^',vt-- ^my.^^- 5 ^v, '- ' v/>< " ' //i / . < ' ' ' .- ' ' ^ ' , .' , - ' ' '> ' / - ; FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF BURNS. (New York Public Library.) 208 ENGLISH LITERATURE and supposing that poetry would scarcely give a living, agreed to go to Jamaica in the capacity of bookkeeper on a plantation. In order to pay for his transportation he published, at the suggestion of a friend, a number of poems lying in his table drawer. The enthusiasm with which the Kilmarnock volume was received in all directions promptly put an end to the Jamaica scheme. The "Ayrshire Plough- man," as he now came to be called, went to Edinburgh in- stead. Winter in Edinburgh. " The journey from Mossgiel to Edinburgh," says Principal Shairp, " was a sort of triumphal progress." The feasting and enthusiasm on the way were, moreover, merely a foretaste of what the whole winter in Edinburgh was to be. All classes welcomed him to their homes and hearts ; in one sense better still, all subscribed liberally to the second edition of his poems, published in April, 1787, " for the sole benefit of the author." From this edition Burns received 500, a huge fortune for one of his experience. Farewell to Greatness in Edinburgh. After travelling in various parts of Scotland, and visiting Ayrshire, Burns returned to Edinburgh. But his second winter there was not to be a duplicate of the first. Though he had been pro- .claimed on all sides a brilliant conversationalist and a satis- factory guest, the novelty of the ploughman poet had worn off, and the best of Edinburgh's intellectual and social life was weary of its " lion." Burns was, moreover, very proud, and acted as if the adulation of Edinburgh was only his due. He once wrote to a friend : "I am as proud as ever ; and when I am laid in my grave, I wish to be stretched at my full length, that I may occupy every inch of ground which I have a right to." In March, 1788, he left Edinburgh, and FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 209 never again paid it a lengthy visit or thought of it in terms of affection. Farmer and Exciseman. Returning to Ayrshire and marrying Jean Armour, the sweetheart of his youth, he leased a farm at Ellisland, near Dumfries, some forty miles from Ayr. When the farm scarcely provided a living, Burns sought and obtained a position as exciseman, paying SCENE OF THE FATEFUL MEETING OF TAM AND SOUTER JOHNIE. 50 a year. It was not a fortunate appointment for Burns. A fondness for alcohol was one of his chief weaknesses, and as exciseman he had to be away from home a great deal, and to come in contact with alcohol far too much for his welfare. Excise and farming were not congenial, and Burns had been spoiled for farming by that first winter in the Scotch capital. After three years at Ellisland, he gave up the lease, sold farm-stock and equipment, and took up residence in the town of Dumfries. 210 ENGLISH LITERATURE To the Ellisland period belong the rollicking Tarn O'Shanter and many short and beautiful songs, including Flow Gently, Sweet A/ton, and Ye Banks and Braes o' Bonny Doon. Early Death. The last years are best passed over briefly. In June, 1794, Burns wrote to a friend: " I am afraid that I am about to suffer for the follies of my youth." While TAM O'SHANTER CROSSING THE BRIDGE OF AYR. The witch is seen just seizing the gray mare's tail. From an old print. some biographers have doubtless painted too darkly the closing period, the best possible even for a friend to say is that " the untimely end of Burns was, it is far too probable, hastened by his own intemperance and imprudence." l He was never in good health after the letter just quoted; and two years later, July 21, he passed away. " His true life," said Lord Rosebery, " began with his death ; with the 1 Lockhart, Life of Scott. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 211 body passed all that was gross and impure ; the clear spirit stood revealed, and soared at once to its accepted place among the fixed stars in the firmament of the rare immortals." To this may fitly be added these lines from William Watson's tribute, The Tomb of Burns: "His greatness, not his littleness, Concerns mankind." "ALLOWAY'S AULD HAUXTED KIRK." Where Tarn O'Shanter met the witches. Poet of Man. Burns is often spoken of as a great poet of nature; but there is little pure description in his work, and that little is not for itself alone. Nature is merely a background from which stands out humanity in some guise. The mountain daisy, which he addresses affectionately as "Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow'r," turns out to be of interest to him only as symbolic of an " artless maid " or a " simple bard." His apparent deep sympathy for a mouse, whose nest he turned up with a plough, 212 ENGLISH LITERATURE becomes an effective illustration that the same thing happens to men : "The best laid schemes o' mice and men Gang aft agley." He does, it is true, assert that "The muse, nae poet ever fand her, Till by himsel' he learned to wander Adown some trottin' burn's meander And no think lang ; " 1 but what we find in Burns of charming descriptive passages is always incidental man is his subject. Poet of the Brotherhood of Man. While this interest in man has a Scotch setting, it is much broader in its reach. It takes in all mankind, as is clearly shown by the poem which, in sentiment at least, is his climax : "For a' that, an' a' that, It's coming yet, for a' that, That man to man, the warld o'er, Shall brothers be for a' that." Burns's Songs. But Burns's most enduring claim on the world's gratitude is his songs love songs, drinking songs, patriotic songs, as well as songs touching upon natural scenes, and songs proclaiming the brotherhood of man. Most readers respond to "Plow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes " and to "Should auld acquaintance be forgot." Most are thrilled by "Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled." 1 "And not think the time heavy." FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 213 Despite the recollection that " brews " of many kinds brought the singer's downfall, few are not appealed to by such songs as "O, Willie brew'd a peck o' maut, An' Rob an' Allan cam to see." The list of his songs that might be called world favorites is large. THE BURNS MAUSOLEUM AT DUMFRIES. " Of all our poets, lyric and idyllic," says a noted American poet and critic, Edmund Clarence Stedman, " he is most nature's darling; his pictures were life; his voice was free- dom; his heart was strength and tenderness." THE RISE OF THE NOVEL Although two works of the Elizabethan Age Sidney's Arcadia and Lyly's Euphues may in a loose sense be called novels; and although Robinson Crusoe and Gulliver's Travels even more nearly approach the modern conception of 214 ENGLISH LITERATURE this type of literature, the defining of the type was yet to be done. It was done about the middle of the eighteenth cen- tury by four men already named ; Samuel Richardson (1689- 1761), Henry Fielding (1707-1754), Tobias George Smollett (1721-1771), and Laurence Sterne (1713-1768). Novel and Romance. The possibilities of the Crusoe and Gulliver kind of story are rather limited. The entire interest is centred in the ' action ; incident, adventure, is all-important; character-drawing is not even attempted, and every figure in both stories appeals to us not at all for what he is, but solely for what he does. Richardson dis- covered the much larger field, the novel of character. Be- tween these tWo types a line is usually drawn by designating Defoe's the romance, and Richardson's the novel. To set forth fully the distinctive features of each would require more space than would be appropriate here. We will, there- fore, content ourselves with Professor Cross's brief definitions : " That prose-fiction which deals realistically with actual life is called preeminently the novel. That prose-fiction which deals with life in a false or fantastic manner, or represents it in the set- ting of strange, improbable, or impossible adventures, or idealizes the virtues and the vices of human nature, is called romance." 1 Richardson's Works. Richardson was a London printer who got into literature quite by accident. Early in life he had been employed by some unlettered young women to write love-letters for them ; and when later in life a publish- ing firm discovered his gift, they suggested that he write a volume of letters to serve as models for the uneducated. The idea came to Richardson that the letters would gain in interest if connected by a thread of story ; and acting on this 1 The Development of the English Novel, page xv. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 215 idea he published at the age of fifty-one Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded, a realistic story told in letters. Pamela Andrews is a lady's maid who is persecuted by the lady's son ; in the end he reforms, and becomes a model husband to Pamela. In the correspondence the characters express themselves entirely without restraint, and thus seemed wonderfully real to readers of the day. Eight years after Pamela came Clarissa Harlowe. The heroine is of higher rank than Pamela ; and instead of reforming the libertine hero, Lovelace, she becomes his victim and dies of a broken heart. Despite the pleas of sentimental readers, communicated to the author during the publication of the story in serial form, he refused to convert the brilliant but soulless Lovelace, and allowed him to die in a duel with a defender of Clarissa's name. In his last novel, Sir Charles Grandison, Richardson aimed to portray a fashionable gentleman possessed of every virtue, who is in the end happily mated to a young woman of correspond- ing perfection. Richardson's Influence. All of these novels suffer from length, from an excess of moral purpose, and from too much fine-spun sentimentalism. In the analysis and portrayal of character, however, and as a general thing, in the logical sequence of incidents, they must be regarded as fixing the type of novel in which George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, and George Meredith in the following century used their great talents with such marked success. Fielding's Works. Henry Fielding, after a prosperous career as playwright, and a short and uncertain one as lawyer, entered the field of the novel to satirize Richardson. Joseph Andrews, published two years after Pamela, has for its hero the brother of Richardson's heroine, possessed, as is his 216 ENGLISH LITERATURE sister, of inordinate virtue, which successfully repels the advances of an immoral suitor. Fielding, once interested in his story, forgot his purpose in beginning it, burlesqued various kinds of writing, ancient and modern, and created in Parson Adams a figure ranking high among the characters of fiction. Fielding wrote three other novels: Jonathan Wild, the story of an utterly depraved criminal ; Amelia, a social satire dealing with the shady side of London life and the inadequacy of English criminal laws ; and Tom Jones : the History of a Foundling, written on a large scale, and equally great on the side of plot, character, and philosophy of life set forth by the author in his own person. " Tom Jones : " Plot and Method. Coleridge once said that the three greatest plots he knew were ^Eschylus's (Edipus Tyrannus, Ben Jon- son's The Alchemist, and Field- ing's Tom Jones. Great as is Tom Jones on the side of plot, a fact which cannot be ade- quately set forth in small space, it is even more remarkable considered from other points of view. To each " book," or main division of the novel, there is an introductory chapter, which is, in Thackeray's words, " a sort of confidential talk between writer and reader." Here Fielding discusses in the first person and at considerable length his methods and aims, a procedure followed with great success regularly by his pro- FlELDING. FROM DRYDEN TO LYRICAL BALLADS 217 fessed disciple Thackeray, and occasionally by George Eliot. 1 Influence of Fielding's Character-drawing. Another respect in which Tom Jones is remarkable is the fulness and faithfulness with which the hero is presented. The " un- varnished truthfulness " of the picture did not prove alto- gether acceptable to the next generation ; and Thackeray in the preface to Pendennis (1850) says : " Since the author of Tom Jones was buried, no writer of fiction among us has been permitted to depict to his utmost power a MAN." Fielding's example, however, in throwing aside conventional modes of characterization, and presenting a hero just as he would have been and acted in real life, was of immense value to the master-writers of fiction of the next century. Smollett. Of Smollett and Sterne not so much need be said. The former admitted his indebtedness to Spanish and French models, wrote several " picaresque " 2 novels in each of which the hero is a clever rascal, and the incidents are told with savage realism. A second point to be observed in Smollett is that in his three best novels, Roderick Random, Peregrine Pickle, and Humphrey Clinker, he introduced a new interest in fiction the sea, drawing at length on five years' experience as a surgeon's mate. Defoe had laid scenes on an imaginary sea: Smollett laid them on a real sea, and brought real English seamen into the action. Still another notable feature of Smollett's works is his charac- terization by peculiarities of speech or manner, a method familiar in the work of his most famous disciple, Charles Dickens. 1 See, e.g., Adam Bede, Chap. XVII. 2 Word derived from Spanish picaro, rogue. 218 ENGLISH LITERATURE Sterne. Sterne's two fictions, Tristram Shandy and A Sentimental Journey, are marred by an excess of sentimen- tality. He was notoriously and purposely careless of form. What he contributed to the English novel was some admir- able character-drawing, including one figure Tristram's Uncle Toby universally admitted to be unsurpassed in eighteenth-century fiction. " As the author of Tristram Shandy, he remains," says Sidney Lee, " a delineator of the comedy of human life before whom only three or four humor- ous writers can justly claim precedence." Admitting the truth of even this encomium, we cannot place a writer so regardless of form as was Sterne on a plane with his great contemporaries, Richardson and Fielding. Other Novelists before 1800. The popularity of the new literary type produced a host of novelists between 1750 and 1800. New sub-types arose. In the so-called " Gothic romance," of which Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto and Mrs. Ann Radcliffe's The Mysteries of Udolpho are the best representatives, emphasis is laid on the supernatural and the terrible. There was the " novel of purpose," of which Johnson's Rasselas and Thomas Day's Sandford and Merton are excellent examples. Then there was Goldsmith's Vicar, a charming volume, in which, probably for the first time in English literature, an author used experiences of his own as material for fiction. None of these added anything of value in the defining of the type, which, as has been said, was due to Richardson, Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne. CHAPTER VIII FROM THE PUBLICATION OF THE LYRICAL BALLADS TO THE DEATH OF RUSKIN (1798-1900) Two Divisions of the Century. English literature of the nineteenth century, like that of the eighteenth, falls into two plainly marked divisions. In the first, usually regarded as ending about the time of Scott's death (1832), the tendencies already mentioned as present to some extent in the verse of Thomson, Gray, and a few others, found their full expres- sion. In the second, though this initiative was not lost, the growth of the modern scientific spirit affected every form of expression, gave a new direction to the forces of the preceding period, and brought many new ones into exist- ence. No one person dominates either portion of nineteenth- century literature ; no figure stands out with sufficient promi- nence to give his name to the period. The time from 1798 to 1832 is known as the Age of Romanticism ; that from 1832 to the end of the century, since it nearly coincides with the reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901), is called the Victorian Age. THE AGE OF ROMANTICISM Difficulty of Definition. Now that, after several hints of the " Romantic " movement, we have arrived at the neces- sity of a definition, we face a great difficulty. To charac- 219 220 ENGLISH LITERATURE S O> O Tf L, A 3ST^ D J * J .S 1 fat >,, ._. -RLAND JSjrZKfi^if '*'f-. .': > ' \ei>^'|' \V , /> CWnist THE ENGLISH LAKE DISTRICT MAP OF THE LAKE DISTRICT. This region might almost be termed the "headquarters" of the Romantic movement. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 221 terize in a few paragraphs a group of writers of whom nearly every one was a law unto himself, is not an easy task. A careful reading of many volumes is necessary to get a satis- factory definition of Romanticism. While, therefore, we cannot hope to define the term here, we can at least set down some of the features marking the period, enough, perhaps, to show the student what he may expect in the writers of the time. Two Characteristics. From the diverse tendencies and productions of the early nineteenth century, two character- istics stand out as applicable to all : individualism, and a revolt against tradition and authority. The heroic couplet, for example, ceased to be the universal metre, not because it was in itself bad, but because for many kinds of expression it was unsuitable. The dignified but heavy style of John- son ceased to be the standard prose style, not because it had no merit, but because writers refused longer to be influenced by the weight of Johnson's name. Extent of Romantic Movement. In addition to mention of these characteristics, one general observation should be made: Romanticism is not an exclusively English move- ment. The spirit that produced it was abroad throughout Europe and America ; and it was shown in other fields than literature. The American Revolution of 1776-1783, the French Revolution of 1789-1795, the bloodless English Revo- lution culminating in the Reform Bill of 1832, all were due to the widespread spirit of revolt. In the literature of France, Germany, and (under the designation of Trans- cendentalism) America, the same note was struck as in Eng- land, though somewhat later. Hugo, Dumas, Sainte-Beuve in France ; Goethe, Fichte, Richter in Germany ; Emerson and Thoreau in America, are as truly described by the term 222 ENGLISH LITERATURE " Romantic " as are Wordsworth, Coleridge, Scott, or any writer treated in the fifty pages following this. In Italy and Spain also the movement was felt ; but these countries " did not exhibit it in such decisive form as did Great Britain, France, and Germany." Aspects of Romanticism. If individualism and revolt are the keynotes of the movement, we can doubtless best GRASMERE AND ITS "ONE GREEN ISLAND." see its real significance by studying the individual writers. It will, however, be of some value to cite some aspects of Romanticism which appear with more or less frequency and with varying emphasis in several writers. (1) Perhaps the most striking mark of the Romanticist is what we call subjective treatment of material; that is, the handling of it so as to show the author's own observation, feelings, sensations, interpretation. (2) Another mark is a love of natural scenery ranging from mountains and LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 223 ocean in one writer to small flowers and quiet lakes in another. "Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean roll! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain," writes Byron ; and Wordsworth : "To me the meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears." (3) A third mark is interest in, and affection for, the past. This is best shown in Scott's great series of historical novels ; but it also appears in the frequent use of old metres the Spenserian stanza by Keats, Byron, and Wordsworth, for example; and the ballad measure by Coleridge and others. Charles Lamb's fondness for writers of long ago and for quaint turns of expression found in them, may be noted on every page. (4) The last mark necessary to be named here is the worship of imagination, a natural corollary to interest in the past. Scott's novels, again, are an admirable illus- tration of this ; so are Byron's tales of the far-away East ; and possibly better than either of these, Coleridge's best- known poems The Ancient Mariner, Christabel, and Kubla Khan. With this brief characterization of the period from 1798 to 1832, we turn to the leading writers for detailed study. The poets were the first to give effective expression to the new spirit, and we shall treat the poets first. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, 1770-1850 Slow Journey to Recognition. That the new poetry did not make its way immediately is quite clear. The maga- zine editors ridiculed Wordsworth's simple style and humble subjects. A traveller in Wordsworth's neighborhood, some 224 ENGLISH LITERATURE years after the poet had written great poems, innocently asked him if he had ever written anything except the Guide to the Lakes. Even Byron, later one of the extreme figures in the revolt, satirized Wordsworth in an early poem as " The mild apostate from poetic rule." The poet said that for years the income from his poetry was CiRA.MMAR SCHOOL AT HAWKSHEAD. not sufficient to keep him in shoestrings. His ultimate artistic triumph is made evident in many ways, not the least being his appointment as poet laureate in his seventy-third year. This honor came solely in recognition of his achieve- ment, and with the understanding that the services usually belonging to the position would not be expected of him. Early Life and Education. Wordsworth was born in Cockermouth, county of Cumberland, the northwest corner LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 225 of England familiarly known as the Lake District. There he lived for seven years, when he was sent to school at Hawks- head, about twenty miles distant. The eight years at Hawks- head, ending with his removal to St. John's College, Cam- bridge, were very happy. No evidence is available point- ing to special distinction at school ; and the evidence of his autobiographical poem, The Prelude, points only to his being INTERIOR OF HAWKSHEAD SCHOOL. Wordsworth's desk is just at the right as one enters. a very healthy boy, fond of sports and outdoor life. Nor did he at all distinguish himself at the University, though he was graduated in regular form in 1791. Influence of the French Revolution. Leaving Cambridge, he spent some time in France, and became enthusiastic over the Revolution. Of this time he wrote : "Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, But to be young was very heaven ! " 226 ENGLISH LITERATURE The excesses of the Revolution lessened his enthusiasm ; and for some years after his return to England he suffered much from the unsettling of his faith in mankind. With Sister and Friend. In 1795 he and his beloved and devoted sister Dorothy settled in Dorsetshire, south- west England, pre- pared for an existence of " plain living and high thinking," sup- ported only by a legacy of 900 left by a friend. They then moved to Alfoxden, in the ad- joining county of Som- erset, attracted thither chiefly by the person- ality of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. When the Wordsworths returned to the Lake District to live, Coleridge fol- lowed ; and their friendship continued till Coleridge's death. To Coleridge, Words- worth dedicated The Prelude; and he is frequently referred to in other poems. "Lyrical Ballads." Before taking up their residence in the Lake District, the two poets had put out the epoch-mark- ing book usually named as the beginning of the " Romantic Triumph." Lyrical Ballads may well have taken the critics WORDSWORTH AT THE AGE OF FORTY- EIGHT. After a crayon sketch by Haydon. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 227 unawares.' Wordsworth had previously published two slender volumes, Coleridge, four; but none of these had attracted attention. In Lyrical Ballade editors and reviewers found a strange, unheard-of gathering of things that set at defiance the whole body of " established rules " in poetry. There DOVE COTTAGE. From the garden. was a mysterious story in verse about a sailor who took a voy- age on which he had the most amazing experiences. Then there was a poem called Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, in which the author went into details about the changes in his own attitude toward nature. " This will never do," said the critics, " because we have never heard of such things in poetry, and therefore they are clearly improper." 228 ENGLISH LITERATURE Wordsworth's " Preface." One who has read even the brief account of Romanticism given above will easily imagine the author's attitude toward this criticism. In 1800 a second edition of Lyrical Ballads appeared, with a long preface by Wordsworth explaining in the calmest fashion why the new poetry must be accepted and highly valued. He had deliberately chosen humble life, ordinary men, in ordinary situa- tions, for his themes ; and he had deliberately chosen the language of everyday life. These are proper subjects for poetry, he said, and this is the proper way to set them forth. And though it cannot be DOROTHY WORDSWORTH. said that he ^ Q ^ lived up to the standard set .by himself, he never once wavered in his faith and his effort. To Dove Cottage, Grasmere. In December, 1799, Wordsworth and Dorothy moved to Grasmere, " truly and vitally, biographically and spiritually, as well as scenically and physically, the center of the Lake District." In this village the poet made his home for thirteen years, for eight of them in Dove Cottage. This little house, like the Shakspere birthplace and other " shrines," is now the LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSEIN'S DEATH 229 property of the nation, and is maintained as a sort of museum. The Poet's Tributes to his Sister. We cannot leave this move in the poet's life without some words about Dorothy Wordsworth. His only sister, two years younger than he, she had been his most favored companion from childhood. After being separated from him during his Hawkshead and Cambridge days and during his post-graduate year in France, she set up with him the modest home in southern England to which we have referred. Her influence at this period, when disap- pointment at the course of the French Revolu- tion seemed likely to end his poetic career when hardly begun, was great and salutary. Of many verse tributes by Wordsworth to his sis- ter one of the most striking is in book XII of The Prelude : MRS. WORDSWORTH. ' Her very presence such a sweetness breathed, That flowers, and trees, and even the silent hills, And everything she looked on, should have had An intimation how she bore herself Towards them and to all creatures. God delights In such a being ; for her common thoughts Are piety, her life is gratitude." 230 ENGLISH LITERATURE Marriage. A few years after moving to Grasmere, Words- worth married Mary Hutchinson, whom he described as "A perfect Woman, nobly planned, To warn, to comfort, and command ; And yet a Spirit still, and bright With something of angelic light." His devotion to wife and sister was amply deserved; for it is truly said that they " worshipped him and made his happi- ness the object of their lives." The Poet's Best Period. The greater portion of Words- worth's best poetry was composed at Dove Cottage, much of it in the garden : "Sweet garden-orchard, eminently fair, The loveliest spot that man has ever found." Here, before 1801, he wrote Michael, Ode on Intimations of Immortality, Ode to Duty, To a Sky-Lark, and numerous other bird- and flower-lyrics, many of his best sonnets, and The Prelude. Though he wrote voluminously almost to the end of his life, there are few poems after 1808 equal to those of the Grasmere period. Full Recognition. In 1813 the poet made his last change of residence to Rydal Mount, near the hamlet of Rydal, about four miles from Grasmere. Here he spent the last thirty-seven years of his life, writing in the same key as in his earlier compositions, strangely unaffected by the -many new exhibitions of the Romantic spirit, or by the modern scien- tific spirit. Recognition of him as the " first of living poets " seems to have become general even before government so described him in offering the laureateship. Nearly all his old friends remained stanch, and many great men of the day were added to the circle. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 231 Rewards. For many years Wordsworth was never financially at ease. The returns from his poetry formed a meagre addition to the income from his legacy, though this was somewhat increased later by a share of his father's es- tate. The move to the more spacious and attractive home of Rydal Mount was made possible by his appointment as dis- tributor of stamps for Westmoreland, with a salary of 400 a year. In 1842 a pension was given to him. Honors not of a financial order came to him, including degrees from Durham and Oxford. Wordsworth's Self- sufficiency. Although Wordsworth lived eigh- teen years beyond the WORDSWORTH WALKING ON HELVELLYN. After the portrait made by Haydon when the poet was seventy-two. date given as ending the Age of Romanticism, he was, as has been said, little affected by the changes taking place around him. He did, it is true, lose much of his radicalism. His acceptance of the laureateship con- vinced many that he had turned his back on his early principles and become a conservative. What really hap- pened was that the immense step forward which he took in Lyrical Ballads and the prefaces to the second and sub- sequent editions of that work was all he was capable of. An observant visitor to Rydal Mount recorded the apparent 232 ENGLISH LITERATURE fact that other men did not seem necessary to him. Legouis, Wordsworth's French biographer, says that books seemed equally unnecessary to him : " He gives us the impression that, had he lived alone on a bookless earth, he would have reached the same conclusions." He reached the point where his own poetry sufficed for his artistic life ; and other notes found no responsive chord in him. RYDAL MOUNT. Wordsworth's last home. Poems of Humble Life. One of the fields in which the poet gave notable expression to the spirit of revolt is poems of humble life. The little cottage girl of We are Seven, the leech-gatherer in Resolution and Independence, the old shep- herd in the pathetic story of Michael, and many similar figures are Wordsworth's deliberate defiance of tradition, of the so-called " established rules " by which, said his critics, poetry had been written time out of mind, and ought still to be written. He chose this kind of life, he said, " be- LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 233 cause, in that condition, the essential passions of the heart find a better soil in which they can attain their maturity ; and because in that condition the passions of men are incor- porated with the beautiful and permanent forms of nature." Sonnets. Another mark of the Romanticist in Words- worth is his fondness for the sonnet-form, which had been GRISEDALE TAHN. A most impressive mountain view near Grasmere ; locally known as the parting-place of Wordsworth and his brother John. almost wholly ignored for the century and a quarter since Milton. Many sonnets of his later years, as well as a few of his earlier, we could spare : those either on trivial subjects, or on brief mental states that do not seem worth recording. There remain, however, a larger number of sonnets of the first order than can be found in any other English poet. Many of these, the sonnet on Milton (London, 1802}, those on the sonnet itself (" Scorn not the sonnet," and " Nuns fret not "), Composed on Westminster Bridge (" Earth 234 ENGLISH LITERATURE has not anything to show more fair "), " The world is too much with us " the list might be largely extended with ease these rank not only among the very best of the author's poems, but among the greatest English poems as well. Poems of Nature. It is to his work as poet of nature that Wordsworth chiefly owes his general fame. There had, of course, been numerous poets who had loved and de- scribed natural objects and scenes ; even the eighteenth century was not entirely without them. Other nature poets had been capable also of faithful, accurate description. The new, that is, the Romantic, element in Wordsworth's nature poetry is the expression in words of sensations aroused by observation of the beauties of the external world. This individual interpretation of nature, even if something like it had before occurred to poets, had not found voice. "The Daisy, by the shadow that it casts, Protects the lingering dew-drop from the sun." Lines to a Child. "For thou art worthy, Thou unassuming Common-place Of Nature, with that homely face, And yet with something of a grace, Which Love makes for thee." To the Daisy. "There is madness about thee, and joy divine In that song of thine ; Lift me, guide me high and high To thy banqueting-place in the sky." To a Sky-Lark. Almost his whole philosophy of nature is summed up in this stanza from The Tables Turned : LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 235 "One impulse from a vernal wood May teach you more of man, Of moral evil and of good, Than all the sages can." Arnold's Adequate Tribute. Of the many tributes called forth by Wordsworth's death two of the most beauti- ful came from Matthew Arnold, a young poet whose admira- THE WORDSWORTH GRAVES. In Grasmere churchyard. tion for the old poet had brought him to the vicinity of Rydal to live. In one of these Arnold says : "Well may we mourn when the head Of a sacred poet lies low, In an age which can rear them no more ! The complaining millions of men Darken in labor and pain ; But he was a priest to us all Of the wonder and bloom of the world, 236 ENGLISH LITERATURE Which we saw with his eyes and were glad. He is dead, and the fruit-bearing day Of his race is past on the earth ; And darkness returns to our eyes." The other concludes : "Keep fresh the grass upon his grave O Rotha, 1 with thy living wave ! Sing him thy best ! for few or none Hears thy voice right, now he is gone." SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE, 1772-1834 In Lamb's Christ's Hospital Five and Thirty Years Ago is drawn a picture of Coleridge when a boy at school. He early showed the interest in philosophic studies that made him as a man a deep thinker and close reasoner. He loved his Greek studies, and impressed all hearers by his reading of Homer and Pindar. So strongly did his personal- ity attract people that he was known as the " inspired charity boy." Character of his Father. He was born at Ottery St. Mary, Devonshire, the youngest of thirteen children. His studious bent was inherited from his father, who was minister of the town, head-master of the grammar school, and a solid scholar. " The image of my father," the son wrote, " my revered, kind, learned, simple-hearted father, is a religion to me." At Christ's Hospital. After the father's death, and before his own tenth year, Samuel Taylor was admitted to Christ's Hospital, the charity-school immortalized by Lamb, who also entered the school on the same day. His intellectual 1 The stream flowing through Grasmere, close to the churchyard where Wordsworth is buried. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 237 powers and personal attractions impressed all, just as they did when he reached manhood. The hardships of the school, including an insufficient supply of food, were galling to him ; but the close friendships he formed, and the opportunities London offered for studying life, served to lessen his resent- ment of conditions. Cambridge. From Christ's Hospital he went (on a scholarship) to Jesus College, Cambridge. Entering the year that Wordsworth was grad- uated from St. John's, Cole- ridge kept up a connection with the college for three years ; but he was very irregular in attend- ance, and did not take a degree. While at the university, he made the acquaintance of Wordsworth, not in person, but in the volume of Descriptive Sketches. Coleridge was enthu- siastic over it. " Seldom if ever," he says, " was the emer- gence of an original genius above the literary horizon more evidently announced." Perhaps Wordsworth was thinking of this sentence when in later years he said of Coleridge : [Thou] "in thy ample mind Hast placed me high above my just deserts." Marriage. About the time when Coleridge left the uni- versity, he met Robert Southey, a meeting which had two immediate results, one of passing, the other of lasting, im- portance. The first was Coleridge's joining in a fantastic scheme for emigrating to America and founding on the banks COLERIDGE. At the age of twenty-six. 238 ENGLISH LITERATURE of the Susquehanna a Pantisocracy, or all-equal government. The scheme fell through for lack of funds and emigrants. The second result was Coleridge's engagement and marriage to Miss Sara Fricker, to whose sister Southey was already engaged. Mrs. Coleridge seems to have been an unsuitable wife for an artist, even for a reliable one ; that she was en- tirely unfit to be the wife of an erratic, unreliable poet was certain. Her life with her husband from 1795 to 1804 was ( unhappy for him as well as for her ; and though no formal separation took place, they saw little of each other after 1804. Friendship with the Wordsworths. Cole- ridge's acquaintance with the Wordsworths has been recorded. If the older, steadier poet profited by his friend's enthusiastic admiration, the latter also gained by the asso- ciation. Through Wordsworth and his sister Coleridge came to a realization of his powers, and without their influence, The Ancient Mariner and perhaps much more of both prose and verse would hardly have been written. Virtu- ally all of Coleridge's best poems were written during the six years of his greatest intimacy with the Wordsworths (1797-1803); and his acquaintance with German meta- physics, which through him did much for English thought, was due to a tour of Germany made with the Words- worths. DOVE COTTAGE LIVING-ROOM. Here Coleridge delivered some of his most impassioned midnight discourses to a small audience of Wordsworths. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 239 The Influence of Opium. The year 1797 is a tragic one in Coleridge's life ; for in that year he began the use of opium. For twenty years, while he was writing his best poetry and his best criticism, he engaged in a constant struggle, frequently a losing one, with the drug. It prevented his working consecutively at anything, prevented his carrying out any plans. " An opium-eater," said De Quincey, another victim of the habit, " never finishes anything." Coleridge for several periods worked at journalism in London, but formed no permanent connection. He was for more than a year secretary to the governor of Malta. He frequently preached in Unitarian churches, and aroused great enthusi- asm ; but only for a single period of a few months did he hold a charge. He was a most inspiring lecturer; but he could never be depended on to speak on the subject announced : people went to hear Coleridge, not on any particular subject. He was quite likely, after announcing Paradise Lost as his topic, to speak on Hamlet. Under such conditions, his income was, of course, uncer- tain. For some years he lived in the house of his prosperous brother-in-law, Southey; and after the separation from his wife, she and her children remained there. Writing and lecturing sometimes paid well ; and many homes sought his presence as guest. At Highgate. In 1816, after fighting the fiend opium single-handed for twenty years and finding victory impos- sible without help, Coleridge put himself under the care of a Dr. Gilman, of Highgate, a suburb of London. The af- flicted man was taken into the physician's home ; and to the devoted care of the physician and Mrs. Gilman he owed the comparative peace which he enjoyed for the remainder of his life. He delivered several successful series of lectures; 240 ENGLISH LITERATURE and with a group of young enthusiasts who repeatedly sought him at his home he carried on many wonderful con- versations. The talk of the " Sage of Highgate " made a deep impression on all hearers, a situation not surprising when one contemplates the vast extent of his reading and the widely recorded charm of his personality. Last Years and Death. For several years Coleridge knew death was near at hand. He felt that he was not fully appreciated ; he suffered physically sometimes ; but he faced the end without a murmur. Some months before it came he wrote an epitaph for himself, containing these lines : "O, lift one thought in prayer for S. T. C. That he who many a year with toil of breath Found death in life may here find life in death!" He died July 25, 1834, and was buried in Highgate church- yard. The Poet. Nearly all Coleridge's really great poetry, as has been noted, was written during the years when he was under the Wordsworths' influence. One may go further: nearly all for which the world cares, including The Ancient Mariner, the fragment Kubla Khan, and part first of Christ- abel (never finished), was written in a single winter, 1797-1798, his " golden year." In the one complete poem and the two un- finished, Coleridge showed himself the possessor of a marvel- lous imagination and a power of haunting phraseology which, under better circumstances, might have made him the equal of England's greatest singers. The product is, however, too meagre to give the writer a large place in English poetry. The Critic. Coleridge's literary criticism is both greater in quantity and far more valuable than his poetry. He is the founder of modern English criticism, as regards not only 241 method, but also, in many cases, substance. To Coleridge is due the present-day opinion of Shakspere, by which the dramatist is understood to be a conscious and consummate artist instead of merely " Fancy's child." To Coleridge is due the current interpretation of Othello, as " a high and chivalrous Moorish chief," whose passion is not jealousy, FACSIMILE OF COLERIDGE'S MANUSCRIPT. (British Museum.) but " rather an agony that the creature whom he had believed angelic should be proved impure." To Coleridge also was due the first thorough study and genuine appreciation of Wordsworth's genius. The Talker. Much of his philosophical writing is diffi- cult reading, and because of his unsystematic habits of 242 ENGLISH LITERATURE composition, unsatisfactory. His philosophical talk, how- ever, to the group of young enthusiasts who hung on his words at Highgate Lamb, De Quincey, Carlyle, Hazlitt, and others was beyond measure inspiring. Hazlitt has described the impression made upon him by the first sermon he heard Coleridge preach. "Mr. Coleridge rose and gave out his text, 'And he went up into the mountain, to pray, HIMSELF, ALONE.' As he gave out this text, his voice 'rose like a steam of rich distilled perfumes,' and when he came to the two last words, which he pronounced loud, deep, and distinct, it seemed to me, who was then young, as if the sounds had echoed from the bottom of the human heart, and as if that prayer might have floated in solemn silence through the universe. . . . The preacher then launched into his sub- ject, like an eagle dallying with the wind. . . . And for myself, I could not have been more delighted if I had heard the music of the spheres." Personal Influence. That his talk was frequently not consecutive, not logical, seems certain ; yet his influence has been far greater than that of many whose thoughts were presented in much better organized form. In 1796 Wordsworth thought Coleridge " the only wonderful man I ever met ; " in 1827 Carlyle called him " a sublime man ... a king of men." In the opinion of Saintsbury he was the most important figure in the Romantic movement in England, whose personal influence on the greatest minds of his own day " was so great as to be almost uncanny." GEORGE NOEL GORDON, LORD BYRON, 1788-1824 Ancestry. Byron, one of the most rebellious figures in a rebellious age, was made extreme not so much by the spirit that was abroad in the land as by inheritance and immediate environment. He was of wild, impulsive, passion- LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 243 ate, defiant blood on both sides : on his father's side in a distinguished but erratic line of Norman nobility; on his mother's, Highland Scotch direct from James I. His mother, to whose sole care he was left at the age of two, was unsuited to be the mother of any child. She alternately fondled him ex- cessively and abused and maltreated him, thus em- phasizing his inborn high temper. Lack of Sympathy with the World. Though many admired Byron's genius, few understood him. Few recognized or acted on the principle expressed by one of the poet's schoolmasters, that he " might be led by a silken string, rather than a cable." People antagonized him; events embittered him. As a result, he wrote before he was thirty and with apparent sincerity : "I have not loved the world, nor the world me; ******* 'Tis but a worthless world to win or lose ; " l and followed this a few years later with "Through life's dull road, so dim and dirty, I have dragged to three and thirty ; BYRON. Childe Harold, Canto III. 244 ENGLISH LITERATURE What have these years brought to me? Nothing except thirty-three." Birth. Byron was born in London. His father, Captain Jack Byron, was an adventurer who, after marrying Cath- erine Gordon and squandering her small fortune, left her with her two-year-old son and fled to France. The boy's club- foot added sensitiveness to the unfortunate inherited qualities we have mentioned. Boyhood. Besides the varying treatment by his mother, and the distresses growing out of his affliction, the outstand- ing facts of his boyhood are his extensive reading, his love affairs, and his in- heritance of a title and estate. The list of books he had read before he was nineteen includes enormous amounts of history, biog- raphy, philosophy, theol- ogy, oratory, fiction ; and poetry without limit. Of the love affairs the most serious was with Mary Anne Chaworth, heiress of the estate adjoining Byron's. " She was the beau ideal," said he, " of all that my youthful fancy could paint of beautiful ; " but she re- turned neither the admiration nor the affection. Though grieved at the time, he said later in life that her perfection he " created in her, ... for I found her anything but angelic." At the age of ten he succeeded his great-uncle as " Lord " Byron and heir of Newstead Abbey. Miss CHAWORTH. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 245 Education. The chief thing that his years at Harrow School gave him was the friendship of Dr. Drury, the master. From Harrow he went up to Cambridge, where he was grad- uated in March, 1808. He was not popular at the Univer- sity, and never thought of it with affection. NEWSTEAD ABBEY. Byron's home in Nottinghamshire. First Publication. The year before he left Cambridge (1807) Byron published his first volume, Hours of Idleness. It was an unpretending book, containing only one poem worth remembering Lachin y Gair; : but the Edinburgh Review could not forego the opportunity to thrash a lord. It performed this feat in an article which characteristically enough aimed not at all at estimating the new poet, but at adding to the critic's reputation for cleverness. Wordsworth 1 Pronounced Loch na Garr. 246 ENGLISH LITERATURE knew better : " These reviewers put me out of patience. The young man will do something, if he goes on as he has begun." First Satire. The young man went on next year by returning the thrashing. In English Bards and Scotch Re- viewers he not only came back at his critic, but included in a scathing satire most of the distinguished men of letters of the day. Wordsworth is represented as "Convincing all, by demonstration plain, Poetic souls delight in prose insane." Jeffrey, editor of the Edinburgh Review, is compared to the savage judge of James the Second's " Star Chamber : " "In soul so like, so merciful, yet just, Some think that Satan has resigned his trust, And given the spirit to the world again, To sentence letters, as he sentenced men." He realized his error, and a few years later made a public apology. " This satire," he says, " was written when I was very young and very angry, and fully bent on displaying my wrath and my wit ; and now I am haunted by the ghosts of my wholesale assertions." " Childe Harold." In February, 1812, the first two cantos of Childe Harold appeared. Its instantaneous suc- cess is recorded in a well-known sentence of the author : " I awoke one morning and found myself famous." Seven editions were sold in four weeks ; he was lauded and flattered by men and women prominent in all walks of life. Nothing could better illustrate the spirit of the age. Childe Harold is a rambling, disconnected series of magnificent pictures of foreign lands and peoples ; and the novelty of such matter in verse caught the public taste at once. It was, moreover, LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 247 in an unusual metre, the Spenserian stanza, which we have seen had been revived in one eighteenth-century poem, Thomson's The Cattle of Indolence. A third respect in which it illustrates the spirit of the age is its note of revolt, against every convention of British life : a note which in the preced- ing century would have prevented the poem from receiving even a respectful hearing. FACSIMILE OF BYRON'S MANUSCRIPT. (British Museum.) Two more cantos of Childe Harold, which appeared in 1818, are even greater poetry than the first two. Canto III contains what is perhaps the most famous passage in all Byron's verse the description of the battle of Waterloo and of Brussels on the evening before beginning "There was a sound of revelry by night." Oriental Tales. In the interval between the first two cantos and the last two Byron wrote a number of oriental 248 ENGLISH LITERATURE tales in verse, of which the best known are The Bride of Abydos and Mazeppa. In these the spirit of revolt continues to find expression ; and the newness of the subjects and the rapid and thrilling stories brought them a wide circle of readers. Of The Corsair, which was written in ten days, 14,000 copies were sold in a single day ; and the poet received a total of 525 for it. HUCKNALL CHURCH, NEAR NEWSTEAD. Denied a place in Westminster Abbey, Byron was buried here. Marriage and Exile. Byron was married in 1815 ; and his wife left him in a year. Whether the trouble was altogether of his making is by no means clear; but the British public took Lady Byron's side, and de- posed its idol promptly and absolutely. Self- exiled, he left England in April, 1816, never to return. The evil genius to which he owed his ancestry and his afflicted body was loath to give him up. Death. For the rest of his life he was a wanderer in Europe. The facts of this period we would like to forget, except the closing episode. In 1823 he cast his lot with the Greeks in their struggle for independence of Turkey, giving largely of his wealth, taking active service in the army, and dying April 19, 1824, of fever contracted by exposure. In the period of his exile Byron wrote The Prisoner of Chilian, a number of quite unactable but highly poetic dramas, LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 249 Mazeppa (one of the oriental tales), and his masterpiece Don Juan. 1 " Don Juan." Don Juan is a poem of the same general class as Childe Harold; that is, it is a rambling, disjointed series of pictures and incidents from experience in foreign lands. It is much longer than its predecessor, and was left unfinished in the seventeenth canto. It is much more bitter in its satire, and much more universal. Its tone is well characterized in the author's words : " In Don Juan I take a vicious and unprincipled character, and lead him through those ranks of society whose accomplishments cover and cloak their vices, and paint the natural effects." Here we see the same spirit of revolt as in Childe Harold, taking the form of a protest against the whole social organization of his day. Don Juan is a very uneven poem. There are beautiful idyls and charming lyrics the story of Haidee, for instance, in Canto IV, and "The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece, Where burning Sappho loved and sung!" Scattered among such as these are episodes and stanzas deliberately vulgar, which in the eyes of British " middle- class respectability " could not be atoned for by any amount of art. Poet Laureate Southey, and Wellington, hero of Waterloo, are attacked in satire that can only be described as vicious. Even his mother and his wife, of whom it might be supposed he would think with sincere regret, are held up to ridicule, as is (in the later cantos) the whole of that Lon- don fashionable life of which he had been at one time the centre. The instalments of the poem were not received with the universal favor that greeted Childe Harold. The 1 Byron rhymes this name with "true one." 250 ENGLISH LITERATURE average Briton was too much shocked by its audacity to enjoy its brilliancy. The critics, however, were almost unanimous in praise of it, Sir Walter Scott, for example, writing : " It has the variety of Shakespeare himself." An- other said that Don Juan will be read " as long as satire, wit, mirth, and supreme excellence shall be esteemed among men. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY, 1792-1822 A Reformer. Shelley was, like Byron, a rebel against society, as Wordsworth and Coleridge had been rebels against literary tradition. Unlike Byron, Shelley was inspired to reform society, though his plans to accomplish this reform are quite incoherent and unintelligible. A Lyric Poet. On the side of pure literature, Shelley is one of a small number of supreme lyrists. The list of his great compositions in the lyric field is not extensive ; but even the least sympathetic students of his life and philosophy admit his su- premacy as lyric poet. Birth, School, and College. He was born near Horsham, in Sussex, some thirty miles south of London, four years after thus be seen, came nearly a SHELLEY. Clearly the portrait of a dreamer. Byron. The two, it will generation later than Wordsworth and Coleridge ; and as has been observed more than once, the French Revolution LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 251 was already history. At the age of twelve Shelley was sent to Eton, where his rebellious spirit first showed itself in opposition to the fagging system. From Eton he proceeded to University College, Oxford, where he remained less than a year, being formally expelled from the institution. This untoward incident was caused by a specific act of rebellion refusal to answer the question of the college authorities whether he did or did not write a pamphlet called The Neces- sity of Atheism. He did, in fact, write it, as the whole col- lege doubtless knew. Marriage. Shelley's father, an entirely orthodox Brit- isher, was so much offended by this performance that he closed his doors against his nineteen-year-old son. Shelley took up residence in London. Part of the time he received a small allowance from his father ; part of the time he is said to have been supported by the pocket-money of his sisters, who were at school in a suburb. In visits to his sisters he met Harriet Westbrook, a girl of sixteen ; and in a short time they eloped to Edinburgh and were married. That Shelley did not love the girl is by no means clear ; but his chief incentives to the marriage appear to have been sympathy with her (real or imagined) harsh treatment at home, and admiration of her willingness to come and live with him whether married or not. Again a Rebel. Thus again the spirit of rebellion plays an important part in Shelley's life. Harriet suffered from tyranny at home; he abhorred tyranny; he would rescue her from it. Harriet loved him enough to defy the conven- tions of society, a sure title to at least the good opinion of a man like Shelley. It is quite useless to record in detail the wanderings of the Shelleys in York, Edinburgh, Keswick, Ireland, 252 ENGLISH LITERATURE Wales. In April, 1813, they were again in London, where in June a daughter was born. A short time after this Shelley and his wife became es- tranged ; and the following year they separated. When she died, in 1816, Shelley married Mary Godwin, daughter of __, William Godwin, whose writings in criticism of social institutions, in- cluding marriage, Shelley admired. greatly Life in Italy. In 1818 the Shel- leys went to Italy, in which country they lived for the remaining four years of the poet's life. He changed his place of resi- dence repeatedly, partly no doubt because of the scandal every- where associated with his name. Most people, he himself said, regarded him as " a prodigy of crime." Later, however, some real friend- ships came into his life, and his last two years were not un- happy. His death came by accidental drowning. "Prometheus Unbound." One work of Shelley's be- sides his lyrics is of interest to the average reader Prome- SHELLEY'S GRAVE. In the Protestant Cemetery at Rome. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 253 theus Unbound, called by the author " a lyrical drama." In a long preface he says the drama is an expression of his " passion for reforming the world." Mrs. Shelley explains in a note that Prometheus typifies humanity, and that Her- cules, who " liberates him from the tortures generated by evil done or suffered," typifies strength. " Shelley's theory of the destiny of the human species was," she says, " that evil is not inherent in the system of the creation, but an acci- dent that might be expelled." When friendly commentators, however, have done their best, Prometheus Unbound remains still something of a puzzle. Yet there is much in it to attract any lover of poetry, even though he is not a partisan of Shelley. One of the most charming of the lyrical passages is assigned to a Spirit in act I : " On a poet's lips I slept Dreaming like a love-adept In the sound his breathing kept ; Nor seeks nor finds he mortal blisses, But feeds on the aerial kisses Of shapes that haunt thought's wildernesses. He will watch from dawn to gloom The lake-reflected sun illume The yellow bees in the ivy-bloom, Nor heed nor see, what things they be ; But from these create he can Forms more real than living man, Nurslings of immortality ! '.' It has been observed that these lines are " vividly suggestive of Shelley's own poetic temper." Greatest Lyrics. Three of his most generally admired lyrics are among those also ranked highest by critical opinion To a Sky-Lark, Ode to the West Wind, and The Cloud. It is idle to say much of such poems : the thoughtful reader will 254 ENGLISH LITERATURE FACSIMILE OF SHELLEY'S SKY-LARK. In his own handwriting. (Widener Memorial Library, Harvard University.) LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 255 find more in them than any helper can find for him. It may be not amiss to advise one approaching them for the first time that they are noted for fitness of metrical form to sense as well as for most felicitous language and imagery. The circle of Shelley enthusiasts is small, the main objec- tion of others being the many things he fails to do. For such we may quote from a famous apostrophe to Shelley : " Each poet gives what he has, and what he can offer ; you spread before us fairy bread, and enchanted wine, and shall we turn away with a sneer, because, out of all the multitudes of singers, one is spiritual and strange? Let Shelley sing of what he saw, what none saw but Shelley ! " 1 JOHN KEATS, 1795-1821 " Beauty is truth, truth beauty that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." These lines from Keats's Ode on a Grecian Urn give the whole of his poetic creed, and the clew to his place in English poetry. The high priest of beauty, he took a firm stand against didactic poetry, contending that if a poem gives pleasure by appeal to one's love of beauty, one need not look for a meaning, a lesson, to explain the appeal. The love of beauty was with him a passion; and it fixes his place as a Romanticist. This quality had been lost during the eigh- teenth century, and Keats restored it to English poetry. Humble Birth, and Limited Opportunities. He was born in London, the son of a livery-stable employe and of the proprietor's daughter. Nothing further is known of his antecedents ; but as Lowell remarks, " It is enough that his poetical pedigree is of the best, tracing through Spenser to Chaucer." He had a grammar-school education, of which 1 Andrew Lang, Letters to Dead Authors. 256 ENGLISH LITERATURE the most important gain was the friendship of the school- master's son, Charles Cowden Clarke. Selection of Poetry for Life-work. At the age of fifteen he was apprenticed to a surgeon ; but though he studied surgery four years and took a hospital course, he never practised. About the time that he decided to give up sur- gery and devote him- self wholly to poetry, he met Leigh Hunt, then a conspicuous figure in London lit- erary circles. Within a short time he made the acquaintance also of Wordsworth, Cole- ridge, Shelley, William Hazlitt, and the artists B. R. Hay don and Joseph Severn. KEATS. From a sketch by his friend Haydon. First Publications. At the suggestion of friends Keats in 1817 published a volume of poems. It contained little meriting serious attention except two sonnets, On First Looking into Chapman's Homer, and On the Grasshopper and the Cricket. These should have attracted attention from the magazines ; but they seem to have been noticed only by Hunt's paper and a few others which Hunt influenced to review the volume. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 257 " Endymion." The following year he published Endym- ion : A Poetic Romance, in four books ; and from that time he never lacked attention from critics. The Quarterly Review and Blackwood's Magazine attacked it viciously, the former boldly proclaiming that the reviewer had read only the first book of the poem. Despite any faults the poem may possess, it would still be memorable for its opening lines : "A thing of beauty is a joy forever : Its loveliness increases ; it will never Pass into nothingness ; but still will keep A bower quiet for us, and a sleep Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing." Though it had been twenty years since Lyrical Ballads appeared, and six since the first two cantos of Childe Harold, the older magazines were still hostile to innovations in liter- ature. The Quarterly's complaint : " There is hardly a complete couplet enclosing a complete idea in the whole book," indicates how tenacious was the hold of eighteenth- century standards. Attitude toward Criticism. So harsh was this attack that for many years it was popularly supposed to have caused Keats's death. Shelley helped to perpetuate this idea in his poem in memory of Keats, Adanais; and Byron added the weight of an epigram : "'Who killed John Keats?' 'I,' says the Quarterly, So savage and Tartarly ; ' 'Twas one of my feats.' " That the hostile articles not only did not kill him, but did not even seriously disturb him, is now perfectly well known. It should have been known to any reader of the poet's pref- ace. He states his consciousness that the poem shows 258 ENGLISH LITERATURE " great inexperience, immaturity, and every error denoting a feverish attempt, rather than a deed accomplished." His motive in admitting its faults he expresses thus : " This is not written with the least atom of purpose to forestall criti- FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF KEATS. (British Museum.) cism of course, but from the desire I have to conciliate men who are competent to look, and who do look with a zealous eye, to the honour of English literature." No man who could write in this manly fashion could be much worried by a spiteful review. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 259 Keats's third volume, including The Eve of St. Agnes, the fragment Hyperion, and the five great odes To a Nightingale, On a Grecian Urn, To Psyche, To Autumn, and On Melancholy appeared in the summer of 1820. The presence of genius here was unmistakable, and was recognized on all hands. Keats, however, was now almost be- yond interest in appreciation. The hand of death, in the form of consumption, was already upon him ; and in pursuance of his physician's advice, he set out for Rome in September, 1820, hoping for benefit from a winter in the south. Severn, his most devoted friend, ac- companied him, and gave him every aid possible; but noth- ing could avail, and he died February 23, 1821. KEATS'S GRAVE. Name " Writ in Water "? Above Keats's grave in the ~ In the Protestant cemetery at Protestant cemetery in Kome Rome.. is an epitaph of his own com- posing : " Here lies one whose name was writ in water." Against this may well be set some lines of a later poet : * "The Star of Fame shines down upon the river, And answering, the stream of Life repeats : ' Upon our waters shall be writ forever The name of Keats ! ' " 1 J. E. Spingarn. 260 ENGLISH LITERATURE In a moment less despairing than that in which he penned his epitaph, Keats had himself expressed confidence in his future : " I think I shall be among the English poets after my death." No one to-day would think of questioning the fulfilment of his belief. Keats's Artistry and Character. What most impresses the student of Keats is not his mere promise, not chiefly his tragically short career, but the amount of really good poetry he wrote. Byron produced a vastly larger amount in a few more years ; so did Shelley. But it is doubtful if either reached the level of Keats's best work as often as Keats did. While they, moreover, had their peculiar merits, neither seems often to have shown the conscientious care for work- manship that Keats showed. Examination of variant readings in The Eve of St. Agnes, for example, reveals a constant search for the right word that marks the true artist. In his devotion to one ideal, the expression of the beautiful, he shows fixedness of purpose that marks lofty character as well. ROMANTIC PROSE It is a common saying that the true glory of the Romantic period lies in its poetry rather than in its prose. We have, however, already noted that Coleridge fills a far larger niche in our prose literature than in our poetic ; and when we join with his name the names of Lamb and De Quincey, and realize that Macaulay's style was the product of this age, we may well hesitate to disparage its prose, even by comparison. There was room for advance in some directions even on the excellent eighteenth-century prose, which was, on the whole, lacking in color and individuality. These qualities are the distinguishing contributions to English prose of the two greatest Romantic essayists. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 261 CHARLES LAMB, 1775-1834 In the life of Lamb, apart from his writing, there are two threads, which Wordsworth must have had in mind in call- ing him " the frolic and the gentle." He was a constant joker, at his own as well as others' expense; and he gave a large part of his life to caring for an afflicted sister. We think we cannot better introduce a sketch of Lamb than by one of his jokes, written when he was fifty-two years old, and entitled " An Autobiographical Sketch "Charles Lamb born in the Inner Temple 10 Feb. 1775 educated in Christ's Hospital afterwards a clerk in the Ac- countant's office East India House pensioned off from that ser- vice 1825 after 33 years service, is now a Gentleman at large, can remember few specialities in his life worth noting except that he once caught a swallow flying (teste sud manu) [witness his own hand] ; below the middle stature, cast of face slightly Jewish, with no Judaic tinge in his complexional religion ; stam- mers abominably and is therefore more apt to discharge hi^ occasional conversation in a quaint aphorism or a poor quibble than in set and edifying speeches : has consequently been libelled as a person always aiming at wit, which, as he told a dull fellow that charged him with it, is at least as good as aiming at dulness ; a small eater but not drinker ; confesses a partiality for the production of the juniper berry, was a fierce smoker of Tobacco, but may be resembled to a volcano burnt out, emitting only now and then a casual puff. Has been guilty of obtruding upon the Public a Tale in Prose, called Rosamund Gray, a Dramatic Sketch named John Woodvil, a Farewell Ode to Tobacco, with sundry other Poems and light prose matter, collected in Two slight crown Octavos and pompously chris- tened his Works, tho' in fact they were his Recreations and his true works may be found on the shelves of Leadenhall Street, filling some hundred Folios. He is also the true Elia whose Essays are extant in a little volume published a year or two since ; and rather better known from that name without a 262 ENGLISH LITERATURE meaning, than from anything he has done or can hope to do in his own. He also was the first to draw the Public attention to the old English Dramatists in a work called ' Specimens of English Dramatic Writers who lived about the time of Shaks- peare,' published about 15 years since. In short all his merits and demerits to set forth would take to the end of Mr. Upcott's book and then not be told truly. He died * 18 much lamented. Witness his hand, Charles Lamb. 10th Apr 1827. 1 To any Body- Please to fill up these blanks. " The Tragedy of Lamb's Life. In this sketch he omits all reference to the tragedy of his life; yet without knowl- edge of that, one has but an imperfect pic- ture of Lamb. When he was twenty-one years old, his sister Mary, in a fit of insan- ity, killed her mother. In order to save her from permanent confinement Lamb, though ten years her junior, assumed the EAST INDIA HOUSE. Care f her ' and he Scene of Lamb's labors. devoted himself to this task till his death at the age of fifty-nine. Mary Lamb had recurring attacks of the trouble ; but there was always some warning of their approach. One of the most pathetic pictures from these lives is that of the brother and sister walking across the field, hand in hand and with tear-stained faces, to the asylum where she was treated. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 263 "Tales from Shakspere." - One of the fruits of their close association was the volume by which Charles Lamb is doubtless most widely known, Tales from Shakspere. Mary Lamb wrote the comedies and Charles the tragedies ; and while the collection can hardly be called a great piece of literature, it still possesses interest for many people older than the children for whom it was intended. Friendships. Lamb enjoyed the friendship of the lead- ing men of letters Wordsworth, Coleridge, Hazlitt, De Quincey, Godwin, and many others. His friendship with Coleridge, begun at Christ's Hospital, continued without interruption till death; and Lamb's biographer, Canon Ainger, is of the opinion that Coleridge's death was Lamb's death blow. He survived his friend but five months. Lamb and Coleridge. Many of the humorous stories of Lamb are connected with Coleridge. " Charles," Cole- ridge once said, " did you ever hear me preach ? " "I n-n-never heard you," stammered Lamb, " d-d-do anything else." Coleridge's lectures and conversation have been remarked on, but not the fact that he was quite willing on occasion to lecture to an individual. One day, according to Lamb, his distinguished friend met him on the street, caught hold of a button on his coat, pushed him into a store entrance, and began talking. In a few moments he closed his eyes. Now Lamb was very much interested; but being also bent on business, he took out his knife, cut off the button, and proceeded on his way. Returning some time later, he found Coleridge in the same place, delivering an impassioned dis- course to the button. Lamb and De Quincey. De Quincey has recorded his consternation when Lamb, on their first meeting, indulged 264 ENGLISH LITERATURE in pretended criticism of Coleridge and Wordsworth. Asked for an instance from The Ancient Mariner to justify his criticism, Lamb replied : " Pray what do you say to this 'The many men so beautiful, And they all dead did lie ' ? So beautiful, indeed ! Beautiful ! Just think of such a gang of Wapping 1 vagabonds, all covered with pitch, and chewing tobacco; and the old gentleman himself what do you call him ? the bright-eyed fellow ? " Lamb's Humor. The most conspicuous quality of Lamb's essays, one is not surprised to find, is humor. It is humor of a unique order, moreover, though it manifests itself in a variety of ways. Sometimes it consists in a novel use of quotations ; as, for example, in A Dissertation upon Roast Pig, where he rejoices in the immaturity of the animal "Ere sin could blight or sorrow fade, Death came with timely care" from Coleridge's Epitaph on an Infant. Frequently it is an unexpected turn of phrase, as the first sentence in A Chap- ter on Ears " I have no ear ; " after which he hastens to inform us that he refers to an ear for music. The introduc- tory paragraph in Poor Relations is typical yet not exactly paralleled elsewhere : he gives twenty-seven phrases to characterize his subject, beginning with " the most irrelevant thing in nature " and ending with " the one thing not need- ful." Lamb's Pathos. This humor, of which a variety of illus- trations might be given indefinitely, has been well described as that " which lies near to pathos and continually passes 1 Wapping is the shipping quarter of London. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 265 into and emerges from it." In some of the Essays of Elia it has passed quickly into pathos and not emerged at all. Such a one is Dream-Children, giving an imaginary picture of him- self with grandchildren. It is by many believed to be auto- biographical, " Alice W n," whom he says he courted " for seven long years," being identified with a certain Nancy Simmons. The story goes that, when he assumed charge of & A A*/ AS* FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF LAMB. Telling how to cook frogs' legs. (British Museum.) his sister, he felt it necessary to put behind him all thoughts of love and marriage. Autobiography of a " Gentle " Writer. Whether or not Dream-Children has immortalized a real love-affair, there is certainly much autobiography in Elia. Mockery End in Hertfordshire and Blakesmoor in H shire are undoubted reproductions of communities in which he visited. His " cousins," James and Bridget Elia, are himself and his sister. Many of his friends are called by their real names in 266 ENGLISH LITERATURE the essays. The writings of such u man as Lamb are, it has been said, all autobiography; and the life pictured is a singularly sweet and gentle one. Said one friend : l "He leaves behind him, freed from griefs and years, Far worthier things than tears. The love of friends without a single foe : Unequaled lot below!" THOMAS DE QUINCEY, 1785-1859 A Stylist. It is as a writer of " impassioned prose " that De Quincey claimed a place for himself in English literature. To-day it is evident that although there is much of value in the matter of his writings, he is important chiefly for style. Since, moreover, impassioned prose is a thing likely to attract strongly or repel strongly, readers of De Quincey are almost invariably partisan or hostile. The final judgment should probably take a middle course, frankly admitting his defects while stoutly proclaiming his merits. Carlyle's Description of De Quincey. No one could read The Confessions of an Opium-Eater without feeling that the author was a strange being. Strange he was indeed, not only in. mind, but in physical appearance as well, if we may trust Carlyle's famous description of him. "One of the smallest man-figures I ever saw; shaped like a pair of tongs ; and hardly above five feet in all . When he sat, you would have taken him, by candlelight, for the beautifulest little child ; bluereyed, blonde-haired, sparkling face, had there not been a something, too, which said, ' Eccovi, 2 this child has been in Hell!'" 1 Walter Savage Landor, To Mary Lamb. 2 Italian, meaning something like "Look here!" This is from Car- lyle's Reminiscences, written many years after De Quincey's death. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 267 Irregular Education. De Quincey was born in Manchester, a large manufacturing city about two hundred miles north- west of London and about forty east of Liverpool. When he was eight years old his father died ; and shortly afterward his mother moved to the city of Bath in southern England. His early education was obtained in most unsatis- factory fashion : two years at Bath Grammar School, a short time with private tutors, one year at a school in Wiltshire, a period of travel with a friend in Ire- land, two years at Man- chester Grammar School. Yet despite this irregular- ity, he made a strong im- pression everywhere by his scholarship, particularly in languages. At fifteen, he says, he " could converse in Greek fluently and without embarrassment ; " and he quotes one of his teachers as say- ing to a friend : " That boy could harangue an Athenian mob better than you or I could address an English one." Wanderings. Unhappy at the Manchester School, and not allowed to withdraw, he ran away. He was not returned to the school ; and a short time afterward received an allow- ance of a guinea a week for a tramp in Wales. For several months he wandered, the latter part of the time without funds because of failure to communicate with his home. In November, 1802, he was in London, and for five months lived the life of a vagrant in the streets. Discovered accidentally DE QUINCEY. 268 ENGLISH LITERATURE by friends, he was persuaded to go home ; and in the autumn was entered at Worcester College, Oxford. Introduction to Opium. At the university he lived much to himself, and read extensively; and the habit of solitude which he cultivated increased natural diffidence. The result was that, after passing written examinations brilliantly, he so dreaded the orals that he ran away and hence received no degree. During these years, while on a visit to London, he first used opium, the practice to which he unquestionably owed not a little of his fame. His own minute record, how- ever, of a not entirely successful struggle against opium would hardly lead one to desire fame at so great a cost. To the Lake District. After the Wordsworths left Dove Cottage, Grasmere, De Quincey occupied it for a num- ber of years. Though Wordsworth was the chief attraction in the region for him, he found another in the person of Margaret Simpson, a Westmoreland farmer's daughter, whom he married in 1816. Publication of the "Confessions." The year 1821, when De Quincey removed to London, stands out prominently in his life. In that year there appeared in the London Magazine, in two instalments, The. Confessions of an English Opium-Eater : Being an Extract from the Life of a Scholar : and De Quincey's career as a contributor to magazines was determined. Readers who had become used to new and striking things in both poetry and prose found in this work a yet greater surprise. The intimate self-revela- tion, together with the wonderful style which revealed new capacities in the language, made the Confessions eclipse in interest even the Essays of Elia appearing in the same magazine. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 269 A Peculiar Character. De Quincey returned to Gras- mere, and continued to reside there until 1828. In that year he removed to Edinburgh, in and near which city he spent the remaining thirty-one years of his life. After the death of his wife in 1837, his daughters tried to make a home for him ; but he was impatient of company and regularity, and THE STUDY AT DOVE COTTAGE. De Quincey gives a full description of the entire house in his Confessions. occupied lodgings in various parts of Edinburgh. To the end he continued a peculiar man. He would remain in one abode, we are told, until his accumulation of books and papers made work impossible ; then he would move, leaving his property behind him. One of his daughters would then follow him, sort the worthless from the valuable, and take the latter to her father's new home. A complete list of De Quincey's works would fill several 270 ENGLISH LITERATURE pages of this book. Not only was he a voluminous writer ; he wrote on a wide range of subjects, classified by Masson as autobiography, biog- raphies, historical es- says, speculative and theological essays, po- litical . economy and politics, literary theory and criticism, tales and romances. CONFESSIONS ENGLISH OPIUM-EATER. LONDON : i'RlJJl'ED full TAYLOR ASD UE-iSEY, FLEET STREEi. 1822. TITLE-PAGE OF THE FIRST EDITION OF THE CONFESSIONS. This edition was published anonymously. Note that the author's name on title-page is inserted in pencil. (New York Public Library.) Minor Writings. It cannot be said that he was equally success- ful in all fields. His political and specula- tive writings have served no purpose beyond " respectable padding for maga- zines." Some of his historical essays, Joan of Arc, for example, are marred by the in- trusion of jocular pas- sages at most serious moments, and by an oc- casional lapse into con- versational tone. His criticism of Goethe, in which he asserts that the German poet's reputation will sink for several generations till it reaches its proper level, is a classic of misconception. One of his literary essays, however, On the Knocking at the LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 271 Gate in Macbeth, is a classic piece of analysis and inter- pretation. In his autobiographical writings De Quincey is seen at his best. These include, besides the Confessions, chapters dealing with his early life, and sketches of prominent men in the Lake District and in London. Self-revelation in the " Confessions." By the Confessions De Quincey will always be best known, and by them his position as a prose writer may not unfairly be determined. Even after we allow for some exaggeration, some inaccuracy of memory, and some coloring due to use of the drug, this work remains a wonderful piece of self-revelation. It is also- a memorable record of a struggle even the beginning of which would be beyond most men in such a situation. The pleas- ures of opium are set forth in picturesque language that might tempt the unwary ; but this is followed by a presenta- tion of the pains of opium forceful enough to deter the most daring. Defects of De Quincey's Style. We have said that De Quincey is to readers of to-day important for his style, and that it is not a style altogether meritorious or the reverse. There is a tendency frequently to use too many unfamiliar words of Latin origin, such as " pandiculation," " hypochon- driacally," " sternutation." His sentences too frequently run to unwieldy lengths, and are made more objectionable by digressions. He too often drops suddenly from a dignified to almost a colloquial manner. Chief Attraction of his Style. These and more serious defects one can overlook in view of the quality that is properly described as " poetical." This quality is apparent 272 ENGLISH LITERATURE on almost every page in that wonderful apostrophe to opium, beginning : " Oh ! just, subtle, and mighty opium ! " in the contrasting of " the beautiful English face of the girl " and " the sallow and bilious skin of the Malay ; " in various descriptions of an opium-eater; and in accounts of tremen- dous opium " dreams." Despite his digressions, De Quincey shows also great constructive power; and the combination of this with the flow of poetical, " impassioned " language results in literary art of a high order. NOVELISTS In addition to reaching great heights in poetry and essay, the Romantic period is marked by high achievements in another field, the novel. Of the two chief novelists of the period we may say that each created a type of novel, and attained a preeminence in that type which has not yet been successfully disputed. Sir Walter Scott, the " Wizard of the North," is still, after a century of imitation, our fore- most historical novelist; Miss Austen, in like manner, remains our foremost writer of the novel of social comedy. SIR WALTER SCOTT, 1771-1832 One of the fullest, most varied, and most attractive lives to be found in the annals of literature is that of Sir Walter Scott. His literary life began, while he was engaged in the practice of law, with translations from the German; pro- ceeded with a collection of ballads from the Border peas- antry ; continued with a series of romances in verse ; with lives of Napoleon, Dryden, Swift, and the novelists ; extensive editions of the works of Dryden and Swift; essays on a LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 273 variety of subjects; and reached its climax in a series of twenty-nine historical romances, picturing vividly most of the important periods in English and Scottish history from the First Crusade (end of the twelfth century) to the last effort of the Scotch to restore the Stuarts (1745). We are ex- ceedingly fortunate in having a full and au- thoritative account of this life, written by his son-in-law, John Gibson Lockhart, a bi- ography worthy to be compared with Bos- well's Life of Johnson. Early Life. His life before he became a man of letters was not particularly eventful. He was born in Edin- burgh, and was, as he himself put it, of gentle, SlB WALTER . though not of dis- tinguished, birth. An illness when he was eighteen months old left him so weak that he was sent to his grandfather's farm to recuperate. When he had improved enough to be moved, he returned to his parents in Edinburgh and entered the high school, from which he proceeded in 1785 to the University of Edinburgh. Though never accused of being a dunce, he made no mark as a student, chiefly because he was more interested in studies of his own choice than in those imposed upon him. 274 ENGLISH LITERATURE Marriage. Scott followed his father into the profession of law, which did not interest him, but at which he worked assiduously for five or six years. During this period he wooed and lost Miss Margaret Belches; then finding his heart " handsomely pieced " in a year or so, wooed and won another Margaret, Miss Carpenter, daughter of a French royalist who died early in the Revolution. The union appears to have been an ideally happy one, in striking contrast to those of his friends Coleridge, Byron, and Shelley. To Abbotsford. In 1979 Scott was appointed Sheriff of Selkirkshire, of which the duties were light, leaving him much leisure for writing. Five years later he took up his residence at Ashestiel on the Tweed; and eight years after that, he moved to Abbotsford, the large estate, also on the Tweed, with which his name is inseparably connected. Poems. Scott's literary career was begun while he was still practising law, with translations. Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, a collection of ballads obtained by him chiefly from unlettered peasants, appeared a few years later. The year after his removal to Ashestiel, however, marks the beginning of his popular success, with The Lay of the Last Minstrel. This he followed with Marmion, a tale of Flodden Field; and The Lady of the Lake, a romantic story of the time of King James V, the scenes of which are laid on and around beautiful Loch Katrine. These com- positions deserve distinction especially as the first of his " fine examples of romantic story, freely embroidered upon a framework of genuine history." l As such, they are the direct ancestors of his romantic novels, and therefore of the greatest value in the development of English story. 1 Herford, The Age of Wordsworth, page 112. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 275 " Waverley." Shortly after he settled at Abbotsford, or to be exact for this is a red-letter date in English litera- ture in February, 1814, while rummaging in search of fishing tackle, he came across an unfinished prose romance. This manuscript, begun and laid aside some years before, he now took up and fin- ished; and in July it appeared anonymously with the title Waverley; or, 'Tis Sixty Years Since. The identity of the author was soon guessed ; and his fame, which had been under a partial eclipse since Byron's Childe Harold appeared, immediately surpassed its former brightness. It is scarcely too much to say that it has not been dimmed since. LQCH AND ,. EMJBN , B IBLE .., Ascendency of Byron. - It is characteristic of Scott's penetration and generosity that he himself recognized and freely acknowledged Byron's superiority as poet, and de- liberately sought another field. After the publication of his second novel, Guy Mannering, his publisher, Ballantyne, calling on him found on Scott's table a copy of Byron's The Giaour, with this inscription by the author : To the Monarch of Parnassus from one of his subjects. Though Scott appre- ciated the kindliness of these words, he knew them to be in- 276 ENGLISH LITERATURE accurate, and said to Ballantyne : " James, Byron hits the mark where I don't even pretend to fledge my arrow." In his new field no such concession has yet been needed. Made Baronet. Being created a baronet in any fashion would doubtless have given Scott great satisfaction ; but the fashion in which he was thus honored was especially pleasing to him. George IV conferred the honor entirely FACSIMILE OF LETTER OF SCOTT TO BISHOP PERCY ABOUT BALLADS. (New York Public Library.) on his own initiative ; and in doing so said to Scott : " I shall reflect with pleasure on Sir Walter Scott's having been the first creation of my reign." Fortune Frowns. So far Fortune had only smiled on Sir Walter. She was soon to bend upon him a frown, the dark- ness of which was to overshadow the remainder of his life. He had for many years been a silent partner in his publishing firm; and when it failed, in 1826, Scott found himself in- volved to the extent of more than 100,000. In his diary he LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 277 records that it was in his power to become a bankrupt, and that " it is the course one should, at any rate, have advised a client to take." This is not, however, to be his course: " No, if they permit me, I will be their vassal for life, and dig in the mine of my imagination to find diamonds (or what may sell for such) to make good my engagements." His creditors met his wishes ; he heroically retrenched, and devoted himself to the stupendous task. When he died, half the debt was paid ; and the income from his copyrights paid the remainder in a few years. Although the struggle very probably shortened his life, sixty-one is not an early age to end a crowded career ; and one cannot altogether regret the episode that showed him to be possessed of the sort of heroism so often celebrated by him in both prose and verse. The End. The strain of these years of forced composition soon began to tell. He could write Guy Mannering in six weeks with pleasure when the chief spur was the pleasure of writing; the thought of creditors outside the door made such feverish haste a burden. Early in 1831 he suffered a paralytic stroke, and a general breakdown soon followed. In October he sailed for Italy in the hope that " warm Vesuvio's vine-clad slopes " would repair his shattered health. The hope was vain. In March, 1832, hearing of Goethe's death, Scott said : " Alas for Goethe ; but he at least died at home Let us to Abbotsford." To Abbotsford he was taken, died there in September, and was buried in Dryburgh Abbey near by. Popular Estimation. The journey from Italy to Scotland was broken by a short stay in London where Scott was very ill at a hotel in Jermyn Street. " Allan Cunningham mentions that, walking home late one night, he found several working-men standing together at the corner of Jermyn 278 ENGLISH LITERATURE Street, and one of them asked him as if there were but one death-bed in London ' Do you know, sir, if this is the street where he is lying? ' " (Lockhart.) Such was the universal affection in which the people held him. SCOTT'S TOMB, DRYBURGH ABBEY. "With the noble dead In Dryburgh's solemn pile, Amid the peer and warrior bold, And mitred abbots stern and old, Who sleep in sculptured aisle." Scott's Title to Fame. Scholars and students of folk-lore will always owe Scott a debt for his enthusiasm for the ballads which he so lovingly sought and transcribed. It is likely that his poems will find not a few readers for many decades. His chief title to fame and continued popular affection, however, will undoubtedly rest on his prose romances, called from the first of the series the Waverley Novels. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 279 A Selection from the Waverley Novels. Although any- thing approaching an adequate characterization of the series in the space at our disposal is impossible, something should be offered as a guide to one who is yet to be introduced to the series, or having been introduced is to pursue the ac- quaintance to the best advantage. Of Ivanhoe, Kenilworth, Rob Roy, and perhaps The Talisman, it is unnecessary to speak, because of long-continued wide popularity. If the present writer were to make a selection to represent Scott THE ENTRANCE HALL AT ABBOTSFORD. most adequately and to make disciples, he would name these : dealing with Scottish history, A Legend of Montrose, and Old Mortality; with English history, The Fortunes of Nigel; with Scottish private life, Guy Mannering, The Heart of Midlothian, and The Bride of Lammermoor. A Legend of Montrose is a better introduction to the Waverley novels than most of the series, because of its brevity and its simplicity of plot. Its historic setting is the Great Rebellion (1645-6), specifically the operations of Royalist forces under Montrose in the Highlands. History is treated with great freedom; and the most entertaining character 280 ENGLISH LITERATURE in the romance is Dugald Dalgetty, soldier of fortune, with a wonderful horse named after Gustavus Adolphus " the Lion of the North and the bulwark of the Protestant faith." Old Mortality deals with a larger canvas (the rebellion of the Covenanters in 1679), contains many stirring battle scenes, and portrays intimately the peasant life of Scot- land. The leaders of the opposing sides, Graham of Claver- house and Balfour of Burley, are superb figures, drawn with an impartiality to which Scott did not always at- tain. The Fortunes of Nigel, while it contains much of varied interest, is chiefly notable for its picture of James I, generally regarded as Scott's greatest achievement in historical por- traiture. Novels of Scottish Private Life. If it be true, as one critic says, that " the permanent value of Scott's novels lies in his pictures of the Scottish peasantry," then the last three of our selection constitute his chief claim on our attention. The plots of two, Guy Mannering and The Heart of Mid- lothian, are based on facts ; but the facts are handled as freely by Scott as are his historical personages and back- grounds. Jeanie Deans, the peasant girl who in The Heart of Midlothian walks from Edinburgh to London to obtain her sister's pardon, is Scott's finest heroine ; and she is surpassed by few in prose fiction. In this book also is found the fierce Madge Wildfire, almost matched by the gypsy Meg Merrilies in Guy Mannering. The Bride of Lammermoor, a sort of novelized Romeo and Juliet, 1 is his only attempt at a 1 Chapter V is headed by this quotation from the play : "Is she a Capulet? O dear account ! my life is my foe's debt." LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 281 love-tragedy. The characters of the technical hero and heroine, Edgar of Ravenswood and Lucy Ashton, are more convincing than such persons usually are in Scott. This romance contains also one of his best comic figures Caleb Balderstone, faithful retainer of Ravenswood. Scott a Large Figure. The preceding four paragraphs must be regarded as mere hints or suggestions. Sir Walter JEANIE DEANS'S COTTAGE. Home, near Edinburgh, of Scott's most delightful heroine. Scott created the historical romance. He wrote at least fif- teen specimens of that type which have not been surpassed, even if it be admitted that they have occasionally been equalled. He fixed the type as it has remained; and no sensible writer would to-day attempt this kind of fiction without a diligent perusal of the master's works. To know so large a figure requires extensive and repeated reading : a sketch of this sort cannot hope to do more than whet the reader's appetite. 282 ENGLISH LITERATURE JANE AUSTEN, 1775-1817 Jane Austen's outward life was utterly commonplace. Her father was minister in Steventon, Hampshire ; and she, the seventh of eight children, was born in the rectory there. No details are known regarding her education; and of the first twenty-one years of her life almost the only recorded happening is an illness she had at the age of eight while on a visit to Southampton. A Life in One County. When Jane was twenty-one years old, the family moved to Bath; and after eight years in that city, they returned to Hampshire. The remainder of Jane's life was spent in this county, at Southampton, Chawton, and Winchester. In the last-named city she died; and in the cathedral there she was buried. Jane and Cassandra. Almost the only other point worth mentioning in connection with her life is her devotion to her sister Cassandra, two years her senior. To this attachment is doubtless due her custom of presenting pairs of sisters in her novels Jane and Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prej- udice, Elinor and Marianne Dashwood in Sense and Sen- sibility, Emma Woodhouse and Isabella Woodhouse Knightly in Emma, Maria and Julia Bartram in Mansfield Park. Character of her Writings. Surely no life could be apparently more wanting in materials for fiction; but it provided just the materials Miss Austen needed. " Three or four families in a country village," said she, " is the very thing to work on." Her people are presented in their everyday dress and manners, and develop, if they may be said to develop at all, without the aid of any striking episodes. We see them at close range ; we are admitted to family LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 283 circles and village parties where we can hear a great deal of exceedingly aimless conversation. Yet one does not seem to be speaking rashly in saying that he must indeed be dull of soul and innocent of a sense of humor who does not enjoy these novels. WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL. The most familiar of Jane Austen "shrines." She died in Winchester, and is buried in the cathedral. Scott's Tribute. No greater tribute has been paid her than an oft-quoted one by Sir Walter : " The Big Bow-wow style I can do myself like any now going ; but the exquisite touch which renders commonplace things interesting " (found in Miss Austen) " is denied me." This contrast between the methods of the two novelists may be brought 284 ENGLISH LITERATURE out by comparing passages that may be found in any of their books. 1 Humor in Dialogue. One who can make such subjects as Miss Austen's interesting must be a genuine humorist, and that is what Miss Austen is. Her humor charms on almost every page, manifesting itself most delightfully in dialogue. Frequently when action is lacking, interest in the characters is kept at a high point by the humor and entire naturalness of their every-day conversation. THE VICTORIAN AGE No definite year marks the change from the Romantic age to the Victorian. Macaulay and Carlyle, true Victorians, began their literary careers in 1825 and 1824 respectively; and De Quincey and Wordsworth, as we have seen, continued to write until the middle of the century. The year 1832 is chosen as the dividing line, not quite arbitrarily, yet with no idea of being exact. Variety in Individual Writers. One characteristic of the second division of the century has been mentioned the growth of the scientific spirit. Of many others that might be given, perhaps variety is the most striking. Wordsworth and Coleridge combined the callings of poetry and criticism ; Coleridge also claims consideration as philosopher. The other great writers of the earlier period, however, were limited in their modes of expression : Byron, Shelley, and Keats, poets only (and each eminent in one limited field), Miss Austen, a novelist only, Lamb and De Quincey, essayists 1 Cf., for example, the first meeting of Edgar and Lucy in The Bride of Lammermoor, chap. V, with the interview of Elizabeth Bennet and Lady Catherine, in Pride and Prejudice, chap. LVI. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 285 only. It is further to be noted that the entire group were men of letters exclusively. The great Victorians, on the other hand, were seldom to be restricted to a scanty plot of ground. Macaulay was states- man, historian, literary essayist. Arnold was poet, literary essayist, worker in education, student of society, and through all, reformer. Thackeray, though in all minds primarily a novelist, wrote some essays of great merit, and some ballads by no means to be despised. One thinks of Dickens as novelist; yet in view of the conscious purpose underlying many of his fictions, it is a question whether he should not be considered first of all a reformer. Tennyson and Browning, the two most conspicuous figures in Victorian literature, were poets only ; but their poetry covers so wide a range that they too exemplify well the variety of interest and of form of expression belonging to the age. THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY, 1800-1859 First in time of the Victorians is Macaulay, who was born in the year of Wordsworth's preface to the Lyrical Ballads, and who published his first essay nine years before the deaths of Lamb and Coleridge. That, the enthusiastic reception of his Milton (1825) was due somewhat to the Romantic love of newness, makes his work look backward ; but he was not essentially an innovator, and his work as a whole clearly belongs with that of the later period. Macaulay's Style. What attracted readers to Macaulay was his style. " The more I think," wrote Jeffrey, editor of the magazine in which the Milton essay appeared, " the less I can conceive where you picked up that style." It is a style that has had a host of admirers ; and even its severest critic, Matthew Arnold, admits that it is " a style to dazzle, 286 ENGLISH LITERATURE to gain admirers everywhere, to attract imitators in multi- tude." To this topic we must return after stating briefly the facts of Macaulay's life. Childhood. He was born at Rothley Temple, Leicester- shire, almost the geographical centre of England. His mother was a Quaker, and his father a Scotch Presbyterian who devoted his life to the cause of abolition. He was one of the precocious children of literary fame; precocious, moreover, in a way to foretell his future greatness. When FACSIMILE OF MACAULAY'S SIGNATURE. (British Museum.) a mere child, asked by a lady whether he was suffering from a slight accident, he replied that " the agony was abated." Before his school-days were over, he had written a history of the world and several heroic poems, which a wise mother withheld from publication. College Life. His parents moved to London while he was still young; and although his preparatory education was received in the country, he was a city boy, emphatically a London product. His record at school and at Trinity College, Cambridge, did not disappoint the hopes raised by his precocity. After graduating in 1822, he contributed to LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 287 magazines, making his first success with Milton three years later. From 1824 to 1831 he held a fellowship at Trinity worth 300 a year. Public Career. Macaulay's career as statesman began with his election to Parliament in 1830. Though he con- tinued to write for magazines, he gave much thought to the need of government reforms, especially in India. His understanding of the situation in India brought him appoint- ment as a member of the Supreme Council there at a salary of 10,000. During four years in the East his principal work was formulating a Criminal Code for India, which he did admirably. Despite the demands of this work on his time, he read an almost incredible amount, chiefly Latin and Greek, not restricting himself to classic authors. He seems to have been a quite undiscriminating reader. " Baron " Macaulay. After returning to England he again sat in Parliament, held positions in two Whig ministries, and was an active member of the opposition during the Tory ministry of Peel. In 1857 his services to the state were rewarded by elevation to the peerage as " Baron Macaulay of Rothley." His retirement from public life was due to anxiety to complete his History of England, the first two volumes of which had appeared in 1848. His failing health retarded the writing, and the five volumes completed before his death were only a small portion of his original plan. He died in December, 1859, and was buried in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey. Poetry and Critical Writing. Besides the. History of England and the Essay on Milton, Macaulay wrote a number of literary and historical essays for magazines, several biographies for the Encyclopedia Britannica, and some 288 ENGLISH LITERATURE poems. Although it would be a mistake to call Macaulay a great poet, the volume called The Lays of Ancient Rome enjoyed great popularity, and at least one, Horatius at the Bridge, still has admirers. Another justly popular poem is the martial Battle of Ivry, celebrating the victory of Henry of Navarre over the Holy League. His essays dealing with literary subjects, it must be admitted, do not seem destined for a high place. He himself said : " I never have written *a piece of criticism on poetry or the fine arts which I would not burn if I had the power." Historical Writing. There remain the History and the historical essays to establish Macaulay's rank as a great writer. " I have written several things," said he, " on his- torical, political, and moral questions, by which I am willing to be estimated." In these we find great narrative skill, and power to present scenes in vivid language. His de- scription of the scene at the trial of Warren Hastings (essay on Hastings) is one of the most real pictures in words which our language can boast. The account of London coffee- houses ( History of England, chapter III) is even more striking because he is presenting not an individual one but a type. Virtues of his Style. The virtues of Macaulay's style are not hard to discover, and they are virtues worthy of MACAULAY. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 289 cultivation by every one who would write effectively. Clear- ness, simplicity, and force are the most evident qualities. One may object to his judgments. Not every reader of Boswell, by any means, will agree that whereas other men " attain literary eminence in spite of their weaknesses, Boswell attained it by reason of his weaknesses ; " but no one ques- tions Macaulay's meaning, or his effectiveness in express- ing it. One may object, as Arnold vigorously does, to the panegyric of the Essay on Milton; but no one will deny that it is set forth in a perfectly clear and exceedingly effec- tive manner. Macaulay's means of obtaining these qualities can be readily found by a careful reader. Simple, concrete words ; illustrations from nearby objects, scenes, and incidents; use of climax, and of parallel and periodic structure in sentences; and, to crown all, a sense of organization that makes every chapter of the history, every essay, every logical subdivision a clear-cut unit these are some of the most evident means of producing the style that aroused Jeffrey's wonder and that has enabled Macaulay ever since to hold so conspicuous a place in literature. THOMAS CARLYLE, 1795-1881 One of the characteristics of Macaulay that is not altogether pleasing is what an acquaintance called his " cocksureness about everything." From this arose a supreme satisfaction with his country, its society, and its institutions. Of the many respects in which Carlyle is opposed to Macaulay, perhaps none is more striking than his lack of satisfac- tion with things as he found them, and his determination to shout forth denunciation of existing evils demanding remedy. 290 ENGLISH LITERATURE Carlyle's Style. Carlyle's style offers a great contrast to Macaulay's. His vocabulary, says Barry, 1 " we learn as though a foreign language." Macaulay himself doubtless took a fling at his great rival when, in his Essay on Addison, he spoke of " the half -German jargon of the present day." An amusing characterization of this style is given in one of George Meredith's novels. 2 There it is described as "a wind-in- the-orchard style, that tumbled down here and there an appreciable fruit with uncouth bluster ; sentences without commencements running to abrupt endings and smoke, like waves against a sea wall, learned dictionary words giving a hand to street slang, and accents falling on them haphazard, like slant rays from driving clouds ; all the pages in a breeze ; the whole book producing a kind of electrical agitation in the mind and joints." Two Great Scotchmen. This great writer, who became, in the words of Goethe, " a moral force of great significance," was a Scotchman, born the year before Burns's death, in the town of Ecclefechan in Dumfriesshire, some fifteen miles from Burns's last home. This association of the two writers' names is a natural, not a forced one ; for Carlyle was a great lover of his fellow-countryman, and twice championed his cause at great length in an essay in the Edinburgh Review, and in The Hero as Man of Letters. Education. Carlyle was of sturdy though humble stock ; his father was a stone-mason, his mother a very religious Lowlander, who learned to write in order to write to her son Thomas. His years in the grammar school were made un- happy by bullies, who took advantage of his determination not to fight. At the age of fourteen he entered Edinburgh University ; and though he attended lectures for five years, 1 Life of Newman, page 77. 2 Beauchamp's Career, chapter II. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 291 he left without a degree. Apparently the only university study that interested him was mathematics. For four years he engaged in teaching. It was then that he met the only intimate friend he ever had, Edward Irving, except for whom, said Carlyle, " I had never, known what the commun- ion of man with man means." When his family wondered at his not choos- ing a vocation, he informed them that he was " a stub- born dog," and would in the end master fortune. Jane Welsh Carlyle. - In 1821 Carlyle met, and in 1826 married, Jane Welsh, "the woman intellectually most suited to him in all Scotland," says one biog- rapher. Spiritually they were not so well suited both were too strong. He, pressed constantly by the need for expression, gave too little attention to the needs of his wife ; and after her death he discovered in her journal that she had felt herself neglected, but had suffered in silence. " The Voice of Scotland " Speaks. In ten years from 1818, the year of his removal to Edinburgh, Carlyle trans- lated Goethe's Wilhelm Meister and specimens of many other CARLYLE. 292 ENGLISH LITERATURE German writers, and did much hack-work for various pub- lishers. In 1828 came the Essay on Burns, nominally a review of Lockhart's life of Burns, which Carlyle char- acterized as " trivial enough." Here spoke " the very voice of Scotland," trying, it said, " to estimate what Burns really was and did for his country and the world." From Dumfriesshire to London. In the same year, driven by financial stress, the Carlyles moved from Edinburgh to a small estate in Dumfriesshire which belonged to Mrs. Carlyle. After six years here, " the dreariest spot in all the British dominions," they made their last change of home, taking up their residence at Cheyne Row, Chelsea, London. In 1836 Sartor Resartus, Carlyle's monumental attack on the shams of the day, was published; in 1837, The French Revolution; in 1839, Chartism, a book demanding substitution of aristocracy for the existing government. During these years he gave several successful series of lectures on German litera- ture, and a series which was published in 1841 with CARLYLE'S LONDON HOME. In Chelsea, famous as the resort of many literary men. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 293 the title, On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History. Success Financial and Personal. At last he had found his public, had indeed " mastered fortune ; " and from this time he was in receipt of a comfortable income. He also began to make friends, including Tennyson, whom he de- scribed as " one of the finest men in the world," and Dickens, " the good, the gentle, highly-gifted, ever-friendly, noble Dickens." Of far more interest to the student of Carlyle is the friendship with Emerson, begun by correspondence some years before, and sealed during Emerson's tour of England in 1847. Frederick the Great, completed in six volumes in 1865, was his last important work. In the same year he was elected Lord Rector of the University of Edinburgh, the only public honor he received from his native country. The Great Loss. Mrs. Carlyle's death in 1866 was a blow from which he never recovered. Honors came to him from many directions, some of which he declined; money was " superabundant," he said. But he felt his loss deeply ; and the reading of Mrs. Carlyle's journal oppressed him, with its revelation of the strong points in her character which he had failed to appreciate. Carlyle outlived his wife fifteen years, dying at the age of eighty-five. To Edinburgh University he left money enough to help ten students, the foundation being named after his wife's father, John Welsh ; and to Harvard a large section of his library. By his own express wish he was buried at Eccle- fechan. Carlyle's Test for Greatness. In popular thought Carlyle is the worshipper of heroes, and the champion of his country. 294 ENGLISH LITERATURE We have referred to his two works in behalf of Burns's reputation. Scarcely less worthy of note is his championship of the character of James Boswell, so vigorously held up to ridicule by Macaulay a year before. In this Carlyle makes good use of an argument already used in the Essay on Burns and subsequently used in Heroes and Hero-Worship; namely, that recognition of greatness implies the possession of great- ness. He shows that if Boswell had been merely seeking notoriety there was no more unlikely person for him to attach himself to than Samuel Johnson. His Theory of History. Carlyle is, however, undoubtedly of importance chiefly as historian. His theory of history, very clear and positive, is set forth in numerous places. " History," he says in the Essay on History, " is the essence of innumerable Biographies." In the first lecture of Heroes and Hero-Worship it appears in these words : " Universal History is at bottom the History of the Great Men who have worked here." In Sartor Resartus: "Great Men are the inspired (speaking and acting) Texts of that divine BOOK OF REVELATIONS, whereof a Chapter is completed from epoch to epoch, and by some named HISTORY. " From this it is clear that to Carlyle a certain amount of hero-worship is necessary to write a history. The outcome of his method is not a canvas like Macaulay's giving a panoramic view of the country or period under consideration; but a canvas from which stand out a few conspicuous figures. Macaulay's method is admirably adapted to such a work as his England in 1685 chapter III of the History of England. Carlyle's, however, is the better to give one a vivid con- ception of the figures who dominated the scene in Paris from 1789 to 1795. In his pages we come to know Marat of the " bleared soul ; " Danton, " the huge, brawny figure ; " LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 295 Mirabeau, " the world-compeller," " manruling deputy," " roughest lion's whelp ever littered of that rough brood ; " Robespierre, the " greenish-colored individual ; " Lafayette, " whose name shall fill the world." Carlyle's Gospel. One result of his theory regarding history and hero-worship is what is commonly called Carlyle's FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF CARLYLE. (British Museum.) " gospel." The essential stuff of all his heroes is " sincerity," the quality that enabled them to see into the heart of things, and made them act " sincerely " on the convictions result- ing from this seeing. This led him to an outspoken and constantly-emphasized condemnation of sham, the preva- lence of which he held responsible for most of his country's ills. 296 ENGLISH LITERATURE Carlyle's Influence. The influence of Carlyle has been strong and far reaching. We seem to see it in Browning's Luria ; "A people is but the attempt of many To rise to the eompleter life of one ; And those who live as models to the mass Are singly of more value than they all." It can hardly have failed to influence Tennyson in such poems as Maud and Locksley Hall, with their notes of re- bellion against " the social lies that warp us from the living truth." It was to the influence of Carlyle that Phillips Brooks, the great American preacher, and John Ruskin, perhaps the greatest English social reformer of the nineteenth century, attributed their determination to do and be some- thing. THE VICTORIAN NOVEL Although there were a number of poets of first rank in Victorian England, the greatest achievements of the age were in prose. Of the two prose forms which reached a high development during this period the novel and the essay the first is secure in its preeminence. Essayists of the eighteenth century and the Romantic period may challenge the superiority of the later essayists; but great as are the novels of Richardson and Fielding, and of Jane Austen and Scott, it must be admitted that in total impression they fall below the great body of Victorian fiction. For this age the novel surpassed in appeal every other form of literature, because of its greater capacity for giving expression to the many-sided life of the age. Of the Vic- torian novelists listed in Baker's Guide to the Best Fiction (more than a hundred) twelve seem to stand out as greater than the rest : Dickens, Thackeray, George Eliot, Trollope, LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 297 Reade, Kingsley, the three Bronte sisters, Stevenson, George Meredith, and Thomas Hardy. Of these the last two have never reached a large audience, and hardly require to be dis- cussed in a short history of English literature. Among the rest we must choose ; l and we shall not vary much from either the critical or the popular judgment in choosing Dickens, Thackeray, and George Eliot from the realists. Stevenson must hold a place as the inaugurator of the reaction from realism and the return to romance. CHARLES DICKENS, 1812-1870 It has been said that whenever literary London gets very dull somebody revives either the Bacpn-Shakspere con- troversy or the reason of Dickens's popularity. The ques- tions, " Did Bacon write Shakspere? " and " Why was Dick- ens popular?" are similar in their entire absurdity. A reading of Bacon's essay Of Love and Shakspere's Romeo and Juliet should answer the first ; a reading of Oliver Twist, or David Copper field, or A Tale of Two Cities, or Nicholas Nickleby, or any of six or eight other novels of Dickens should answer the second. Dickens's People. Dickens was interested in people, so much interested that by the creations in his stories he added largely to the population of the world, especially that of England. This interest led to his career as reformer, to his humanitarianism, his continued efforts to improve the condition of the poor and down-trodden. All the country was waking to the need of reforming prisons and workhouses, and of abolishing the slums of London; and through 1 The writers omitted here are briefly characterized in the supplement- ary list, pages 374-379. 298 ENGLISH LITERATURE Dickens, says Professor Cross, 1 " spoke the heart and con- science of Britain." One important quality for his work which he possessed and used with great effect, was humor. A host of humorous figures he created ; and at least a hundred of them are familiar to all who claim to be well-read in English literature. The tone of his humor is suggested by his great rival, Thack- FACSIMILE OF A LETTER OF DICKENS. (New York Public Library.) eray : " I am grateful for the innocent laughter and the sweet and unsullied page which the author of David Copperfield gives to my children." Early Life. Dickens's early life contained very little in the way of preparation for a great career. He was born in Portsmouth, where his father, John Dickens, was a navy- yard clerk. The senior Dickens was a poor financier; and Development of the English Novel, page 183. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 299 after several not helpful moves found himself and his family located in a wretched part of London. While Charles was still a child, his father was imprisoned for debt, leaving him to earn a living as best he could. Following his custom of turning personal experiences to account in novels, he has left in the early chapters of David Copperfield a record of these miserable days. ONE OF SEVERAL "ORIGINALS." Beginnings of Authorship. When John Dickens 's for- tunes improved, Charles obtained a few years' schooling. His real education, however, came from the London streets and from his work as a newspaper reporter, out of which grew his first independent writing, Sketches by Boz, published in periodicals in 1835-1836. From the success of this venture came his first long fiction, Pickwick Papers. Dickens was 300 ENGLISH LITERATURE engaged to write " something " to accompany drawings by one Robert Seymour. When, however, Seymour died after eight drawings were published, the fame of the stories which the " something " had become was great, and Dickens was empowered to secure an artist to illustrate them. Variety of Work. Oliver Twist appeared in 1837-1838, Nicholas Nickleby in 1838-1839; and in the remainder of his life he wrote twelve other novels, some verse, The Child's History of England, and two Christmas stories of enduring charm The Cricket on the Hearth, and A Christmas Carol. In 1842 Dickens visited the United States on a lecture tour. He was disappointed at not finding " the republic of [his] imagination; " and on his return to England pub- lished two books satirizing the land that had welcomed him heartily. Married Life. The novelist's home was not happy. In 1836 he married Catharine Hogarth, but soon discovered that they were " strangely ill-assorted." After twenty years of unsuccessful efforts at living together, they agreed to separate. He had already purchased Gad's Hill, an es- tate about twenty miles from London on the Canterbury- road ; and he took up his residence there shortly after the separation. Last Years. Early in his period of residence at Gad's Hill, Dickens began to give public readings from his works. He travelled much for this purpose, not only in England but also in America, and was well received everywhere. Though he was not an old man, and though he was in reasonably good health, the work required too great effort. He died suddenly at Gad's Hill in June, 1870, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 301 Some acquaintance with the novels of Dickens has for so long been considered a part of even the average child's in- tellectual equipment, that it seems almost unnecessary to characterize him. It is nevertheless a fact that the aver- age reader does not always get all he could (and should) from Dickens. A few hints may therefore be given to show the best he stands for. DICKENS'S LIBRARY AT GAD'S HILL. Dickens's Pathos. The taste that is touched by the death-scenes of Dickens is hardly a healthy one, is certainly not a cultured one. Not that the death of Little Nell in Old Curiosity Shop has not in it the possibility of pathos it has. So has the death of Paul in Dombey and Son. The trouble is the deliberateness with which the novelist 302 ENGLISH LITERATURE sets out to make us weep, not unlike the manner of the typical evangelist who tells harrowing tales to bring weeping crowds to the " mourners' bench." His Plots. A thoughtful reader will find little to praise in Dickens's plots, which are as a rule artificial, melodra- matic, and marked by repeated abuses of coincidence. These characteristics are frequently shown in his conclusions, such as notably that of David Copperfield, where all the still liv- ing villains of the story are assembled in a prison which David happens to visit. Other faults might readily be pointed out ; but these are sufficient as " hints " of short- comings, and it is more desirable to indicate qualities of another sort. Pictures of Contemporary Life. As a portrayer of con- temporary life and manners, Dickens has not been surpassed. It must be admitted that he was more successful in handling the lower walks of life than the upper; but so, for that matter, was the aristocratic Sir Walter. Oliver Twist gives a quite convincing picture of the underworld in London ; Nicholas Nickleby, of a large class of abominable schools for boys ; Bleak House, of the tedious procedure of English courts. Exaggeration there is perhaps in all ; but they remain in essentials true to conditions existing in his day. Dickens's Humor. Nearly all the good things one might say about Dickens may be covered by a phrase ap- plied to him by Andrew Lang " the greatest comic genius of modern times."- His humorous figures, though here also his proneness to exaggeration must be admitted, are an un- failing source of wholesome delight. The method, carica- ture as it is commonly called, " the heightening of non-es- sential characteristics," may seem simple ; but though other LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 303 great novelists' have used it at times, they have proved un- equal to the accomplishment of Dickens. Uncle Pullet in George Eliot's The Mill on the Floss might almost be called " the man with the lozenges." Dalgetty, in Scott's The Legend of Montrose, is marked invariably by boasting of his horse or his college. George Osborne, in Thack- eray's Vanity Fair, is adequately summed up in Becky Sharp's nick- name " Cupid." What other writers did well occasionally, Dickens did repeatedly with al- most uniform success. The Dickens Gallery. What has this method given us ? The Dickens " gallery " is very ex- tensive, and one knows not where to select. In David Copperfield there are Micawber the impecunious but ver- bally grandiloquent, "waiting for something to turn up ; " Uriah Keep, of the " clammy fingers," the " writhing body," and the " 'umble " pretensions ; Miss Betsey Trotwood, with an antipathy to donkeys ; Mr. Dick, the weak-minded one who, despite Charles the First's SAIREY GAMP AND BETSEY PRIG TAKING TEA. Two famous characters in Dickens' s Martin ChuzzLewit. 304 ENGLISH LITERATURE head, has sense enough to use his lack of sense to great advantage. Oliver Twist contributes chiefly to the rogues' gallery ; but the Jew Fagan, the Artful Dodger, the per- sonification of cruelty called Bill Sikes, and his loving, faithful companion Nancy, are unforgettable. Squeers, the schoolmaster, in Nicholas Nickleby; Mr. Pumblechook, the self-styled victim of ingratitude in Great Expectations; Sairey Gamp, the honest ( ?) nurse, friend of " Mrs. Harris," in Martin Chuzzlewit the list might be continued into the hundreds. The Debt of Gratitude Due Dickens. Most eulogies on Dickens, as Mr. Chesterton has said, are bad ; criticism of his characters must necessarily be inadequate. " Real pri- mary creation," says this eminently successful eulogist of Dickens, " calls forth not criticism, not appreciation, but a kind of incoherent gratitude." And gratitude is the feeling expressed by Thackeray in the passage quoted above. Dick- ens's scenes of pathos may be too manifestly moist, his plots may be melodramatic, his characters and incidents may show exaggeration and too much coincidence ; but these defects are of little weight in the scales when the " innocent laughter and the sweet and unsullied page " are set over against them. GEORGE ELIOT, 1819-1880 When George Eliot arrived in this world, her father recorded the event in his diary as the birth of " Mary Ann Evans." She preferred to write herself " Marian ; " and when her first piece of fiction appeared, the name at- tached as author was that by which she is best known " George Eliot." Her choice of a masculine pen-name was due to a feeling that the public would look askance at the sort of story she wrote if the author were known to be a woman. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 305 Education. She was born at Arbury Farm, Warwick- shire, the " heart of England." She came of good stock not highly cultured ; and her own formal education was limited to town schools in her native county, which she attended until she was twelve years old. While she was still a girl, the death of her mother made her the housekeeper. Though further schooling was out of the question, she con- ARBURY FARM, WARWICKSHIRE. Birthplace of George Eliot. tinued studying by herself. There is hardly a novel of hers which does not show good results from her labor in this line ; for one is usually impressed, not merely by her masterly portrayal of English life and people, but by the extent of her information. Religion. When she was twenty-one, she and her father moved to Coventry, an important event in her life because 306 ENGLISH LITERATURE of associations formed there. Under the influence of a family named Bray, she became a sceptic, and stopped going to church. One of the strongest evidences of George Eliot's breadth is her sympathetic presentation of religious char- acters so utterly unlike herself as Dolly Winthrop in Silas Marner and Dinah Morris in Adam Bede. Her first publi- cations were translations of German works dealing with religion Strauss 's Life of Jesus, and Feuerbach's Essence of Christianity. Influence of Mr. Lewes. In 1851 she became assistant editor of the Westminster Review. Through this connection she met George Henry Lewes, to whom she was united three years later. At Lewes's suggestion she attempted a work of fiction; and in Blackwood's Magazine for January, 1857, appeared the first instalment of The Sad Fortunes of the Rev. Amos Barton, published the next year with two other stories as Scenes of Clerical Life. The volume was well received ; and of all the critics who reviewed it, only Charles Dickens suspected that the author was a woman. If he was mis- taken, said he, " no man ever before had the art of making himself so like a woman since the world began." " Adam Bede " and its Source. In these stories the author drew largely from Warwickshire, using real incidents as well as real persons and places. Though in her first novel, Adam Bede, which came out the year after Scenes, she again drew on the same stock, she avoided so faithful a portraiture. The closeness to fact of the short stories seemed to her a mistake, and was, she admitted, due to inexperience. The hero of Adam Bede was taken to some extent from the au- thor's father, Robert Evans, though he is not a portrait. Dinah Morris was modeled after an aunt of George Eliot's, and Mrs. Poyser has some characteristics that came from LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 307 George Eliot's mother. Adam Bede fixed the author's place as one of the leading novelists of England, and must have convinced her that her " besetting sin " was gratified " ambition a desire insatiable for the esteem of my fel- low-creatures." Two More Warwickshire Novels. Two other novels of the same general type followed, in which characters and Vff ^ jfrr^&~ *-*!*<*-e^: r 4- Co. Eu Sn Mf 356 ENGLISH LITERATURE and although his first connection with the pupil was due to truancy, the professor loved Stevenson best of all his friends. Stevenson, on the other hand, writing a memoir of Jenkin, found it a great pleasure, when digging into the past of his friend, " to find him at every spadeful shine brighter." His own sunny disposition and pervading charm gained for him other notable and lasting friendships, including, among men of letters, Andrew Lang, Edmund Gosse, the poet W. E. Henley, and closest of all, Sidney Colvin, professor at Oxford. Early Writings. Stevenson's first published work, a mag- azine article on Roads, attracted no attention. Various essays and short stories in magazines, including some of his very best, appeared from 1877 to 1883 without marked success. His first story, A Lodging for the Night, ranked, not only by critics but by short-story writers as one of the finest specimens in all literature, did not bring him before the public as the greatest successor of Poe and Hawthorne. Not even when the essays and stories were gathered into dignified volumes did the public realize that a real genius had appeared. First Successes. His popularity began with Treasure Island, published in 1883, and still enjoying, a full generation later, great favor among young and old alike. One can scarcely think of its ever losing its hold. It is a pirate story, a blood-and-thunder story, but one " with a difference " from all other pirate stories. Of its two most surely immortal characters, Pew and Long John Silver, Professor Phelps well says that it was no " trifling feat to make a blind man and a one-legged man so formidable that even the reader is afraid of them." Three years after Treasure Island the work appeared which established Stevenson's position and brought him an income commensurate with his merit. This work was Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, a setting forth in LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 357 story form of the dual nature in man one struggling upward toward good, the other downward to evil. Wanderings, and Marriage. We must turn back some years to resume the thread of his life aside from his writings. From 1873 to 1891 Stevenson made a succession of moves in search of health, living in southern France, Switzerland, Bournemouth (south coast of England), California, the Adi- rondacks. On one of the visits to France he met and fell in love with an American lady, Mrs. Os bourne, whom he mar- ried in 1880 at her home in San Francisco. "The Amateur Emigrant." -When he decided to go to California, his finances were low, and he made the trip as an emigrant. His experiences are recorded in two delightful volumes The Amateur Emigrant and Across the Plains. The first is perhaps more entertaining, with its humorous yet sympathetic portraits of steerage types, and its account of steerage life. Stevenson made himself thoroughly at home in the motley crowd ; enjoyed himself and added to their enjoyment ; and made some shrewd observations on life. He rightly called himself an amateur emigrant ; for he was not born to such associations as the journey furnished. The uniform failure of his fellow-passengers to recognize him as a " gentleman " (from an Englishman's point of view) was notable. One took him to be a mason, another a seaman, another a practical engineer, and so on. " From all these guesses," says Stevenson, "I drew one conclusion, which told against the insight of my companions. They might be close observers in their own way, and read the manners in the face ; but it was plain that they did not extend their observation to the hands." Home in Samoa. The union of Stevenson and Mrs. Osbourne appears, from testimony of many kinds, to have 358 ENGLISH LITERATURE been one of those ideal unions which all too seldom bless men of genius. In 1891, after sailing the Pacific in a yacht for three years, the Stevensons settled at Apia, Samoa. Here he built a home, and here he lived to the full the three years left to him. Besides writing much he interested himself in the VAILIMA. Stevenson's home in Samoa. natives and in the bad government provided for them by their European masters ; and became, with the title of " Tusitala," general counsellor to all classes of people on all sorts of subjects. Lloyd Osbourne, Stevenson's stepson and literary partner, says : "Government chiefs and rebels consulted him with regard to policy; political letters were brought to him to read and LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 359 criticise ; his native following was so widely divided in party that he was often kept better informed on current events than any person in the country. An armed party would come from across the island with gifts, and a request that Tusitala would take charge of the funds of the village and buy the roof-iron of a pro- posed church. Parties would come to hear the latest news of the proposed disarming of the country, or to arrange a private audience with one of the officials ; and poor war-worn chieftains, whose only anxiety was to join the winning side, and who wished to consult with Tusitala as to which that might be. Mr. Steven- son would sigh sometimes as he saw these stately folk crossing the lawn in single file, their attendants following behind with presents and baskets, but he never failed to meet or hear them." Death and Epitaph. At the end of a hard day's writing in December, 1894, Stevenson was taken suddenly ill, lost consciousness immediately, and passed away in two hours. Natives cut a path up the steep side of Mount Vaea, and bore his body to a spot on its summit which he had chosen for his final resting-place. On one side of his tomb is his own Requiem : "Under the wide and starry sky, Dig the grave and let me lie. Glad did I live and gladly die, And I laid me down with a will. "This be the verse you grave for me; Here he lies where he longed to be; Home is the sailor, home from sea, And the hunter home from the hill." Stevenson wrote poems, plays, long romances, romantic short stories, travel sketches, essays on various subjects, and a great number of letters which make almost, if not quite, as good reading as anything else he wrote. His plays were not successful on the stage, and may be entirely disregarded in an estimate of his work. If his achievement in essay and romance were not so high, his three volumes of poetry might 360 ENGLISH LITERATURE claim some attention ; but under the circumstances, only a few poems in his Child's Garden of Verse seem likely to live. Stevenson the Romancer. It is in the field of romance that Stevenson's achievement has long been recognized, a field for which he had an inborn liking, and in which he produced several unquestioned master- pieces. When realism had been long dominant in prose narra- tive, when " the novel of soci- ety " had come to be synonymous with the novel, Stevenson set out to write " the romance of man." His Creed as Romancer. In A Gossip on Romance, he deliberately takes issue with the public who have come " to look somewhat down on incident, and reserve their admiration for the clink of teaspoons and the accents of the curate. It is thought clever," said he, " to write a novel with no story at all, or at least with a very dull one." He argues the superi- ority of romance because " fic- tion is to the grown man what play is to the child ; " and be- cause in a good romance " the game so chimes with the grown man's fancy that he can join in it with his whole heart, and it pleases him with every turn, and he loves to recall it and dwell upon its recollection with entire delight." STEVENSON. From a photograph taken in Samoa. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 361 In A Humble Remonstrance he trains his guns on Walter Besant and Henry James, two eminent realists and champions of realistic fiction. Here he urges that " the novel exists not by its resemblances to life, but by its immeasurable difference from life ; " and that in art, including prose narrative, " man's one method, whether he reasons or creates, is to half-shut his eyes against the dazzle and confusion of reality." These two essays, it might be said, embody Stevenson's entire creed as a writer of fiction, a creed from which he never wavered. Walter Scott, " out and away the king of the romantics," he admitted to be his master; and although Stevenson never painted so large a canvas as his predecessor, or attempted to depict any great historical period or move- ment as did Scott, he was a worthy disciple. In some stories Kidnapped, David Balfour, and The Black Arrow, for instance there is something of an historical background ; but history is never Stevenson's chief interest. Long Romances. Besides Treasure Island and Dr. Jckyll and Mr. Hyde, Stevenson wrote three other long romances of the first rank Kidnapped and its sequel David Balfour, and The Master of Ballantrae. They are mostly Scotch in characters and setting, but much of Kid- napped takes place at sea, and with Treasure Island must be placed high in the literature of the sea. Two other long romances, Weir of Hermiston and St. Ives, he left unfinished. Short Stories. Among his short romantic tales it is difficult to choose for special praise. In A Lodging for the Night, his first composition of this class and generally con- sidered his best, he produced " a grisly winter's tale " of Francois Villon, a fifteenth-century Frenchman previously described by Stevenson in an essay as " student, poet, and housebreaker." Markheim is another presentation of the 362 ENGLISH LITERATURE problem of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, written on a very different plan from its successor, and showing in this very difference Stevenson's imaginative power. The Merry Men, a tale of the northern coast of Scotland and of the effect of wrecks on the natives, is wonderfully thrilling, in the best sense of that much abused word. Will o' the Mill is as much opposed as possible to most of his narratives, being as he himself said, an " experiment " in presenting an inactive, unambitious sort of person with whom he could have had little sympathy. Stevenson the Essayist. Recognition of Stevenson's greatness as an essayist has come slowly but certainly to thoughtful readers. To-day not a few critics predict that when his romances short and long are regarded as antiquated, his essays will still be fresh and inspiring. This statement should be modified so as to refer, not to his critical essays, pleasant though these may be; but to his personal essays, those easy, graceful, and friendly compositions that so endear him to the reader. Personality. In these, Stevenson the man stands clearly revealed. " It is surely beyond a doubt," he says in An Apology for Idlers, 1 " that people should be a good deal idle in youth. Many by extreme activity make a large fortune, who remain underbred and pathetically stupid to the last. And meantime there goes the idler, who began life along with them by your leave, a different picture. Extreme busy- ness, whether at school or college, kirk or market, is a symp- tom of deficient vitality ; and a faculty for idleness implies a catholic appetite and a strong sense of personal identity." Now this is perfectly acceptable if one understands what 1 Included in the volume Virjini^us Pucrisquc. LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 363 Stevenson means by " idle : " not " doing nothing, but doing a great deal not recognised in the dogmatic formularies of the ruling class." It would be hard to find a great man who did nothing less frequently than Stevenson. Belief in the Value of Effort. A passage in Aes Triplex, generally called his masterpiece of literary composition, shows the same faith -in the value of honest endeavor as El FACSIMILE OF STEVENSON'S MANUSCRIPT MEMOIRS OF HIMSELF. (Widener Memorial Library, Harvard University.) Dorado, from which we quoted at the beginning of this sketch. " It is not only in finished undertakings that we ought to honor useful labour. A spirit goes out of a man who means execution, which outlives the most untimely ending. All who have meant good work with their whole hearts, have done good work, although they may die before they have the time to sign it." Stevenson signed enough, one may think ; but he left two romances unfinished, and as Chesterton says, " he died with a thousand stories in his heart." 364 ENGLISH LITERATURE Nearly every essay is marked by a " wholesome ethical quality," resulting in a spirit of optimism not surpassed by Robert Browning himself. Amid his various high excellences, none is more valuable than this. One other passage must be given to illustrate ; from the concluding paragraph of one of his late essays, Pulvis et Umbra. "As we dwell, we living things, in our isles of terror and under the imminent hand of death, God forbid it should be man the erected, the reasoner, the wise in his own eyes God forbid it should be man that wearies in well-doing, that despairs of unre- warded effort, or utters the language of complaint." Optimism. This pervading quality becomes even more inspiring when we note how utterly he lived his philosophy. His cheerful optimism under the constant shadow of death is the best of sermons. Students of American literature will recall the similarly inspiring struggle of the great Georgia poet, Sidney Lanier. To the present writer another char- acteristic common to the American and the Scotchman is that they wear well. The works of the latter that will wear best are undoubtedly these friendly essays revealing a true, beautiful, and vigorous spirit, and pointing ever to greater heights as the best goals of man's effort. CONCLUSION A connecting link between the time of Ruskin's death (1900) and the present will be found in our list of supple- mentary writers. Though only an uncritical opinion would as yet place the best writers of the past twenty years on a level with the best of the Victorians, there are among them names of no small distinction. It is altogether possible that a generation or two hence, with better perspective, these recent writers will be given a higher rank than now. So LYRICAL BALLADS TO RUSKIN'S DEATH 365 with many writers of the present day. The historian of literature, however, must take a conservative position, with- out necessarily going so far as the late Sir Leslie Stephen: " A writer, it is said, is entitled to be called a classic when his books have been read a century after his death." 1 No sort of forecast for English literature can safely be made at the present time. Almost everything written in England since the beginning of the Great European War has been to some extent colored by that gigantic conflict. Rapid and amazing changes in governments are bringing about amazing changes in the life and thought of the people ; and the end is not yet. If literature is the written record of the life of a nation, English literature is likely to be un- settled and uncertain as long as these changes are taking place ; and what the coming of peace will bring no man can predict. 1 Hours in a Library, I, 186. SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS NOT TREATED IN THE BODY OF THE HISTORY Chapters I-IH (before 1557) GOWER, JOHN (13257-1408), of whose life little is known, was a close friend of Chaucer. He wrote mostly in Latin and French, and it was probably Chaucer's example that led him to write in English at all. His most important work, Confessio Amantis ("Confession of a Lover"), is a collection of stories from various sources. LAYAMON (see page 17) was a country priest who lived near the Welsh border, and who wrote early in the thirteenth century a long poem called Brut. It deals with the stories of Arthur for the first time in English. Layamon based his work on Wace, a French writer, but often departed from his source. In Brut, for instance, we first get the story of Arthur's being carried to Avalon by fairies, instead of dying. MORE, SIR THOMAS (1478-1535), is best known for his Utopia (meaning "Nowhere"), a picture of an ideal commonwealth, drawn largely from Plato's Republic. Since it was originally written in Latin, and was not put into English until sixteen years after the author's death, its importance in English litera- ture is due solely to its matter. So realistic was the account of the land and its inhabitants that many men of the day be- lieved it a real country, and some wished to send Christian mis- sionaries there. Chapter IV (1557-1642) ASCHAM, ROGER (1515-1568), was one of the foremost scholars of his day; tutor to Queen Elizabeth (see page 48). Quite in contrast with the great scholar of a slightly later time, Francis Bacon, Ascham believed in English as a language for literature, and wrote in English. Toxophilus, nominally written to advocate 367 368 ENGLISH LITERATURE archery as a national sport, is really a plea for a sane manner of living, with due regard for outdoor sports in general. His other important work, . The Schoolmaster, sets forth some very modern-sounding theories regarding education. CHAPMAN, GEORGE (1559-1634), besides dramas (see page 82) wrote some poems and a conclusion to Marlowe's Hero and Leander, and made poetic translations of the Iliad and the Odyssey. Keats's sonnet, On First Looking into Chapman's Homer, now seems undue praise ; but Chapman's faults are chiefly those of the age in which he wrote, and his work is a noble beginning of Homeric translations. DONNE, JOHN (1573-1631), was the founder of the "school" of poetry called by Doctor Johnson the "Metaphysical." His poems, which were not published till after his death, are marked by philosophizing, far-fetched allusions, too ingenious figures of speech, and a conscious display of out-of-the-way information. His influence on other English poets for half a century was great and unhealthy. DRAYTON, MICHAEL (1563-1631), was a writer of much verse, but little real poetry. He is best known by his Battle of Agin- court, one of the best pieces of patriotic poetry in English. His most ambitious work, Polyolbion, is a sort of poetical geography of Britain. HOOKER, RICHARD (1553-1600), was a prominent upholder of the Church of England in the early days of the Puritan controversy (see page 86) . His Ecclesiastical Polity is important in the history of English prose style as one of the few works -of its time un- influenced by Euphuism (see page 50). It is not a "modern" style, but it has points of real superiority over most contemporary prose works. RALEIGH, SIR WALTER (1552-1618), was a typical combination of statesman, poet, prose writer, and courtier, who may be com- pared with Sidney (see page 51). He was a man of action, and belongs more to history than to literature ; but he is memorable here as friend and patron of Spenser, and as writer of a number of interesting lyrics, of a History of the World, and of several "accounts" of his voyages of exploration and colonization. SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 369 Chapter V (1642-1660) COWLEY, ABRAHAM (1618-1667), was a royalist poet of great reputation in his day, now not holding a high place even among minor poets. He belonged to the school of Donne; his work shows all the weaknesses of Donne, and few of the solid talents that redeem much of Donne. The Mistress, a collection of about a hundred love poems, may still be read with interest. Cowley's aspiration was to be merely : "Too low for envy, for contempt too high." FULLER, THOMAS (1608-1661), belongs with Sir Thomas Browne (see page 113) among the "quaint" writers of old time who were beloved by Charles Lamb. He also shares with Sir Thomas the distinction of being no partisan in the stirring days of Crom- well. Both the Parliamentary party and the Royalists objected to his moderation. His most important and interesting work is Worthies of England, biographical sketches enlivened by curious anecdotes and a pervading quiet humor. MARVELL, ANDREW (1621-1678), a close friend of Milton, is the only other Puritan poet of the day deserving even passing mention. He took an active part in politics during the Common- wealth, and was only occasionally a poet. His feeling for nature was genuine, and his verses embodying this feeling constitute his best claim on modern readers. The Garden is perhaps the most generally admired of his poems. TAYLOR, JEREMY (1613-1667), was the greatest preacher who espoused the cause of the Church of England in the theological controversies of the day. His greatest work, however, Holy Living and Dying, is not controversial, but is a sort of manual for the faithful. "He makes life a procession to the grave," says William Hazlitt, "but crowns it with garlands, and rains sacrificial roses on its path." WALLER, EDMUND (1606-1687), like Cowley, has fallen greatly in the critics' opinion. Edmund Gosse makes much of Waller's historical position in English poetry, but is compelled to admit that he can never again be popular. Perhaps half a dozen of Waller's lyrics will be remembered, of which the most pleasing is that beginning : "Go, lovely rose !" 370 ENGLISH LITERATURE WALTON, IZAAK (1593-1683), of whom it has been said : " There is perhaps no character, whether personal or literary, more perfectly enviable than that of Izaak Walton." He was a London merchant who was able to retire from business at the age of fifty, and who lived a happy life of ease and quiet forty years more. His writing was solely for recreation ; and his most important work is in praise of his favorite sport fishing. The Complete Angler is cast in the form of dialogues between Venator (a hunter), Auceps (a falconer), and Piscator (an angler). Most of the talking is done by the last-named, who gives detailed instructions where and how various fish are to be caught, and quaintly interesting descriptions of English scenery. The Complete Angler is a delight- ful quiet volume, and deserves, if ever book did deserve it, char- acterization as "unique." Chapter VI (1660-1700) BUTLER, SAMUEL (1612-1680). His only claim to notice is a long satire in verse, Hudibras. It is a clever but coarse burlesque on the Puritans, written to please the profligate courtiers of Charles II. The portrait of "Sir" Hudibras is supposed to have been drawn from Sir Samuel Luke, one of the most extreme adherents of Cromwell. CONGREVE, WILLIAM (1670-1729), was the foremost of the comic dramatists of the Restoration. His chief comedies Love for Love, The Double Dealer, and The Old Bachelor are marked by brilliant conversation, but also by the low moral tone characterizing all the drama of the period. OTWAY, THOMAS (1652-1685), was perhaps the greatest writer of tragedy during the Restoration Period, as Congreve was the greatest in the comic field. His best play, Venice Preserved, remained popular for nearly a hundred years, and was occasionally acted until the middle of the nineteenth century. WYCHERLEY, WILLIAM (1640-1716), was second perhaps to Congreve in merit, but far surpassed him in the immorality of his writings. His two best plays (if it is permissible to use the word in connection with Wycherley) are The Country Wife and The Plain Dealer, the central ideas of which are borrowed from two plays of Moliere. SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 371 Chapter VII (170O-1798) BLAKE, WILLIAM (1757-1827), was a painter and engraver as well as a poet. Most of his poetry and most of his paintings are at least peculiar, are to many fantastic, and to not a few are the work of an insane man. Before he gave himself wholly to this strangeness he had published two volumes, Poetical Sketches and Songs of Innocence. In these are many short and simple lyrics that even the most hostile critics admit to be great poems. CHATTERTON, THOMAS (1752-1770), "the marvelous boy that perished in his pride" (Wordsworth), published several poems which he pretended were by a fifteenth century writer named Rowley. He had poetic power; but when his pretence was exposed and he failed as a writer in London, he committed suicide at the age of eighteen. His career is one of the most striking illustrations of the precocity of genius. MACPHERSON, JAMES (1736-1796), a Scotchman, published in- 1762 Fragments of Ancient Poetry, Translated from the Gaelic. Later he published Fingal and Temora, long narrative poems which he claimed to be translations from Ossian, an ancient Scotch poet. Dr. Johnson and other critics denounced the poems as forgeries, and in a short time they were generally understood to be such. Macpherson is important among the forerunners of Romanticism, because he helped to arouse interest in the distant and mysterious past. RAMSAY, ALLAN (1686-1758), a Scotchman, was a writer of poems of merit in themselves and of more importance because they influenced Burns. Ramsay was a wigmaker, then a bookseller, conducted a circulating library, and ran a theatre for a short time. He rewrote or imitated many ancient Scotch songs, and wrote many original ones. His best work is The Gentle Shepherd, a pastoral drama with songs, a picture of real rustic life in Scot- land. SHERIDAN, RICHARD BRINSLEY (1751-1816), may be said to have revived the comedy of the Restoration, and to have washed out most of its filth. Examined closely, his two best plays The Rivals and The School for Scandal are seen to have a background scarcely more moral than the plays of Congreve and Wycherley. They are, however, not openly immoral, and either 372 ENGLISH LITERATURE play may be read or witnessed without offence. The dialogue is as bright and sparkling, the situations and characters are as amusing now as in the day of their first success. YOUNG, EDWARD (1683-1765), is remembered as the author of a long poem in blank verse called Night Thoughts on Life, Death, and Immortality. As the title suggests, it is a sombre, gloomy composition. It was popular for many years; but almost its only interest for a modern reader is in its epigrams, many of which have become proverbs. Among them are: "Pro- crastination is the thief of time;" "How blessings brighten as they take their leave;" "Who does the best his circumstance allows, Does well, acts nobly ; angels can do no more." Chapter VIII (1) Age of Romanticism (1798-1832) CAMPBELL, THOMAS (1777-1844), though he wrote several long poems, holds a place in English literature chiefly because of a few short lyrics. Of these the most worth while are two patriotic poems Ye Mariners of England and The Battle of the Baltic. They are the best of their kind before Tennyson. HAZLITT, WILLIAM (1778-1830), attained considerable fame as a critic and is still highly valued by many discriminating readers. He wrote voluminously on the drama, on painting, and on liter- ature. Most of his essays, which were written for periodicals, are short ; but he left three large connected studies which have stood the test of time. These are : Lectures on the English Poets, Lectures on the English Comic Writers (admirable introductory lecture on Wit and Humor], and Lectures on Elizabethan Literature. HUNT, LEIGH (1784-1859), a very miscellaneous writer, wrote a few things of the first, or very nearly the first, rank. His poem, Abou Ben Adhem, is still much admired by critical and uncritical alike. He wrote a sonnet, To the Grasshopper and the Cricket, which compares favorably with that of Keats on the same subject. Other poems of merit he wrote, but his prose is more deserving of a place in our literature. Perhaps his most interest- ing and valuable essays are An Illustrative Essay on Wit and Humor, and his attempt to answer the question, What is Poetry f An interesting episode in his life is an imprisonment for two SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 373 years for libelling the prince regent. His political friendsjegarded him as a martyr, and made him more comfortable and happy in prison than he could ever make himself while at large. JEFFREY, FRANCIS (1771-1850), was editor of The Edinburgh Review for twenty-seven years from its establishment in 1802. The reviewers were at first opposed to all innovations in literature ; and Jeffrey is chiefly remembered as a severe critic of Wordsworth and the other "new" poets, whom he criticised simply because they broke with the "fixed standards" of poetry. He later, however, modified his views ; and there is no doubt that his independence was an aid to literature. LANDOR, WALTER SAVAGE (1775-1864), after a stormy career, died in Italy at the age of eighty-nine, "an exile from his country," says an admirer, "misunderstood from the very individuality of his genius by the majority of his countrymen, but highly appre- ciated by those who could rightly estimate the works he has left behind him." His poetry has comparatively few readers. In both his poetry and his prose he lived too entirely in the past, and made no effort to bring it into relation with the present. His greatest work, Imaginary Conversations, portrays well the per- sonages and periods dealt with; yet there is a sort of "aloofness and unreality" about even these that detracts from their in- terest. MOORE, THOMAS (1779-1852), though extraordinarily popular in his day (and he was contemporary with Scott and Byron), and though his Lalla Rookh still has admirers, is not a great poet. Yet it is unlikely that he will soon be forgotten. Besides the highly-colored Oriental tale in verse just named, Moore wrote Irish Melodies, at least two of which are familiar to all lovers of music Believe me if all those endearing young charms, and The Last Rose of Summer. He also wrote a biography of his friend, Lord Byron, which has not yet been superseded. PERCY, BISHOP THOMAS (1729-1811), was a collector and editor of ballads, whose Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765) marks a critical epoch in the history of English literature. Many poets were profoundly influenced by it ; its influence on not only the poetry but the entire career of Walter Scott is almost incalculable. While still a boy, Scott read the Reliques "with a delight which 374 ENGLISH LITERATURE may be imagined but cannot be described." To the inspiration of Bishop Percy's volume we owe, in no small measure, the splendid array of stories of a picturesque past that have endeared Sir Walter to countless thousands. SOUTHEY, ROBERT (1774-1843), poet laureate from 1813 till his death, was a voluminous writer. The list of volumes bearing his name numbers one hundred and nine titles, and he wrote a larger number of magazine articles. His poetry is mediocre ; and few readers can be found who know more of it than a few of child- hood's favorite lyrics, such as The Battle of Blenheim, The Inch- cape Rock, and The Cataract of Lodore. His prose is better, and his best prose work, Life of Nelson, is a classic. "The best eulogy of Nelson," said Southey, "is the faithful history of his actions; the best history, that which shall relate them most perspicuously." Adhering to this ideal, he produced one of the greatest biographies in English. WILSON, JOHN (1785-1854), better known by his pen-name "Christopher North," was prominent among the magazine pilots, being the dominating spirit of Blackwood's Magazine from 1825 until his death. His criticisms are hardly to be called great, though they are usually more judicial than the great Jeffrey's. The best of his essays, published with the title Nodes Ambrosianae ("Ambrosial Nights"), are imaginary dialogues of prominent men on questions of the day. In these are some striking characteri- zations, among which the most notable is that of Wilson's friend, the Scotch poet James Hogg, known in literature as "the Ettrick Shepherd." Chapter VIII (2) Victorian Age (1832-1900) BLACKMORE, RICHARD D. (1825-1900), was schoolmaster, lawyer, poet, and romancer. Not all these designations together are as useful to describe Blackmore as is the mere phrase, "author of Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor." This is a story of Somersetshire toward the end of the seventeenth century, with a little history, and with abundant romantic material of various kinds love, feuds, adventure, a highwayman, and legendary deeds. The story has enjoyed great popularity ever since its appearance in 1869. SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 375 BORROW, GEORGE (1803-1881), traveller, and chronicler of gypsy life. He seems to have possessed wide but inaccurate information ; and some have said that his writing on his principal subject is superficial. There is, nevertheless, no doubt that the English conception of gypsies is due largely, if not wholly, to Sorrow's three books The Bible in Spain, Lavengro, and Romany Rye. BRONTE is the family name of three sisters who occupy a small but firm place in English fiction. CHARLOTTE (1816-1855) is certainly the most widely known of the three, and by only one of her four novels Jane Eyre. EMILY (1818-1848) wrote one novel, Wuthering Heights, which in some respects is superior to Jane Eyre, and which some eminent critics consider entirely superior. ANNE (1820-1849) wrote two novels, Agnes Gray, and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, the first having an interest as being largely autobiographical. BROWNING, ELIZABETH BARRETT (1806-1861). For note on her life see page 349. Her best work in poetry is Sonnets from the Portuguese, in which is enshrined her love for her husband. Aurora Leigh is a sort of novel in verse which has not found many admirers. In sympathy with the reform ideals of Dickens and others, Mrs. Browning wrote poems in behalf of the downtrodden, especially of factory children. Much of her poetry is marred by obscurity, and not altogether redeemed by the force and vigor that characterize her husband's. BULWER-LYTTON, EDWARD (1803-1873), was a prolific novelist, highly esteemed in his day, but now seen to be of at least a second order of merit. The only works clearly above his average are The Last Days of Pompeii, an historical romance of the first century, and The Last of the Barons, the period of which is the Wars of the Roses (1455-1485). CLOUGH,! ARTHUR HUGH (1819-1861), was a poet of unful- filled promise, more likely to live in Arnold's memorial poem, Thyrsis, than by virtue of any writing of his own. Clough's appeal both in subjects and manner is to a very limited audience ; :ind only one of his poems Say not the struggle nought availeth has had even a moderate popularity. 1 The name is pronounced Kluf. 376 ENGLISH LITERATURE COLLINS, WILKIE (1824-1899), was author of many mediocre novels, and of two of real merit. In these two, The Woman in White and The Moonstone, there are very complicated and myste- rious plots, and the element of suspense is strong. DARWIN, CHARLES ROBERT (1809-1882), was a biologist, the publication of whose Origin of Species in 1859 brought a change "in the whole intellectual outlook of the world." It was not the first work advocating the theory of evolution, but it was the first offering an explanation of evolution in the organic kingdom. "Darwinism" has undergone much modification as to details; but its fundamental ideas have survived the most vigorous attack, and it remains to-day essentially true. DISRAELI, BENJAMIN (1804-1881), Earl of Beaconsfield, was politician as well as novelist ; and his best works, Coningsby and Sybil, are political novels. In these he introduced well-known people, frequently his political opponents, but under assumed names. FITZGERALD, EDWARD (1809-1885), holds a place in English literature because of his version (much more than a translation) of the Rubdiydt '(meaning "quatrains") of the Persian poet Omar Khayyam. FREEMAN, EDWARD AUGUSTUS (1823-1892), is one of the fore- most English historical writers, who made the Norman Conquest peculiarly his own field. The reader is frequently inclined to wish for a little less diffuseness ; but this characteristic was the direct result of his desire to give the whole truth, and Freeman's History of the Norman Conquest remains the best work dealing with that period. FROUDE, JAMES ANTHONY (1818-1894), was an historian, and disciple and biographer of Carlyle. His most important work, also one of the most important historical works in English, is A History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Defeat of the Spanish Armada, in twelve volumes. GASKELL, MRS. ELIZABETH (1810-1865), was author of several novels, the most important of which is Cranford. This story, the scene of which is an English village, is probably the quietest, most subdued classic of English fiction ; but it is none the less a SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 377 classic of unfading charm. In Mary Barton and North and South, Mrs. Gaskell dealt with bad living conditions of the laboring class, and so ranked herself among the humanitarian or reform writers. GREEN, JOHN RICHARD (1837-1883), was the third of the great trio of English historians of the nineteenth century. His Short History of the English People is an unsurpassed interpretation of the nation considered from all points of view political, social, and literary. KINGSLEY, CHARLES (1819-1875), was minister, professor of history, naturalist, novelist. Only in the last-named capacity is he of interest to literature. Four of his novels have claims to greatness : Yeast and Alton Locke, dealing with social problems ; and Hypatia and Westward Ho!, historical romances. The scene of Hypatia is Egypt in the fifth century; Westward Ho! deals, in the language of its sub-title, with "the voyages and adventures of Sir Amyas Leigh in the reign of her most gracious majesty Queen Elizabeth." MILL, JOHN STUART (1806-1873), was educated apart from other boys, and was early instructed in subjects usually reserved for maturer years. The result was an almost excessive develop- ment of the intellect at the expense of the other faculties of his mind. He wrote on philosophic, economic, and social subjects. His most important works are : System of Logic, On Liberty, On Representative Government, Political Economy. MORRIS, WILLIAM (1834-1896), was artist, social reformer, and poet. His labors in the first and second of these capacities were very varied, including architecture, painting, interior decoration, and printing and bookbinding. Most of his poetry is narrative ; and although much of this is freely translated or adapted from Anglo-Saxon and Icelandic literature and legend, it takes high rank as original work. The Earthly Paradise is a collection of stories from various sources told in a delightful style modeled on the old romances. The Defence of Guinevere is one of the best modern poems dealing with Arthurian legend. NEWMAN, CARDINAL JOHN HENRY (1801-1890), became a minister of the Church of England at the age of twenty-three, 378 ENGLISH LITERATURE and twenty years later left that faith for the Roman Catholic. He was created cardinal in 1879. Newman is a master of style, and has had an immense influence on English thought. Of his many works the most valuable and interesting is Apologia pro Vita, Sua ("Apology for His Own Life"), in which he traces the development of his mind during the years preceding his change of faith. He is widely known and loved to-day as the author of Lead, Kindly Light, probably the most popular modern hymn in the English language. PATER, WALTER (1839-1894), was a scholarly critic who wrote on literature, art, and philosophy. Though his style is praised by many, Pater is difficult reading. His volumes that have the largest circle of readers are Studies in the History of the Renaissance (art) and Appreciations (literature). The latter contains a notable essay on style. READE, CHARLES (1814-1884), was a novelist and playwright with a tendency to use the novel as a means to promote reforms. Put Yourself in his Place sets forth the evils of trades unionism, which, in the author's opinion, greatly outweighed its merits. It is Never Too Late to Mend attacks a certain vicious kind of prison administration in England. These works are very slightly regarded to-day. One book of Reade's which still ranks high is The Cloister and the Hearth, an historical novel portraying very effectively the transition from medieval to modern times in Germany and Italy. ROSSETTI, CHRISTINA (1830-1894), is to be classed with Mrs. Browning both on the ground of merit and on that of subjects. She differs in having written no long poems. Her chief claim to distinction lies in a number of short lyrics on lofty and serious subjects. Her brother, DANTE GABRIEL (1828-1882), reached greater heights than she. He was painter and poet, with a fondness for the mystical and with other qualities making against popularity. He wrote a sonnet-sequence called The House of Life, a record of his love for his wife, which bears comparison with Mrs. Browning's sequence (see page 375). His one popular poem, The Blessed Damozel, was admittedly inspired by Poe's The Raven. Poe portrayed the bereaved lover on earth ; Rossetti, the loved one in heaven. SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 379 TROLLOPE, ANTHONY (1815-1882), satiric novelist, was a disciple of Thackeray. His field, like that of his master, is "Society;" but it differs greatly in that, instead of the crowded, variegated life of London, Trollope prefers the small town. His best books, a series called the "Barchester" novels, deal with life and church politics the struggle for the "loaves and fishes" in a cathedral town. Barchester Towers is generally named as his masterpiece. Recent and Living Writers AUSTIN, ALFRED (1835-1913), wrote three novels, some volumes of criticism, a great amount of verse, and some miscellaneous journalistic pieces. He is chiefly remembered as having been made poet laureate in 1896 in succession to Tennyson. The appointment was not well received ; and neither by critics, cultured readers, nor the general reading public is Austin at all highly regarded. BARRIE, SIR JAMES MATTHEW (1860- ), was born in Kirrie- muir, "N.B.," as he writes it in Who's Who. This means, not New Brunswick, as the casual reader might suppose, but "North Britain," commonly called Scotland! First known as the author of some charming Scotch stories, long and short the best of which is called The Little Minister, he has since 1897 been one of the most successful playwrights. While his plays are without question among the best dramatic work of the day, his success has been in no small measure due to Miss Maude Adams, also without question the most popular actress in America since 1897. In that year she appeared in Sir James's dramatization of The Little Minister; since then she has contributed no little to an enthusiastic reception of five other plays by him : Peter Pan, Quality Street, What Every Woman Knows, The Legend of Leonora, and A Kiss for Cinderella. Peter Pan (first produced, 1904), a beautiful fairyland play for all ages, has been revived annually in New York during Christmas week, and bids fair to retain a remarkable hold for many years. BENNETT, ARNOLD (1867- ), is a writer of successful novels, plays, and essays. His most ambitious effort to date (1918) seems to be his trilogy of novels Clayhanger, Hilda Lessways, 380 ENGLISH LITERATURE and These Twain. He has caught the public taste with some comedies, of which What the Public Wants is perhaps the best known; and with some little essays published in handy form, such as How to Live on Twenty-four Hours a Day. BRIDGES, ROBERT (1844- ), was comparatively unknown when he was appointed poet laureate in 1913. After being graduated from Eton and from Corpus Christi College, Oxford, he practised medicine until 1882. He has written plays, critical essays, and lyrics. All that is worth while belongs in the third class; and even his greatest admirers admit that all is the work of a very minor poet. BROOKE, RUPERT (1887-1915), was an English poet of great promise who contracted disease during the Dardanelles campaign and died on board a French hospital ship. The striking facts concerning his poetry are his worship of beauty, his frequent references to death, and his speculations on a future life. In view of his burial on the island of Lemnos, one of a group of sonnets entitled 1914 has a special interest : THE SOLDIER "If I should die, think only this of me : That there's some corner of a foreign field That is forever England. There shall be In that rich dust a richer dust concealed ; A dust whom England bore, shaped, made a man, Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam, A body of England's, breathing English air, Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home. "And think, this heart, all evil shed away, A pulse in the eternal mind, no less Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given ; Her sights and sounds ; dreams happy as her day ; And laughter learned of friends ; and gentleness, In hearts at peace, under an English heaven." BUTLER, SAMUEL, (1835-1902), deserved, as truly as did any English literary man of the nineteenth century, the epithet "versatile." He was a painter, a Shaksperean critic, a successful sheep farmer in New Zealand, a composer of music after the SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 381 manner of Handel, a critic and translator of Homer, author of books of scientific controversy, romancer, and novelist. His place in literature seems likely to depend finally on his picture of an ideal state, Erewhon, and his novel, The Way of All Flesh. Some serious students of Butler would add his Note-Books. CAINE, HALL (1853- ), is novelist and dramatist. He was educated as an architect, and wrote on architectural subjects, but never practised the profession. His first novel, The Shadow of a Crime, appeared in 1885 ; his most famous, which also was highly successful when dramatized, The Christian, in 1897. The Woman Thou Gavest Me, 1913, which deals with a difficult social problem, aroused much discussion and rather general condem- nation. CHESTERTON, GILBERT KEITH (1874- ), is journalist and literary critic. Many of his best newspaper skits may be found in the volumes entitled All Things Considered and Tremendous Trifles. Perhaps his best critical work, much of which is of a high order, is Robert Browning (English Men of Letters series) ; Charles Dickens: A Critical Study; and Criticisms and Appre- ciations of Dickens. DE MORGAN, WILLIAM (1839-1917), adopted art as a profession, studied at the Royal Academy, and became known for his work in stained glass and ceramics. At the age of sixty-seven he published a leisurely, realistic novel, Joseph Vance, which was well received. A year later came Alice-for-Short, and a year after that, Somehow Good, both of which approached the best traditions of the Victorian novel. In four other novels following these there is a distinct falling off in merit and appeal. DOBSOX, AUSTIN (1840- ), first attracted attention as a poet in 1868, when he published the first original "ballade" in English. This is one of the French artificial forms of verse which have attracted a few real poets in other countries. Other forms of this class, in which also Dobson has excelled, are called rondeaus, rondels, and villanelles. Since 1885 he has given himself mostly to biographical and critical prose, dealing chiefly with eighteenth-century writers. Both his prose and his verse are highly valued by critics. 382 ENGLISH LITERATURE DOYLE, SIR ARTHUR CONAN (18:")!) - ), physician and novel- ist, was knighted for his professional service in the South African war (1899-1902). By the world he will be remembered as the author of clever detective stories, and the creator of one remark- able character Sherlock Holmes. The stories of the great detective have been translated into most modern languages ; and they have been as great favorites in Russia and Japan as in England and America. GALSWORTHY, JOHN (1867- ), is novelist and dramatist, realistic portrayer of commonplace people and scenes. He is, like so many recent writers of fiction, much interested in problems of society ; he is at the same time a master of his art. His best novels, if one must choose, are probably Fraternity and The Country House. One of his best plays, Strife, deals with the capital and labor problem. HARDY, THOMAS (1840- ), aspires to fame as a poet, but it seems clear that he is destined to be known as novelist only. Between 1870 and 1897 he wrote fourteen novels, the scenes of which are in Southwestern England, which he designates as "Wessex." Although there is hardly a weak novel in the series, critical opinion is agreed that three are superior to the rest, and are 'all but sure of a place among the greatest English novels. These are Far from the Madding 'Crowd, The Return of the Native, and Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Mr. Hardy is a humorist of the first order, and his portrayal of the Wessex peasants is delightful in this kind. Because, however, of the sombre cast of his stories, and because of his apparent belief in the domination of life by events beyond human control, he is by many regarded as a "pessi- mist," a "fatalist," or even a "pagan." Another view is that he is "a rigid moralist," whose observation of life has impressed upon him the truth that "man may be forced to reap where he has not sown." HENLEY, WILLIAM ERNEST (1849-1903), was editor, critic, poet, and friend of Robert Louis Stevenson. In collaboration with Stevenson he wrote several plays. His poems were well received by a small but competent circle, and his critical essays are valuable both in themselves and for their influence toward a higher class of journalistic work. Most of his essays and poems SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 383 have been collected. Of the former the best are to be found in Views and Reviews; of the latter, in A Book of Verse and London Voluntaries. JONES, HENRY ARTHUR (1851- ), has been one of the fore- most English dramatists since 1884, when he published the first of his social comedies Saints and Sinners. His best play is The Rogue's Comedy. A number of his plays have been translated into other languages and performed with success in several coun- tries of Europe. KIPLING, RTJDYARD (1865- ), probably the most popular English poet since Tennyson and one of the most popular prose writers, was born in Bombay. Much of his best work deals with life in India ; well represented by Wee Willie Winkie and by several stories in The Day's Work. His Ballads and Barrack Room Ballads still find widespread favor, notably, "On the Road to Mandalay," "Danny Deever," "Fuzzy Wuzzy," and "Tommy Atkins." The Jungle Book, The Second Jungle Book, and Just So Stories, though written for children, contain much of interest and profit to adult readers. His writings during the present war have not been highly significant; but some things, like The Outlaws, for example, a poem on the German crime against Belgium, are vigorous and worth remembering. His greatest achievement is The Recessional, written for Queen Victoria's jubilee (1897). LANG, ANDREW (1844-1912), was a versatile Scotchman, born at Selkirk (Scott's county), and educated at Edinburgh Academy and St. Andrew's University. He wrote poems, collected in seven volumes ; translated (in collaboration) the Iliad and the Odyssey ; made valuable contributions to Homeric criticism ; made valuable researches in Scottish history; wrote important works on folk- lore; and compiled a number of excellent volumes of fairy talcs. Few writers in late days have done so much work of the first rank in fields so varied. LEE, SIR SIDNEY (1859- ), is one of the foremost living literary critics, and joint editor (with Sir Leslie Stephen) of the monumental Dictionary of National Biography. His special field is the sixteenth century; his most important work is A Life of William Shakespeare, first published in 1898, revised and re- written, 1915. 384 ENGLISH LITERATURE LOCKE, WILLIAM JOHN (1863- ), was born in the West Indies, and educated at St. John's College, Cambridge. He became an architect, and was secretary of the Royal Institute of British Architects from 1897 to 1907. He has written some plays, but is best known as author of several novels, of which the most successful are The Beloved Vagabond and The Fortunate Youth. MASEFIELD, JOHN (1875- ), is lyric, narrative, and dramatic poet. In 1916 and 1917 he lectured in America on aspects of the war and on English poets. He saw service with a hospital unit at the Dardanelles. "No poet," says one critic, "sings more clearly of the real England. No poet is singing more directly to his people than Masefield." The Tragedy of Nan is generally regarded as his best play. The Widow in the Bye Street and Dauber are among his best narratives in verse, the field in which he seems most sure of a distinguished place. MEREDITH, GEORGE (1828-1909), was poet, novelist, and reformer. His style is at times obscure; and the difficulty of understanding him has resulted in his never achieving great popularity. It is doubtless as true of Meredith as of Robert Browning that he was never intentionally obscure, but that he also never intended anything he wrote as a "substitute for a cigar, or a game of dominoes, to an idle man." Although Meredith wrote some poems of permanent value, it is as novelist that he takes his most certain place in literature. He is very clearly in the first rank of English novelists. He is a psychological realist, much concerned with the frailties of his race and nation, and aiming at reform. His best novels are The Ordeal of Richard Fever el, setting forth the failure of a fantastic scheme of education ; Beauchamp's Career, portraying a political idealist ; and Diana of the Crossways and One of Our Conquerors, attacks upon generally accepted ideas regarding marriage. The Adventures of Harry Richmond is perhaps his best as a story; that is, it is fuller of incident than his others. It contains also two well-drawn and interesting boys of an age which Meredith particularly excelled in drawing. NOTES, ALFRED (1880- ), has been publishing verse of merit since 1902. Besides some narratives and a large number of lyrics showing poetic skill and imagination, Noyes has written SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 385 an epic poem, Drake, and a drama, Sherwood. In 1914 he became visiting professor of English literature at Princeton, and in the years following gave readings from his works and lectures on various phases of the war. PHILLIPS, STEPHEN (1869-1915), was a writer of lyric and narrative verse, and of drama in verse. Perhaps his best narrative is Marpessa, story of a maiden who, allowed to choose the god Apollo or a human being Idas for her husband, chose Idas. He wrote seven dramas, of which the best are probably Paolo and Francesca, based on Dante, and The Sin of David, based on an incident of the English Civil War (1643-4). PINERO, SIR ARTHUR WING (1855- ), has been one of the foremost dramatists of the world since about 1890. Previously he was an actor, and he has in his writing made good use of his experience behind the footlights. He has written a large number of plays farces, comedies, and tragedies. In the opinion of many critics he has written no better tragedy than The Second Mrs. Tanqueray (1893), and no better comedies than The Princess and the Butterfly (1897) and Trelawney of the Wells (1898) . Among later plays, Mid-channel (1909) is highly regarded by critics, but has not met with so cordial a reception from the public. SHAW, GEORGE BERNARD (1856- ), is undoubtedly the most conspiciwus figure among living English writers. Whether he is the greatest, or merely a sensationalist, is a matter of dis- agreement. He has written several novels of no special merit ; a host of essays, long and short, on a miscellaneous array of subjects ; and about twenty-five plays. Upon the last group of writings Shaw's rank, it seems likely, will finally rest. They are all clever, most of them are brilliant ; and he has great power in impressing his theme on the minds of his audience. Many think he has never surpassed The Devil's Disciple, one of his early efforts. Other plays which seem likely to live are Arms and the Man, Man and Superman, and Androcles and the Lion. SINCLAIR, MAY ( ? - ), began her literary career in 1887 with a volume of poems. In 1895 appeared her first short story ; in 1897, her first novel. Not until 1904, with The Divine Fire, did she attain a real success ; and not until this novel had made a stir in America did the writer obtain a following in England. 386 ENGLISH LITERATURE Since then she has written a number of novels, the most recent of which (1918), The Tree of Heaven, bids fair to repeat the success of The Divine Fire. Miss Sinclair has published one notable volume in criticism, The Three Brontes; and an interesting Journal of Impressions in Belgium (1915). SPENCER, HERBERT (1820-1903), was one of the foremost scientific writers of the Victorian period. He wrote on economics, biology, ethics, psychology, and sociology ; but his chief value is not so much in the substance of his writings as in the clearness of his method and his style. Without being "popular" in the way a lyceum lecturer on science is popular, Spencer succeeded in making intelligible to unscientific people many fundamental scientific facts and principles. His Autobiography is very interest- ing and well written. STEPHEN, SIR LESLIE (1832-1904), was critic and biographer, editor of the Dictionary of National Biography. Though his studies and writings cover many centuries, he is at his best in treating writers after 1700 ; especially, those of the eighteenth century. Besides the general direction of the Dictionary and the contribution of about thirty articles to it, his most important work is in Hours in a Library, Studies of a Biographer, and History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century. SWINBURNE, ALGERNON CHARLES (1837-1909), was a great critic, and the last of the greater Victorian poets. As critic he had marked power of appreciation ; but he was too vigorous in his praise or condemnation to convince most readers. He is especially noted for the variety and skill of his metres ; and he wrote a number of dramas and some non-dramatic narratives. Of the dramas, Atalanta in Calydon has had the greatest success, of the narratives, Tristram of Lyonnesse, an Arthurian story, holds first place. The best of his lyrics deal with the sea. WARD, MRS. HUMPHRY (1851- ), is a novelist, niece of Matthew Arnold. She came into prominence in 1888 with the publication of Robert Elsmere, a novel dealing with the change of an English minister from orthodoxy to liberalism, and dis- cussing at great length the "higher criticism" of the Bible. In recent years she has dealt with social questions, notably in The SUPPLEMENTARY LIST OF AUTHORS 387 Marriage of William Ashc, Fenwick's Career, and The Testing of Diana Mallory. WATSON, WILLIAM (1858- ), is a poet who some critics think should be at present England's laureate. In general it may be said that his work is too intellectual and too highly finished to attain wide recognition. He gained considerable notoriety in 1909 by The Woman with a Serpent's Tongue, believed to have been aimed at the wife of a distinguished English statesman. WELLS, HERBERT GEORGE (1866- ), may be said to have shared for some years the spotlight on the literary stage with Shaw. At the beginning of his career he wrote stories with a scientific turn, which caused him to be compared with Jules Verne. Later he wrote novels dealing with various social problems, such as Tono-Bungay, a satire on successful quackery; and Marriage. Since the war began he has written two novels of the moment, Mr. Britling Sees It Through and The Soul of a Bishop, which picture the development of the British people in the stress of the conflict. The first of these war novels had a phenomenal success ; Mr. Wells has also written essays of which the most important is perhaps God, the Invisible King, an extended effort to frame a religion for a thinking man of the twentieth century. YEATS, WILLIAM BUTLER (1865- ), is the most notable figure in the so-called "Celtic Renaissance," or Irish rebirth in literature. His most striking quality is shown in a realistic treat- ment of the world of unreality ; and it is in this that he resembles somewhat the writers (mostly nameless) of Ireland's great age of literature about the seventh to the twelfth century. Of all his lyric and dramatic works the best-known is probably The Land of Heart's Desire, an exquisite fairy play. SELECTED LIST OF BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL WORKS IN view of the thousands of valuable works on English literature, the following can be only suggestive. In compiling it the writer has had in mind usefulness for high school students and teachers, though many standard works must be included which would be in place in any library. Works listed as wholes in footnotes are omitted here : e.g., on ballads, page 36 ; on Shakspere, page 79 ; others on pages 91, 119, 120, etc. 1. General Works. Cambridge History of English Literature, 14 vols. (Putnams.) Separate chapters by leading specialists of the world. Invaluable, but of by no means equal merit throughout. GARNETT AND GOSSE, Illustrated History of English Literature, 4 vols. (Macmillan.) Chiefly noteworthy, as its title indicates, for its illustrations, though the matter represents the mature work of two eminent English scholars and men of letters. SAINTSBURY, Short History of English Literature. (Longmans.) Probably the best one-volume work on the subject, but quite un- suited to classroom use. TAINE, History of English Literature. (Holt.) Interesting as the estimate of a cultured Frenchman. RYLAND, Chronological Outlines of English Literature. (Mac- millan.) Gives names and dates of authors and writings, both by years and alphabetically by authors. Dictionary of National Biography, 70 vols., with two supplements and others to follow. (Macmillan.) Contains sketches of all Englishmen (exclusive of the living) who have a place in the memory of their countrymen. GREEN, Short History of the English People. (Macmillan.) See page 377. 388 BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL WORKS 389 GARDINER, Student's History of England. (Longmans.) ANDREWS, History of England. (Allyn and Bacon.) These last two are among the best single-volume historical books. 2. Series. Handbooks of English Literature, ed. Hales. (Macmillan.) Each volume is complete in itself, and forms a good introduction to the period with which it deals. SNELL, The Age of Alfred (664-1154) ; SNELL, "The Age of Transition (1400-1580), 2 vols. ; SECCOMBE AND ALLEN, The Age of Shakespeare (1579-1631), 2 vols. ; MASTERMAN, The Age of Milton (1632-1660) ; GARNETT, The Age of Dryden (1660- 1700) ; DENNIS, The Age of Pope (1700-1744) ; SECCOMBE, The Age of Johnson (1748-1798) ; HERFORD, The Age of Wordsworth (1798- 1832) ; WALKER, The Age of Tennyson (1830-1870). Periods of European Literature, ed. Saintsbury. (Scribners.) KER, The Dark Ages; SAINTSBURY, The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory; SNELL, The Fourteenth Century; SMITH, G. GREGORY, The Transition Period; SAINTSBURY, The Earlier Renais- sance; HANNAY, The Later Renaissance; GRIERSON, The First Half of the Seventeenth Century; ELTON, The Augustan Ages; MILLAR, The Mid-Eighteenth Century; VAUGHAN, The Romantic Revolt; OMOND, The Romantic Triumph; SAINTSBURY, The Later Nine- teenth Century. Types of Literature, ed. Neilson. (Houghton.) THORNDIKE, Tragedy; CHANDLER, The Literature of Roguery; GEROULD, Saints' Lives; SCHELLING, The English Lyric; GUMMERE, The Popular Ballad. English Men of Letters. (Macmillan.) Short biographies by well- known scholars and critics. Included are the following writers treated in this book : Addison, Arnold, Austen, Bacon, Browne, Browning, Bunyan, Burke, Burns, Byron, Carlyle, Chaucer, Cole- ridge, Cowper, Defoe, DeQuincey, Dickens, Dryden, George Eliot, Fielding, Fitzgerald, Goldsmith, Gray, Hazlitt, Johnson, Keats, Lamb, Landor, Macaulay, Milton, Moore, Morris, Pater, Pope, Richardson, Rossetti, Ruskin, Scott, Shakespeare, Shelley, Sheridan, Sidney, Southey, Spenser, Sterne, Swift, Taylor, Tennyson, Thack- eray, Thomson, Wordsworth. Great Writers. (Walter Scott.) A series similar to the preceding with excellent bibliographies. Includes Austen, Charlotte Bronte, Browning, Bunyan, Burns, Byron, Carlyle, Coleridge, Darwin, 390 ENGLISH LITERATURE Dickens, George Eliot, Goldsmith, Johnson, Keats, Milton, Rossetti, Scott, Shelley, Sheridan, Smollett, Thackeray. Literary Lives, ed. Robertson Nicoll. (Scribners.) Includes Arnold, Charlotte Bronte, Bunyan, Mrs. Gaskell, Hazlitt, Newman. 3. Collections. WARD, The English Poets, 4 vols. (Macmillan.) Selections from the great poets and from a large number of minor poets from Chaucer to the present time. Contains also some excellent introductory essays. CRAIK, English Prose, 5 vols. (Macmillan.) On same plan as the preceding, and aims to do for prose what Ward does for poetry. Among one-volume collections of value, but not well adapted to use in secondary schools, may be mentioned the following : MANLY, English Prose and Poetry (Ginn) ; 'NEWCOMER- ANDREWS, Twelve Cen- turies of English Poetry and Prose (Scott, Foresman and Co.) ; PAN- COAST, English Prose and Verse (Holt) ; CUNLIFFE, PYRE, AND YOUNG, Century Readings in English Literature (Century Co.) ; SNYDER AND MARTIN, Book of English Literature (Macmillan). All books in groups 1 and 2 contain bibliographies. The fullest, which include the titles of practically all works of importance on English literature, as well as complete lists of the authors' works, are to be found in the Cambridge History and the Dictionary of Na- tional Biography. INDEX Absalom and Achitophel, 127. Adam Bede, 306, 310-311. ADDISON, JOSEPH, 155 ff. Adonais, 57, 257, 343. ^ELFRIC, 3. Alchemist, The, 84, 216. Alexander and Campaspe, 50. Alexander's Feast, 129. ALFRED THE GREAT, 9, 10-12, 13, 16. Amoretti, 55. Ancient Mariner, Rime of the, 36, 264. Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, 1213. Antony and Cleopatra, 127. Apology for Idlers, 318, 363. Arcadia, 52, 213. Areopagitica, 105. Argument against Abolishing Chris- tianity, 143. ARNOLD, MATTHEW, 17, 235, 285, 328-335. Arthurian Legends, 16, 56, 109, 343-344. ASCHAM, ROGER, 48, 367. Astrcea Redux, 125. Astrophel and Stella, 53. As You Like It, 50, 72, 79. AUSTEN, JANE, 272, 282-284. AUSTIN, ALFRED, 379. BACON, FRANCIS, 40, 57-61, 85, 94. Ballad of Bouillabaisse, 314. Ballads, "Popular," 34-36. BARRIE, J. M., 379. Battle of Maldon, 12. Battle of Otterburn, 35. Battle of the Books, 142. BEAUMONT, FRANCIS, 82. BEDA, THE "VENERABLE," 6, 8-9, 10. BENNETT, ARNOLD, 379. Beowulf, 3-5. Bible (translations), 85. BLACKMORE, RICHARD D., 374. Blackwood's Magazine, 257, 306, 338. BLAKE, WILLIAM, 371. Bleak House, 302. Bonnie George Campbell, 36. Book of the Duchess, 25, 26. BORROW, GEORGE, 375. BOSWELL, JAMES, 123, 183, 184- 186, 273. Bride of Lammermoor, The, 279, 280, 284 n. 1. BRIDGES, ROBERT, 380. Broken Heart, The, 82. BRONTE, ANNE, 375. BRONTE, CHARLOTTE, 297, 375. BRONTE, EMILY, 375. BROOKE, RUPERT, 380. BROWNE, SIR THOMAS, 89, 113, 117. BROWNING, ELIZABETH BARRETT, 349-350, 375. BROWNING, ROBERT, 346-353. Brunanburh, Battle of, 12-13. BuLWER-LiYTTON, EDWARD, 375. BUNYAN, JOHN, 129-134. BURKE, EDMUND, 192-195. BURNS, ROBERT, 204-213. Bussy d'Ambois, 82. BUTLER, SAMUEL (1612-1680), 370. BUTLER, SAMUEL (1835-1902), 380. BYRON, GEORGE NOEL GORDON, LORD, 242-250, 337. C^DMON, 5, 6. CAINE, HALL, 381. 391 392 INDEX Campaign, The, 161. CAMPBELL.THOMAS, 372. Canterbury Tales, 20, 25, 27-30, 31. CAREW, THOMAS, 88, 90, 93. CARLYLE, JANE WELSH, 291, 293. CARLYLE, THOMAS, 185, 242, 289- 296. Castle of Indolence, 175, 247. Castle of Otranto, 218. Catiline, 83. Cavaliers, 88 ff. CAXTON, WILLIAM, 37-38. CHAPMAN, GEORGE, 82, 368. CHATTERTON, THOMAS, 371. CHAUCER, GEOFFREY, 1, 24-32, 33. Chesterfield, the Earl of, 181 CHESTERTON, G. K., 304, 335, 381. Childe Harold, 57, 246, 275. Christmas Carol, A, 300. Christ (Caedraon's), 6. Christabel, 240. Chronicle, Anglo-Saxon, 12-13. Clarissa Harlowe, 215. Cloud, The, 253. CLOUGH, ARTHUR HUGH, 375. COLERIDGE, SAMUEL TAYLOR, 226, 236-242. COLLIER, JEREMY, 134. COLLINS, WILKJE, 376. COLLINS, WILLIAM, 195-196. Comus, 85, 101. Confessions of an English Opium- Eater, 266, 268, 271. CONGREVE, WILLIAM, 370. Corinna's Going a-Maying, 97. Cotter's Saturday Night, 205. COWLEY, ABRAHAM, 369. COWPER, WILLIAM, 200-204. Cricket on the Hearth, The, 300. Crossing the Bar, 342. Culture and Anarchy, 331. Cursor Mundi, 19. Cymbeline, 17, 44, 79. CYNEWULF, 5, 6. Daniel Deronda, 308. Dante, 41. DARWIN, CHARLES ROBERT, 318, 376. David and Bethsabe, 69. David Balfour, 361. David Copperfield, 297, 298, 299, 302, 303. Death of Blanche the Duchess, 25, 26. Defence of Poesy, 52. DEFOE, DANIEL, 150-155. DEKKER, THOMAS, 82. DE MORGAN, WILLIAM, 381. DE QUINCEY, THOMAS, 117, 266- 272. Deserted Village, 187. DICKENS, CHARLES, 297-304. Dictionary (Johnson's), 180. DISRAELI, BENJAMIN, 376. DOBSON, AUSTIN, 381. Doctor Faustus, 70. Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Strange Case of, 356. Don Juan, 249. DONNE, JOHN, 368. DOUGLAS, GAVIN, 33. DOYLE, A. CONAN, 382. Drake, Sir Francis, 48. Drama before Elizabeth, 62 ff. Drapier's Letters, 147. DRAYTON, MICHAEL, 368. Dream-Children, 265. DRYDEN, JOHN, 123-129. DUNBAR, WILLIAM, 33. Dunciad, The, 168. Duty, Ode to, 230. Ecclesiastical History, 9. Edinburgh Review, 245, 246. Edward I, 67. Edward II, 70. Elegy Written in a Country Church- yard, 197, 198. Elene. 6. "ELIOT, GEORGE," 296, 304-311. Elizabeth, Queen, 42, 46 ff. Emerson (Arnold on), 332. Empedocles on Etna, 330. Endymion, 257. English Bards and Scotch Re- viewers, 246. English Humourists of the Eigh- teenth Century, 314. INDEX 393 Enoch Arden, 341. Epithalamion, 55. Essay on Criticism, 166. Essay on Man, 169, 170. Essays (Bacon's), 58. Essays in Criticism, 330. Essays of Elia, 265. Euphues, 46, 47, 50-51, 213. Evans, Mary Ann ("George Eliot"), 296, 304. Eve of St. Agnes, 57, 259. Everyman, 65. Evolution, 318-319. Exeter Book, 2. Fables (Dryden's), 129 FaSrie Queene, 54, 55, 56. FIELDING, HENRY, 215-217. FITZGERALD, EDWARD, 376. FLETCHER, JOHN, 82. FORD, JOHN, 81. Fortunes of Nigel, The, 279. Four P's, The, 66. Frederick the Great, 293. FREEMAN, EDWARD AUGUSTUS, 376. French Revolution (Carlyle's), 292. Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay, 69. FROUDE, JAMES ANTHONY, 376. FULLER, THOMAS, 369. GALSWORTHY, JOHN, 382. Gammer Gurton's Needle, 67, 69. GASKELL, MRS. ELIZABETH, 376. Gawain and the Green Knight, Sir, 19. Genesis and Exodus (the Csedmo- nian), 6. GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH, 16-17. Godwin, William, 252. GOLDSMITH, OLIVER, 186-192. Good-Natured Man, 191. Gorboduc, 46, 66. Gossip on Romance, A, 360. GOWER, JOHN, 367. Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, 130. GRAY, THOMAS, 196-200, 218. Grecian Urn, Ode on a, 255. GREEN, JOHN RICHARD, 377. GREENE, ROBERT, 69, 74. Groatsworth of Wit, A, 74. Gulliver's Travels, 136, 146-147, 213. Guy Mannering, 275, 277, 279, 280. Hamlet, 70, 79, 81. HARDY, THOMAS, 297, 382. Hathaway, Anne, 73. Havelok the Dane, 17. HAZLITT, WILLIAM, 242, 372. Heart of Midlothian, The, 279, 280. HENLEY, WILLIAM ERNEST, 382. Henry Esmond, 313. Henry IV, 79. Henry V, 79-. Hero and Leander, 72. Heroes and Hero-Worship, 293, 294. HERRICK, ROBERT, 89, 90, 93-98. Hesperides, 95. HEYWOOD, JOHN, 66. HEYWOOD, THOMAS, 77. Hind and the Panther, The, 128. Historia Regum Britannice, 16. Hobbes, Thomas, 59. HOLINSHED, RALPH, 46. Homer, Chapman's translation, 82. Homer, Pope's translation, 167, 177, 323. HOOKER, RICHARD, 368. House of Fame, 27. HOWARD, HENRY, EARL OF SURREY, 41, 42, 43-44. Humphrey Clinker, 217. HUNT, LEIGH, 256, 372. HUXLEY, THOMAS HENRY, 1, 316- 322. Hycke-scorner, 65. Hydriotaphia, 115. Idylls of the King, 44, 341, 342. II Penseroso, 98, 100, 103. Immortality, Intimations of, 230. In Memoriam, 339, 342. Interludes, 65. JEFFREY, FRANCIS, 285, 373. Jew of Malta, The, 70. John Gilpin, The Diverting History of, 202. 394 INDEX JOHNSON, DK. SAMUEL, 1, 125, 176 ff. JONES, HENRY ARTHUR, 383. JONSON, BEN, 71, 81, 82-85, 94. Joseph Andrews, 215. Journal of the Plague Year, 151. Juliana, Life of Saint, 6. Julius Caesar, 79, 82, 84. KEATS, JOHN, 1, 57, 255-260. Kemp Owyne, 34. Kidnapped, 361. King and No King, A, 82. King Horn, 17. King John (Bale's), 66. King Lear, 17, 44, 69, 79. KINGSLEY, CHARLES, 297, 377. KIPLING, RUDYARD, 34, 383. Knight's Tale, 26, n. Kubla Khan, 240. Lady of the Lake, The, 274. U Allegro, 97, 98, 100, 103. LAMB, CHARLES, 1, 236, 261-266. LAMB, MARY, 262. LANDOR, WALTER SAVAGE, 373. LANG, ANDREW, 302, 383. LANGLAND, WILLIAM, 20, 21-22. Lanier, Sidney, 364. LAYAMON, 17, 367. Lay of the Last Minstrel, The, 274. Lays of Ancient Rome, 288. LEE, SIR SIDNEY, 383. Legend of Good Women, 27. Legend of Montrose, A, 279, 303. Legouis (French critic) on Words- worth, 232. Life and Death of Mr. Bad-man, 132'. Life of Johnson (Boswell's), 185, 273. Lives of the Poets (Johnson's), 177, 182. LOCKE, WILLIAM JOHN, 384. LOCKHART, JOHN GIBSON, 273. Locksley Hall, 339, 343. Lodging for the Night, A, 356, 361. London, 176. Lotos-Eaters, 57, 343. LOVELACE, RICHARD, 88, 90, 92. Love's Labour's Lost, 51, 78, 80. Lucrece, 74. Lycidas, 101, 177. LYDGATE, JOHN, 33. LYLY, JOHN, 46, 49-51, 213. Lyrical Ballads, 34, 226, 257, 285. MACAULAY, THOMAS BABINGTON, 1, 285-289. Macbeth, 44, 79, 81. Mac Flecknoe, 128. MACPHERSON, JAMES, 371. Maid's Tragedy, The, 82. Maldon, Battle of, 12. MALORY, SIR THOMAS, 33, 34, 38-39. MANDEVILLE, SIR JOHN, 22-24. MARLOWE, CHRISTOPHER, 70-72. Marmion, 274. MARSTON, JOHN, 77. MARVELL, ANDREW, 369. MASEFIELD, JOHN, 384. Masks, 84, 101. Merchant of Venice, 79. MEREDITH, GEORGE, 290 and n. 2, 297, 384. MERES, FRANCIS, 75. Merry Men, The, 362. Michael, 230, 232. Middlemarch, 308. MIDDLETON, THOMAS, 77. Midsummer Night's Dream, 50. MILL, JOHN STUART, 377. Mitt on the Floss, The, 303, 307, 310. MILTON, JOHN, 6, 44, 85, 87, 98- 113. Miracle Plays, 62. Modern Painters, 323. Modest Proposal, A, 147. Moli&re, 119. MOORE, THOMAS, 373. Moralities, 65. MORE, SIR THOMAS, 367. MORRIS, WILLIAM, 17, 377. Morte d' Arthur, 38-39. Mysteries of Udolpho, 218. Newcomes, The, 313. NEWMAN, JOHN HENRY, CARDINAL, 87, 377. INDEX 395 Nicholas Nickleby, 297, 300, 304. Noah's Flood, 64. NOTES, ALFRED, 384. OCCLEVE, THOMAS, 33. Old Curiosity Shop, 301. Old Mortality, 279, 280. Oliver Twist, 297, 300, 304. On a Piece of Chalk, 321. On Coral and Coral Reefs, 321. Opium Eater, Confessions of an, 266, 268, 271. Origin of Species, 318. OHM, or ORMIN, 20. Othello, 79. Otterburn, Battle of (ballad), 35. OTWAY, THOMAS, 370. Palace of Pleasure, 47. Palladia Tamia, 75. Pamela, 215. Paracelsus, 348. Paradise Lost, 6, 44, 108 ff., 133, 344. Paradise Regained, 108, 112. Paraphrase (Caedmon's), 6. Parlement of Foules, 27. PATER, WALTER, 378. Paynter's Palace of Pleasure, 47. PEELE, GEORGE, 69. Pendennis, 313. PEPYS, SAMUEL, 120-123. Perceval, 18. PERCY, THOMAS, 373. Petrarch, 42. Philaster, 82. PHILLIPS, STEPHEN, 385. Pickwick Papers, 299, 312. Pied Piper of Hamelin, 349. Piers Plowman, The Vision of, 21, 22, 26. Pilgrim's Progress, The, 131-132, 323. PINERO, SIR ARTHUR W., 385. Pippa Passes, 346, 349. Play of St. Katharine, 62. Play of the Shepherds, 64. Plutarch's Lives (North's transla- tion), 47. Poets' Corner, 32, 287. Poor Relations, 264. POPE, ALEXANDER, 164-172. Poyser, Mrs., 310-311. Praeterita, 326. Preface (Wordsworth's), 228. Prelude, The, 225, 229. Pride and Prejudice, 282. Prometheus Unbound, 252-253. Puritans, 86 ff. Quarterly Review, 257. RADCLIFFE, MRS. ANNE, 218. Raleigh, Sir Walter, 54, 56, 368. Ralph Roister Doister, 46, 66, 67. RAMSAY, ALLAN, 371. Rape of the Lock, The, 166. Rasselas, 182, 218. READE, CHARLES, 297, 378. Recuyell (Caxton's) , frontispiece, 38. Religio Laid, 128. Religio Medici, 115. Renaissance, 39 ff. Requiem (Stevenson), 359. Revenge, The, 34, 341. Richard II, 78. Richard III, 78. RICHARDSON, SAMUEL, 214-215. Ring and the Book, The, 351. Roast Pig, A Dissertation upon, 264. Robin Hood Ballads, 35. Robinson Crusoe, 136, 151, 154-155, 213, 323. Roderick Random, 217. Romanticism, 219 ff. Romeo and Juliet, 78, 280, 297. Romola, 308. ROSSETTI, CHRISTINA GEORGINA, 378. ROSSETTI, DANTE GABRIEL, 378. RUSKIN, JOHN, 322-328. Rymer, Thomas (ballad), 35. Sairey Gamp, 303. Samson Agonistes, 108, 112. Sartor Resartus, 292. SCOTT, SIR WALTER, 272-281, 283. Seasons, The, 173. 396 INDEX Sejanus, 83. Sense and Sensibility, 282. Sentimental Journey, 218. Sesame and Lilies, 325, 327. Seven Lamps of Architecture, 324, 327. SHAKSPEBE, WILLIAM, 1, 44, 47, 72- 81, 88, 119. Shakspere, Tales from, 263. Sharp, Becky, 303, 315. SHAW, GEORGE BERNARD, 385. SHELLEY, PERCY BYSSHE, 57, 250- 255. Shepherd's Calender, The, 46, 47, 54. SHERIDAN, RICHARD BRINSLEY, 371. She Stoops to Conquer, 191. Shoemakers' Holiday, The, 82. Shortest Way with the Dissenters, 152. SIDNEY, SIR PHILIP, 51-53, 213. Silas Marner, 309. SINCLAIR, MAY, 385. Silent Woman, The, 84. nor lie in wait For wealth or honors, or for worldly state ; 242 ENGLISH LITERATURE Whom they must follow ; on whose head must fall, Like showers of manna, if they come at all : 45 Whose powers shed round him in the common strife, Or mild concerns of ordinary life, A constant influence, a peculiar grace ; But who, if he be called upon to face Some awful moment to which Heaven has joined 50 Great issues, good or bad for human kind, Is happy as a lover ; and attired With sudden brightness, like a man inspired ; And, through the heat of conflict keeps the law In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw ; 55 Or if an unexpected call succeed, Come when it will, is equal to the need : He who though thus endued as with a sense And faculty for storm and turbulence, Is yet a soul whose master-bias leans 60 To homef elt pleasures and to gentle scenes ; Sweet images I which, wheresoe'er he be, Are at his heart ; and such fidelity It is his darling passion to approve ; More brave for this, that he hath much to love : 65 'Tis, finally, the man, who, lifted high Conspicuous object in a nation's eye, Or left unthought-of in obscurity, Who, with a toward or untoward lot, Prosperous or adverse, to his wish or not, 70 Plays, in the many games of life, that one Where what he most doth value must be won : Whom neither shape of danger can dismay, Nor thought of tender happiness betray ; Who, not content that former worth stand fast, 75 Looks forward, persevering to the last, From well to better, daily self-surpassed : Who, whether praise of him must walk the earth For ever, and to noble deeds give birth, Or he must fall to sleep without his fame, WILLIAM WORDSWORTH 243 And leave a dead unprofitable name, 80 Finds comfort in himself and in his cause ; And, while the mortal mist is gathering, draws His breath in confidence of Heaven's applause. This is the happy Warrior ; this is he That every man in arms should wish to be. 85 Influence of a Mountain-peak (From The Prelude, Book I) One summer evening (led by her) I found A little boat tied to a willow tree Within a rocky cove, its usual home. Straight I unloosed her chain, and stepping in Pushed from the shore. It was an act of stealth 5 And troubled pleasure, nor without the voice Of mountain-echoes did my boat move on ; Leaving behind her still, on either side, Small circles glittering idly in the moon, Until they melted all into one track 10 Of sparkling light. But now, like one who rows, Proud of his skill, to reach a chosen point With an unswerving line, I fixed my view Upon the summit of a craggy ridge, The horizon's utmost boundary ; far above 15 Was nothing but the stars and the gray sky. ' She was an elfin pinnace ; lustily I dipped my oars into the silent lake, And, as I rose upon the stroke, my boat Went heaving through the water like a swan ; 20 When, from behind that craggy steep till then The horizon's bound, a huge peak, black and huge, As if with voluntary power instinct Upreared its head. I struck and struck again, And growing still in stature the grim shape 25 Towered up between me and the stars, and still 244 ENGLISH LITERATURE For so it seemed, with purpose of its own And measured motion like a living thing, Strode after me. With trembling oars I turned, 30 And through the silent water stole my way Back to the covert of the willow tree ; There in her mooring-place I left my bark, And through the meadows homeward went, in grave And serious mood ; but after I had seen 35 That spectacle, for many days, my brain Worked with a dim and undetermined sense Of unknown modes of being ; o'er my thoughts There hung a darkness, call it solitude Or blank desertion. No familiar shapes 40 Remained, no pleasant images of trees, Of sea or sky, no colors of green fields ; But huge and mighty forms, that do not live Like living men, moved slowly through the mind By day, and were a trouble to my dreams. Composed Upon Westminster Bridge, Sept. 3, 1802 Earth has not anything to show more fair : Dull would he be of soul who could pass by A sight so touching in its majesty : This city now doth, like a garment, wear The beauty of the morning ; silent, bare, Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie Open unto the fields, and to the sky ; All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. Never did sun more beautifully steep In his first splendor, valley, rock, or hill ; Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep ! The river glideth at his own sweet will : Dear God ! the very houses seem asleep ; And all that mighty heart is lying still ! WILLIAM WORDSWORTH 245 London, 1802 Milton 1 thou should 'st be living at this hour : England hath need of thee : she is a fen Of stagnant waters : altar, sword, and pen, Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower, Have forfeited their ancient English dower 5 Of inward happiness. We are selfish men ; Oh ! raise us up, return to us again ; And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power. Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart : Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea : 10 Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free, So didst thou travel on life's common way, In cheerful godliness ; and yet thy heart The lowliest duties on herself did lay. "Nuns Fret Not" Nuns fret not at then- convent's narrow room ; And hermits are contented with then" cells ; And students with their pensive citadels ; Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom, Sit blithe and happy ; bees that soar for bloom, 5 High as the highest peak of Furness-fells, Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells : In truth, the prison, unto which we doom Ourselves, no prison is ; and hence for me, In sundry moods, 'twas pastime to be bound 10 Within the sonnet's scanty plot of ground ; Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be) Who have felt the weight of too much liberty, Should find brief solace there, as I have found. 246 ENGLISH LITERATURE "The World is too Much with Us" The world is too much with us : late and soon, Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers : Little we see in Nature that is ours ; We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon ! 5 This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon ; The winds that will be howling at all hours, And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers ; For this, for everything, we are out of tune ; It moves us not. Great God ! I'd rather be 10 A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn ; So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn ; Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea ; Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn. "Scorn not the Sonnet" Scorn not the Sonnet ; Critic, you have frowned, Mindless of its just honours ; with this key Shakspeare unlocked his heart ; the melody Of this small lute gave ease to Petrarch's wound ; 5 A thousand times this pipe did Tasso sound ; With it Camoens soothed an exile's grief ; The Sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf Amid the cypress with which Dante crowned His visionary brow : a glow-worm lamp, 10 It cheered mild Spenser, called from Faery-land To struggle through dark ways ; and, when a damp Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand The Thing became a trumpet ; whence he blew Soul-animating strains alas, too few ! SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE 247 SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE Chaucer (From Table Talk) I take unceasing delight in Chaucer. His manly cheer- fulness is especially delicious to me in my old age. How exquisitely tender he is, and yet how perfectly free from the least touch of sickly melancholy or morbid drooping ! The sympathy of the poet with the subjects of his poetry is par- 5 ticularly remarkable in Shakspeare and Chaucer ; but what the first effects by a strong act of imagination and mental metamorphosis, the last does without any effort, merely by the inborn kindly joyousness of his nature. How well we seem to know Chaucer ! How absolutely nothing do we know 10 of Shakspeare ! Othello (From Table Talk) Othello must not be conceived as a negro, but a high and chivalrous Moorish chief. Shakspeare learned the spirit of the character from the Spanish poetry, which was prevalent in England in his time. Jealousy does not strike me as the point in his passion ; I take it to be rather an agony that 5 the creature whom he had believed angelic, with whom he had garnered up his heart, and whom he could not help still loving, should be proved impure and worthless. It was the struggle not to love her. It was a moral indignation and regret that virtue should so fall : " But yet the pity of it, 10 lago ! O lago ! the pity of it, lago ! " In addition to this, his honor was concerned : lago would not have succeeded but by hinting that his honor was compromised. There is no ferocity in Othello ; his mind is majestic and composed. 248 ENGLISH LITERATURE 15 He deliberately determines to die, and speaks his last speech with a view of showing his attachment to the Venetian state, though it had superseded him. An Observation on Patriotism (From Table Talk) The free class in a slave state is always, in one sense, the most patriotic class of people in an empire; for their patriotism is not simply the patriotism of other people, but an aggregate of lust of power, and distinction, and supremacy. On Style (From Lectures) In order to form a good style, the primary rule and condi- tion is, not to attempt to express ourselves in language before we thoroughly know our own meaning : when a man per- fectly understands himself, appropriate diction will generally 5 be at his command either in writing or speaking. In such cases the thoughts and the words are associated. In the next place preciseness in the use of terms is required, and the test is whether you can translate the phrase adequately into simpler terms, regard being had to the feeling of the 10 whole passage. Try this upon Shakspeare or Milton, and see if you can substitute other simpler words in any given passage without a violation of the meaning or tone. The source of bad writing is the desire to be something more than a man of sense, the straining to be thought a genius ; 15 and it is just the same in speech-making. If men would only say what they have to say in plain terms, how much more eloquent they would be ! Another rule is to avoid con- verting mere abstractions into persons. I believe you will very rarely find, in any great writer before the Revolution, SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE 249 the possessive case of an inanimate noun used in prose in- 20 stead of the dependent case; as "the watch's hand," for "the hand of the watch." The possessive or Saxon genitive was confined to persons, or at least to animated subjects. And I cannot conclude this lecture without insisting on the importance of accuracy of style, as being near akin to veracity 25 and truthful habits of mind. He who thinks loosely will write loosely; and, perhaps, there is some moral incon- venience in the common forms of our grammars, which give our children so many obscure terms for material distinctions. Let me also exhort you to careful examination of what you 30 read, if it be worth any perusal at all : such an examination will be a safeguard from fanaticism, the universal origin of which is in the contemplation of phenomena without investi- gation into their causes. Kubla Khan : or, a Vision in a Dream In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree : Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea. 5 So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round : And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills, Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree ; And here were forests ancient as the hills, 10 Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. But oh ! that deep romantic chasm which slanted Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover ! A savage place ! as holy and enchanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted 15 250 ENGLISH LITERATURE By woman wailing for her demon-lover ! And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, A mighty fountain momently was forced : 20 Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail : And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever It flung up momently the sacred river. 25 Five miles meandering with a mazy motion Through wood and dale the sacred river ran, Then reached the caverns measureless to man, And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean : And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far 30 Ancestral voices prophesying war ! The shadow of the dome of pleasure Floated midway on the waves ; Where was heard the mingled measure From the fountain and the caves. 35 It was a miracle of rare device, A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice I A damsel with a dulcimer In a vision once I saw : It was an Abyssinian maid, 40 And on her dulcimer she played, Singing of Mount Abora. Could I revive within me Her symphony and song, To such a deep delight 'twould win me, 45 That with music loud and long, I would build that dome in air, That sunny dome 1 those caves of ice ! And all who heard should see them there, And all should cry, Beware ! Beware ! 50 His flashing eyes, his floating hair ! GEORGE NOEL GORDON, LORD BYRON 251 Weave a circle round him thrice, And close your eyes with holy dread, For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise. GEORGE NOEL GORDON, LORD BYRON Lachin y Gair Away, ye gay landscapes, ye gardens of roses I In you let the minions of luxury rove ; Restore me the rocks, where the snowflake reposes, Though still they are sacred to freedom and love : Yet, Caledonia, beloved are thy mountains, 5 Round their white summits though elements war ; Though cataracts foam 'stead of smooth-flowing fountains, I sigh for the valley of dark Loch na Garr. Ah ! there my young footsteps in infancy wander'd ; My cap was the bonnet, my cloak was the plaid ; 10 On chieftains long perished my memory ponder'd, As daily I strode through the pine-cover'd glade ; I sought not my home till the day's dying glory Gave place to the rays of the bright polar star ; For fancy was cheer'd by traditional story, 15 Disclosed by the natives of dark Loch na Garr. "Shades of the dead ! have I not heard your voices Rise on the night-rolling breath of the gale?" Surely the soul of the hero rejoices, And rides on the wind, o'er his own Highland vale. 20 Round Loch na Garr while the stormy wind gathers, Winter presides in his cold icy car ; Clouds there encircle the forms of my fathers ; They dwell in the tempests of dark Loch na Garr. " Ill-starr 'd, though brave, did no visions foreboding 25 Tell you that fate had forsaken your cause?" 252 ENGLISH LITERATURE Ah ! were you destined to die at Culloden, Victory crown'd not your fall with applause : Still were you happy in death's earthly slumber, 30 You rest with your clan in the caves of Braemar ; The pibroch resounds, to the piper's loud number, Your deeds on the echoes of dark Loch na Garr. Years have roll'd on, Loch na Garr, since I left you, Years must elapse ere I tread you again : 35 Nature of verdure and flow'rs has bereft you, Yet still are you dearer than Albion's plain. England ! thy beauties are tame and domestic To one who has roamed o'er the mountains afar : Oh for the crags that are wild and majestic ! 40 The steep frowning glories of dark Loch na Garr. Wordsworth (From English Bards and Scotch Reviewers) Next comes the dull disciple of thy school, That mild apostate from poetic rule, The simple Wordsworth, framer of a lay As soft as evening in his favourite May, 5 Who warns his friend "to shake off toil and trouble, And quit his books, for fear of growing double" ; Who, both by precept and example, shows That prose is verse, and verse is merely prose; Convincing all, by demonstration plain, 10 Poetic souls delight in prose insane ; And Christmas stories tortured into rhyme Contain the essence of the true sublime. Thus, when he tells the tale of Betty Foy, The idiot mother of "an idiot Boy ", 15 A moon-struck, silly lad, who lost his way, And, like his bard, confounded night with day ; GEORGE NOEL GORDON, LORD BYRON 253 So close on each pathetic part he dwells, And each adventure so sublimely tells, That all who view the "idiot in his glory" Conceive the Bard the hero of the story. 20 The Bull-Fight (From Childe Harold, Canto I) The lists are oped, the spacious area clear'd, Thousands on thousands piled are seated round ; Long ere the first loud trumpet's note is heard, No vacant space for lated wight is found : Here dons, grandees, but chiefly dames abound, 5 Skill'd in the ogle of a roguish eye, Yet ever well inclined to heal the wound ; None through their cold disdain are doom'd to die, As moonstruck bards complain, by Love's sad archery. Hush'd is the din of tongues on gallant steeds, 10 With milk-white crest, gold spur, and light-poised lance, Four cavaliers prepare for venturous deeds, And lowly bending to the lists advance ; Rich are their scarfs, their chargers featly prance : If in the dangerous game they shine to-day, 15 The crowd's loud shout and ladies' lovely glance, Best prize of better acts, they bear away, And all that kings or chiefs e'er gain their toils repay. In costly sheen and gaudy cloak array'd, But all afoot, the light-limb'd Matadore 20 Stands in the centre, eager to invade The lord of lowing herds ; but not before The ground, with cautious tread, is traversed o'er, Lest aught unseen should lurk to thwart his speed : His arms a dart, he fights aloof, nor more 25 Can man achieve without the friendly steed Alas ! too oft condemn'd for him to bear and bleed. 254 ENGLISH LITERATURE Thrice sounds the clarion ; lo ! the signal falls, The den expands, and Expectation mute 30 Gapes round the silent circle's peopled walls. Bounds with one lashing spring the mighty brute, . And, wildly staring, spurns, with sounding foot, The sand, nor blindly rushes on his foe : Here, there, he points his threatening front, to suit 35 His first attack, wide waving to and fro His angry tail ; red rolls his eye's dilated glow. Sudden he stops ; his eye is fixed : away, Away, thou heedless boy ! prepare the spear : Now is thy time to perish, or display 40 The skill that yet may check his mad career. With well-timed croupe the nimble coursers veer ; On foams the bull, but not unscathed he goes ; Streams from his flank the crimson torrent clear ; He flies, he wheels, distracted with his throes ; 45 Dart follows dart ; lance, lance ; loud bellowings speak his woes. Again he comes ; nor dart nor lance avail, Nor the wild plunging of the tortured horse ; Though man and man's avenging arms assail, Vain- are his weapons, vainer is his force. 50 One gallant steed is stretch'd a mangled corse ; Another, hideous sight ! unseam'd appears, His gory chest unveils life's panting source ; Though death-struck, still his feeble frame he rears ; Staggering, but stemming all, his lord unharm'd he bears. 55 Foil'd, bleeding, breathless, furious to the last, Full in the centre stands the bull at bay, 'Mid wounds, and clinging darts, and lances brast, And foes disabled in the brutal fray ; And now the Matadores around him play, 60 Shake the red cloak and poise the ready brand : Once more through all he bursts his thundering way GEORGE NOEL GORDON, LORD BYRON 255 Vain rage ! the mantle quits the conynge hand, Wraps his fierce eye 'tis past he sinks upon the sand ! Where his vast neck just mingles with the spine, Sheathed in his form the deadly weapon lies. 65 He stops he starts disdaining to decline : Slowly he falls, amidst triumphant cries, Without a groan, without a struggle, dies. The decorated car appears on high The corse is piled sweet sight for vulgar eyes 70 Four steeds that spurn the rein, as swift as shy, Hurl the dark bulk along, scarce seen in dashing by. Such the ungentle sport that oft invites The Spanish maid, and cheers the Spanish swain. Waterloo (From Childe Harold, Canto III) There was a sound of revelry by night, And Belgium's capital had gathered then Her Beauty and her Chivalry, and bright The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men ; A thousand hearts beat happily ; and when 5 Music arose with its voluptuous swell, Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again, And all went merry as a marriage bell ; But hush ! hark ! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell ! Did ye not hear it ? No ; 'twas but the wind, 10 Or the car rattling o'er the stony street ; On with the dance ! let joy be unconfined ; No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet. But hark ! that heavy sound breaks in once more, 15 As if the clouds its echo would repeat ; And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before ! Arm ! arm ! it is ! it is the cannon's opening roar ! 256 ENGLISH LITERATURE Within a windowed niche of that high hall 20 Sate Brunswick's fated chieftain ; he did hear That sound ^the first amidst the festival, And caught its tone with Death's prophetic ear, And when they smiled because he deemed it near, His heart more truly knew that peal too well 25 Which stretched his father on a bloody bier, And roused the vengeance blood alone could quell. He rushed into the field, and, foremost fighting, fell. Ah ! then and there was hurrying to and fro, And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress, 30 And cheeks all pale, which but an hour ago Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness ; And there were sudden partings, such as press The life from out young hearts, and choking sighs Which ne'er might be repeated : who could guess 35 If ever more should meet those mutual eyes, Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could rise ! And there was mounting in hot haste : the steed, The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, 40 And swiftly forming in the ranks of war ; And the deep thunder peal on peal afar ; And near, the beat of the alarming drum Roused up the soldier ere the morning star ; While thronged the citizens with terror dumb, 45 Or whispering with white lips "The foe ! They come ! they come ! " And wild and high the "Cameron's Gathering" rose, The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn's hills Have heard, and heard, too, have her Saxon foes ; How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills 50 Savage and shrill ! But with the breath which fills Their mountain pipe, so fill the mountaineers With the fierce native daring which instils 257 The stirring memory of a thousand years, And Evan's, Donald's fame rings in each clansman's ears ! And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves, 55 Dewy with Nature's tear-drops, as they pass, Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves, Over the unreturning brave, alas ! Ere evening to be trodden like the grass Which now beneath them, but above shall grow In its next verdure, when this fiery mass Of living valor, rolling on the foe, And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold and low. Last noon beheld them full of lusty life, Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay, 65 The midnight brought the signal-sound of strife, The morn the marshalling in arms the day Battle's magnificently stern array ! The thunder-clouds close o'er it, which when rent The earth is covered thick with other clay, 70 Which her own clay shall cover, heaped and pent, Rider and horse friend, foe, in one red burial blent ! To Thomas Moore My boat is on the shore, And my bark is on the sea ; But, before I go, Tom Moore, Here's a double health to thee ! Here's a sigh to those who love me, 5 And a smile to those who hate ; And, whatever sky's above me, Here's a heart for every fate. Though the ocean roar around me, Yet it still shall bear me on ; 10 Though a desert should surround me, It hath springs that may be won. 258 ENGLISH LITERATURE Were't the last drop in the well, As I gasped upon the brink, 15 Ere my fainting spirit fell, 'Tis to thee that I would drink. With that water, as this wine, The libation I would pour Should be peace with thine and mine, 20 And a health to thee, Tom Moore. Stanzas When a man hath no freedom to fight for at home, Let him combat for that of his neighbours ; Let him think of the glories of Greece and of Rome, And get knock'd on the head for his labours. To do good to mankind is the chivalrous plan, And is always as nobly requited ; Then battle for freedom whenever you can, f And, if not shot or hang'd, you'll get knighted. Epigram The world is a bundle of hay, Mankind are the asses who pull ; Each tugs it a different way, And the greatest of all is John Bull. On my Thirty-third Birthday, January 22, 1821 Through life's dull road, so dim and dirty, I have dragg'd to three-and-thirty. What have these years left to me ? Nothing except thirty-three. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 259 Stanzas from "Don Juan'! But let me to my story : I must own, If I have any fault, it is digression Leaving my people to proceed alone, While I soliloquize beyond expression ; But these are my addresses from the throne, 6 Which put off business to the ensuing session, Forgetting each omission is a loss to The world, not quite so great as Ariosto. Nothing so difficult as a beginning In poesy, unless perhaps the end ; 10 For oftentimes, when Pegasus seems winning The race, he sprains a wing, and down we tend, Like Lucifer, when hurled from heaven for sinning ; Our sin the same, and hard as his to mend, Being pride, which leads the mind to soar too far, 15 Till our own weakness shows us what we are. Some have accused me of a strange design Against the creed and morals of the land, And trace it in this poem every line : I don't pretend that I quite understand 20 My own meaning when I would be very fine ; But the fact is, that I have nothing planned Unless it were to be a moment merry, A novel word in my vocabulary. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY Ode to the West Wind O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing, 260 ENGLISH LITERATURE Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, 5 Pestilence-stricken multitudes : O thou, Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low, Each like a corpse within its grave, until Thine azure sister of the spring shall blow 10 . Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill (Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air) With living hues and odors plain and hill : Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere ; Destroyer and preserver ; hear, oh hear ! 15 Thou on whose stream, 'mid the steep sky's commotion, Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed, Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean, "Angels of rain and lightning : there are spread On the blue surface of thine airy surge, 20 Like the bright hair uplifted from the head Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge Of the horizon to the zenith's height The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge Of the dying year, to which this closing night 25 Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre, Vaulted with all thy congregated might Of vapors, from whose solid atmosphere Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst : oh hear ! in Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams 30 The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 261 Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay, And saw in sleep old palaces and towers Quivering within the wave's intenser day, All overgrown with azure moss and flowers 35 , So sweet, the sense faints picturing them ! Thou For whose path the Atlantic's level powers Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear The sapless foliage of the ocean, know 40 Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear, And tremble and despoil themselves : oh hear ! IV If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear ; If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee ; A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share 45 The impulse of thy strength, only less free Than thou, O uncontrollable ! If even I were as in my boyhood, and could be The comrade of thy wanderings over heaven, As then, when to outstrip thy skyey speed 50 Scarce seemed a vision ; I would ne'er have striven As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need. Oh ! lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud ! I fall upon the thorns of life ! I bleed ! A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed 55 One too like thee : tameless, and swift, and proud. Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is : What if my leaves are falling like its own ! The tumult of thy mighty harmonies 262 ENGLISH LITERATURE 60 Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone, Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, spirit fierce, My spirit ! Be thou me, impetuous one ! Drive my dead thoughts over the universe Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth ! 65 And, by the incantation of this verse, Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind ! Be through my lips to unawakened earth The trumpet of a prophecy ! O wind, 70 If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind ? The Cloud I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, From the seas and the streams ; I bear light shade for the leaves when laid In their noon-day dreams. 5 From my wings are shaken the dews that waken The sweet buds every one, When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, As she dances about the sun. I wield the flail of the lashing hail, 10 And whiten the green plains under, And then again I dissolve it in rain, And laugh as I pass in thunder. I sift the snow on the mountains below, And their great pines groan aghast ; 15 And all the night 'tis my pillow white, While I sleep in the arms of the blast. Sublime on the towers of my skyey bowers, Lightning my pilot sits ; In a cavern under is fettered the thunder, 20 It struggles and howls at fits ; PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 263 Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion, This pilot is guiding me, Lured by the love of the genii that move In the depths of the purple sea ; Over the rills, and the crags, and the hills ; 25 Over the lakes and the plains, Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream, The Spirit he loves remains ; And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, Whilst he is dissolving in rains. 30 The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes, And his burning plumes outspread, Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, When the morning star shines dead, As on the jag of a mountain crag, 35 Which an earthquake rocks and swings, An eagle alit one moment may sit In the light of its golden wings. And when sunset may breathe, from the lit sea beneath, It ardors of rest and of love, 40 And the crimson pall of eve may fall From the depth of heaven above, With wings folded I rest, on mine airy nest, As still as a brooding dove. That orbed maiden with white fire laden, 45 Whom mortals call the moon, Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor, By the midnight breezes strewn ; And wherever the beat of her unseen feet, Which only the angels hear, 50 May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof, The stars peep behind her and peer ; And I laugh to see them whirl and flee, Like a swarm of golden bees, When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent, 55 Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas, 264 ENGLISH LITERATURE Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high, Are each paved with the moon and these. I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone, 60 And the moon's with a girdle of pearl ; The volcanoes are dim, and the stars reel and swim, When the whirlwinds my banner unfurl. From cape to cape, with a bridge-like shape, Over a torrent sea, 65 Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof, The mountains its columns be. The triumphal arch through which I march With hurricane, fire, and snow, When the powers of the air are chained to my chair, 70 Is the million-colored bow ; The sphere-fire above its soft colors wove, While the moist earth was laughing below. I am the daughter of earth and water, And the nursling of the sky ; 75 I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores ; I change, but I cannot die. For after the rain when with never a stain The pavilion of heaven is bare, And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams 80 Build up the blue dome of air, I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, And out of the caverns of rain, Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise and unbuild it again. To a Skylark Hail to thee, blithe spirit ! Bird thou never wert, That from heaven, or near it, Pourest thy full heart 5 In profuse strains of unpremeditated art. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 265 Higher still and higher From the earth thou springest Like a cloud of fire ; The blue deep thou wingest, And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest. 10 In the golden lightning Of the sunken sun, O'er which clouds are bright'ning, Thou dost float and run ; Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun. 15 The pale purple even Melts around thy flight ; Like a star of heaven In the broad day-light Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight, 20 Keen as are the arrows Of that silver sphere, Whose intense lamp narrows In the white dawn clear, Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there. 25 All the earth and air With thy voice is loud, As, when night is bare, From one lonely cloud The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is overflowed. 30 What thou art we know not ; What is most like thee ? From rainbow clouds there flow not Drops so bright to see As from thy presence showers a rain of melody. 35 Like a poet hidden In the light of thought, 266 ENGLISH LITERATURE Singing hymns unbidden, Till the world is wrought 40 To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not : Like a high-born maiden In a palace tower, Soothing her love-laden Soul in secret hour 45 With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower : Like a glow-worm golden In a dell of dew, Scattering unbeholden Its aerial hue 50 Among the flowers and grass which screen it from the view : Like a rose embowered In its own green leaves, By warm winds deflowered, Till the scent it gives 55 Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-winged thieves. Sound of vernal showers On the twinkling grass, Rain-awakened flowers, All that ever was 60 Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass. Teach us, sprite or bird, What sweet thoughts are thine ; I have never heard Praise of love or wine 65 That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine : Chorus Hymenseal, Or triumphal chant, Matched with thine would be all But an empty vaunt, 70 A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 267 What objects are the fountains Of thy happy strain? What fields, or waves, or mountains? What shapes of sky or plain ? What love of thine own kind ? what ignorance of pain ? 75 With thy clear keen joyance Languor cannot be : Shadow of annoyance Never came near thee : Thou lovest, but ne'er knew love's sad satiety. 80 Waking or asleep, Thou of death must deem Things more true and deep Than we mortals dream, Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream ? g5 We look before and after, And pine for what is not : Our sincerest laughter With some pain is fraught ; Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought. 90 Yet if we could scorn Hate, and pride, and fear ; If we were things born Not to shed a tear, I know not how thy joy we ever should come near. 95 Better than all measures Of delightful sound, Better than all treasures That in books are found, Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground I 100 268 ENGLISH LITERATURE Teach me half the gladness That thy brain must know, Such harmonious madness From my lips would flow, 105 The world should listen then, as I am listening now. JOHN KEATS On First Looking into Chapman's Homer Much have I travelled in the realms of gold, And many goodly states and kingdoms seen ; Round many western islands have I been Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold. 5 Oft of one wide expanse had I been told That deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne; Yet did I never breathe its pure serene Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold : Then felt I like some watcher of the skies 10 When a new planet swims into his ken ; Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes He stared at the Pacific and all his men Looked at each other with a wild surmise Silent, upon a peak in Darien. On the Grasshopper and the Cricket The Poetry of earth is never dead : When all the birds are faint with the hot sun, And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead ; 6 That is the Grasshopper's he takes the lead In summer luxury he has never done With his delights ; for when tired out with fun He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed. The poetry of earth is ceasing never ; 10 On a lone winter evening, when the frost JOHN KEATS 269 Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills The Cricket's song, in warmth increasing ever, And seems to one in drowsiness half lost, The Grasshopper's among some grassy hills. Ode on a Grecian Urn Thou still unravished bride of quietness, Thou foster-child of silence and slow time, Sylvan historian, who canst thus express A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme : What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape 5 Of deities or mortals, or of both, In Tempe or the dales of Arcady ? What men or gods are these ? What maidens loth ? What mad pursuit ? What struggle to escape ? What pipes and timbrels ? What wild ecstasy ? 10 Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter ; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on ; Not to the sensual ear, but, more endeared, Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone : Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave 15 Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare ; Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss, Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve ; She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss, Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair ! 20 Ah, happy, happy boughs ! that cannot shed Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu : And, happy melodist, unwearied, Forever piping songs forever new ; More happy love ! more happy, happy love ! 25 Forever warm and still to be enjoyed, Forever panting, and forever young ; All breathing human passion far above, 270 ENGLISH LITERATURE That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed, 30 A burning forehead, and a parching tongue. Who are these coming to the sacrifice ? To what green altar, O mysterious priest, Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies, And all her silken flanks with garlands dressed ? 35 What little town by river or sea shore, Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel, Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn ? And, little town, thy streets for evermore Will silent be ; and not a soul to tell 40 Why thou art desolate, can e'er return. O Attic shape ! Fair attitude ! with brede Of marble men and maidens over-wrought, With forest branches and the trodden weed ; Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought 45 As doth eternity : Cold Pastoral ! When old age shall this generation waste, Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st, "Beauty is truth, truth beauty," that is all 50 Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. The Eve of St. Agnes St. Agnes' Eve Ah, bitter chill it was ! The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold ; The hare limped trembling through the frozen grass, And silent was the flock in woolly fold : Numb were the Beadsman's fingers, while he told His rosary, and while his frosted breath, Like pious incense from a censer old, Seemed taking flight for heaven, without a death, Past the sweet Virgin's picture, while his prayer he saith. JOHN KEATS 271 His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man ; 10 Then takes his lamp, and riseth from his knees, And back returneth, meagre, barefoot, wan, Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees : The sculptured dead, on each side, seem to freeze, Emprisoned in black, purgatorial rails : 15 Knights, ladies, praying in dumb orat'ries, He passeth by ; and his weak spirit fails To think how they may ache in icy hoods and mails. Northward he turneth through a little door, And scarce three steps, ere Music's golden tongue 20 Flattered to tears this aged man and poor ; But no already had his deathbell rung ; The joys of all his life were said and sung : His was harsh penance on St. Agnes' Eve : Another way he went, and soon among 25 Rough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve, And all night kept awake, for sinners' sake to grieve. That ancient Beadsman heard the prelude soft ; And so it chanced, for many a door was wide, From hurry to and fro. Soon, up aloft, 30 The silver, snarling trumpets 'gan to chide : The level chambers, ready with their pride, Were glowing to receive a thousand guests : The carved angels, ever eager-eyed, Stared, where upon their heads the cornice rests, 35 With hair blown back, and wings put crosswise on their breasts. At length burst in the argent revelry, With plume, tiara, and all rich array, Numerous as shadows haunting fairily The brain, new stuffed, in youth, with triumphs gay 40 Of old romance. These let us wish away, And turn, sole-thoughted, to one Lady there, Whose heart had brooded, all that wintry day, 272 ENGLISH LITERATURE On love, and winged St. Agnes' saintly care, 45 As she had heard old dames full many times declare. They told her how, upon St. Agnes' Eve, Young virgins might have visions of delight, And soft adorings from their loves receive Upon the honeyed middle of the night, 50 If ceremonies due they did aright : As, supperless to bed they must retire, And couch supine their beauties, lily white ; Nor look behind, nor sideways, but require Of Heaven with upward eyes for all that they desire. 55 Full of this whim was thoughtful Madeline : The music, yearning like a God in pain, She scarcely heard : her maiden eyes divine, Fixed on the floor, saw many a sweeping train Pass by she heeded not at all : in vain 60 Came many a tiptoe, amorous cavalier, And back retired ; not cooled by high disdain, But she saw not : her heart was otherwhere : She sighed for Agnes' dreams, the sweetest of the year. She danced along with vague, regardless eyes, 65 Anxious her lips, her breathing quick and short : The hallowed hour was near at hand : she sighs Amid the timbrels, and the thronged resort Of whisperers in anger, or in sport ; 'Mid looks of love, defiance, hate, and scorn, 70 Hoodwinked with faery fancy ; all amort, Save to St. Agnes and her lambs unshorn, And all the bliss to be before to-morrow morn. So, purposing each moment to retire, She lingered still. Meantime, across the moors, 75 Had come young Porphyro, with heart on fire For Madeline. Beside the portal doors, Buttressed from moonlight, stands he, and implores JOHN KEATS 273 All saints to give him sight of Madeline, But for one moment in the tedious hours, That he might gaze and worship all unseen ; 80 Perchance speak, kneel, touch, kiss in sooth such things have been. He ventures in : let no buzzed whisper tell : All eyes be muffled, or a hundred swords Will storm his heart, Love's fev'rous citadel : For him, those chambers held barbarian hordes, 85 Hyena foemen, and hot-blooded lords, Whose very dogs would execrations howl Against his lineage : not one breast affords Him any mercy, in that mansion foul, Save one old beldame, weak in body and in soul. 90 Ah, happy chance ! the aged creature came, Shuffling along with ivory-headed wand, To where he stood, hid from the torch's flame, Behind a broad hall-pillar, far beyond The sound of merriment and chorus bland : 95 He startled her ; but soon she knew his face, And grasped his fingers in her palsied hand, Saying, "Mercy, Porphyro ! hie thee from this place; They are all here to-night, the whole bloodthirsty race ! "Get hence! get hence! there's dwarfish Hildebrand ; 100 He had a fever late, and in the fit He cursed thee and thine, both house and land : Then there's that old Lord Maurice, not a whit More tame for his gray hairs Alas me ! flit ! Flit like a ghost away." "Ah, Gossip dear, 105 We're safe enough ; here in this armchair sit, And tell me how" "Good Saints ! not here, not here; Follow me, child, or else these stones will be thy bier." He followed through a lowly arched way, Brushing the cobwebs with his lofty plume ; 110 274 ENGLISH LITERATURE And as she muttered "Well-a-day !" He found him in a little moonlight room, Pale, latticed, chill, and silent as a tomb. "Now tell me where is Madeline," said he, 115 "O tell me, Angela, by the holy loom Which none but secret sisterhood may see, When they St. Agnes' wool are weaving piously." "St. Agnes ! Ah I it is St. Agnes' Eve Yet men will murder upon holy days : 120 Thou must hold water in a witch's sieve, And be liege-lord of all the Elves and Fays, To venture so : it fills me with amaze To see thee, Porphyro ! St. Agnes' Eve ! God's help ! my lady fair the conjurer plays 125 This very night : good angels her deceive ! But let me laugh awhile, I've mickle time to grieve." Feebly she laugheth in the languid moon, While Porphyro upon her face doth look, Like puzzled urchin on an aged crone 130 Who keepeth closed a wond'rous riddle-book, As spectacled she sits in chimney nook. But soon his eyes grew brilliant, when she told His lady's purpose ; and he scarce could brook Tears, at the thought of those enchantments cold, 135 And Madeline asleep in lap of legends old. Sudden a thought came like a full-blown rose, Flushing his brow, and in his pained heart Made purple riot : then doth he propose A stratagem, that makes the beldame start : 140 "A cruel man and impious thou art : Sweet lady, let her pray, and sleep, and dream Alone with her good angels, far apart From wicked men like thee. Go, go ! I deem Thou canst not surely be the same that thou didst seem." JOHN KEATS 275 "I will not harm her, by all saints I swear," 145 Quoth Porphyro : "O may I ne'er find grace When my weak voice shall whisper its last prayer, If one of her soft ringlets I displace, Or look with ruffian passion in her face : Good Angela, believe me by these tears ; 160 Or I will, even in a moment's space, Awake, with horrid shout, my foemen's ears, And beard them, though they be morefanged than wolves and bears." "Ah ! why wilt thou affright a feeble soul ? A poor, weak, palsy-stricken, church-yard thing, 155 Whose passing-bell may ere the midnight toll ; Whose prayers for thee, each morn and evening, Were never missed." Thus plaining, doth she bring A gentler speech from burning Porphyro ; So woeful, and of such deep sorrowing, 160 That Angela gives promise she will do Whatever he shall wish, betide her weal or woe. Which was, to lead him, in close secrecy, Even to Madeline's chamber, and there hide Him in a closet, of such privacy 165 That he might see her beauty unespied, And win perhaps that night a peerless bride, While legioned fairies paced the coverlet, And pale enchantment held her sleepy-eyed. Never on such a night have lovers met, 170 Since Merlin paid his Demon all the monstrous debt. "It shall be as thou wishest," said the dame : "All cates and dainties shall be stored there Quickly on this feast-night : by the tambour frame Her own lute thou wilt see : no time to spare, 175 For I am slow and feeble, and scarce dare On such a catering trust my dizzy head. Wait here, my child, with patience ; kneel in prayer 276 ENGLISH LITERATURE The while. Ah ! thou must needs the lady wed, 180 Or may I never leave my grave among the dead." So saying, she hobbled off with busy fear. The lover's endless minutes slowly passed ; The dame returned, and whispered in his ear To follow her ; with aged eyes aghast 185 From fright of dim espial. Safe at last, Through many a dusky gallery, they gain The maiden's chamber, silken, hushed, and chaste ; Where Porphyro took covert, pleased amain. His poor guide hurried back with agues in her brain. 190 Her falt'ring hand upon the balustrade, Old Angela was feeling for the stair, When Madeline, St. Agnes' charmed maid, Rose, like a missioned spirit, unaware : With silver taper's light, and pious care, 195 She turned, and down the aged gossip led To a safe level matting. Now prepare, Young Porphyro, for gazing on that bed ; She comes, she comes again, like ring-dove frayed and fled. Out went the taper as she hurried in ; 200 Its little smoke, in pallid moonshine, died : She closed the door, she panted, all akin To spirits of the air, and visions wide : No uttered syllable, or, woe betide I But to her heart, her heart was voluble, 205 Paining with eloquence her balmy side ; As though a tongueless nightingale should swell Her throat in vain, and die, heart-stifled, in her dell. A casement high and triple-arched there was, All garlanded with carven imag'ries 210 Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass, And diamonded with panes of quaint device Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes, JOHN KEATS 277 As are the tiger-moth's deep-damasked wings ; And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldries, And twilight saints, and dim emblazonings, 215 A shielded scutcheon blushed with blood of queens and kings. Full on this casement shone the wintry moon, And threw warm gules on Madeline's fair breast, As down she knelt for heaven's grace and boon ; Rose-bloom fell on her hands, together pressed, 220 And on her silver cross soft amethyst, And on her hair a glory, like a saint : She seemed a splendid angel, newly dressed, Save wings, for heaven : Porphyro grew faint : She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from mortal taint. 225 Anon his heart revives : her vespers done, Of all its wreathed pearls her hair she frees ; Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one ; Loosens her fragrant bodice ; by degrees Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees : 230 Half-hidden, like a mermaid in seaweed, Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees, In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed, But dares not look behind, or all the charm is fled. Soon, trembling in her soft and chilly nest, 235 In sort of wakeful swoon, perplexed she lay, Until the poppied warmth of sleep oppressed Her soothed limbs, and soul fatigued away ; Flown, like a thought, until the morrow-day ; Blissfully havened both from joy and pain ; 240 Clasped like a missal where swart Paynims pray ; Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain, As though a rose should shut, and be a bud again. Stol'n to this paradise, and so entranced, Porphyro gazed upon her empty dress, 245 And listened to her breathing, if it chanced To wake into a slumberous tenderness ; 278 ENGLISH LITERATURE Which when he heard, that minute did he bless, And breathed himself : then from the closet crept, 250 Noiseless as fear in a wide wilderness, And over the hushed carpet, silent, stepped, And 'tween the curtains peeped, where, lo ! how fast she slept. Then by the bedside, where the faded moon Made a dim, silver twilight, soft he set 255 A table, and, half anguished, threw thereon A cloth of woven crimson, gold, and jet : O for some drowsy Morphean amulet ! The boisterous, midnight, festive clarion, The kettle-drum, and far-heard clarionet, 260 Affray his ears, though but in dying tone : The hall door shuts again, and all the noise is gone. And still she slept an azure-lidded sleep, In blanched linen, smooth, and lavendered, While he from forth the closet brought a heap 265 Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and gourd ; With jellies soother than the creamy curd, And lucent syrups, tinct with cinnamon; Manna and dates, in argosy transferred From Fez ; and spiced dainties, every one, 270 From silken Samarcand to cedared Lebanon. These delicates he heaped with glowing hand On golden dishes and in baskets bright Of wreathed silver : sumptuous they stand In the retired quiet of the night, 275 Filling the chilly room with perfume light. "And now, my love, my seraph fair, awake ! Thou art my heaven, and I thine eremite : Open thine eyes, for meek St. Agnes' sake, Or I shall drowse beside thee, so my soul doth ache." 280 Thus whispering, his warm, unnerved arm Sank in her pillow. Shaded was her dream JOHN KEATS 279 By the dusk curtains : 'twas a midnight charm Impossible to melt as icd stream : The lustrous salvers in the moonlight gleam ; Broad golden fringe upon the carpet lies : 285 It seemed he never, never could redeem From such a steadfast spell his lady's eyes ; So mused awhile, entoiled in woofed phantasies. Awakening up, he took her hollow lute, Tumultuous, and, in chords that tenderest be, 290 He played an ancient ditty, long since mute, In Provence called, "La belle dame sans merci," Close to her ear touching the melody ; Wherewith disturbed she uttered a soft moan : He ceased she panted quick and suddenly 295 Her blue affrayed eyes wide open shone : Upon his knees he sank, pale as smooth-sculptured stone. Her eyes were open, but she still beheld, Now wide awake, the vision of her sleep : There was a painful change, that nigh expelled 300 The blisses of her dream so pure and deep, At which fair Madeline began to weep, And moan forth witless words with many a sigh ; While still her gaze on Porphyro would keep ; Who knelt, with joined hands and piteous eye, 305 Fearing to move or speak, she looked so dreamingly. "Ah, Porphyro!" said she, "but even now Thy voice was at sweet tremble in mine ear, Made tunable with every sweetest vow ; And those sad eyes were spiritual and clear : 310 How changed thou art ! how pallid, chill, and drear ! Give me that voice again, my Porphyro, Those looks immortal, those complainings dear ! Oh leave me not in this eternal woe, For if thou diest, my Love, I know not where to go." 315 280 ENGLISH LITERATURE Beyond a mortal man impassioned far At these voluptuous accents, he arose, Ethereal, flushed, and like a throbbing star Seen 'mid the sapphire heaven's deep repose ; 320 Into her dream he melted, as the rose Blendeth its odor with the violet, Solution sweet : meantime the frost-wind blows Like Love's alarum, pattering the sharp sleet Against the window-panes ; St. Agnes' moon hath set. 325 'Tis dark : quick pattereth the flaw-blown sleet : "This is no dream, my bride, my Madeline !" 'Tis dark : the iced gusts still rave and beat : "No dream, alas ! alas ! and woe is mine ! Porphyro will leave me here to fade and pine. 330 Cruel ! what traitor could thee hither bring ? I curse not, for my heart is lost in thine, Though thou f orsakest a deceived thing ; A dove forlorn and lost with sick unpruned wing." "My Madeline ! sweet dreamer ! lovely bride ! 335 Say, may I be for aye thy vassal blest ? Thy beauty's shield, heart-shaped and vermeil dyed ? Ah, silver shrine, here will I take my rest After so many hours of toil and quest, A famished pilgrim, saved by miracle. 340 Though I have found, I will not rob thy nest Saving of thy sweet self ; if thou think'st well To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude infidel. "Hark ! 'tis an elfin-storm from faery land, Of haggard seeming, but a boon indeed : 345 Arise arise ! the morning is at hand ; The bloated wassailers will never heed : Let us away, my love, with happy speed ; There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see, Drowned all in Rhenish and the sleepy mead : JOHN KEATS 281 Awake ! arise ! my love, and fearless be, 350 For o'er the southern moors I have a home for thee." She hurried at his words, beset with fears, For there were sleeping dragons all around, At glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears Down the wide stairs a darkling way they found. 355 In all the house was heard no human sound. A chain-dropped lamp was flickering by each door ; The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hound, Fluttered in the besieging wind's uproar ; And the long carpets rose along the gusty floor. 360 They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall ; Like phantoms, to the iron porch they glide ; Where lay the Porter, in uneasy sprawl, With a huge empty flagon by his side : The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide, 365 But his sagacious eye an inmate owns : By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide : The chains lie silent on the footworn stones ; The key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans. And they are gone : ay, ages long ago 370 These lovers fled away into the storm. That night the Baron dreamt of many a woe, And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm, Were long be-nightmared. Angela the old 375 Died palsy-twitched, with meagre face deform ; The Beadsman, after thousand aves told, For aye unsought for slept among his ashes cold. 282 ENGLISH LITERATURE CHARLES LAMB A Dissertation upon Roast Pig (From Essays of Elia) Mankind, says a Chinese manuscript, which my friend M. was obliging enough to read and explain to me, for the first seventy thousand ages ate their meat raw, clawing or biting it from the living animal, just as they do in Abyssinia to this 5 day. This period is not obscurely hinted at by their great Confucius in the second chapter of his Mundane Mutations, where he designates a kind of golden age by the term Cho- fang, literally the Cook's Holiday. The manuscript goes on to say, that the art of roasting, or rather broiling (which 10 1 take to be the elder brother) was accidentally discovered in the manner following. The swine-herd, Ho-ti, having gone out into the woods one morning, as his manner was, to collect mast for his hogs, left his cottage in the care of his eldest son Bo-bo, a 15 great lubberly boy, who being fond of playing with fire, as younkers of his age commonly are, let some sparks escape into a bundle of straw, which kindling quickly, spread the conflagration over every part of their poor mansion, till it was reduced to ashes. Together with the cottage (a sorry 20 antediluvian make-shift of a building, you may think it), what was of much more importance, a fine litter of new- farrowed pigs, no less than nine in number, perished. China pigs have been esteemed a luxury all over the East from the remotest periods that we read of. Bo-bo was in the 25 utmost consternation, as you may think, not so much for the sake of the tenement, which his father and he could easily build up again with a few dry branches, and the labor of an hour or two, at any time, as for the loss of the pigs. While he was thinking what he should say to his father, 30 and wringing his hands over the smoking remnants of one CHARLES LAMB 283 of those untimely sufferers, an odor assailed his nostrils, unlike any scent which he had before experienced. What could it proceed from ? not from the burnt cottage he had smelt that smell before indeed this was by no means the first accident of the kind which had occurred through the 35 negligence of this unlucky young fire-brand. Much less did it resemble that of any known herb, weed, or flower. A premonitory moistening at the same time overflowed his nether lip. He knew not what to think. He next stooped down to feel the pig, if there were any signs of life in it. He 40 burnt his fingers, and to cool them he applied them in his booby fashion to his mouth. Some of the crumbs of the scorched skin had come away with his fingers, and for the first time in his life (in the world's life indeed, for before him no man had known it) he tasted crackling ! Again he felt 45 and fumbled at the pig. It did not burn him so much now, still he licked his fingers from a sort of habit. The truth at length broke into his slow understanding, that it was the pig that smelt so, and the pig that tasted so delicious ; and, surrendering himself up to the newborn pleasure, he fell to 50 tearing up whole handfuls of the scorched skin with the flesh next it, and was cramming it down his throat in his beastly fashion, when his sire entered amid the smoking rafters, armed with retributory cudgel, and finding how affairs stood, began to rain blows upon the young rogue's shoulders, as 55 thick as hailstones, which Bo-bo heeded not any more than if they had been flies. The tickling pleasure, which he experienced in his lower regions, had rendered him quite callous to any inconveniences he might feel in those remote quarters. His father might lay on, but he could not beat 60 him from his pig, till he had fairly made an end of it, when, becoming a little more sensible of his situation, something like the following dialogue ensued. "You graceless whelp, what have you got there devour- 284 ENGLISH LITERATURE 65 ing ? Is it not enough that you have burnt me down three houses with your dog's tricks, and be hanged to you, but you must be eating fire, and I know not what what have you got there, I say ? " "O, father, the pig, the pig, do come and taste how nice 70 the burnt pig eats." The ears of Ho-ti tingled with horror. He cursed his son, and he cursed himself that ever he should beget a son that should eat burnt pig. Bo-bo, whose scent was wonderfully sharpened since 75 morning, soon raked out another pig, and fairly rending it asunder, thrust the lesser half by main force into the fists of Ho-ti, still shouting out " Eat, eat, eat the burnt pig, father, only taste O Lord," with such-like barbarous ejacula- tions, cramming all the while as if he would choke. 80 Ho-ti trembled every joint while he grasped the abomi- nable thing^ wavering whether he should not put his son to death for an unnatural young monster, when the crackling scorching his fingers, as it had done his son's, and applying the same remedy to them, he in his turn tasted some of its 85 flavor, which, make what sour mouths he would for a pre- tence, proved not altogether displeasing to him. In conclu- sion (for the manuscript here is a little tedious) both father and son fairly sat down to the mess, and never left off till they had despatched all that remained of the litter. 90 Bo-bo was strictly enjoined not to let the secret escape, for the neighbors would certainly have stoned them for a couple of abominable wretches, who could think of improving upon the good meat which God had sent them. Neverthe- less, strange stories got about. It was observed that Ho-ti's 95 cottage was burnt down now more frequently than ever. Nothing but fires from this time forward. Some would break out in broad day, others in the night-time. As often as the sow farrowed, so sure was the house of Ho-ti to be in CHARLES LAMB 285 a blaze ; and Ho-ti himself, which was the more remarkable, instead of chastising his son, seemed to grow more indulgent 100 to him than ever. At length they were watched, the terrible mystery discovered, and father and son summoned to take their trial at Pekin, then an inconsiderable assize town. Evidence was given, the obnoxious food itself produced in court, and verdict about to be pronounced, when the foreman 105 of the jury begged that some of the burnt pig, of which the culprits stood accused, might be handed into the box. He handled it, and they all handled it, and burning their fingers, as Bo-bo and his father had done before them, and nature prompting to each of them the same remedy, against the face HO of all the facts, and the clearest charge which judge had ever given, to the surprise of the whole court, townsfolk, strangers, reporters, and all present without leaving the box, or any manner of consultation whatever, they brought in a simultaneous verdict of Not Guilty. 115 The judge, who was a shrewd fellow, winked at the mani- fest iniquity of the decision ; and, when the court was dis- missed, went privily, and bought up all the pigs that could be had for love or money. In a few days his Lordship's town house was observed to be on fire. The thing took wing, 120 and now there was nothing to be seen but fires in every direc- tion. Fuel and pigs grew enormously dear all over the district. The insurance offices one and all shut up shop. People built slighter and slighter every day, until it was feared that the very science of architecture would in no long 125 time be lost to the world. Thus this custom of firing houses continued, till in process of time, says my manuscript, a sage arose, like our Locke, who made a discovery, that the flesh of swine, or indeed of any other animal, might be cooked (burnt, as they called it) without the necessity of consuming 130 a whole house to dress it. Then first began the rude form of a gridiron. Roasting by the string, or spit, came in a century 286 ENGLISH LITERATURE or two later, I forget in whose dynasty. By such slow degrees, concludes the 'manuscript, do the most useful, and 135 seemingly the most obvious arts, make their way among mankind. Without placing too implicit faith in the account above given, it must be agreed, that if a worthy pretext for so dangerous an experiment as setting houses on fire (especially 140 in these days) could be assigned in favor of any culinary object, that pretext and excuse might be found in ROAST PIG. Of all the delicacies in the whole mundw edibilis, I will maintain it to be the most delicate princeps obsoniorum. I speak not of your grown porkers things between pig 145 and pork those hobbydehoys but a young and tender suckling under a moon old guiltless as yet of the sty with no original speck of the amor immunditioe, the hered- itary failing of the first parent, yet manifest his voice as yet not broken, but something between a childish treble and 150 a grumble the mild forerunner, or prceludium, of a grunt. He must be roasted. I am not ignorant that our ancestors ate them seethed, or boiled but what a sacrifice of the exterior tegument! There is no flavor comparable, I will contend, to that of 155 the crisp, tawny, well-watched, not over-roasted, crackling, as it is well called the very teeth are invited to their share of the pleasure at this banquet in overcoming the coy, brittle resistance with the adhesive oleaginous O call it not fat but an indefinable sweetness growing up to it 160 the tender blossoming of fat fat cropped in the bud taken in the shoot in the first innocence the cream and quintessence of the child-pig's yet pure food the lean, no lean, but a kind of animal manna or, rather, fat and lean (if it must be so) so blended and running into each other, 165 that both together make but one ambrosian result, or com- mon substance. CHARLES LAMB 287 Behold him, while he is doing it seemeth rather a re- freshing warmth, than a scorching heat, that he is so passive to. How equably he twirleth round the string ! Now he is just done. To see the extreme sensibility of that tender 170 age, he hath wept out his pretty eyes radiant jellies shooting stars See him in the dish, his second cradle, how meek he lieth ! wouldst thou have had this innocent grow up to the grossness and indocility which too often accompany maturer 175 swinehood ? Ten to one he would have proved a glutton, a sloven, an obstinate, disagreeable animal wallowing in all manner of filthy conversation from these sins he is happily snatched away " Ere sin could blight, or sorrow fade, 180 Death came with timely care" his memory is odoriferous no clown curseth, while his stomach half rejecteth, the rank bacon no coalheaver bolteth him in reeking sausages he hath a fair sepulchre in the grateful stomach of the judicious epicure and for 185 such a tomb might be content to die. He is the best of Sapors. Pine-apple is great. She is indeed almost too transcendent a delight, if not sinful, yet so like to sinning, that really a tender-conscienced person would do well to pause too ravishing for mortal taste, she 190 woundeth and excoriateth the lips that approach her like lovers' kisses, she biteth she is a pleasure bordering on pain from the fierceness and insanity of her relish but she stoppeth at the palate she meddleth not with the . appetite and the coarsest hunger might barter her con- 195 sistently for a mutton chop. Pig let me speak his praise is no less provocative of the appetite, than he is satisfactory to the criticalness of the 288 ENGLISH LITERATURE censorious palate. The strong man may batten on him, 200 and the weakling refuseth not his mild juices. Unlike to mankind's mixed characters, a bundle of virtues and vices, inexplicably intertwisted, and not to be unravelled without hazard, he is good throughout. No part of him is better or worse than another. He helpeth, as far as his 205 little means extend, all around. He is the least envious of banquets. He is all neighbors' fare. I am one of those, who freely and ungrudgingly impart a share of the good things of this life which fall to their lot (few as mine are in this kind) to a friend. I protest I take 210 as great an interest in my friend's pleasures, his relishes, and proper satisfactions, as in mine own. "Presents," I often say, "endear Absents." Hares, pheasants, partridges, snipes, barn-door chickens (those "tame villatic fowl"), capons, plovers, brawn, barrels of oysters, I dispense as 2 15 freely as I receive them. I love to taste them, as it were, upon the tongue of my friend. But a stop must be put some- where. One would not, like Lear, "give everything." I make my stand upon pig. Methinks it is an ingratitude to the Giver of all good flavors, to extra-domiciliate, or send out 220 of the house, slightingly (under pretext of friendship, or I know not what) a blessing so particularly adapted, pre- destined, I may say, to my individual palate it argues an insensibility. I remember a touch of conscience in this kind at school. 225 My good old aunt, who never parted from me at the end of a holiday without stuffing a sweetmeat, or some nice thing, into my pocket, had dismissed me one evening with a smok- ing plum-cake, fresh from the oven. In my way to school (it was over London Bridge) a gray-headed old beggar saluted 230 me (I have no doubt at this time of day that he was a coun- terfeit). I had no pence to console him with, and in the vanity of self-denial, and the very coxcombry of charity, CHARLES LAMB 289 school-boy-like, I made him a present of the whole cake ! I walked on a little, buoyed up, as one is on such occasions, with a sweet soothing of self-satisfaction ; but before I had 235 got to the end of the bridge, my better feelings returned, and I burst into tears, thinking how ungrateful I had been to my good aunt, to go and give her good gift away to a stranger, that I had never seen before, and who might be a bad man for aught I knew ; and then I thought of the pleas- 240 ure my aunt would be taking in thinking that I I myself, and not another would eat tier nice cake and what should I say to her the next time I saw her how naughty I was to part with her pretty present and the odor of that spicy cake came back upon my recollection, and the pleasure 245 and the curiosity I had taken in seeing her make it, and her joy when she sent it to the oven, and how disappointed she would feel that I had never had a bit of it in my mouth at last and I blamed my impertinent spirit of alms-giving, and out-of -place hypocrisy of goodness, and above all 1 250 wished never to see the face again of that insidious, good-for- nothing, old gray impostor. Our ancestors were nice in their method of sacrificing these tender victims. We read of pigs whipped to death with something of a shock, as we hear of any other obsolete 255 custom. The age of discipline is gone by, or it would be curious to inquire (in a philosophical light merely) what effect this process might have toward intenerating and dul- cifying a substance, naturally so mild and dulcet as the flesh of young pigs. It looks like refining a violet. Yet we 260 should be cautious, while we condemn the inhumanity, how we censure the wisdom of the practice. It might impart a gusto I remember an hypothesis, argued upon by the young students, when I was at St. Omer's, and maintained with 265 much learning and pleasantry on both sides, " Whether, sup- 290 ENGLISH LITERATURE posing that the flavor of a pig who obtained his death by whipping (per flagellationem extremam) superadded a pleasure upon the palate of a man more intense than any possible 270 suffering we can conceive in the animal, is man justified in using that method of putting the animal to death?" I for- get the decision. His sauce should be considered. Decidedly, a few bread crumbs,' done up with his liver and brains, and a dash of 275 mild sage. But, banish, dear Mrs. Cook, I beseech you, the whole onion tribe. Barbecue your whole hogs to your palate, steep them in shalots, stuff them out with plantations of the rank and guilty garlic; you cannot poison them, or make them stronger than they are but consider, he is a weakling 280 a flower. Dream- Children ; A Reverie (From Essays of Elia) Children love to listen to stories about their elders, when they were children ; to stretch their imagination to the con- ception of a traditionary great-uncle or grandame, whom they never saw. It was in this spirit that my little ones crept 5 about me the other evening to hear about their great-grand- mother Field, who lived in a great house in Norfolk (a hun- dred times bigger than that in which they and papa lived) which had been the scene so at least it was generally be- lieved in that part of the country of the tragic incidents 10 which they had lately become familiar with from the ballad of the Children in the Wood. Certain it is that the whole story of the children and their cruel uncle was to be seen fairly carved out in wood upon the chimney-piece of the great hall, the whole story down to the Robin Redbreasts, till a 15 foolish rich person pulled it down to set up a marble one of modern invention in its stead, with no story upon it. CHARLES LAMB 291 Here Alice put out one of her dear mother's looks, too ten- der to be called upbraiding. Then I went on to say, how religious and how good their great-grandmother Field was, how beloved and respected by every body, though she was 20 not indeed the mistress of this great house, but had only the . charge of it (and yet in some respects she might be said to be the mistress of it too) committed to her by the owner, who preferred living in a newer and more fashionable man- sion which he had purchased somewhere in the adjoining 25 county ; but still she lived in it in a manner as if it had been her own, and kept up the dignity of the great house in a sort while she lived, which afterwards came to decay, and was nearly pulled down, and all its old ornaments stripped and carried away to the owner's other house, where they were 30 set up, and looked as awkward as if some one were to carry away the old tombs they had seen lately at the Abbey, and stick them up in Lady C.'s tawdry gilt drawing-room. Here John smiled, as much as to say, "that would be foolish indeed." 35 And then I told how, when she came to die, her funeral was attended by a concourse of all the poor, and some of the gentry too, of the neighborhood for many miles round, to show their respect for her memory, because she had been such a good and religious woman : so good indeed that she 40 knew all the Psaltery by heart, ay, and a great part of the Testament besides. Here little Alice spread her hands. Then I told what a tall, upright, graceful person their great- grandmother Field once was ; and how in her youth she was esteemed the best dancer here Alice's little right foot 45 played an involuntary movement, till upon my looking grave, it desisted the best dancer, I was saying, in the county, till a cruel disease, called a cancer, came, and bowed her down with pain; but it could never bend her good spirits, or make them stoop, but they were still upright, because 50 292 ENGLISH LITERATURE she was so good and religious. Then I told how she was used to sleep by herself in a lone chamber of the great lone house; and how she believed that an apparition of two infants was to be seen at midnight gliding up and down 55 the great staircase near where she slept, but she said " those innocents would do her no harm;" and how frightened I used to be, though in those days I had my maid to sleep with me, because I was never half so good or religious as she and yet I never saw the infants. Here John expanded all 60 his eyebrows and tried to look courageous. Then I told how good she was to all her grand-children, having us to the great house in the holidays, where I in par- ticular used to spend many hours by myself, in gazing upon the old busts of the Twelve Caesars, that had been Emperors 65 of Rome, till the old marble heads would seem to live again, or I to be turned into marble with them ; how I never could be tired with roaming about that huge mansion, with its vast empty rooms, with their worn-out hangings, fluttering tapes- try, and carved oaken panels, with the gilding almost rubbed 70 out sometimes in the spacious old-fashioned gardens, which I had almost to myself, unless when now and then a solitary gardening man would cross me and how the nectarines and peaches hung upon the walls, without my ever offering to pluck them, because they were forbidden fruit, unless now 75 and then, and because I had more pleasure in strolling about among the old melancholy-looking yew trees, or the firs, and picking up the red berries, and the fir apples, which were good for nothing but to look at or in lying about upon the fresh grass, with all the fine garden smells around me go or basking in the orangery, till I could almost fancy myself ripening too along with the oranges and the limes in that grateful warmth or in watching the dace that darted to and fro in the fish-pond, at the bottom of the garden, with here and there a great sulky pike hanging midway down the CHARLES LAMB 293 water in silent state, as if it mocked at their impertinent 85 friskings, I had more pleasure in these busy-idle diversions than in all the sweet flavors of peaches, nectarines, oranges, and such like common baits of children. Here John slily deposited back upon the plate a bunch of grapes, which, not unobserved by Alice, he had meditated dividing with her, 90 and both seemed willing to relinquish them for the present as irrelevant. Then in somewhat a more heightened tone, I told how, though their great-grandmother Field loved all her grand- children, yet in an especial manner she might be said to 95 love their uncle, John L , because he was so handsome and spirited a youth, and a king to the rest of us ; and, in- stead of moping about in solitary corners, like some of us, he would mount the most mettlesome horse he could get, when but an imp no bigger than themselves, and make it 100 carry him half over the county in a morning, and join the hunters when there were any out and yet he loved, the old great house and gardens too, but had too much spirit to be always pent up within their boundaries and how their uncle grew up to man's estate as brave as he was handsome, 105 to the admiration of everybody, but of their great-grand- mother Field most especially ; and how he used to carry me upon his back when I was a lame-footed boy for he was a good bit older than me many a mile when I could not walk for pain ; and how in after life he became lame-footed too, no and I did not always (I fear) make allowances enough for him when he was impatient, and in pain, nor remember sufficiently how considerate he had been to me when I was lame-footed; and how when he died, though he had not been dead an hour, it seemed as if he had died a great while 115 ago, such a distance there is betwixt life and death ; and how I bore his death as I thought pretty well at first, but after- wards it haunted and haunted me ; and though I did not cry 294 ENGLISH LITERATURE or take it to heart as some do, and as I think he would have 120 done if I had died, yet I missed him all day long, and knew not till then how much I had loved him. I missed his kind- ness, and I missed his crossness, and wished him to be alive again, to be quarrelling with him (for we quarrelled some- times), rather than not have him again, and was as uneasy 125 without him, as he their poor uncle must have been when the doctor took off his limb. Here the children fell a-crying, and asked if their little mourning which they had on was not for uncle John, and they looked up, and prayed me not to go on about their uncle, but to tell them some stories about 130 their pretty dead mother. Then I told how for seven long years, in hope sometimes, sometimes in despair, yet persisting ever, I courted the fair Alice W n ; and, as much as children could understand, I explained to them what coyness, and difficulty, and denial 135 meant in maidens when suddenly, turning to Alice, the soul of the first Alice looked out at her eyes with such a reality of re-presentment, that I became in doubt which of them stood there before me, or whose that bright hair was; and while I stood gazing, both the children gradually 140 grew fainter to my view, receding, and still receding till nothing at last but two mournful features were seen in the uttermost distance, which, without speech, strangely im- pressed upon me the effects of speech ; " We are not of Alice, nor of thee, nor are we children at all. The children of 145 Alice call Bartrum father. We are nothing ; less than noth- ing, and dreams. We are only what might have been, and must wait upon the tedious shores of Lethe millions of ages before we have existence, and a name" and im- mediately awaking, I found myself quietly seated in my 150 bachelor armchair, where I had fallen asleep, with the faithful Bridget unchanged by my side but John L. (or James Elia) was gone for ever. THOMAS DE QUINCEY 295 THOMAS DE QUINCEY A Meeting with Lamb (From London Reminiscences) I. was to come so early as to drink tea with Lamb ; and the hour was seven. He lived in the Temple ; and I, who was not then, as afterwards I became, a student and member of "the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple," did not know much of the localities. However, I found out his abode, 5 not greatly beyond my time: nobody had been asked to meet me, which a little surprised me, but I was glad of it : for, besides Lamb, there was present his sister, Miss Lamb, of whom, and whose talents and sweetness of dis- position, I had heard. I turned the conversation, upon the 10 first opening which offered, to the subject of Coleridge ; and many of my questions were answered satisfactorily, because seriously, by Miss Lamb. But Lamb took a pleasure in baffling me, or in throwing ridicule upon the subject. Out of this grew the matter of our affray. We were speak- 15 ing of "The Ancient Mariner." Now, to explain what fol- lowed, and a little to excuse myself, I must beg the reader to understand that I was under twenty years of age, and that my admiration for Coleridge (as, in perhaps a still greater degree, for Wordsworth) was literally in no respect short of a 20 religious feeling : it had, indeed, all the sanctity of religion, and all the tenderness of a human veneration. Then, also, to imagine the strength which it would derive from circum- stances that do not exist now, but did then, let the reader further suppose a case not such as he may have known 25 since that era about Sir Walter Scotts and Lord Byrons, where every man you could possibly fall foul of, early or late, night or day, summer or winter, was in perfect readiness to feel and express his sympathy with the admirer but when no man, beyond one or two in each ten thousand, had so 30 296 ENGLISH LITERATURE much as heard of either Coleridge or Wordsworth, and that one, or those two, knew them only to scorn them, trample on them, spit upon them. Men so abject in public estima- tion, I maintain, as that Coleridge and that Wordsworth, 35 had not existed before, have not existed since, will not exist again. We have heard in old times of donkeys insulting effete or dying lions by kicking them ; but in the case of Coleridge . and Wordsworth it was effete donkeys that kicked living 40 lions. They, Coleridge and Wordsworth, were the Pariahs of literature in those days : as much scorned wherever they were known; but escaping that scorn only because they were as little known as Pariahs, and even more obscure. Well, after this bravura, by way of conveying my sense 45 of the real position then occupied by these two authors a position which thirty and odd years have altered, by a revo- lution more astonishing and total than ever before happened in literature or in life let the reader figure to himself the sensitive horror with which a young person, carrying his 50 devotion about with him, of necessity, as the profoundest of secrets, like a primitive Christian amongst a nation of Pagans, or a Roman Catholic convert amongst the bloody , idolaters of Japan in Oxford, above all places, hoping for no sympathy, and feeling a daily grief, almost a shame, 55 in harboring this devotion to that which, nevertheless, had done more for the expansion and sustenance of his own inner mind than all literature besides let the reader figure, I say, to himself, the shock with which such a person must recoil from hearing the very friend and associate of these 60 authors utter what seemed at that time a burning ridicule of all which belonged to them their books, their thoughts, their places, their persons. This had gone on for some time before we came upon the ground of "The Ancient Mariner" ; I had been grieved, perplexed, astonished ; and how else THOMAS DE QUINCEY 297 could I have felt reasonably, knowing of Lamb's propensity 65 to mystify a stranger; he, on the other hand, knowing nothing of the depth of my feelings on these subjects, and 1 that they were not so much mere literary preferences as something that went deeper than life or household affec- tions ? 70 At length, when he had given utterance to some ferocious canon of judgment, which seemed to question the entire value of the poem, I said, perspiring (I dare say) in this detestable crisis "But, Mr. Lamb, good heavens! how is it possible you can allow yourself in such opinions? What 75 instance could you bring from the poem that would bear you out in these insinuations?" "Instances?" said Lamb: "oh, I'll instance you, if you come to that. Instance, in- deed ! Pray, what do you say to this 'The many men so beautiful, . 80 And they all dead did lie' ? So beautiful, indeed ! Beautiful ! Just think of such a gang of Wapping vagabonds, all covered with pitch, and chewing tobacco ; and the old gentleman himself what do you call him ? the bright-eyed fellow ? " What more might follow 85 I never heard ; for, at this point, in a perfect rapture of horror, I raised my hands both hands to both ears ; and, without stopping to think or to apologize, I endeavoured to restore equanimity to my disturbed sensibilities by shut- ting out all further knowledge of Lamb's impieties. 90 At length he seemed to have finished ; so I, on my part, thought I might venture to take off the embargo : and in fact he had ceased : but no sooner did he find me restored to my hearing than he said with a most sarcastic smile which he could assume upon occasion " If you please, sir, we'll 95 say grace before we begin." I know not whether Lamb were really piqued or not at the mode by which I had expressed 298 ENGLISH LITERATURE my disturbance : Miss Lamb certainly was not ; her goodness led her to pardon me, and to treat me in whatever light 100 she might really view my almost involuntary rudeness as the party who had suffered wrong; and, for the rest of the evening, she was so pointedly kind and conciliatory in her manner that I felt greatly ashamed of my boyish failure in self-command. Yet, after all, Lamb necessarily appeared 105 so much worse, in my eyes, as a traitor is worse than an open enemy. Lamb, after this one visit not knowing at that time any particular reason for continuing to seek his acquaint- ance I did not trouble with my calls for some years. At 110 length, however, about the year 1808, and for the six or seven following years, in my evening visits to Coleridge, I used to meet him again ; not often, but sufficiently to correct the altogether very false impression I had received of his character and manners. Apostrophe to Opium (From Confessions of an English Opium-Eater) Oh ! just, subtle, and mighty opium ! that to the hearts of poor and rich alike, for the wounds that will never heal, and for "the pangs that tempt the spirit to rebel," bringest an assuaging balm ; eloquent opium ! that with thy potent 5 rhetoric stealest away the purposes of wrath; and to the guilty man for one night givest back the hopes of his youth, and hands washed pure from blood ; and to the proud man a brief oblivion for " Wrongs unredress'd and insults unavenged ; " 10 that summonest to the chancery of dreams, for the triumphs of suffering innocence, false witnesses ; and confoundest perjury; and dost reverse the sentences of unrighteous judges : thou buildest upon the bosom of darkness, out of THOMAS DE QUINCEY 299. the fantastic imagery of the brain, cities and temples beyond the art of Phidias and Praxiteles beyond the splendour 15 of Babylon and Hekatompylos : and " from the anarchy of dreaming sleep," callest into sunny light the faces of long- buried beauties, and the blessed household countenances, cleansed from the "dishonours of the grave." Thou only givest these gifts to man ; and thou hast the keys of Para- 20 disc, oh, just, subtle, and mighty opium ! Incident of the Malay (From the Confessions) I remember, about this time, a little incident, which I mention, because, trifling as it was, the reader will soon meet it again in my dreams, which it influenced more fearfully than could be imagined. One day a Malay knocked at my door. What business a Malay could have to transacts amongst English mountains, I cannot conjecture : but pos- sibly he was on his road to a seaport about forty miles distant. The servant who opened the door to him was a young girl born and bred amongst the mountains, who had never seen an Asiatic dress of any sort: his turban, therefore, con-io founded her not a little ; and, as it turned out that his attain- ments in English were exactly of the same extent as hers in the Malay, there seemed to be an impassable gulf fixed between all communication of ideas, if either party had happened to possess any. In this dilemma, the girl, recol-is lecting the reputed learning of her master, and doubtless giving me credit for a knowledge of all the languages of the earth, besides, perhaps, a few of the lunar ones, came and gave me to understand that there was a sort of demon below, whom she clearly imagined that my art could exorcise from 20 the house. I did not immediately go down : but, when I did, the group which presented itself, arranged as it was by 300 ENGLISH LITERATURE i accident, though not very elaborate, took hold of my fancy and my eye in a way that none of the statuesque attitudes 25 exhibited in the ballets at the Opera-house, though so osten- tatiously complex, had ever done. In a cottage kitchen, but panelled on the wall with dark wood that from age and rubbing resembled oak, and looking more like a rustic hall of entrance than a kitchen, stood the 30 Malay his turban and loose trousers of dingy white relieved upon the dark panelling : he had placed himself nearer to the girl than she seemed to relish ; though her native spirit of mountain intrepidity contended with the feeling of simple awe which her countenance expressed as she gazed upon the tiger- 35 cat before her. And a more striking picture there could not be imagined, than the beautiful English face of the girl, and its exquisite fairness, together with her erect and independent attitude, contrasted with the sallow and bilious skin of the Malay, enamelled or veneered with mahogany, by marine 40 air, his small, fierce restless eyes, thin lips, slavish gestures and adorations. Half -hidden by the ferocious looking Malay was a little child from a neighboring cottage who had crept in after him, and was now in the act. of reverting its head, and gazing upwards at the turban and the fiery eyes beneath 45 it, whilst with one hand he caught at the dress of the young woman for protection. My knowledge of the Oriental tongues is not remarkably extensive, being indeed confined to two words the Arabic word for barley, and the Turkish for opium (madjoon), which I have learnt from Anastasius. 50 And, as I had neither a Malay dictionary, nor even Ade- lung's "Mithridates," which might have helped me to a few words, I addressed him in some lines from the Iliad ; con- sidering that, of such languages as I possessed, Greek, in point of longitude, came geographically nearest to an Oriental 55 one. He worshipped me in a most devout manner, and replied in THOMAS DE QUINCEY 301 what I suppose was Malay. In this way I saved my repu- tation with my neighbors : for the Malay had no means of betraying the secret. He lay down upon the floor for about an hour, and then pursued his journey. On his departure, 60 I presented him with a piece of opium. To him, as an Orientalist, I concluded that opium must be familiar : and the expression of his face convinced me that it was. Nevertheless, I was struck with some little consterna- tion when I saw him suddenly raise his hand to his mouth, 65 and, in the schoolboy phrase, bolt the whole, divided into three pieces, at one mouthful. The quantity was enough to kill three dragoons and their horses; and I felt some alarm for the poor creature; but what could be done? I had given him the opium in compassion for his solitary life, 70 on recollecting that if he had travelled on foot from London it must be nearly three weeks since he could have exchanged a thought with any human being. I could not think of violating the laws of hospitality by having him seized and drenched with an emetic, and thus frightening him into a 75 notion that we were going to sacrifice him to some English idol. No : there was clearly no help for it : he took his leave : and for some days I felt anxious : but as I never heard of any Malay being found dead, I became convinced that he was used to opium : and that I must have done 80 him the service I designed, by giving him one night of respite from the pains of wandering. This incident I have digressed to mention, because this Malay, partly from the picturesque exhibition he assisted to frame, partly from the anxiety I connected with his image 85 for some days, fastened afterwards upon my dreams, and brought other Malays with him worse than himself, that ran "a-muck" at me, and led me into a world of troubles. 302 ENGLISH LITERATURE From Pleasure to Pain (From the Confessions) But now farewell a long farewell to happiness winter or summer! farewell to smiles and laughter! farewell to peace of mind ! farewell to hope and to tranquil dreams, and to the blessed consolations of sleep ! for more than 5 three years and a half I am summoned away from these : I am now arrived at an Iliad of woes : for I have now to record THE PAINS OF OPIUM " as when some great painter dips His pencil in the gloom of earthquake and eclipse." Shelley's Revolt of Islam. A Digression on Reading Aloud (From the Confessions) I shall now enter in medias res, and shall anticipate, from a time when my opium pains might be said to be at their acme, an account of their palsying effects on the intellectual faculties. 5 My studies have now been long interrupted. I cannot read to myself with any pleasure, hardly with a moment's endurance. Yet I read aloud sometimes for the pleasure of others ; because reading is an accomplishment as a superficial and ornamental attainment, almost the only one I possess : 10 and formerly, if I had any vanity at all connected with any endowment or attainment of mine, it was with this ; for I had observed that no accomplishment was so rare. Players are the worst readers of all : John Kemble reads vilely : and Mrs. Siddons, who is so celebrated, can read nothing 15 well but dramatic compositions : Milton she cannot read sufferably. People in general either read poetry without any SIR WALTER SCOTT 303 passion at all, or else overstep the modesty of nature, and read not like scholars. Of late, if I have felt moved by anything in books, it has been by the grand lamentations of Samson Agonistes, or the great harmonies of the Satanic 20 speeches in " Paradise Regained," when read aloud by my- self. A young lady sometimes comes and drinks tea with us : at her request and M[argaret]'s I now and then read Wordsworth's poems to them. (Wordsworth, by and by, is the only poet I ever met who could read his own verses : 25 often indeed he reads admirably.) SIR WALTER SCOTT First Meeting of Edgar and Lucy (From The Bride of Lammermoor, Chap. V) Lucy had scarcely replied to her father in the words we have mentioned, and he Was just about to rebuke her sup- posed timidity, when a bull, stimulated either by the scarlet colour of Miss Ashton's mantle, or by one of those fits of capricious ferocity to which their dispositions are liable, 5 detached himself suddenly from the group which was feeding at the upper extremity of a grassy glade, that seemed to lose itself among the crossing and entangled boughs. The animal approached the intruders on his pasture ground, at first slowly, pawing the ground with his hoof, bellowing from 10 time to time, and tearing up the sand with his horns, as if to lash himself up to rage and violence. The Lord Keeper, who observed the animal's demeanour, was aware that he was about to become mischievous, and, drawing his daughter's arm under his own, began to walk 15 fast along the avenue, in hopes to get out of his sight and his reach. This was the most injudicious course he could have adopted, for, encouraged by the appearance of flight, the bull began to pursue them at full speed. Assailed by a 304 ENGLISH LITERATURE 20 danger so imminent, firmer courage than that of the Lord Keeper might have given way. But paternal tenderness, "love strong as death," sustained him. He continued to support and drag onward his daughter, until, her fears al- together depriving her of the power of flight, she sunk down 25 by his side ; and when he could no longer assist her to escape, he turned round and placed himself betwixt her and the raging animal, which advancing in full career, its brutal fury enhanced by the rapidity of the pursuit, was now within a few yards of them. The Lord Keeper had no weapons; 30 his age and gravity dispensed even with the usual appendage of a walking sword, could such appendage have availed him anything. It seemed inevitable that the father or daughter, or both, should have fallen victims to the impending danger, when a 35 shot from the neighbouring thicket arrested the progress of the animal. He was so truly struck between the junction of the spine with the skull, that the wound, which in any other part of his body might scarce have impeded his career, proved instantly fatal. Stumbling forward with a hideous bellow, 40 the progressive force of his previous motion, rather than any operation of his limbs, carried him up to within three yards of the astonished Lord Keeper, where he rolled on the ground, his limbs darkened with the black death-sweat, .and quivering with the last convulsions of muscular motion. 45 Lucy lay senseless on the ground, insensible of the wonder- ful deliverance which she had experienced. Her father was almost equally stupefied, so rapid and unexpected had been the transition from the horrid death which seemed inevitable, to perfect security. He gazed on the animal, terrible even 50 in death, with a species of mute and confused astonishment, which did not permit him distinctly to understand what had taken .place ; and so inaccurate was his consciousness of what had passed, that he might have supposed the bull had been SIR WALTER SCOTT 305 arrested in its career by a thunderbolt, had he not observed among the branches of the thicket the figure of a man, with 55 a short gun or musquetoon in his hand. This instantly recalled him to a sense of their situation a glance at his daughter reminded him of the necessity of procuring her assistance. He called to the man, whom he concluded to be one of his foresters, to give immediate 60 attention to Miss Ashton, while he himself hastened to call assistance. The huntsman approached them accordingly, and the Lord Keeper saw he was a stranger, but was too much agitated to make any farther remarks. In a few hurried words, he directed the shooter, as stronger and more active 65 than himself, to carry the young lady to a neighbouring fountain, while he went back to Alice's hut to procure more aid. The man to whose timely interference they had been so much indebted, did not seem inclined to leave his good work 70 half finished. He raised Lucy from the ground in his arms, and conveying her through the glades of the forest by paths with which he seemed well acquainted, stopped not until he laid her in safety by the side of a plentiful and pellucid fountain, which had been once covered in, screened, and 75 decorated with architectural ornaments of a Gothic char- acter. But now the vault which had covered it being broken down and riven, and the Gothic font ruined and demolished, the stream burst forth from the recess of the earth in open day, and winded its way among the broken sculpture and 80 moss-grown stones which lay in confusion around its source. [Three paragraphs omitted here tell a "legendary tale" of the meeting by this fountain of a Ravenswood long since dead, and a beautiful nymph. They met once a week, and the nymph insisted that they must part with the ringing 85 of the vesper bell. Once the bell was delayed, the nymph plunged into the fountain, and was seen no more. The 306 ENGLISH LITERATURE spot was thereafter regarded as fatal to the Ravenswood family.] 90 It was on this ominous spot that Lucy Ashton first drew breath after her long and almost deadly swoon. Beautiful and pale as the fabulous Naiad in the last agony of separation from her lover, she was seated so as to rest with her back against a part of the ruined wall, while her mantle, dripping 95 with the water which her protecter had used profusely to recall her senses, clung to her slender and beautifully pro- portioned form. The first moment of recollection brought to her mind the danger which had overpowered her senses the next called 100 to remembrance that of her father. She looked around he was nowhere to be seen "My father my father!" was all that she could ejaculate. " Sir William is safe," answered the voice of a stranger "perfectly safe, and will be with you instantly." 105 "Are you sure of that?" exclaimed Lucy "the bull w r as close by us do not stop me I must go to seek my father!" And she arose with that purpose; but her strength was so much exhausted, that, far from possessing the power to 110 execute her purpose, she must have fallen against the stone on which she had leant, probably not without sustaining serious injury. The stranger was so near to her, that, without actually suffering her to fall, he could not avoid catching her in his 115 arms, which, however, he did with a momentary reluctance, when youth interposes to prevent beauty from danger. It seemed as if her weight, slight as it was, proved too heavy for her young and athletic assistant, for, without feeling the temptation of detaining her in his arms even for a single 120 instant, he again placed her on the stone from which she had risen, and retreating a few steps, repeated hastily, "Sir SIR WALTER SCOTT 307 William Ashton is perfectly safe, and will be here instantly. Do not make yourself anxious on his account Fate has singularly preserved him. You, madam, are exhausted, and must not think of rising until you have some assistance more 125 suitable than mine." Lucy, whose senses were by this time more effectually collected, was naturally led to look at the stranger with attention. There was nothing in his appearance which should have rendered him unwilling to offer his arm to a young 130 lady who required support, or which could have induced her to refuse his assistance; and she could not help thinking, even in that moment, that he seemed cold and reluctant to offer it. A shooting-dress of dark cloth intimated the rank of the wearer, though concealed in part by a large and loose 135 cloak of a dark brown colour. A Montero cap and a black feather drooped over the wearer's brow, and partly concealed his features, which, so far as seen, were dark, regular, and full of majestic, though somewhat sullen, expression. Some secret sorrow, or the brooding spirit of some moody passion, 140 had quenched the light and ingenuous vivacity of youth in a countenance singularly fitted to display both; and it was not easy to gaze on the stranger without a secret impression either of pity or awe, or at least of doubt and curiosity allied to both. 145 The impression which we have necessarily been long in describing, Lucy felt in the glance of a moment, and had no sooner encountered the keen black eyes of the stranger, than her own were bent on the ground with a mixture of bashful embarrassment and fear. Yet there was a necessity to speak, 150 or at least she thought so, and in a fluttered accent she began to mention her wonderful escape, in which she was sure that the stranger must, under Heaven, have been her father's protector, and her own. He seemed to shrink from her expressions of gratitude, 155 308 ENGLISH LITERATURE while he replied abruptly, " I leave you, madam," the deep melody of his voice rendered powerful, but not harsh, by something like a severity of tone "I leave you to the protection of those to whom it is possible you may have this 160 day been a guardian angel." Lucy was surprised at the ambiguity of his language, and, with a feeling of artless and unaffected gratitude, began to deprecate the idea of having intended to give her deliverer any offence, as if such a thing had been possible. "I have 165 been unfortunate," she said, " in endeavouring to express my thanks I am sure it must be so, though I cannot recollect what I said but would you but stay till my father till the Lord Keeper comes would you only permit him to pay you his thanks, and to enquire your name?" 170 "My name is unnecessary," answered the stranger; " your father I would rather say Sir William Ashton ; will learn it soon enough, for all the pleasure it is likely to afford him." "You mistake him," said Lucy earnestly; "he will be 175 grateful for my sake and for his own. You do not know my father, or you are deceiving me with a story of his safety, when he has already fallen a victim to the fury of that animal." When she had caught this idea, she started from the 180 ground, and endeavoured to press towards the avenue in which the accident had taken place, while the stranger, though he seemed to hesitate between the desire to assist and the wish to leave her, was obliged, in common humanity, to oppose her both by entreaty and action. 185 " On the word of a gentleman, madam, I tell you the truth ; your father is in perfect safety; you will expose yourself to injury if you venture back where the herd of wild cattle grazed. If you will go" for, having once adopted the idea that her father was still in danger, she pressed forward SIR WALTER SCOTT 309 in spite of him "If you will go, accept my arm, though 1 190 am not perhaps the person who can with most propriety offer you support." But, without heeding this intimation, Lucy took him at his word. "O if you be a man," she said, "If you be a gentleman, assist me to find my father ! You shall not 195 leave me you must go with me he is dying perhaps while we are talking here!" Then, without listening to excuse or apology, and holding fast by the stranger's arm, though unconscious of any thing save the support which it gave, and without which she 200 could not have moved, mixed with a vague feeling of pre- venting his escape from her, she was urging, and almost dragging him forward, when Sir William Ashton came up, followed by the female attendant of blind Alice, and by two wood-cutters, whom he had summoned from their occupa-205 tion to his assistance. His joy at seeing his daughter safe, overcame the surprise with which he would at another time have beheld her hanging as familiarly on the arm of a stranger, as she might have done upon his own. " Lucy, my dear Lucy, are you safe ? are you well ? " 210 were the only words that broke from him as he embraced her in ecstasy. " I am well, sir, thank God ! and still more that I see you so; but this gentleman," she said, quitting his arm, and shrinking from him, "What must he think of me?" and her 215 eloquent blood, flushing over neck and brow, spoke how much she was ashamed of the freedom with which she had craved, and even compelled his assistance. "This gentleman," said Sir William Ashton, "will, I trust, not regret the trouble we have given him, when I assure him 220 of the gratitude of the Lord Keeper for the greatest service which one man ever rendered to another for the life of my child for my own life, which he has saved by his 310 ENGLISH LITERATURE bravery and presence of mind. He will, I am sure, permit us 225 to request" "Request nothing of me, my lord," said the stranger, in a stern and peremptory tone; "I am the Master of Ravens- wood." There was a dead pause of surprise, not unmixed with less 230 pleasant feelings. The Master wrapt himself in his cloak, made a haughty inclination towards Lucy, muttering a few words of courtesy, as indistinctly heard as they seemed to be reluctantly uttered, and, turning from them, was imme- diately lost in the thicket. Soldier, Rest ! (From The Lady of the Lake, Canto I) Soldier, rest ! thy warfare o'er, Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking ; Dream of battled fields no more, Days of danger, nights of waking. 5 In our isle's enchanted hall, Hands unseen thy couch are strewing, Fairy strains of music fall, Every sense in slumber dewing. Soldier, rest ! thy warfare o'er, 10 Dream of fighting fields no more ; Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking, Morn of toil, nor night of waking. No rude sound shall reach thine ear, Armor's clang, or war-steed champing, 15 Trump nor pibroch summon here Mustering clan or squadron tramping. Yet the lark's shrill fife may come At the daybreak from the fallow, And the bittern sound his drum, 20 Booming from the sedgy shallow. SIR WALTER SCOTT 311 Ruder sounds shall none be near, Guards nor warders challenge here, Here's no war-steed's neigh and champing, Shouting clans or squadrons stamping. Huntsman, rest ! thy chase is done ; 25 While our slumbrous spells assail ye, Dream not, with the rising sun, Bugles here shall sound reveille. Sleep ! the deer is in his den ; Sleep ! thy hounds are by thee lying : 30 Sleep ! nor dream in yonder glen How thy gallant steed lay dying. Huntsman, rest ! thy chase is done ; Think not of the rising sun, For at dawning to assail ye 35 Here no bugles sound reveille. Here's a Health to King Charles (From Woodstock, Chap. XX) Bring the bowl which you boast, Fill it up to the brim ; 'Tis to him we love most, And to all who love him. Brave gallants, stand up, 5 And avaunt ye, base carles ! Were there death in the cup, Here's a health to King Charles ! Though he wanders through dangers, Unaided, unknown, 10 Dependent on strangers, Estranged from his own ; Though 'tis under our breath, Amidst forfeits and perils, Here's to honour and faith, 15 And a health to King Charles ! 312 ENGLISH LITERATURE Let such honours abound As the time can afford, The knee on the ground, 20 And the hand on the sword ; But the time shall come round When, 'mid Lords, Dukes, and Earls,, The loud trumpet shall sound, Here's a health to King Charles ! The Escape of Marmion (From Marmion, Canto VI) XIII Not far advanced was morning day,.' When Marmion did his troop array To Surrey's camp to ride ; He had safe-conduct for his band 5 Beneath the royal seal and hand. And Douglas gave a guide ; The ancient Earl, with stately grace-,. Would Clara on her palfrey place, And whisper'd in an under tone, 10 "Let the hawk stoop, his prey is flown."" The train from out the castle drew, But Marmion stopp'd to bid adieu : "Though something I might plain," he said* "Of cold respect to stranger guest, 15 Sent hither by your King's behest, While in Tantallon's towers I staid ; Part we in friendship from your land, And, noble Earl, receive my hand." But Douglas round him drew his cloak,. 20 Folded his arms, and thus he spoke : "My manors, halls, and bowers, shall' still Be open, at my Sovereign's will, To each one whom he lists, howe'eir- Unmeet to be the owner's peer* SIR WALTER SCOTT 313 My castles are my King's alone, 25 From turret to foundation-stone The hand of Douglas is his own ; And never shall in friendly grasp The hand of such as Marmion clasp." XIV Burn'd Marmion's swarthy cheek like fire, 30 And shook his very frame for ire, And "This to me !" he said, "An 'twere not for thy hoary beard, Such hand as Marmion's had not spared To cleave the Douglas' head ! 35 And, first, I tell thee, haughty Peer, ^He, who does England's message here, Although the meanest in her state, May well, proud Angus, be thy mate : And, Douglas, more I tell thee here, 40 Even in thy pitch of pride, Here in thy hold, thy vassals near, (Nay, never look upon your lord, And lay your hands upon your sword,) I tell thee, thou'rt defied ! 45 And if thou said'st, I am not peer To any lord in Scotland here, Lowland or Highland, far or near, Lord Angus, thou hast lied !" On the Earl's cheek the flush of rage 50 O'ercame the ashen hue of age : Fierce he broke forth, "And darest thou then To beard the lion in his den, The Douglas in his hall ? And hopest thou hence unscathed to go ? 55 No, by Saint Bride of .Bothwell, no ! Up drawbridge, grooms what, Warder, ho I Let the portcullis fall." 314 ENGLISH LITERATURE Lord Marmion turn'd, well was his need, 60 And dash'd the rowel in his steed, Like arrow through the archway sprung, The ponderous grate behind him rung : To pass there was such scanty room, The bars descending, razed his plume. xv 65 The steed along the drawbridge flies, Just as it trembled on the rise ; Nor lighter does the swallow skim Along the smooth lake's level brim : And when Lord Marmion reach'd his band, 70 He halts, and turns with clenched hand, And shout of loud defiance pours, And shook his gauntlet at the towers. "Horse ! horse !" the Douglas cried, "and chase !" But soon he rein'd his fury's pace : 75 "A royal messenger he came, Though most unworthy of the name. A letter forged ! Saint Jude to speed 1 Did ever knight so foul a deed ! At first in heart it liked me ill, 80 When the King praised his clerkly skill. Thanks to Saint Bothan, son of mine, Save Gawain, ne'er could pen a line : So swore I, and I swear it still, Let my boy-bishop fret his fill. 85 Saint Mary mend my fiery mood I Old age ne'er cools the Douglas blood, I thought to slay him where he stood. 'Tis pity of him too," he cried : "Bold can he speak, and fairly ride, 90 I warrant him a warrior tried." With this his mandate he recalls, And slowly seeks his castle halls. JANE AUSTEN 315 JANE AUSTEN Elizabeth has a Distinguished Visitor (From Pride and Prejudice, Chap. LVI) One morning, about a week after Bingley's engagement with Jane had been formed, as he and the females of the family were sitting together in the dining-room, their attention was suddenly drawn to the window, by the sound of a carriage; and they perceived a chaise-and-four drivings up the lawn. It was too early in the morning for visitors, and besides, the equipage did not answer to that of any of their neighbours. The horses were post; and neither the carriage nor the livery of the servant who preceded it, were familiar to them. As it was certain, however, that somebody 10 was coming, Bingley instantly prevailed on Miss Bennet to avoid the confinement of such an intrusion, and walk away with him into the shrubbery. They both set off, and the conjectures of the remaining three continued, though with little satisfaction, till the door was thrown open, and their 15 visitor entered. It was Lady Catherine de Bourgh. They were of course all intending to be surprised ; but their astonishment was beyond their expectation; and on the part of Mrs. Bennet and Kitty, though she was per- fectly unknown to them, even inferior to what Elizabeth felt. 20 She entered the room with an air more than usually un- gracious, made no other reply to Elizabeth's salutation than a slight inclination of the head, and sat down without saying a word. Elizabeth had mentioned her name to her mother on her ladyship's entrance, though no request of introduction 25 had been made. Mrs. Bennet, all amazement, though flattered by having a guest of such high importance, received her with the utmost politeness. After sitting for a moment in silence, she said, very stiffly to Elizabeth 30 316 ENGLISH LITERATURE " I hope you are well, Miss Bennet. That lady, I suppose, is your mother?" Elizabeth replied very concisely that she was. "And that, I suppose, is one of your sisters?" 35 "Yes, madam," said Mrs. Bennet, delighted to speak to a Lady Catherine. "She is my youngest girl but one, my youngest of all is lately married ; and my eldest is somewhere about the ground, walking with a young man, who, I believe, will soon become a part of the family." 40 "You have a very small park here," returned Lady Catherine, after a short silence. " It is nothing in comparison of Rosings, my lady, I dare say ; but, I assure you, it is much larger than Sir William Lucas's." "This must be a most inconvenient sittings-room for the 45 evening in summer: the windows are full west." Mrs. Bennet assured her that they never sat there after dinner, and then added "May I take the liberty of asking your ladyship whether you left Mr. and Mrs. Collins well?" 50 "Yes, very well. I saw them the night before last." Elizabeth now expected that she would produce a letter for her from Charlotte, as it seemed the only probable motive for her calling. But no letter appeared, and she was com- pletely puzzled. 55 Mrs. Bennet, with great civility, begged her ladyship to take some refreshment ; but Lady Catherine very resolutely, and not very politely, declined eating anything; and then rising up, said to Elizabeth "Miss Bennet, there seemed to be a prettyish kind of a 60 little wilderness on one side of your lawn. I should be glad to take a turn in it, if you will favour me with your company." "Go, my dear," cried her mother, "and shew her ladyship about the different walks. I think she will be pleased with the hermitage." JANE AUSTEN 317 Elizabeth obeyed, and, running into her own room for her 65 parasol, attended her noble guest downstairs. As they passed through the hall, Lady Catherine opened the doors into the dining-parlour and drawing-room, and pronouncing them, after a short survey, to be decent-looking rooms, walked on. Her carriage remained at the door, and Elizabeth saw 70 that her waiting-woman was in it. They proceeded in silence along the gravel-walk that led to the copse ; Elizabeth was determined to make no effort for conversation with a woman who was now more than usually insolent and disagreeable. "How could I ever think her like her nephew?" said she, 75 as she looked in her face. As soon as they entered the copse, Lady Catherine began in the following manner : "You can be at no loss, Miss Bennet, to understand the reason of my journey hither. Your own heart, your own 80 conscience, must tell you why I come." Elizabeth looked with unaffected astonishment. "Indeed, you are mistaken, madam. I have not been at all able to account for the honour of seeing you here." "Miss Bennet," replied her ladyship, in an angry tone, 85 "you ought to know that I am not to be trifled with. But, however insincere you may choose to be, you shall not find me so. My character has ever been celebrated for its sin- cerity and frankness, and in a cause of such moment as this I shall certainly not depart from it. A report of a most 90 alarming nature reached me two days ago. I was told that not only your sister was on the point of being most advantageously married, but that you, that Miss Elizabeth Bennet, would, in all likelihood, be soon afterwards united to my nephew my own nephew Mr. Darcy. Though 1 95 know it must be a scandalous falsehood though I would not injure him so much as to suppose the truth of it possible, I instantly resolved on setting off for this place, that I might make my sentiments known to you." 318 ENGLISH LITERATURE 100 "If you believed it impossible to be true," said Elizabeth, colouring with astonishment and disdain, "I wonder you took the trouble of coming so far. What could your lady- ship propose by it?" "At once to insist upon having such a report universally 105 contradicted." "Your coming to Longbourn, to see me and my family," said Elizabeth coolly, " will be rather a confirmation of it ; if, indeed, such a report is in existence." " If ! do you, then, pretend to be ignorant of it ? Has it 110 not been industriously circulated by yourselves? Do you not know that such a report is spread abroad?" "I never heard that it was." " And can you likewise declare, that there is no foundation for it?" 115 "I do not pretend to possess equal frankness with your ladyship. You may ask questions, which / shall not choose to answer." " This is not to be borne ! Miss Bennet, I insist on being satisfied. Has he, has my nephew, made you an offer of 120 marriage ?" "Your ladyship has declared it to be impossible." " It ought to be so ; it must be so, while he retains the use of his reason. But your arts and allurements may, in a moment of infatuation, have made him forget what he owes 125 to himself and to all his family. You may have drawn him in." " If I have, I shall be the last person to confess it." " Miss Bennet, do you know who I am ? I have not been accustomed to such language as this. I am almost the nearest 130 relation he has in the world, and am entitled to know all his dearest concerns." "But you are not entitled to know mine; nor will such behaviour as this ever induce me to be explicit." JANE AUSTEN 319 " Let me be rightly understood. This match, to which you have the presumption to aspire, can never take place. No, 135 never. Mr. Darcy is engaged to my daughter. Now, what have you to say?" " Only this : that if he is so, you can have no reason to suppose he will make an offer to me." Lady Catherine hesitated for a moment, and then 140 replied "The engagement between them is of a peculiar kind. From their infancy, they have been intended for each other. It was the favourite wish of his mother, as well as of hers. While in their cradles, we planned the union : and now, at 145 the moment when the wishes of both sisters would be ac- complished in their marriage, to be prevented by a young woman of inferior birth, of no importance in the world, and wholly unallied to the family ! Do you pay no regard to the wishes of his friends to his tacit engagement with 150 Miss de Bourgh ? Are you lost to every feeling of propriety and delicacy? Have you not heard me say that from his earliest hours he was destined for his cousin?" " Yes, and I had heard it before. But what is that to me ? If there is no other objection to my marrying your nephew, 155 I shall certainly not be kept from it by knowing that his mother and aunt wished him to marry Miss de Bourgh. You both did as much as you could, in planning the marriage ; its completion depended on others. If Mr. Darcy is neither by honour nor inclination confined to his cousin, why is 160 not he to make another choice ? and if I am that choice, why may I not accept him?" " Because honour, decorum, prudence nay, interest, forbid it. Yes, Miss Bennet, interest ; for do not expect to be noticed by his family or friends if you wilfully act against 165 the inclinations of all. You will be censured, slighted, and despised by every one connected with him. Your alliance 320 ENGLISH LITERATURE will be a disgrace ; your name will never even be mentioned by any of us." 170 "These are heavy misfortunes," replied Elizabeth. "But the wife of Mr. Darcy must have such extraordinary sources of happiness necessarily attached to her situation, that she could, upon the whole, have no cause to repine." " Obstinate, headstrong girl ! I am ashamed of you ! Is 175 this your gratitude for my attentions to you last spring ? Is nothing due to me on that score? "Let us sit down. You are to understand, Miss Bennet, that I came here with the determined resolution of carrying my purpose; nor will I be dissuaded from it. I have not 180 been used to submit to any person's whims. I have not been in the habit of brooking disappointment." " That will make your ladyship's situation at present more pitiable; but it will have no effect on me" " I will not be interrupted ! Hear me in silence. My 185 daughter and my nephew are formed for each other. They are descended, on the maternal side, from the same noble line ; and, on the fathers', from respectable, honourable, and ancient, though untitled families. Their fortune on both sides is splendid. They are destined for each other by the 190 voice of every member of their respective houses ; and what is to divide them? The upstart pretensions of a young woman without family, connections, or fortune. Is this to be endured ? But it must not, shall not be ! If you were sensible of your own good, you would not wish to quit the 195 sphere in which you have been brought up." " In marrying your nephew I should not consider myself as quitting that sphere. He is a gentleman ; I am a gentleman's daughter: so far we are equal." "True. You are a gentleman's daughter. But who was 200 your mother ? Who are your uncles and aunts ? Do not imagine me ignorant of their condition." JANE AUSTEN 321 "Whatever my connections may be," said Elizabeth, "if your nephew does not object to them, they can be nothing to you." " Tell me, once for all, are you engaged to him ? " 205 Though Elizabeth would not, for the mere purpose of obliging Lady Catherine, have answered this question, she could not but say, after a moment's deliberation, "I am not." Lady Catherine seemed pleased. "And will you promise me never to enter into such an 210 engagement?" "I will make no promise of the kind." "Miss Bennet, I am shocked and astonished. I expected to find a more reasonable young woman. But do not de- ceive yourself into a belief that I will ever recede. I shall 2 15 not go away till you have given me the assurance I require." "And I certainly never shall give it. I am not to be intimidated into anything so wholly unreasonable. Your v ladyship wants Mr. Darcy to marry your daughter; but would my giving you the wished-for promise make their 220 marriage at all more probable ? Supposing him to be at- tached to me, would my refusing to accept his hand make him wish to bestow it on his cousin? Allow me to say, Lady Catherine, that the arguments with which you have supported this extraordinary application have been as 225 frivolous as the application was ill-judged. You have widely mistaken my character, if you think I can be worked on by such persuasions as these. How far your nephew might approve of your interference in his affairs I cannot tell ; but you have certainly no right to concern yourself 230 in mine. I must beg, therefore, to be importuned no further on the subject." "Not so hasty, if you please. I have by no means done. To all the objections I have already urged, I have still an- other to add. I am no stranger to the particulars of your 235 322 ENGLISH LITERATURE youngest sister's infamous elopement. I know it all; that the young man's marrying her was a patched-up business, at the expense of your father and uncle. And is such a girl to be my nephew's sister? Is her husband, who is the 240 son of his late father's steward, to be his brother ? Heaven and earth of what are you thinking ? Are the shades of Pemberley to be thus polluted?" "You can now have nothing farther to say," she resentfully answered. " You have insulted me in every possible method. 245 I must beg to return to the house." And she rose as she spoke. Lady Catherine rose also, and they turned back. Her ladyship was highly incensed. " You have no regard, then, for the honour and credit of my nephew ! Unfeeling, selfish girl ! Do you not consider 250 that a connection with you must disgrace him in the eyes of everybody?" "Lady Catherine, I have nothing further to say. You know my sentiments." "You are, then, resolved to have him?" 255 " I have said no such thing. I am only resolved to act in that manner which will, in my own opinion, constitute my happiness, without reference to you, or to any person so wholly unconnected with me." "It is well. You refuse, then, to oblige me. You refuse 260 to obey the claims of duty, honour, and gratitude. You are determined to ruin him in the opinion of all his friends, and make him the contempt of the world." "Neither duty, nor honour, nor gratitude," replied Eliza- beth, " has any possible claim on me in the present instance. 265 No principle of either would be violated by my marriage with Mr. Darcy. And with regard to the resentment of his family or the indignation of the world, if the former were excited by his marrying me, it would not give me one moment's concern and the world in general would have 270 too much sense to join in the scorn." THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 323 " And this is your real opinion ! This is your final resolve ! Very well. I shall now know how to act. Do not imagine, Miss Bennet, that your ambition will ever be gratified. I came to try you. I hoped to find you reasonable; but, depend upon it, I will carry my point." 275 In this manner Lady Catherine talked on, till they were at the door of the carriage, when, turning hastily round, she added "I take no leave of you, Miss Bennet. I send no com- pliments to your mother. You deserve no such attention. 280 I am seriously displeased." Elizabeth made no answer, and, without attempting to persuade her ladyship to return into the house, walked quietly into it herself. THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY James Boswell (From essay on Boswell' s Life of Johnson) That such a man should have written one of the best books in the world is strange enough. But this is not all. Many persons who have conducted themselves foolishly in active life, and whose conversation has indicated no superior powers of mind, have left us valuable works. Goldsmith was very 5 justly described by one of his contemporaries as an inspired idiot, and by another as a being, " Who wrote like an angel, and talked like poor Poll." La Fontaine was in society a mere simpleton. His blunders would not come in amiss among the stories of Hierocles. But 10 these men attained literary eminence in spite of their weak- nesses. Boswell attained it by reason of his weaknesses. If he had not been a great fool, he would never have been a great writer. Without all the qualities which made him the jest 324 ENGLISH LITERATURE 15 and the torment of those among whom he lived, without the officiousness, the inquisitiveness, the effrontery, the toad- eating, the insensibility to all reproof, he never could have produced so excellent a book. He was a slave proud of his servitude, a Paul Pry, convinced that his own curiosity 20 and garrulity were virtues, an unsafe companion who never scrupled to repay the most liberal hospitality by the basest violation of confidence, a man without delicacy, without shame, without sense enough to know when he was hurting the feelings of others or when he was exposing himself to derision ; 25 and because he was all this, he has, in an important depart- ment of literature, immeasurably surpassed such writers as Tacitus, Clarendon, Alfieri, and his own idol Johnson. Of the talents which ordinarily raise men to eminence as writers, Boswell had absolutely none. There is not in all 30 his books a single remark of his own on literature, politics, religion, or society, which is not either commonplace or absurd. His dissertations on hereditary gentility, on the slave-trade, and on the entailing of landed estates, may serve as examples. To say that these passages are sophistical 35 would be to pay them an extravagant compliment. They have no pretence to argument, or even to meaning. He has reported innumerable observations made by himself in the course of conversation. Of those observations we do not remember one which is above the intellectual capacity of a 40 boy of fifteen. He has printed many of his own letters, and in these letters he is always ranting or twaddling. Logic, eloquence, wit, taste, all those things which are generally considered as making a book valuable, were utterly wanting to him. He had, indeed, a quick observation and a retentive 45 memory. These qualities, if he had been a man of sense and virtue, would scarcely of themselves have sufficed to make him conspicuous; but because he was a dunce, a parasite, and a coxcomb, they have made him immortal. THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 325 Scene at the Trial of Warren Hastings (From essay on Warren Hastings) On the 13th of February, 1788, the sittings of the Court commenced. There have been spectacles more dazzling to the eye, more gorgeous with jewelry and cloth of gold, more attractive to grown-up children, than that which was then exhibited at Westminster; but, perhaps, there never 5 was a spectacle so well calculated to strike a highly cultivated, a reflecting, and imaginative mind. All the various kinds of interest which belong to the near and to the distant, to the present and to the past, were collected on one spot, and in one hour. All the talents and all the accomplishments which are 10 developed by liberty and civilization were now displayed, with every advantage that could be derived both from co- operation and from contrast. Every step in the proceedings carried the mind either backward, through many troubled centuries, to the days when the foundations of our constitu- 15 tion were laid, or far away, over boundless seas and deserts, to dusky nations living under strange stars, worshipping strange gods, and writing strange characters from right to left. The High Court of Parliament was to sit, according to forms handed down from the days of the Plantagenets, 20 on an Englishman accused of exercising tyranny over the lord of the holy city of Benares, and over the ladies of the princely house of Oude. The place was worthy of such a trial. It was the great hall of William Rufus, the hall which had resounded with 25 acclamations at the inauguration of thirty kings, the hall which had witnessed the just sentence of Bacon and the just absolution of Somers, the hall where the eloquence of Strafford had for a moment awed and melted a victorious party in- flamed with just resentment, the hall where Charles had 30 confronted the High Court of Justice with the placid courage 326 ENGLISH LITERATURE which has half redeemed his fame. Neither military nor civil pomp was wanting. The avenues were lined with grenadiers. The streets were kept clear by cavalry. The 35 peers, robed in gold and ermine, were marshalled by the heralds under Garter King-at-arms. The judges in their vestments of state attended to give advice on points of law. Near a hundred and seventy lords, three fourths of the Upper House as the Upper House then was, walked in solemn 40 order from their usual place of assembling to the tribunal. The junior Baron present led the way, George Eliott, Lord Heathfield, recently ennobled for his memorable defence of Gibraltar against the fleets and armies of France and Spain. The long procession was closed by the Duke of Norfolk, 45 Earl Marshal of the realm, by the great dignitaries, and by the brothers and sons of the King. Last of all came the Prince of Wales, conspicuous by his fine person and noble bearing. The gray old walls were hung with scarlet. The long galleries were crowded by an audience such as has 50 rarely excited the fears or the emulation of an orator. There were gathered together, from all parts of a great, free, en- lightened, and prosperous empire, grace and female loveliness, wit and learning, the representatives of every science and of every art. There were seated round the Queen the fair- 55 haired young daughters of the house of Brunswick. There the Ambassadors of great Kings and Commonwealths gazed with admiration on a spectacle which no other country in the world could present. There Siddons, in the prime of her ma- jestic beauty, looked with emotion on a scene surpassing all 60 the imitations of the stage. There the historian of the Roman Empire thought of the days when Cicero pleaded the cause of Sicily against Verres, and when, before a senate which still retained some show of freedom, Tacitus thundered against the oppressor of Africa. There were seen, side by 65 side, the greatest painter and the greatest scholar of the THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 327 age. The spectacle had allured Reynolds from that easel which has preserved to us the thoughtful foreheads of so many writers and statesmen, and the sweet smiles of so many noble matrons. It had induced Parr to suspend his labors in that dark and profound mine from which he had extracted 70 a vast treasure of erudition, a treasure too often buried in the earth, too often paraded with injudicious and inelegant ostentation, but still precious, massive, and splendid. There appeared the voluptuous charms of her to whom the heir of the throne had in secret plighted his faith. There too was 75 she, the beautiful mother of a beautiful race, the Saint Cecilia, whose delicate features, lighted up by love and music, art has rescued from the common decay. There were the members of that brilliant society which quoted, criticised, and exchanged repartees, under the rich peacock- 80 hangings of Mrs. Montague. And there the ladies whose lips, more persuasive than those of Fox himself, had carried the Westminster election against palace and treasury, shone around Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire. London Coffee-Houses (From History of England, Chap. Ill) The coffee-house must not be dismissed with a cursory mention. It might, indeed, at that time have been not improperly called a most important political institution. No Parliament had sat for years. The municipal council of the city had ceased to speak the sense of the citizens. Public 5 meetings, harangues, resolutions, and the rest of the modern machinery of agitation had not yet come into fashion. Noth- ing resembling the modern newspaper existed. In such circumstances the coffee-houses were the chief organs through which the public opinion of the metropolis vented itself. 10 The first of these establishments had been set up, in the 328 ENGLISH LITERATURE . time of the Commonwealth, by a Turkey merchant, who had acquired among the Mahometans a taste for their favourite beverage. The convenience of being able to make appoint- isments in any part of the town, and of being able to pass evenings socially at a very small charge, was so great that the fashion spread fast. Every man of the upper or middle class went daily to his coffee-house to learn the news and discuss it. Every coffee-house had one or more orators to 20 whose eloquence the crowd listened with admiration, and who soon became, what the journalists of our time have been called, a fourth Estate of the realm. The court had long seen with uneasiness the growth of this new power in the state. 25 An attempt had been made, during Danby's adminis- tration, to close the coffee-houses. But men of all parties missed their usual places of resort so much that there was a universal outcry. The government did not venture, in opposition to a feeling so strong and general, to enforce a 30 regulation of which the legality might well be questioned. Since that time ten years had elapsed, and during those years the number and influence of the coffee-houses had been constantly increasing. Foreigners remarked that the coffee- house was that which especially distinguished London from 35 all other cities; that the coffee-house was the Londoner's home, and that those who wished to find a gentleman commonly asked, not whether he lived in Fleet Street or Chancery Lane, but whether he frequented the Grecian or the Rainbow. Nobody was excluded from these places who 40 laid down his penny at the bar. Yet every rank and profession, and every shade of reli- gious and political opinion, had its own headquarters. There were houses near Saint James's Park where fops con- gregated, their heads and shoulders covered with black or 45 flaxen wigs, not less ample than those which are worn by THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 329 the Chancellor and by the Speaker of the House of Com- mons. The wig came from Paris ; and so did the rest of the fine gentleman's ornaments, his embroidered coat, his fringed gloves, and the tassels which upheld his pantaloons. The conversation was in that dialect which, long after it had 50 ceased to be spoken in fashionable circles, continued, in the mouth of Lord Foppington, to excite the mirth of theatres. The atmosphere was like that of a perfumer's shop. Tobacco in any other form than that of richly scented snuff was held in abomination. If any clown, ignorant of the usages of the 55 house, called for a pipe, the sneers of the whole assembly and the short answers of the waiters soon convinced him that he had better go somewhere else. Nor, indeed, would he have had far to go. For, in general, the coffee-rooms reeked with tobacco like a guard- 60 room ; and strangers sometimes expressed their surprise that so many people should leave their own firesides to sit in the midst of eternal fog and stench. Nowhere was the smoking more constant than at Will's. That celebrated house situated between Co vent Garden and. Bow Street, 65 was sacred to polite letters. There the talk was about poetical justice and the unities of place and time. There was a faction for Perrault and the moderns, a faction for Boileau and the ancients. One group debated whether Paradise Lost ought not to have been in rhyme. To another 70 an envious poetaster demonstrated that Venice Preserved ought to have been hooted from the stage. Under no roof was a greater variety of figures to be seen. There were Earls in stars and garters, clergymen in cassocks and bands, pert Templars, sheepish lads from the Universities, translators 75 and index-makers in ragged coats of frieze. The great press was to get near the chair where John Dryden sat. In winter that chair was always in the warmest nook by the fire; in summer it stood in the balcony. To bow to the Laureate, 330 ENGLISH LITERATURE 80 and to hear his opinion of Racine's last tragedy or of Bossu's treatise on epic poetry, was thought a privilege. A pinch from his snuff-box was an honour sufficient to turn the head of a young enthusiast. There were coffee-houses where the first medical men might 85 be consulted. Dr. John Radcliffe, who, in the year 1685, rose to the largest practice in London, came daily, at the hour when the Exchange was full, from his house in Bow Street, then a fashionable part of the capital, to Garraway's, and was to be found, surrounded by surgeons and apothe- 90 caries, at a particular table. There were Puritan coffee- houses where no oath was heard, and where lank-haired men discussed election and reprobation through their noses ; Jew coffee-houses where dark-eyed money changers from Venice and from Amsterdam greeted each other ; and popish 95 coffee-houses where, as good Protestants believed, Jesuits planned, over their cups, another great fire, and cast silver bullets to shoot the King. The Battle of Ivry Now glory to the Lord of Hosts, from whom all glories are ! And glory to our Sovereign Liege, King Henry of Navarre ! Now let there be the merry sound of music and the dance ; Through thy corn-fields green, and sunny vines, O pleasant land of France ! 5 And thou, Rochelle, our own Rochelle, proud city of the waters, Again let rapture light the eyes of all thy mourning daughters. As thou wert constant in our ills, be joyous in our joy ; For cold and stiff and still are they who wrought thy walls annoy. Hurrah ! hurrah 1 a single field hath turned the chance of war ! 10 Hurrah ! hurrah ! for Ivry, and King Henry of Navarre. Oh ! how our hearts were beating, when, at the dawn of day, We saw the army of the League drawn out in long array ; THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 331 With all its priest-led citizens, and all its rebel peers, And Appenzel's stout infantry, and Egmont's Flemish spears; There rode the brood of false Lorraine, the curses of our land ; 15 And dark Mayenne was in the midst, a truncheon in his hand ; And, as we look'd on them, we thought of Seine's empurpled flood, And good Coligni's hoary hair all dabbled with his blood ; And we cried unto the living God, who rules the fate of war, To fight for His own holy name, and Henry of Navarre. 20 The King is come to marshal us, in all his armor drest ; And he has bound a snow-white plume upon his gallant crest. He look'd upon his people, and a tear was in his eye ! He look'd upon the traitors, and his glance was stern and high. Right graciously he smil'd on us, as roll'd from wing to wing, 25 Down all our line, in deafening shout : "God save our lord, the King!" "And if my standard-bearer fall, as fall full well he may, For never saw I promise yet of such a bloody fray, Press where ye see my white plume shine amidst the ranks of war, And be your oriflamme to-day the helmet of Navarre." 30 Hurrah ! the foes are moving. Hark to the mingled din, Of fife, and steed, and trump, and drum, and roaring culverin. The fiery duke is pricking fast across St. Andre's plain, With all the hireling chivalry of Guelders and Almayne. Now by the lips of those ye love, fair gentlemen of France, 35 Charge for the golden lilies, upon them with the lance ! A thousand spurs are striking deep, a thousand spears in rest, A thousand knights are pressing close behind the snow-white crest ; And in they burst, and on they rushed, while, like a guiding star, Amidst the thickest carnage blazed the helmet of Navarre. 40 Now, God be praised, the day is ours. Mayenne hath turned his rein; D'Aumale hath cried for quarter; the Flemish count is slain. Their ranks are breaking like thin clouds before a Biscay gale ; The field is heaped with bleeding steeds, and flags,' and cloven mail. 332 ENGLISH LITERATURE 45 And then we thought on vengeance, and, all along our van, "Remember Saint Bartholomew!" was passed from man to man. But out spake gentle Henry, "No Frenchman is my foe : Down, down with every foreigner, but let your brethren go." Oh ! was there ever such a knight, in friendship or in war, 50 As our Sovereign Lord, King Henry, the soldier of Navarre ? Right well fought all the Frenchmen who fought for France to-day ; And many a lordly banner God gave them for a prey. But we of the religion have borne us best in fight ; And the good Lord of Rosny hath ta'en the cornet white. 55 Our own true Maximilian the cornet white hath ta'en, The cornet white with crosses black, the flag of false Lorraine. Up with it high ; unfurl it wide ; that all the host may know , How God hath humbled the proud house which wrought His Church such woe. Then on the ground, while trumpets sound their loudest point of war, CO Fling the red shreds, a footcloth meet for Henry of Navarre. Ho ! maidens of Vienna ; ho ! matrons of Lucerne ; Weep, weep, and rend your hair for those who never shall return. Ho I Philip, send, for charity, thy Mexican pistoles, That Antwerp monks may sing a mass for thy poor spearmen's souls. 65 Ho ! gallant nobles of the League, look that your arms be bright ; Ho ! burghers of St. Genevieve, keep watch and ward to-night ; For our God hath crushed the tyrant, our God hath raised the slave, And mocked the counsel of the wise, and the valor of the brave. Then glory to his holy name, from whom all glories are ; 70 And glory to our Sovereign Lord, King Henry of Navarre. THOMAS CARLYLE 333 THOMAS CARLYLE James Boswell (From essay on Boswell' s Life of Johnson) We have next a word to say of James Boswell. Boswell has already been much commented upon ; but rather in the way of censure and vituperation than of true recognition. He was a man that brought himself much before the world ; confessed that he eagerly coveted fame, or, if that were not 5 possible, notoriety; of which latter as he gained far more than seemed his due, the public were incited, not only by their natural love of scandal, but by a special ground of envy, to say whatever ill of him could be said. Out of the fifteen millions that then lived, and had bed and board, in 10 the British Islands, this man has provided us a greater pleasure than any other individual at whose cost we now enjoy ourselves ; perhaps has done us a greater service than can be specially attributed to more than two or three : yet, ungrateful that we are, no written or spoken eulogy of James 15 Boswell anywhere exists; his recompense in solid pudding (so far as copyright went) was not excessive ; and as for the empty praise, it has altogether been denied him. Men are unwiser than children; they do not know the hand that feeds them. 20 Boswell was a person whose mean or bad qualities lay open to the general eye; visible, palpable to the dullest. His good qualities, again, belonged not to the Time he lived in ; were far from common then ; indeed, in such a degree, were almost unexampled ; not recognizable therefore by every 25 one ; nay, apt even (so strange had they grown) to be con- founded with the very vices they lay contiguous to, and had sprung out of. That he was a wine-bibber and gross liver ; gluttonously fond of whatever would yield him a little solace- ment, were it only of a stomachic character, is undeniable 30 334 ENGLISH LITERATURE enough. That he was vain, heedless, a babbler ; had much of the sycophant, alternating with the braggadocio, curiously spiced too with an all-pervading dash of the coxcomb; that he gloried much when the Tailor, by a court-suit, had 35 made a new man of him ; that he appeared at the Shake- speare Jubilee with a riband, imprinted " CORSICA BOSWELL," round his hat ; and in short, if you will, lived no day of his life without doing and saying more than one pretentious ineptitude : all this unhappily is evident as the sun at noon. 40 The very look of Bos well seems to have signified so much. In that cocked nose, cocked partly in triumph over his weaker fellow-creatures, partly to snuff -up the smell of coming pleas- ure, and scent it from afar; in those bag-cheeks, hanging like half-filled wine-skins, still able to contain more ; in that 45 coarsely protruded shelf -mouth, that fat dewlapped chin ; in all this, who sees not sensuality, pretension, boisterous imbecility enough; much that could not have been orna- mental in the temper of a great man's overfed great man (what the Scotch name flunky}, though it had been more 50 natural there? The under part of BoswelPs face is of a low, almost brutish character. Unfortunately, on the other hand, what great and genuine good lay in him was nowise so self-evident. That Boswell was a hunter after spiritual Notabilities, that he loved such, 55 and longed, and even crept and crawled, to be near them ; that he first (in old Touchwood Auchinleck's phraseology) " took on with Paoli " ; and then being off with " the Corsican lanlouper," took on with a schoolmaster, "ane that keeped a schule, and ca'd it an academy" : that he did all this, and 60 could not help doing it, we account a Very singular merit. The man, once for all, had an "open sense," an open loving heart, which so few have : where Excellence existed, he was compelled to acknowledge it; was drawn towards it, and (let the old sulphur-brand of a Laird say what he liked) THOMAS CARLYLE 335 could not bid walk with it, if not as superior, if not as 65 equal, then as inferior and lackey ; better so than not at all. If we reflect now that this love of Excellence had not only such an evil nature to triumph over ; but also what an educa- tion and social position withstood it and weighed it down, its innate strength, victorious over all these things, may aston- 70 ish us. Consider what an inward impulse there must have been, how many mountains of impediment hurled aside, before the Scottish Laird could, as humble servant, embrace the knees (the bosom was not permitted him) of the English Dominie ! " Your Scottish Laird," says an English naturalist 75 of these days, " may be defined as the hungriest and vainest of all bipeds yet known." Boswell too was a Tory; of quite peculiarly feudal, genealogical, pragmatical temper; had been nurtured in an atmosphere of Heraldry, at the feet of a very Gamaliel in that kind ; within bare walls, adorned 80 only with pedigrees ; amid serving-men in threadbare livery : all things teaching him, from birth upwards, to remember that a Laird was a Laird. Perhaps there was a special vanity in his very blood : old Auchinleck had, if not the gay, tail-spreading, peacock vanity of his son, no little of the 85 slow-stalking, contentious, hissing vanity of the gander; a still more fatal species. Scottish Advocates will yet tell you how the ancient man, having chanced to be the first sheriff appointed (after the abolition of "hereditary juris- diction") by royal authority, was wont, in dull-snuffing, 90 pompous tone, to preface many a deliverance from the bench with these words : " I, the first King's Sheriff in Scotland, And now behold the worthy Bozzy, so prepossessed and held back by nature and by art, fly nevertheless like iron to its magnet, whither his better genius called ! You may 95 surround the iron and the magnet with what enclosures and encumbrances you please, with wood, with rubbish, with brass : it matters not, the two fell each other, they struggle 336 ENGLISH LITERATURE restlessly towards each other, they will be together. The 100 iron may be a Scottish squirelet, full of gulosity and "gig- manity ; " 1 the magnet an English plebeian, and moving rag- and-dust mountain, coarse, proud, irascible, imperious : nevertheless, behold how they embrace, and inseparably cleave to one another ! It is one of the strangest phenomena 105 of the past century, that at a time when the old reverent feeling of Discipleship (such as brought men from far coun- tries, with rich gifts and prostrate soul, to the feet of the Prophets) had passed utterly away from men's practical experience, and was no longer surmised to exist (as it does), 110 perennial, indestructible, in man's inmost heart, James Boswell should have been the individual, of all others, predestined to recall it, in such singular guise, to the wonder- ing, and, for a long while, laughing and unrecognizing world. It has been commonly said, " The man's vulgar vanity was 115 all that attached him to Johnson; he delighted to be seen near him, to be thought connected with him.'* Now let it be at once granted that no consideration springing oift of vulgar vanity could well be absent from the mind of James Boswell, in this his intercourse with Johnson, or in any con- 120 siderable transaction of his life. At the same time, ask your- self : Whether such vanity, and nothing else, actuated him therein ; whether this was the true essence and moving prin- ciple of the phenomenon, or not rather its outward vesture, and the accidental environment (and defacement) in which 125 it came to light ? The man was, by nature and habit, vain ; a sycophant-coxcomb, be it granted : but had there been nothing more than vanity in him, was Samuel Johnson the man of men to whom he must attach himself ? 1 Q. "What do you mean by 'respectable'? A. He always kept a gig." (Thurtell's Trial.) "Thus," it has been said, "does society naturally divide itself into four classes : Noblemen, Gentlemen, Gigmen, and Men." [Carlyle's note.] THOMAS CARLYLE 337 At the date when Johnson was a poor rusty-coated "scholar," dwelling in Temple-lane, and indeed throughout 130 their whole intercourse afterwards, were there not chancellors and prime ministers enough ; graceful gentle men, the glass of fashion ; honor-giving noblemen ; dinner-giving rich men ; renowned fire-eaters, swordsmen, gownsmen ; Quacks and Realities of all hues, any one of whom bulked much larger 135 in the world's eye than Johnson ever did ? To any one of whom by half that submissiveness and assiduity, our Bozzy might have recommended himself ; and sat there, the envy of surrounding lickspittles ; pocketing now solid emolument, swallowing now well-cooked viands and wines of rich vintage ; 140 in each case, also, shone-on by some glittering reflex of Renown or Notoriety, so as to be the observed of innumerable observers. To no one of whom, however, though otherwise a most diligent solicitor and purveyor, did he so Attach him- self : such vulgar courtierships were his paid drudgery, or 145 leisure amusement; the worship of Johnson was his grand, ideal, voluntary business. Does not the frothy-hearted, yet enthusiastic man, doffing his Advocate's-wig, regularly take post, and hurry up to London, for the sake of his Sage chiefly ; as to a Feast of Tabernacles, the Sabbath of his 150 whole year ? The plate-licker and wine-bibber dives into Bolt Court, to sip muddy coffee with a cynical old man, and a sour-tempered blind old woman (feeling the cups, whether they are full, with her finger) ; and patiently endures con- tradictions without end ; too happy so he may but be allowed 155 to listen and live. Nay, it does not appear that vulgar vanity could ever have been much flattered by Boswell's relation to Johnson. Mr. Croker says, Johnson was to the last little regarded by the great world ; from which, for a vulgar vanity, all 160 honor, as from its fountain, descends. Bozzy, even among Johnson's friends and special admirers, seems rather to have 338 ENGLISH LITERATURE been laughed at than envied : his officious, whisking, con- sequential ways, the daily reproofs and rebuffs he underwent, 165 could gain from the world no golden, but only leaden opinions. His devout Discipleship seemed nothing more than a mean Spanielship, in the general eye. His mighty "constellation," or sun, round whom he, as satellite, observantly gyrated, was, for the mass of men, but a huge ill-snuffed tallow-light, 170 and he a weak night-moth, circling foolishly, dangerously about it, not knowing what he wanted. If he enjoyed High- land dinners and toasts, as henchman to a new sort of chieftain, Henry Erskine, in the domestic "Outer-House," could hand him a shilling "for the sight of his Bear." 175 Doubtless the man was laughed at, and often heard himself laughed at for his Johnsonism. To be envied is the grand and sole aim of vulgar vanity ; to be filled with good things is that of .sensuality : for Johnson perhaps no man living envied poor Bozzy ; and of good things (except himself paid 180 for them) there was no vestige in that acquaintanceship. Had nothing other or better than vanity and sensuality been there, Johnson and Boswell had never come together, or had soon and finally separated again. Robert Burns (From Heroes and Hero- Worship : "The Hero as Man of Letters") Once more we have to say here, that the chief quality of Burns is the sincerity of him. So in his Poetry, so in his Life. The Song he sings is not of fantasticalities ; it is of a thing felt, really there ; the prime merit of this, as of all in 5 him, and of his Life generally, is truth. The Life of Burns is what we may call a great tragic sincerity. A sort of savage sincerity, not cruel, far from that ; but wild, wrestling naked with the truth of things. In that sense, there is something of the savage in all great men. THOMAS CARLYLE 339 Hero-worship, Odin, Burns ? Well ; these Men of 10 Letters too were not without a kind of Hero-worship : but what a strange condition has that got into now ! The waiters and ostlers of Scotch inns, prying about the door, eager to catch any word that fell from Burns, were doing unconscious reverence to the Heroic. Johnson had his Bos- 15 well for worshiper. Rousseau had worshipers enough; princes calling on him in his mean garret ; the great, the beautiful, doing reverence to the poor moonstruck man. For himself a most portentous contradiction; the two ends of his life not to be brought into harmony. He sits at the 20 tables of grandees ; and has to copy music for his own living. He cannot even get his music copied. " By dint of dining out," says he, "I run the risk of dying by starvation at home." For his worshipers too a most questionable thing! If doing Hero-worship well or badly be the test of vital well- 25 being or illbeing to a generation, can we say that these generations are very first-rate ? And yet our heroic Men of Letters do teach, govern, are kings, priests, or what you like to call them; intrinsically there is no preventing it by any means whatever. The world has to obey him who thinks 30 and sees in the world. The world can alter the manner of that; can either have it as blessed continuous summer sunshine, or as unblessed black thunder and tornado, with unspeakable difference of profit for the world ! The manner of it is very alterable ; the matter and fact of it is not alter- 35 able by any power under the sky. Light; or, failing that, lightning : the world can take its choice. Not whether we call an Odin god, prophet, priest, or what we call him ; but whether we believe the word he tells us : there it all lies. If it be a true word, we shall have to believe it ; believing it, 40 we shall have to do it. What name or welcome we give him or it, is a point that concerns ourselves mainly. It, the new Truth, new deeper revealing of the Secret of this Uni- 340 ENGLISH LITERATURE verse, is verily of the nature of a message from on high; 45 and must and will have itself obeyed. My last remark is on that notablest phasis of Burns's history, his visit to Edinburgh. Often it seems to me as if his demeanor there were the highest proof he gave of what a fund of worth and genuine manhood was in him. If we 50 think of it, few heavier burdens could be laid on the strength of a man. So sudden; all common Lionism, which ruins innumerable men, was as nothing to this. It is as if Napoleon had been made a King of, not gradually, but at once from the Artillery Lieutenancy in the Regiment La Fere. Burns, 55 still only in his twenty-seventh year, is no longer even a plowman ; he is flying to the West Indies to escape disgrace and a jail. This month he is a ruined peasant, his wages seven pounds a year, and these gone from him : next month he is in the blaze of rank and beauty, handing down jeweled 60 Duchesses to dinner ; the cynosure of all eyes ! Adversity is sometimes hard upon a man ; but for one man who can stand prosperity, there are a hundred that will stand ad- versity. I admire much the way in which Burns met all this. 65 Perhaps no man one could point out was ever so sorely tried, and so little forgot himself. Tranquil, unastonished ; not abashed, not inflated, neither awkwardness nor affectation : he feels that he there is the man Robert Burns ; that the "rank is but the guinea-stamp;" that the celebrity is but 70 the candle-light which will show what man, not in the least make him a better or other man ! Alas, it may readily, unless he look to it, make him a worse man ; a wretched in- flated windbag, inflated till he burst, and become a dead lion ; for whom, as some one has said, " there is no resurrection 75 of the body" ; worse than a living dog ! Burns is admirable here. And yet, alas, as I have observed elsewhere, these Lion- THOMAS CARLYLE 341 hunters were the ruin and death of Burns. It was they that rendered it impossible for him to live ! They gathered round him in his Farm ; hindered his industry ; no place was remote 80 enough from them. He could not get his Lionism forgotten, honestly as he was disposed to do so. He falls into dis- contents, into miseries, faults ; the world getting ever more desolate for him ; health, character, peace of mind all gone ; solitary enough now. It is tragical to think of ! These 85 men came but to see him ; it was out of no sympathy with him, nor no hatred to him. They came to get a little amuse- ment : they got their amusement ; and the Hero's life went for it ! A Definition of History (From essay on History) Under a limited, and the only practicable shape, History proper, that part of History which treats of remarkable action, has, in all modern as well as ancient times, ranked among the highest arts; and perhaps never stood higher than in these times of ours. For whereas, of old, the charm of History 5 lay chiefly in gratifying our common appetite for the wonder- ful, for the unknown, and her office was but as that of a Minstrel and Storyteller, she has now farther become a Schoolmistress, and professes to instruct in gratifying. Whether, with the stateliness of that venerable character, 10 she may not have taken up something of its austerity and frigidity; whether, in the logical terseness of a Hume or Robertson, the graceful ease and gay pictorial heartiness of a Herodotus or Froissart may not be wanting, is not the question for us here. Enough that all learners, all inquiring 15 minds of every order, are gathered round her footstool, and reverently pondering her lessons, as the true basis of Wisdom. Poetry, Divinity, Politics, Physics, have each 342 ENGLISH LITERATURE their adherents and adversaries; each little guild support- 20 ing a defensive and offensive war for its own special do- main ; while the domain of History is as a Free Emporium, where all these belligerents peaceably meet and furnish them- selves; and Sentimentalist and Utilitarian, Sceptic and Theologian, with one voice advise us : Examine History, for 25 it is "Philosophy teaching by Experience." Far be it from us to disparage such teaching, the very attempt at which must be precious. Neither shall we too rigidly inquire : How much it has hitherto profited ? Whether most of what little practical wisdom men have, has 30 come from study of professed History, or from other less boasted sources; whereby, as matters now stand, a Marl- borough may become great in the world's business, with no History save what he derives from Shakspear's Plays ? Nay, whether in that same teaching by Experience, historical 35 Philosophy has yet properly deciphered the first element of all science in this kind : What the aim and significance of that wondrous changeful Life it investigates and paints may be? Whence the course of man's destinies in this Earth originated, and whither they are tending ? Or, indeed, if 40 they have any course and tendency, are really guided for- ward by an unseen mysterious Wisdom, or only circle in blind mazes without recognizable guidance? Which questions, altogether fundamental, one might think, in any Philosophy of History, have, since the era when Monkish Annalists were 45 wont to answer them by the long-ago extinguished light of their Missal and Breviary, been by most philosophical Historians only glanced at dubiously and from afar; by many, not so much as glanced at. The truth is, two difficulties, never wholly surmountable, 50 lie in the way. Before Philosophy can teach by Experience, the Philosophy has to be in readiness, the Experience must be gathered and intelligibly recorded. Now, overlooking CHARLES DICKENS 343 the former consideration, and with regard only to the latter, let any one who has examined the current of human affairs, and how intricate, perplexed, unfathomable, even when 55 seen into with our own eyes, are their thousandfold blending movements, say whether the true representing of it is easy or impossible. Social Life is the aggregate of all the indi- vidual men's Lives who constitute society; History is the essence of innumerable Biographies. But if one Biography, 60 nay, our own Biography, study and recapitulate it as we may, remains in so many points unintelligible to us, how much more must these million; the very facts of which, to say nothing of the purport of them, we know not, and cannot know ! 65 CHARLES DICKENS Preface to "Oliver Twist" Once upon a time it was held to be a coarse and shocking circumstance, that some of the characters in these pages are chosen from the most criminal and degraded of London's population. As I saw no reason, when I wrote this book, why the 5 dregs of life (so long as their speech did not offend the ear) should not serve the purpose of a moral, as well as its froth and cream, I made bold to believe that this same Once upon a time would not prove to be All-time or even a long time. I saw many strong reasons for pursuing my course. I had 10 read of thieves by scores ; seductive fellows (amiable for the most part), faultless in dress, plump in pocket, choice in horse-flesh, bold in bearing, fortunate in gallantry, great at a song, a bottle, pack of cards or dice-box, and fit com- panions for the bravest. But I had never met (except in 15 Hogarth] with the miserable reality. It appeared to me that to draw a knot of such associates in crime as really 344 ENGLISH LITERATURE did exist; to paint them in all their deformity, in all their wretchedness, in all the squalid misery of their lives ; to show 20 them as they really were, for ever skulking uneasily through the dirtiest paths of life, with the great black ghastly gallows closing up their prospect, turn them where they might; it appeared to me that to do this, would be to attempt a something which was needed, and which would be a service 25 to society. And I did it as I best could. What manner of life is that which is described in these pages, as the everyday existence of a Thief? What charms has it for the young and ill-disposed, what allurements for the most jolter-headed of juveniles? Here are no ca'nter- 30 ings on moonlit heaths, no merrymakings in the snuggest of all possible caverns, none of the attractions of dress, no embroidery, no lace, no jack-boots, no crimson coats and ruffles, none of the dash and freedom with which "the road" has been time out of mind invested. The cold wet shelter- 35 less midnight streets of London ; the foul and frowsy dens, where vice is closely packed and lacks the room to turn ; the haunts of hunger and disease; the shabby rags that scarcely hold together; where are the attractions of these things ? 40 There are people, however, of so refined and delicate a nature, that they cannot bear the contemplation of such horrors. Not that they turn instinctively from crime; but that criminal characters, to suit them, must be, like their meat, in delicate disguise. A Massaroni in green velvet 45 is an enchanting creature; but a Sikes in fustian is insup- portable. A Mrs. Massaroni, being a lady in short petti- coats and a fancy dress, is a thing to imitate in tableaux and have in lithograph on pretty songs; but a Nancy, being a creature in a cotton gown and cheap shawl, is not CHARLES DICKENS 345 to be thought of. It is wonderful how Virtue turns from 50 dirty stockings ; and how Vice, married to ribbons and a little gay attire, changes her name, as wedded ladies do, and becomes Romance. But as the stern truth, even in the dress of this (in novels) much exalted race, was a part of the purpose of this book, 55 I did not, for these readers, abate one hole in the Dodger's coat, or one scrap of curl-paper in Nancy's dishevelled hair. I had no faith in the delicacy which could not bear to look upon them. I had no desire to make proselytes among such people. I had no respect for their opinion, good or 60 bad ; did not covet their approval ; and did not write for their amusement. It has been observed of Nancy that her devotion to the brutal house-breaker does not seem natural. And it has been objected to Sikes in the same breath with some in- 65 consistency, as I venture to think that he is surely over- drawn, because in him there would appear to be none of those redeeming traits which are objected to as unnatural in his mistress. Of the latter objection I will merely remark, * that I fear there are in the world some insensible and callous 70 natures, that do become utterly and incurably bad. Whether this be so or not, of one thing I am certain : that there are such men as Sikes, who, being closely followed through the same space of time and through the same cur- rent of circumstances, would not give, by the action of a 75 moment, the faintest indication of a better nature. Whether every gentler human feeling is dead within such bosoms, or the proper chord to strike has rusted and is hard to find, I do not pretend to know ; but that the fact is as I state it, I am sure. 80 It is useless to discuss whether the conduct and character of the girl seems natural or unnatural, probable or im- probable, right or wrong. If is TRUE. Every man who has 346 ENGLISH LITERATURE watched these melancholy shades of life, must know it to 85 be so. From the first introduction of that poor wretch, to her laying her bloodstained head upon the robber's breast, there is not a word exaggerated or overwrought. It is em- phatically God's truth, for it is the truth He leaves in such depraved and miserable breasts ; the hope yet lingering 90 there ; the last fair drop of water at the bottom of the weed- choked well. It involves the best and worst shades of our nature ; much of its ugliest hues, and something of its most beautiful; it is a contradiction, an anomaly, an apparent impossibility; but it is a truth. I am glad to have had 95 it doubted, for in that circumstance I should find a sufficient assurance (if I wanted any) that it needed to be told. In the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty, it was publicly declared in London by an amazing Alderman, that Jacob's Island did not exist, and never had existed. 100 Jacob's Island continues to exist (like an ill-bred place as it is) in the year one thousand eight hundred and sixty- seven, though improved and much changed. Mr. Micawber (From David Copperfield, Chaps. XI, XII) The counting-house clock was at half-past twelve, and there was general preparation for going to dinner, when Mr. Quinion tapped at the counting-house window, and beckoned to me to go in. I went in, and found there a sstoutish, middle-aged person, in a brown surtout and black tights and shoes, with no more hair upon his head (which was a large one and very shining) than there is upon an egg, and with a very extensive face, which he turned full upon me. His clothes were shabby, but he had an imposing 10 shirt-collar on. He carried a jaunty sort of stick, with a large pair of rusty tassels to it; and a quizzing-glass hung CHARLES DICKENS 347 outside his coat, for ornament, I afterwards found* as he very seldom looked through it, and couldn't see anything when he did. "This," said Mr. Quinion, in allusion to myself, "is he." 15 "This," said the stranger, with a certain condescending roll in his voice, and a certain indescribable air of doing something genteel, which impressed me very much, "is Master Copperfield. I hope I see you well, sir?" I said I was very well, and hoped he was. I was suf-20 ficiently ill at ease, Heaven knows ; but it was not in my nature to complain much at that time of my life, so I said I was very well, and hoped he was. "I am," said the stranger, "thank Heaven, quite well. I have received a letter from Mr. Murdstone, in which he 25 mentions that he would desire me to receive into an apart- ment in the rear of my house, which is at present unoccu- pied and is, in short, to be let as a in short," said the stranger, with a smile, and in a burst of confidence, "as a bedroom the young beginner whom I have now the pleas- 30 ure to " and the stranger waved his hand, and settled his chin in his shirt-collar. "This is Mr. Micawber," said Mr. Quinion to me. "Ahem!" said the stranger, "that is my name." "Mr. Micawber," said Mr. Quinion, "is known to Mr. 35 Murdstone. He takes orders for us on commission, when he can get any. He has been written to by Mr. Murdstone, on the subject of your lodgings, and he will receive you as a lodger." "My address," said Mr. Micawber, "is Windsor Terrace, 40 City Road. I in short," said Mr. Micawber, with the same genteel air, and in another burst of confidence " I live there." I made him a bow. "Under the impression," said Mr. Micawber, "that your 45 348 ENGLISH LITERATURE peregrinations in this metropolis have not as yet been ex- tensive, and that you might have some difficulty in pen- etrating the arcana of the Modern Babylon in the direction of the City Road in short," said Mr. Micawber, in another 50 burst of confidence, " that you might lose yourself I shall be happy to call this evening, and install you in the knowledge of the nearest way." I thanked him with all my heart, for it was friendly in him to offer to take that trouble. 55 "At what hour," said Mr. Micawber, "shall I " "At about eight," said Mr. Quinion. "At about eight," said Mr. Micawber. "I beg to wish you good day, Mr. Quinion. I will intrude no longer." So he put on his hat, and went out with his cane under 60 his arm : very upright, and humming a tune when he was clear of the counting-house. Mr. Micawber's difficulties were an addition to the dis- tressed state of my mind. In my forlorn state I became quite attached to the family, and used to walk about, busy 65 with Mrs. Micawber's calculations of ways and means, and heavy with the weight of Mr. Micawber's debts. On a Saturday night, which was my grand treat, partly because it was a great thing to walk home with six or seven shillings in my pocket, looking into the shops and thinking what such 70 a sum would buy, and partly because I went home early, Mrs. Micawber would make the most heart-rending confidences to me ; also on a Sunday morning, when I mixed the portion of tea or coffee I had bought over-night, in a little shaving-pot, and sat late at my breakfast. It was 75 nothing at all unusual for Mr. Micawber to sob violently at the beginning of one of these Saturday night conversa- tions, and sing about Jack's delight being his lovely Nan, CHARLES DICKENS 349 towards the end of it. I have known him come home to supper with a flood of tears, and a declaration that nothing was now left but a jail; and go to bed making a calcula-so tion of the expense of putting bow-windows to the house, "in case anything turned up," which was his favourite ex- pression. And Mrs. Micawber was just the same. "I shall never, Master Copjperfield," said Mrs. Micawber, " revert to the period when Mr. Micawber was in difficulties, 85 without thinking of you. Your conduct has always been of the most delicate and obliging description. You have never been a lodger. You have been a friend." "My dear," said Mr. Micawber; " Copperfield," for so he had been accustomed to call me of late, "has a heart 90 to feel for the distresses of his fellow-creatures when they are behind a cloud, and a head to plan, and a hand to in short, a general ability to dispose of such available prop- erty as could be made away with." I expressed my sense of this commendation, and said 1 95 was very sorry we were going to lose one another. "My dear young friend," said Mr. Micawber, "I am older than you ; a man of some experience in life, and and of some experience, in short, in difficulties, generally speaking. At present, and until something turns up (which I am, 1 100 may say, hourly expecting), I have nothing to bestow but advice. Still my advice is so far worth taking that in short, that I have never taken it myself, and am the " here Mr. Micawber, who had been beaming and smiling, all over his head and face, up to the present moment, checked 105 himself and frowned "the miserable wretch you behold." "My dear Micawber !" urged his wife. "I say," returned Mr. Micawber, quite forgetting himself, and smiling again, "the miserable wretch you behold. My 350 .ENGLISH LITERATURE 110 advice is, never do to-morrow what you can do to-day. Procrastination is the thief of time. Collar him ! " "My poor papa's maxim," Mrs. Micawber observed. "My dear," said Mr. Micawber, "your papa was very well in his way, and Heaven forbid that I should disparage 115 him. Take him for all in all, we ne'er shall in short, make the acquaintance, probably, of anybody else possessing at his time of life, the same legs for gaiters, and able to read the same description of print, without spectacles. But he applied that maxim to our marriage, my dear; and 120 that was so far prematurely entered into, in consequence, that I never recovered the expense." Mr. Micawber looked aside at Mrs. Micawber, and added : "Not that I am sorry for it. Quite the contrary, my love." After which he was grave for a minute or so. 125 "My other piece of advice, Copperfield," said Mr. Micawber, "you know. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery. The blossom is 130 blighted, the leaf is withered, the God of day goes down upon the dreary scene, and in short, you are for ever floored. As I am!" To make his example the more impressive, Mr. Micawber drank a glass of punch with an air of great enjoyment and 135 satisfaction, and whistled the College Hornpipe. I did not fail to assure him that I would store these pre- cepts in my mind, though indeed I had no need to do so, for, at the time, they affected me visibly. Next morning I met the whole family at the coach-office, and saw them, with 140 a desolate heart, take their places outside, at the back. "Master Copperfield," said Mrs. Micawber, "God bless you ! I never can forget all that, you know, and I never would if I could." CHARLES DICKENS 351 "Copperfield," said Mr. Micawber, "farewell! Every happiness and prosperity ! If, in the progress of revolving 145 years, I could persuade myself that my blighted destiny had been a warning to you, I should feel that I had not occupied another man's place in existence altogether in vain. In case of anything turning up (of which I am rather con- fident), I shall be extremely happy if it should be in my power 150 to improve your prospects." Uriah Heep (From David Copperfield, Chaps. XV, XVI) When the pony-chaise stopped at the door, and my eyes were intent upon the house, I saw a cadaverous face appear at a small window on the ground floor (in a little round tower that formed one side of the house), and quickly disappear. The low arched door then opened, and the face came out. 5 It was quite as cadaverous as it had looked in the window, though in the grain of it there was that tinge of red which is sometimes to be observed in the skins of red-haired people. It belonged to a red-haired person a youth of fifteen, as I take it now, but looking much older whose hair was 10 cropped as close as the closest stubble; who had hardly any eyebrows, and no eye-lashes, and eyes of a red-brown, so unsheltered and unshaded, that I remember wondering how he went to sleep. He was high-shouldered and bony : dressed in decent black, with a white wisp of a neckcloth : 15 buttoned up to the throat; and had a long, lank, skeleton hand, which particularly attracted my attention, as he stood at the pony's head, rubbing his chin with it, and looking up at us in the chaise. "Is Mr. Wickfield at home, Uriah Heep?" said my aunt. 20 "Mr. Wickfield's at home, ma'am," said Uriah Heep, 352 ENGLISH LITERATURE "if you'll please to walk in there:" pointing with his long hand to the room he meant. We got out ; and leaving him to hold the pony, went into a 25 long low parlour looking towards the street, from the window of which I caught a glimpse, as I went in, of Uriah Heep breathing into the pony's nostrils, and immediately covering them with his hand, as if he were putting some spell upon him. As I came back, I saw Uriah Heep shutting up the office ; 30 and, feeling friendly towards everybody, went in and spoke to him, and at parting, gave him my hand. But oh, what a clammy hand his was ! as ghostly to the touch as to the sight ! I rubbed mine afterwards, to warm it, and to rub his off. It was such an uncomfortable hand, that, when I went 35 to my room, it was still cold and wet upon my memory. Leaning out of window, and seeing one of the faces on the beam-ends looking at me sideways, I fancied it was Uriah Heep got up there somehow, and shut him out in a hurry. Seeing a light in the little round office, and immediately 40 feeling myself attracted towards Uriah Heep, who had a sort of fascination for me, I went in there instead. I found Uriah reading a great fat book, with such demonstrative attention, that his lank forefinger followed up every line as he read, and made clammy tracks along the page (or so I 45 fully believed) like a snail. "You are working late to-night, Uriah," says I. "Yes, Master Copperfield," says Uriah. As I was getting on the stool opposite, to talk to him more conveniently, I observed that he had not such a thing 50 as a smile about him, and that he could only widen his mouth and make two hard creases down his cheeks, one on each side, to stand for one. CHARLES DICKENS 353 "I am not doing office-work, Master Copperfield," said Uriah. "What work, then?" I asked. 55 "I am improving my legal knowledge, Master Copper- field," said Uriah. " I am going through Tidd's Practice. Oh, what a writer Mr. Tidd is, Master Copperfield !" My stool was such a tower of observation, that as I watched him reading on again, after this rapturous exclama- 60 tion, and following up the lines with his forefinger, I observed that his nostrils, which were thin and pointed, with sharp dints in them, had a singular and most uncomfortable way of expanding and contracting themselves ; that they seemed to twinkle instead of his eyes, which hardly ever twinkled at all. 65 "I suppose you are quite a great lawyer?" I said, after looking at him for some time. "Me, Master Copperfield?" said Uriah. "Oh, no! I'm a very umble person." It was no fancy of mine about his hands, I observed ; 70 for he frequently ground the palms against each other as if to squeeze them dry and warm, besides often wiping them, in a stealthy way, on his pocket-handkerchief. "I am well aware that I am the umblest person going," said Uriah Heep, modestly ; " let the other be where he may. 75 My mother is likewise a very umble person. We live in a numble abode, Master Copperfield, but have much to be thankful for. My father's former calling was umble. He was a sexton." "What is he now?" I asked. 80 "He is a partaker of glory at present, Master Copper- field," said Uriah Heep. "But we have much to be thank- ful for. How much have I to be thankful for in living with Mr. Wickfield!" I asked Uriah if he had been with Mr. Wickfield long ? 85 " I have been with him going on four year, Master Copper- 354 ENGLISH LITERATURE field," said Uriah : shutting up his book, after carefully marking the place where he had left off. "Since a year after my father's death. How much have I to be thankful 90 for, in that ! How much have I to be thankful for, in Mr. Wickfield's kind intention to give me my articles, which would otherwise not lay within the umble means of mother and self!" "Then, when your articled time is over, you'll be a regular 95 lawyer, I suppose?" said I. "With the blessing of Providence, Master Copperfield," returned Uriah. "Perhaps you'llbe a partner in Mr. Wickfield's business, one of these days," I said, to make myself agreeable; "and 100 it will be Wickfield and Keep, or Keep late Wickfield." "Oh, no, Master Copperfield," returned Uriah, shaking his head, "I am much too umble for that!" He certainly did look uncommonly like the carved face on the beam outside my window, as he sat, in his humility, 105 eyeing me sideways, with his mouth widened, and the creases in his cheeks. "Mr. Wickfield is a most excellent man, Master Copper- field," said Uriah. "If you have known him long, you know it, I am sure, much better than I can inform you." 110 I replied that I was certain he was; but that I had not known him long myself, though he was a friend of my aunt's. "Oh, indeed, Master Copperfield," said Uriah. "Your aunt is a sweet lady, Master Copperfield ! " He had a way of writhing when he wanted to express 115 enthusiasm, which was very ugly; and which diverted my attention from the compliment he had paid my relation, to the snaky twistings of his throat and body. "A sweet lady, Master Copperfield!" said Uriah Keep. " She has a great admiration for Miss Agnes, Master Copper- 120 field, I believe?" CHARLES DICKENS 355 I said "Yes," boldly; not that I knew anything about it, Heaven forgive me! "I hope you have, too, Master Copperfield," said Uriah. "But I am sure you must have." "Everybody must have," I returned. 125 "Oh, thank you, Master Copperfield," said Uriah Heep, " for that remark ! It is so true ! Umble as I am, I know it is so true ! Oh, thank you, Master Copperfield !" He writhed himself quite off his stool in the excitement of his feelings, and, being off, began to make arrangements 130 for going home. "Mother will be expecting me," he said, referring to a pale, inexpressive-faced watch in his pocket, "and getting uneasy ; for though we are very umble, Master Copperfield, we are much attached to one another. If you would come 135 and see us, any afternoon, and take a cup of tea at our lowly dwelling, mother would be as proud of your company as I should be." I said I should be glad to come. " Thank you, Master Copperfield," returned Uriah, put- 140 ting his book away upon the shelf. " I suppose you stop here, some time, Master Copperfield?" I said I was going to be brought up there, I believed, as long as I remained at school. "Oh, indeed!" exclaimed Uriah. "I should think you 145 would come into the business at last, Master Copperfield!" I protested that I had no views of that sort, and that no such scheme was entertained in my behalf by anybody ; but Uriah insisted on blandly replying to all my assurances, " Oh, yes, Master Copperfield, I should think you would, 150 indeed!" and, "Oh, indeed, Master Copperfield, I should think you would, certainly!" over and over again. Being, at last, ready to leave the office for the night, he asked me if it would suit my convenience to have the light put out ; 356 ENGLISH LITERATURE 155 and on my answering "Yes," instantly extinguished it. After shaking hands with me his hand felt like a fish, in the dark he opened the door into the street a very little, and crept out, and shut it, leaving me to grope my way back into the house : which cost me some trouble and a fall over 160 his stool. This was the proximate cause, I suppose, of my dreaming about him, for what appeared to me to be half the night. GEORGE ELIOT Maggie Behaves Worse than she Expected (From The Mill on the Floss, Book I, Chap. X) The startling object which thus made an epoch for uncle Pullet was no other than little Lucy, with one side of her person, from her small foot to her bonnet-crown, wet and discoloured with mud, holding out two tiny blackened 5 hands, and making a very piteous face. To account for this unprecedented apparition in aunt Pullet's parlour, we must return to the moment when the three children went to play out of doors, and the small demons who had taken possession of Maggie's soul at an early period of the day 10 had returned in all the greater force after a temporary absence. All the disagreeable recollections of the morning were thick upon her, when Tom, whose displeasure towards her had been considerably refreshed by her foolish trick of causing him to upset his cowslip wine, said, " Here, Lucy, 15 you come along with me," and walked off to the area where the toads were, as if there were not Maggie in existence. Seeing this, Maggie lingered at a distance, looking like a small Medusa with her snakes cropped. Lucy was naturally pleased that cousin Tom was so good to her, and it was very 20 amusing to see him tickling a fat toad with a piece of string GEORGE ELIOT 357 y when the toad was safe down the area, with an iron grating over him. Still Lucy wished Maggie to enjoy the spectacle also, especially as she would doubtless find a name for the toad; and say what had been his past history; for Lucy had a delighted semi-belief in Maggie's stories about the 25 live things they came upon by accident how Mrs. Earwig had a wash at home, and one of her children had fallen into the hot copper, for which reason she was running so fast to fetch the doctor. Tom had a profound contempt for this nonsense of Maggie's, smashing the earwig at once 30 as a superfluous yet easy means of proving the entire un- reality of such a story ; but Lucy, for the life of her, could not help fancying there was something in it, and at all events thought it was very pretty make-believe. So now the de- sire to know the history of a very portly toad, added to her 35 habitual affectionateness, made her run back to Maggie and say, " Oh, there is such a big, funny toad, Maggie ! Do come and see." Maggie said nothing, but turned away from her with a deeper frown. As long as Tom seemed to prefer Lucy to 40 her, Lucy made part of his unkindness. Maggie would have thought a little while ago that she could never be cross with pretty little Lucy, any more than she could be cruel to a little white mouse ; but then, Tom had always been quite indifferent to Lucy before, and it had been left to Maggie 45 to pet and make much of her. As it was, she was actually beginning to think that she should like to make Lucy cry, by slapping or pinching her, especially as it might vex Tom, whom it was of no use to slap, even if she dared, because he didn't mind it. And if Lucy hadn't been there, Maggie 50 was sure he would have got friends with her sooner. Tickling a fat toad who is not highly sensitive is an amuse- ment that it is possible to exhaust, and Tom by and by began to look round for some other mode of passing the time. 358 ENGLISH LITERATURE 55 But in so prim a garden, where they were not to go off the paved walks, there was not a great choice of sport. The only great pleasure such a restriction allowed was the pleasure of breaking it, and Tom began to meditate an insurrectionary visit to the pond, about a field's length beyond the garden. 60 "I say, Lucy," he began, nodding his head up and down with great significance, as he coiled up his string again, "what do you think I mean to do?" "What, Tom?" said Lucy, with curiosity. "I mean to go to the pond, and look at the pike. You 65 may go with me if you like, " said the young sultan. " Oh, Tom, dare you ? " said Lucy. " Aunt said we mustn't go out of the garden." "Oh, I shall go out at the other end of the garden," said Tom. "Nobody 'ull see us. Besides, I don't care if they 70 do I'll run off home." "But I couldn't run," said Lucy, who had never before been exposed to such severe temptation. "Oh, never mind they won't be cross with you" said Tom. "You say I took you." 75 Tom walked along, and Lucy trotted by his side, timidly enjoying the rare treat of doing something naughty excited also by the mention of that celebrity, the pike, about which she was quite uncertain whether it was a fish or a fowl. Maggie saw them leaving the garden, and could not resist 80 the impulse to follow. Anger and jealousy can no more bear to lose sight of their objects than love, and that Tom and Lucy should do or see anything of which she was igno- rant would have been an intolerable idea to Maggie. So she kept a few yards behind them, unobserved by Tom, 85 who was presently absorbed in watching for the pike a highly interesting monster; he was said to be so very old, so very large, and to have such a remarkable appetite. The pike, like other celebrities, did not show when he was watched GEORGE ELIOT 359 for, but Tom caught sight of something in rapid movement in the water, which attracted him to another spot on the 90 brink of the pond. "Here, Lucy!" he said in a loud whisper, "come here! take care ! keep on the grass don't step where the cows have been ! " he added, pointing to a peninsula of dry grass, with trodden mud on each side of it ; for Tom's contempt- 95 uous conception of a girl included the attribute of being unfit to walk in dirty places. Lucy came carefully as she was bidden, and bent down to look at what seemed a golden arrow-head darting through the water. It was a water-snake, Tom told her, and Lucy 100 at last could see the serpentine wave of its body, very much wondering that a snake could swim. Maggie had drawn nearer and nearer she must see it too, though it was bitter to her like everything else, since Tom did not care about her seeing it. At last, she was close by Lucy, and Tom, 105 who had been aware of her approach, but would not notice it till he was obliged, turned round and said "Now, get away, Maggie. There's no room for you on the grass here. Nobody asked you to come." There were passions at war in Maggie at that moment no to have made a tragedy, if tragedies were made by passion only, but the essential n /ne'yetfo? which was present in the passion was wanting to the action ; the utmost Maggie could do, with a fierce thrust of her small brown arm, was to push poor little pink-and-white Lucy into the cow- trodden 115 mud. Then Tom could not restrain himself, and gave Maggie two smart slaps on the arm as he ran to pick up Lucy, who lay crying helplessly. Maggie retreated to the roots of a tree a few yards off, and looked on impenitently. Usually 120 her repentance came quickly after one rash deed, but now Tom and Lucy had made her so miserable, she was glad to 360 ENGLISH LITERATURE spoil their happiness glad to make everybody uncomfort- able. Why should she be sorry? Tom was very slow to 125 forgive her, however sorry she might have been. "I shall tell mother, you know, Miss Mag," said Tom, loudly and emphatically, as soon as Lucy was up and ready to walk away. It was not Tom's practice to "tell," but here justice clearly demanded that Maggie should be visited 130 with the utmost punishment : not that Tom had learnt to put his views in that abstract form ; he never mentioned "justice," and had no idea that his desire to punish might be called by that fine name. Lucy was too entirely absorbed by the evil that had befallen her the spoiling of her pretty 135 best clothes, and the discomfort of being wet and dirty to think much of the cause, which was entirely mysterious to her. She could never have guessed what she had done to make Maggie angry with her; but she felt that Maggie was very unkind and disagreeable, and made no magnani- I40mous entreaties to Tom that he would not "tell," only running along by his side and crying piteously, while Maggie sat on the roots of the tree and looked after them with her small Medusa face. "Sally," said Tom, when they reached the kitchen door, 145 and Sally looked at them in speechless amaze, with a piece of bread-and-butter in her mouth and a toasting-fork in her hand " Sally, tell mother it was Maggie pushed Lucy into the mud." "But Lors ha' massy, how did you get near such mud as 150 that?" said Sally, making a wry face, as she stooped down and examined the corpus delicti. Tom's imagination had not been rapid and capacious enough to include this question among the foreseen conse- quences, but it was no sooner put than he foresaw whither 155 it tended, and that Maggie would not be considered the only culprit in the case. He walked quietly away from the GEORGE ELIOT 361 kitchen door, leaving Sally to that pleasure of guessing which active minds notoriously prefer to ready-made knowledge. Sally, as you are aware, lost no time in presenting Lucy 160 at the parlour door, for to have so dirty an object introduced into the house at Garum Firs was too great a weight to be sus- tained by a single mind. "Goodness gracious!" aunt Pullet exclaimed, after pre- luding by an inarticulate scream ; " keep her at the door, 165 Sally ! Don't bring her off the oilcloth, whatever you do." "Why she's tumbled into some nasty mud," said Mrs. Tulliver, going up to Lucy to examine into the amount of damage to clothes for which she felt herself responsible to her sister Deane. 170 "If you please, 'um, it was Miss Maggie as pushed her in," said Sally ; " Master Tom's been and said so, and they must ha' been to the pond, for it's only there they could ha' got into such dirt." " There it is, Bessy ; it's what I've been telling you," 175 said Mrs. Pullet, in a tone of prophetic sadness; "it's your children there's no knowing what they'll come to." Mrs. Tulliver was mute, feeling herself a truly wretched mother. As usual, the thought pressed upon her that people would think that she had done something wicked to deserve 180 her maternal troubles, while Mrs. Pullet began to give elaborate directions to Sally how to guard the premises from serious injury in the course of removing the dirt. Mean- time tea was to be brought in by the cook, and the two naughty children were to have theirs in an ignominous 185 manner in the kitchen. Mrs. Tulliver went out to speak to these naughty children, supposing them to be close at hand ; but it was not until after some search that she found Tom leaning with rather a hardened careless air against the white paling of the poultry-yard, and lowering his piece of 190 362 ENGLISH LITERATURE string on the other side as a means of exasperating the turkey-cock. "Tom, you naughty boy, where's your sister?" said Mrs. Tulliver in a distressed voice. 195 "I don't know," said Tom; his eagerness for justice on Maggie had diminished since he had seen clearly that it could hardly be brought about without the injustice of some blame on his own conduct. "Why, where did you leave her?" said his mother, looking 200 round. "Sitting under the tree, against the pond," said Tom, apparently indifferent to everything but the string and the turkey-cock. "Then go and fetch her in this minute, you naughty boy. 205 And how could you think o' going to the pond, and taking your sister where there was dirt? You know she'll do mischief, if there's mischief to be done." It was Mrs. Tulliver's way, if she blamed Tom, to refer his misdemeanour, somehow or other, to Maggie. 210 The idea of Maggie sitting alone by the pond roused an habitual fear in Mrs. Tulliver's mind, and she mounted the horse-block to satisfy herself by a sight of that fatal child, while Tom walked not very quickly on his way towards her. 215 "They're such children for the water, mine are," she said aloud, without reflecting that there was no one to hear her ; "they'll be brought in dead and drownded some day. I wish that river was far enough." But when she not only failed to discern Maggie, but 220 presently saw Tom returning from the pool alone, this hovering fear entered and took .complete possession of her, and she hurried to meet him. "Maggie's nowhere about the pond, mother," said Tom; "she's gone away." WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 363 You may conceive the terrified search for Maggie, and the 225 difficulty of convincing her mother that she was not in the pond. Mrs. Pullet observed that the child might come to a worse end if she lived there was no knowing ; and Mr. Pullet, confused and overwhelmed by this revolutionary aspect of things the tea deferred and the/poultry alarmed 230 by the unusual running to and fro took up his spud as an instrument of search, and reached down a key to un- lock the goose-pen, as a likely place for Maggie to lie con- cealed in. Tom, after a while, started the idea that Maggie was gone 235 home (without thinking it necessary to state that it was what he should have done himself under the circumstances), and the suggestion was seized as a comfort by his mother. "Sister, for goodness' sake, let 'em put the horse in the carriage and take me home we shall perhaps find her on 240 the road. Lucy can't walk in her dirty clothes," she said, looking at that innocent victim, who was wrapped up in a shawl, and sitting with naked feet on the sofa. Aunt Pullet was quite willing to take the shortest means of restoring her premises to order and quiet, and it was not 245 long before Mrs. Tulliver was in the chaise, looking anxiously at the most distant point before her. What the father would say if Maggie was lost? was a question that pre- dominated over every other. WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY Mrs. Crawley, the Colonel, and Little Rawdy (From Vanity Fair, Chap. XXXVII) About the little Rawdon, if nothing has been said all this while, it is because he is hidden upstairs in a garret somewhere or has crawled below into the kitchen for com- 364 ENGLISH LITERATURE panionship. His mother scarcely ever took notice of him. 5 He passed the days with his French bonne as long as that domestic remained in Mr. Crawley's family, and when the Frenchwoman went away, the little fellow, howling in the loneliness of the night, had compassion taken on him by the housemaid, who took him out of his solitary nursery 10 into her bed in the garret hard by, and comforted him. Rebecca, my Lord Steyne, and one or two more were in the drawing-room taking tea after the Opera, when this shouting was heard overhead. "It's my cherub crying for his nurse," she said. She did not offer to move to go 15 and see the child. "Don't agitate your feelings by going to look for him," said Lord Steyne, sardonically. "Bah!" replied the other, with a sort of blush, "he'll cry himself to sleep ;" and they fell to talking about the Opera. Rawdon had stolen off though, to look after his son and 20 heir; and came back to the company when he found that honest Dolly was consoling the child. The Colonel's dress- ing-room was in those upper regions. He used to see the boy there in private. They had interviews together every morning when he shaved ; Rawdon minor sitting on a box 25 by his father's side, and watching the operation with never- ceasing pleasure. He and the sire were great friends. The father would bring him sweetmeats from the dessert, and hide them in a certain old epaulet box, where the child went to see them, and laughed with joy on discovering the treasure ; 30 laughed, but not too loud ; for mamma was below asleep and must not be disturbed. She did not go to rest till very late, and seldom rose till after noon. Rawdon bought the boy plenty of picture-books, and crammed his nursery with toys. Its walls were covered 35 with pictures pasted up by the father's own hand, and purchased by him for ready-money. When he was off duty with Mrs. Rawdon in the Park, he would sit up here, WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 365 passing hours with the boy; who rode on his chest, who pulled his great mustachios as if they were driving-reins, and spent days with him in indefatigable gambols. The 40 room was a low room, and once, when the child was not five years old, his father, who was tossing him wildly up in his arms, hit the poor little chap's skull so violently against the ceiling that he almost dropped the child, so terrified was he at the disaster. Rawdon minor had made up his 45 face for a tremendous howl the severity of the blow indeed authorised that indulgence ; but just as he was going to begin, the father interposed. "For God's sake, Rawdy, don't wake mamma," he cried. And the child looking in a very hard and piteous way at 50 his father, bit his lips, clenched his hands, and didn't cry a bit. Rawdon told that story at the clubs, at the mess, to everybody in town. "By Gad, sir," he explained to the public in general, "what a good plucked one that boy of mine is what a trump he is ! I half sent his head through the 55 ceiling, by Gad, and he wouldn't cry for fear of disturbing his mother." Sometimes once or twice in a week that lady visited the upper regions in which the child lived. She came like a vivified figure out of the Magasin des Modes blandly 60 smiling in the most beautiful new clothes and little gloves and boots. Wonderful scarfs, laces, and jewels glittered about her. She had always a new bonnet on, and flowers bloomed perpetually in it ; or else magnificent curling ostrich feathers, soft and snowy as camellias. She nodded twice 65 or thrice patronisingly to the little boy, who looked up from his dinner or from the pictures of soldiers he was painting. When she left the room, an odour of rose, or some other magical fragrance, lingered about the nursery. She was an unearthly being in his eyes, superior to his father to 70 all the world : to be worshipped and admired at a distance. 366 ENGLISH LITERATURE To drive with that lady in the carriage was an awful rite; he sat up in the back seat, and did not dare to speak ; he gazed with all his eyes at the beautifully dressed princess 75 opposite to him. Gentlemen on splendid prancing horses came up, and smiled and talked with her. How her eyes beamed on all of them ! Her hand used to quiver and wave gracefully as they passed. When he went out with her he had his new red dress on. His old brown holland was good 80 enough when he stayed at home. Sometimes when she was away, and Dolly his maid was making the bed, he came into his mother's room. It was as the abode of a fairy to him a mystic chamber of splendour and delights. There in the wardrobe hung those wonderful robes pink and blue, 85 and many-tinted. There was the jewel-case, silver-clasped ; and the wondrous bronze hand on the dressing-table, glist- ening all over with a hundred rings. There was the cheval- glass, that miracle of art, in which he could just see his own wondering head, and the reflection of Dolly (queerty distorted 90 and as if up in the ceiling), plumping and patting the pil- lows of the bed. Oh, thou poor lonely little benighted boy ! Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children; and here was one who was worshipping a stone ! 95 Now Rawdon Crawley, rascal as the Colonel was, had certain manly tendencies of affection in his heart, and could love a child and a woman still. For Rawdon minor he had a great secret tenderness then, which did not escape Re- becca, though she did not talk about it to her husband. 100 It did not annoy her; she was too good-natured. It only increased her scorn for him. He felt somehow ashamed at this paternal softness, and hid it from his wife only indulging it when alone with the boy. He used to take him out of mornings, when they would 105 go to the stables together, and to the Park. Little Lord WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 367 Southdown, the best-natured of men, who would make you a present of the hat from his head, and whose main occupa- tion in life was to buy nicknacks that he might give them away afterwards, bought the little chap a pony not much bigger than a large rat, the donor said, and on this little black 110 Shetland pigmy young Rawdon's great father was pleased to mount the boy, and to walk by his side in the Park. It pleased him to see his old quarters, and his old fellow-guards- men at Knightsbridge : he had begun to think of his bach- elorhood with something like regret. The old troopers were 115 glad to recognize their ancient officer, and dandle the little Colonel. Colonel Crawley found dining at mess and with his brother-officers very pleasant. "Hang it, I ain't clever enough for her I know it. She won't miss me," he used to say ; and he was right, his wife did not miss him. 120 Rebecca was fond of her husband. She was always per- fectly good-humored and kind to him. She did not even show her scorn much for him; perhaps she liked him the better for being a fool. He was her upper servant and maitre d' hotel. He went on her errands ; obeyed her orders without 125 question ; drove in the carriage in the ring with her without repining; took her to the Opera-box; solaced himself at his club during the performance, and came punctually back to fetch her when due. He would have liked her to be a little fonder of the boy ; but even to that he reconciled 130 himself. "Hang it, you know, she's so clever," he said, "and I'm not literary and that, you know." For, as we have said before, it requires no great wisdom to be able to win at cards and billiards, and Rawdon made no pretensions to any other sort of skill. 135 368 ENGLISH LITERATURE Washington Irving (From Roundabout Papers : " Nil Nisi Bonum ") Almost the last words which Sir Walter spoke to Lock- hart, his biographer, were, "Be a good man, my dear!" and with the last flicker of breath on his dying lips, he sighed a farewell to his family, and passed away blessing them. 5 Two men, famous, admired, beloved, have just left us, the Goldsmith and the Gibbon of our time. 1 Ere a few weeks are over, many a critic's pen will be at work, reviewing their lives and passing judgment on their work. This is no review, or history, or criticism : only a word in testimony of respect 10 and regard from a man of letters, who owes to his own pro- fessional labour the honour of becoming acquainted with these two eminent literary men. One was the first ambassador whom the New World of Letters sent to the Old. He was born almost with the 15 republic ; the pater patriae had laid his hand on the child's head. He bore Washington's name; he came amongst us bringing the kindest sympathy, the most artless, smiling goodwill. His new country (which some people here might be disposed to regard rather superciliously) could send 20 us, as he showed in his own person, a gentleman, who, though himself born in no very high sphere, was most fin- ished, polished, easy, witty, quiet; and, socially, the equal of the most refined Europeans. If Irving's welcome in England was a kind one, was it not also gratefully re- 25 membered ? If he ate our salt, did he not pay us with a thankful heart? Who can calculate the amount of friend- liness and good feeling for our country which this writer's generous and untiring regard for us disseminated in his own ? 1 Washington Irving died November 28, 1859 ; Lord MacauJay died December 28, 1859. [Thackeray's note.] WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 369 His books are read by millions 1 of his countrymen, whom he has taught to love England, and why to love her. It would 30 have been easy to speak otherwise than he did ; to inflame national rancours, which, at the time that he first became known as a public writer, war had just .renewed; to cry down the old civilization at the expense of the new ; to point out our faults, arrogance, short-comings, and give the re- 35 public to infer how much she w r as the parent state's superior. There are writers enough in the United States, honest and otherwise, who preach that kind of doctrine. But the good Irving, the peaceful, the friendly, had no place for bitterness in his heart, and no scheme but kindness. Received in 40 England with extraordinary tenderness and friendship (Scott, Southey, Byron, a hundred others have borne witness to their liking for him), he was a messenger of goodwill -and peace between his country and ours. " See, friends ! " he seems to say, " these English are not so wicked, rapacious, 45 callous, proud, as you have been taught to believe them. I went amongst them a humble man ; won my way by my pen; and, when known, found every hand held out to me with kindliness and welcome. Scott is a great man, you acknowledge. Did not Scott's King of England give a gold 50 medal to him, and another to me, your countryman, and a stranger?" Tradition in the United States still fondly retains the history of the feasts and rejoicings which awaited Irving on his return to his native country from Europe. He 55 had a national welcome ; he stammered in his speeches, hid himself in confusion, and the people loved him all the better. He had worthily represented America in Europe. In that young community a man who brings home with him abundant European testimonials is still treated with re- 60 1 See his Life in the most remarkable Dictionary of Authors, published lately at Philadelphia, by Mr. Allibone. [Thackeray's note.] 370 ENGLISH LITERATURE spect (I have found American writers, of wide-world repu- tation, strangely solicitous about the opinion of quite obscure British critics, and elated or depressed by their judgments) ; and Irving went home medalled by the King, diplomatized 65 by the University, crowned and honoured and admired. He had not in any way intrigued for his honours, he had fairly won them; and, in Irving's instance, as in others, the old country was glad and eager to pay them. In America the love and regard for Irving was a national 70 sentiment. Party wars are perpetually raging there, and are carried on by the press with a rancour and fierceness against individuals which exceed British, almost Irish, virulence.* It seemed to me, during a year's travel in the country, as if no one ever aimed a blow at Irving. All men 75 held their hands from that harmless friendly peacemaker. I had the good fortune to see him at New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, 1 and remarked how in every place he was honoured and welcome. Every large city has its "Irving House." The country takes pride in the 80 fame of its men of letters. The gate of his own charming little domain on the beautiful Hudson River was for ever swinging before visitors who came to him. He shut out no one. 2 I had seen many pictures of his house, and read 1 At Washington, Mr. Irving came to a lecture given by the writer, which Mr. Fillmore and General Pierce, the President and President Elect, were also kind enough to attend together. "Two Kings of Brent- ford smelling at one rose," says Irving, looking up with his good- humoured smile. [Thackeray's note.] 2 Mr. Irving described to me, with that humour and good humour which he always kept, how, amorist other visitors, a member of the British press who had carried his distinguished pen to America (where he employed it in vilifying his own country) came to Sunnyside, in- troduced himself to Irving, partook of his wine and luncheon, and in two days described Mr. Irving, his house, his nieces, his meal, and his manner of dozing afterwards, in a New York paper. On another occasion, Irving said, laughing, "Two persons came to me, and one held me in conversation whilst the other miscreant took my portrait!" [Thackeray's note.] WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 371 descriptions of it, in both of which it was treated with a not unusual American exaggeration. It was a pretty little cabin 85 of a place ; the gentleman of the press who took notes of the place, whilst his kind old host was sleeping, might have vis- ited the whole house in a couple of minutes. And how came it that this house was so small, when Mr. Irving's books were sold by hundreds of thousands, nay, 90 millions, when his profits were known to be large, and the habits of life of the good old bachelor were notoriously modest and simple ? He had loved once in his life. The lady he loved died, and he, whom all the world loved, never sought to replace her. I can't say how much the thought of that 95 fidelity has touched me. Does not the very cheerfulness of his after life add to the pathos of that untold story? To grieve always was not in his nature ; or, when he had his sorrow, to bring all the world in to condole with him and bemoan it. Deep and quiet he lays the love of his heart, 100 and buries it; and grass and flowers grow over the scarred ground in due time. Irving had such a small house and such narrow rooms, because there was a great number of people to occupy them. He could only afford to keep one old horse (which, lazy and 105 aged as it was, managed once or twice to run away with that careless old horseman). He could only afford to give plain sherry to that amiable British paragraph-monger from New York, who saw the patriarch asleep over his modest, blameless cup, and fetched the public into his private cham-no ber to look at him. Irving could only live very modestly, because the wifeless, childless man had a number of children to whom he was as a father. He had as many as nine nieces, I am told I saw two of these ladies at his house with all of whom the dear old man had shared the produce of his 115 labour and genius. "Be a good man, my dear." One can't but think of these 372 ENGLISH LITERATURE last words of the veteran Chief of Letters, who had tasted and tested the value of worldly success, admiration, pros- 120 peri ty. Was Irving not good, and of his works, was not his life the best part ? In his family, gentle, generous, good- humoured, affectionate, self-denying : in society, a delight- ful example of complete gentlemanhood ; quite unspoiled by prosperity ; never obsequious to the great (or, worse 125 still, to the base and mean, as some public men are forced to be in his and other countries) ; eager to acknowledge every contemporary's merit; always kind and affable to the young members of his calling; in his professional bar- gains and mercantile dealings delicately honest and grateful, 130 one of the most charming masters of our lighter language ; the constant friend to us and our nation ; to men of letters doubly dear, not for his wit and genius merely, but as an exemplar of goodness, probity, and pure life ; I don't know what sort of testimonial will be raised to him in his own 135 country, where generous and enthusiastic acknowledgment of American merit is never wanting ; but Irving was in our service as well as theirs ; and as they have placed a stone at Greenwich yonder in memory of that gallant young Bellot, who shared the perils and fate of some of our Arctic seamen, 140 1 would like to hear of some memorial raised by English writers and friends of letters in affectionate remembrance of the dear and good Washington Irving. THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY The Method of Scientific Investigation (From Darwiniana: " The Causes of the Phenomena of Organic Na- ture," HI) The method of scientific investigation is nothing but the expression of the necessary mode of working of the human mind. It is simply the mode at which all phenomena are THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY 373 reasoned about, rendered precise and exact. There is no more difference, but there is just the same kind of difference, 5 between the mental operations of a man of science and those of an ordinary person, as there is between the operations and methods of a baker or of a butcher weighing out his goods in common scales, and the operations of a chemist in performing a difficult and complex analysis by means of 10 his balance and finely graduated weights. It is not that the action of the scales in the one case, and the balance in the other, differ in the principles of their construction or manner of working ; but the beam of one is set on an infinitely finer axis than the other, and of course turns by the addition 15 of a much smaller weight. You will understand this better, perhaps, if I give you some familiar example. You have all heard it repeated, I dare say, that men of science work by means of induction and deduction, and that by the help of these operations, they, 20 in a sort of sense, wring from Nature certain other things, which are called natural laws, and causes, and that out of these, by some cunning skill of their own, they build up hypotheses and theories. And it is imagined by many, that the operations of the common mind can be by no means 25 compared with these processes, and that they have to be acquired by a sort of special apprenticeship to the craft. To hear all these large words, you would think that the mind of a man of science must be constituted differently from that of his fellow men ; but if you will not be frightened by terms, 30 you will discover that you are quite wrong, and that all these terrible apparatus are being used by yourselves every day and every hour of your lives. There is a well-known incident in one of Moliere's plays, where the author makes the hero express unbounded delight 35 on being told that he had been talking prose during the whole of his life. In the same way, I trust, that you will take com- 374 ENGLISH LITERATURE fort, and be delighted with yourselves, on the discovery that you have been acting on the principles of inductive 40 and deductive philosophy during the same period. Prob- ably there is not one here who has not in the course of the day had occasion to set in motion a complex train of reason- ing, of the very same kind, though differing of course in degree, as that which a scientific man goes through in tracing 45 the causes of natural phenomena. A very trivial circumstance will serve to exemplify this. Suppose you go into a fruiterer's shop, wanting an apple, you take up one, and, on biting it, you find it is sour ; you look at it, and see that it is hard and green. You take 50 up another one, and that too is hard, green, and sour. The shopman offers you a third ; but, before biting it, you ex- amine it, and find that it is hard and green, and you im- mediately say that you will not have it, as it must be sour, like those that you have already tried. 55 Nothing can be more simple than that, you think; but if you will take the trouble to analyse and trace out into its logical elements what has been done by the mind, you will be greatly surprised. In the first place you have performed the operation of induction. You found that, in two ex- GOperiences, hardness and greenness in apples went together with sourness. It was so in the first case, and it was con- firmed by the second. True, it is a very small basis, but still it is enough to make an induction from ; you generalize the facts, and you expect to find sourness in apples where 65 you get hardness and greenness. You found upon that a general law that all hard and green apples are sour ; and that, so far as it goes, is a perfect induction. Well, having got your natural law in this way, when you are offered another apple which you find is hard and green, you say, "All hard 70 and green apples are sour ; this apple is hard and green, therefore this apple is sour." That train of reasoning is THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY 375 what logicians call a syllogism, and has all its various parts and terms, its major premiss, its minor premiss, and its conclusion. And, by the help of further reasoning, which if drawn out, would have to be exhibited in two or three 75 other syllogisms, you arrive at your final determination, "I will not have that apple." So that, you see, you have, in the first place, established a law by induction, and upon that you have founded a deduction, and reasoned out the special particular case. 80 Well now, suppose, having got your conclusion of the law, that at some time afterwards, you are discussing the qualities of apples with a friend : you will say to him, " It is a very curious thing, but I find that all hard and green apples are sour ! " Your friend says to you, " But how do you know 85 that?" You at once reply, "Oh, because I have tried them over and over again, and have always found them to be so." Well, if we were talking science instead of common sense, we should call that an experimental verification. And, if still opposed, you go further, and say, " I have heard from the 90 people in Somersetshire and Devonshire, where a large number of apples are grown, that they have observed the same thing. It is also found to be the case in Normandy, and in North America. In short, I find it to be the universal experience of mankind wherever attention has been directed to the sub- 95 ject." Whereupon, your friend, unless he is a very un- reasonable man, agrees with you, and is convinced that you are quite right in the conclusion you have drawn. He believes, although perhaps he does not know he believes it, that the more extensive verifications are, that the 100 more frequently experiments have been made, and results of the same kind arrived at, that the more varied the conditions under which the same results are attained, the more certain is the ultimate conclusion, and he disputes the question no further. He sees that the experiment has 105 376 ENGLISH LITERATURE been tried under all sorts of conditions, as to time, place, and people, with the same result; and he says with you, therefore, that the law you have laid down must be a good one, and he must believe it. 110 In science we do the same thing; the philosopher exercises precisely the same faculties, though in a much more delicate manner. In scientific inquiry it becomes a matter of duty to expose a supposed law to every possible kind of verification, and to take care, moreover, that this 115 is done intentionally, and not left to a mere accident, as in the case of the apples. And in science, as in common life, our confidence in a law is in exact proportion to the absence of variation in the result of our experimental verifications. For instance, if you let go your grasp of an article you may 120 have in your hand, it will immediately fall to the ground. That is a very common verification of one of the best estab- lished laws of nature that of gravitation. The method by which men of science establish the existence of that law is exactly the same as that by which we have established 125 the trivial proposition about the sourness of hard and green apples. But we believe it in such an extensive, thorough, and unhesitating manner because the universal experience of mankind verifies it, and we can verify it ourselves at any time ; and that is the strongest possible foundation on which 130 any natural law can rest. So much, then, by way of proof that the method of es- tablishing laws in science is exactly the same as that pursued in common life. Let us now turn to another matter (though really it is but another phase of the same question), and that 135 is, the method by which, from the relations of certain phe- nomena, we prove that some stand in the position of causes towards the others. I want to put the case clearly before you, and I will there- fore show you what I mean by another familiar example. THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY 377 I will suppose that one of you, on coming down in the morning 140 to the parlor of your house, finds that a tea-pot and some spoons which had been left in the room on the previous evening are gone, the window is open, and you observe the mark of a dirty hand on the window-frame, and perhaps, in addition to that, you notice the impress of a hob-nailed 145 shoe on the gravel outside. All these phenomena have struck your attention instantly, and before two seconds have passed you say, "Oh, somebody has broken open the window, entered the room, and run off with the spoons and the tea- pot!" That speech is out of your mouth in a moment. 150 And you will probably add, " I know there has ; I am quite sure of it ! " You mean to say exactly what you know ; but in reality you are giving expression to what is, in all essential particulars, an hypothesis. You do not know it at all ; it is nothing but an hypothesis rapidly framed in 155 your own mind. And it is an hypothesis founded on a long train of inductions and deductions. What are those inductions and deductions, and how have you got at this hypothesis? You have observed in the first place, that the window is open, but by a train of reason- IGO ing involving many inductions and deductions, you have probably arrived long before at the general law and a very good one it is that windows do not open of them- selves ; and you therefore conclude that something has opened the window. A second general law that you have arrived 165 at in the same way is, .that tea-pots and spoons do not go out of a window spontaneously, and you are satisfied that, as they are not now where you left them, they have been removed. In the third place, you look at the marks on the window-sill, and the shoe-marks outside, and you say that 170 in all previous experience the former kind of a mark has never been produced by anything else but the hand of a human being ; and the same experience shows that no other 378 ENGLISH LITERATURE animal but man at present wears shoes with hob-nails in 175 them such as would produce the marks in the gravel. I do not know, even if we could discover any of those " missing links" that are talked about, that they would help us to any other conclusion ! At any rate the law which states our present experience is strong enough for my present 180 purpose. You next reach the conclusion that, as these kind of marks have not been left by any other animal than man, or are liable to be formed in any other way than a man's hand and shoe, the marks in question have been formed 185 by a man in that way. You have, further, a general law, founded on observation and experience, and that, too, is, I am sorry to say, a very universal and unimpeachable one, that some men are thieves ; and you assume at once from all these premisses and that is what constitutes 190 your hypothesis that the man who made the marks outside and on the window-sill, opened the window, got into the room, and stole your tea-pot and spoons. You have now arrived at a vera causa; you have assumed a cause which, it is plain, is competent to produce all the phe- I95nomena you have observed. You can explain all these phenomena only by the hypothesis of a thief. But that is a hypothetical conclusion, of the justice of which you have no absolute proof at all ; it is only rendered highly probable by a series of inductive and deductive reasonings. 200 I suppose your first action, assuming that you are a man of ordinary common sense, and that you have established this hypothesis to your own satisfaction, will very likely be to go off for the police, and set them on the track of the burglar, with the view to the recovery of your property. 205 But just as you are starting with this object, some person comes in, and on learning what you are about, says, "My good friend, you are going on a great deal too fast. How THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY 379 do you know that the man who really made the marks took the spoons ? It might have been a monkey that took them, and the man may have merely looked in afterwards." 210 You would probably reply, "Well, that is all very well, but you see it is contrary to all experience of the way tea-pots and spoons are abstracted ; so that, at any rate, your hypoth- esis is less probable than mine." While you are talking the thing over in this way, another friend arrives, one of the 215 good kind of people that I was talking of a little while ago. And he might say, "Oh, my dear sir, you are certainly going on a great deal too fast. You are most presumptuous. You admit that all these occurrences took place when you were fast asleep, at a time when you could not possibly have 220 known anything about what was taking place. How do you know that the laws of Nature are not suspended during the night? It may be that there has been some kind of supernatural interference in this case." In point of fact, he declares that your hypothesis is one of which you cannot 225 at all demonstrate the truth, and that you are by no means sure that the laws of Nature are the same when you are asleep as when you are awake. Well, now, you cannot at the moment answer that kind of reasoning. You feel that your worthy friend has you 230 somewhat at a disadvantage. You will feel perfectly con- vinced in your own mind, however, that you are quite right, and you say to him, "My good friend, I can only be guided by the natural probabilities of the case, and if you will be kind enough to stand aside and permit me to pass, I will 235 go and fetch the police." Well, we will suppose that your journey is successful, and that by good luck you meet with a policeman; that eventually the burglar is found with your property on his person, and the marks correspond to his hand and to his boots. Probably any jury would consider 240 those facts a very good experimental verification of your 380 ENGLISH LITERATURE hypothesis, touching the cause of the abnormal phenomena observed in your parlor, and would act accordingly. Now, in this supposititious case, I have taken phenomena 245 of a very common kind, in order that you might see what are the different steps in an ordinary process of reasoning, if you will only take the trouble to analyse it carefully. All the operations I have described, you will see, are involved in the mind of any man of sense in leading him to a con- 250 elusion as to the course he should take in order to make good a robbery and punish the offender. I say that you are led, in that case to your conclusion by exactly the same train of reasoning as that which a man of science pursues when he is endeavouring to discover the origin and laws of 255 the most occult phenomena. The process is, and always must be, the same ; and precisely the same mode of reason- ing was employed by Newton and Laplace in their endeavours- to discover and define the causes of the movements of the heavenly bodies, as you, with your own common sense, 260 would employ to detect a burglar. The only difference is, that the nature of the inquiry being more abstruse, every step has to be most carefully watched, so that there may not be a single crack or flaw in your hypothesis. A flaw or crack in many of the hypotheses of daily life may be of 265 little or no moment as affecting the general correctness of the conclusions at which we may arrive ; but, in a scientific inquiry, a fallacy, great or small, is always of importance, and is sure to be in the long run constantly productive of mischievous if not fatal results. 270 Do not allow yourselves to be misled by the common notion that an hypothesis is untrustworthy simply because it is an hypothesis. It is often urged, in respect to some scien- tific conclusion, that, after all, it is only an hypothesis. But what more have we to guide us in nine-tenths of the 275 most important affairs of daily life than hypotheses, and THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY 381 often very ill-based ones? So that in science, where the evidence of an hypothesis is subjected to the most rigid examination, we may rightly pursue the same course. You may have hypotheses, and hypotheses. A man may say, if he likes, that the moon is made of green cheese : that is 280 an hypothesis. But another man, who has devoted a great deal of time and attention to the subject, and availed himself of the most powerful telescopes and the results of the obser- vations of others, declares that in his opinion it is probably composed of materials very similar to those of which our own 285 earth is made up : and that is also only an hypothesis. But I need not tell you that there is an enormous differ- ence in the value of the two hypotheses. That one which is based on sound scientific knowledge is sure to have a cor- responding value; and that which is a mere hasty random 290 guess is likely to have but little value. Every great step in our progress in discovering causes has been made in ex- actly the same way as that which I have detailed to you. A person observing the occurrence of certain facts and phenomena asks, naturally enough, what process, what 295 kind of operation known to occur in Nature applied to the particular case, will unravel and explain the mystery? Hence you have the scientific hypothesis; and its value will be proportionate to the care and completeness with which its basis had been tested and verified. It is in these 300 matters as in the commonest affairs of practical life : the guess of the fool will be folly, while the guess of the wise man will contain wisdom. In all cases, you see that the value of the result depends on the patience and faithfulness with which the investigator applies to his hypothesis every 305 possible kind of verification. 382 ENGLISH LITERATURE JOHN RUSKIN On Some Lines of "Lycidas" (From Sesame and Lilies) You can easily ascertain the meanings through which the English word has passed ; and those which in a good writer's work it must still bear. And now, merely for example's sake, I will, with your permission, read a few lines of a true book 5 with you, carefully ; and see what will come out of them. I will take a book perfectly known to you all ; no English words are more familiar to us, yet nothing perhaps has been less read with sincerity. I will take these few following lines of Lycidas. 10 "Last came, and last did go, The pilot of the Galilean lake ; Two massy keys he bore of metals twain (The golden opes, the iron shuts amain). He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake : 15 ' How well could I have spar'd for thee, young swain, Enow of such as for their bellies' sake Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold ! Of other care they little reckoning make, Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast, 20 And shove away the worthy bidden guest ; Blind mouths ! that scarce themselves know how to hold A sheep-hook, or have learn'd aught else, the least That to the faithful herdman's art belongs ! What recks it them ? What need they ? They are sped ; 25 And when they list, their lean and flashy songs Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw; The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed, But swoln with wind, and the rank mist they draw, Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread ; 30 Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw Daily devours apace, and nothing said.' " JOHN RUSKIN 383 Let us think over this passage, and examine its words. First, is it not singular to find Milton assigning to St. Peter, not only his full episcopal function, but the very types of it which Protestants usually refuse most passionately ? 35 His "mitred" locks! Milton was no Bishop-lover; how comes St. Peter to be "mitred?" "Two massy keys he bore." Is this, then, the power of the keys claimed by the Bishops of Rome, and is it acknowledged here by Milton only in a poetical licence, for the sake of its picturesqueness, 40 that he may get the gleam of the golden keys to help his effect? Do not think it. Great men do not play stage tricks with doctrines of life and death : only little men do that. Milton means what he says ; and means it with his might too is going to put the whole strength of his spirit 45 presently into the saying of it. For though not a lover of false bishops, he was a lover of true ones; and the Lake- pilot is here, in his thoughts, the type and head of true epi.- copal power. For Milton reads that text, " I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of Heaven" quite honestly. 50 Puritan though he be, he would not blot it out of the book because there have been bad bishops ; nay, in order to under- stand him, we must understand that verse first ; it will not do to eye it askance, or whisper it under our breath, as if it were a weapon of an adverse sect. It is a solemn, univer-55 sal assertion, deeply to be kept in mind by all sects. But perhaps we shall be better able to reason on it if we go on a little farther, and come back to it. For clearly, this marked insistence on the power of the true episcopate is to make us feel more weightily what is to be charged against the false 60 claimants of episcopate ; or generally, against false claimants of power and rank in the body of the clergy ; they who, " for their bellies' sake, creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold." Do not think Milton uses those three words to fill up his verse, as a loose writer would. He needs all the three ; 65 384 ENGLISH LITERATURE specially those three, and no more than those " creep," and "intrude," and "climb;" no other words would or could serve the turn, and no more could be added. For they exhaustively comprehend the three classes, correspondent to 70 the three characters, of men who dishonestly seek ecclesiasti- cal power. First, those who " creep " into the fold ; who do not care for office, nor name, but for secret influence, and do all things occultly and cunningly, consenting to any servility of office or conduct, so only that they may intimately discern, 75 and unawares direct, the minds of men. Then those who "intrude" (thrust, that is) themselves into the fold, who by natural insolence of heart, and stout eloquence of tongue, and fearlessly perseverant self-assertion, obtain hearing and authority with the common crowd. Lastly, those who 80 " climb," who, by labour and learning, both stout and sound, but selfishly exerted in the cause of their own ambition, gain high dignities and authorities, and become "lords over the heritage," though not "ensamples to the flock." Now go on : ' 85 "Of other care they little reckoning make, Than how to scramble at the shearer's feast. Blind mouths " I pause again, for this is a strange expression ; a broken metaphor, one might think, careless and unscholarly. 90 Not so : its very audacity and pithiness are intended to make us look close at the phrase and remember it. Those two monosyllables express the precisely accurate contraries of right character, in the two great offices of the Church those of bishop and pastor. 95 A Bishop means a person who sees. A Pastor means one who feeds. The most unbishoply character a man can have is therefore to be Blind. JOHN RUSKIN 385 The most unpastoral is, instead of feeding, to want to be fed, to be a Mouth. 100 Take the two reverses together, and you have "blind mouths." We may advisably follow out this idea a little. Nearly all the evils in the Church have arisen from bishops desiring power more than light. They want authority, not outlook. Whereas their real office is not to rule ; though it 105 may be vigorously to exhort and rebuke; it is the king's office to rule ; the bishop's office is to oversee the flock ; to number it, sheep by sheep ; to be ready always to give full account of it. Now it is clear he cannot give account of the souls, if he has not so much as numbered the bodies of his no flock. The first thing, therefore, that a bishop has to do is at least to put himself in a position in which, at any moment, he can obtain the history from childhood of every living soul in his diocese, and of its present state. Down in that back 115 street, Bill, and Nancy, knocking each other's teeth out ? Does the bishop know all about it? Has he his eye upon them? Has he had his eye upon them? Can he circum- stantially explain to us how Bill got into the habit of beating Nancy about the head ? If he cannot, he is no bishop 120 though he had a mitre as high as Salisbury steeple ; he is no bishop, he has sought to be at the helm instead of the masthead; he has no sight of things. "Nay," you say, it is not his duty to look after Bill in the back street. What ! the fat sheep that have full fleeces you think it is only those 125 he should look after, while (go back to your Milton) "the hungry sheep look up, and are not fed, besides what the grim wolf, with privy paw" (bishops knowing nothing about it) "daily devours apace, and nothing said?" " But that's not our idea of a bishop." Perhaps not ; but 130 it was St. Paul's ; and it was Milton's. They may be right, or we may be; but we must not think we are reading 386 ENGLISH LITERATURE either one or the other by putting our meaning into their words. 135 I go on. " But, swollen with wind, and the rank mist they draw." This is to meet the vulgar answer that " if the poor are not looked after in their bodies, they are in their souls; they have spiritual food." 140 And Milton says, "They have no such thing as spiritual food ; they are only swollen with wind." At first you may think that is a coarse type, and an obscure one. But again, it is a quite literally accurate one. Take up your Latin and Greek dictionaries, and find out the meaning of "spirit." 145 It is only a contraction of the Latin word "breath," and an indistinct translation of the Greek word for "wind." The same word is used in writing, "The wind bloweth where it listeth ; " and in writing, " So is every one that is born of the Spirit ;" born of the breath, that is; for it means the breath 150 of God, in soul and body. We have the true sense of it in our words "inspiration" and "expire." Now, there are two kinds of breath with which the flock may be filled; God's breath, and man's. The breath of God is health, and life, and peace to them, 155 as the air of heaven is to the flocks on the hills ; but man's breath the word which he calls spiritual, is disease and contagion to them, as the fog of the fen. They rot in- wardly with it ; they are puffed up by it, as a dead body by the vapours of its own decomposition. This is literally true 160 of all false religious teaching ; the first, and last, and f atalest sign of it is that "puffing up." Your converted children, who teach their parents ; your converted convicts, who teach honest men; your converted dunces, who, having lived in cretinous stupefaction half their lives, suddenly awaking 165 to the fact of there being a God, fancy themselves therefore JOHN RUSKIN 387 His peculiar people and messengers; your sectarians of every species, small and great, Catholic or Protestant, of high church or low, in so far as they think themselves exclusively in the right and others wrong ; and pre-eminently, in every sect, those who hold that men can be saved by thinking 170 rightly instead of doing rightly, by word instead of act, and wish instead of work : these are the true fog children clouds, these, without water; bodies, these, of putrescent vapour and skin, without blood or flesh : blown bag-pipes for the fiends to pipe with corrupt, and corrupting, 175 "Swollen with wind, and the rank mist they draw." Lastly, let us return to the lines respecting the power of the keys, for now we can understand them. Note the differ- ence between Milton and Dante in their interpretation of this power : for once, the latter is weaker in thought ; he sup- 180 poses both the keys to be of the gate of heaven; one is of gold, the other of silver : they are given by St. Peter to the sentinel angel ; and it is not easy to determine the meaning either of the substances of the three steps of the gate, or of the two keys. But Milton makes one, of gold, the key of 185 heaven ; the other, of iron, the key of the prison, in which the wicked teachers are to be bound who " have taken away the key of knowledge, yet entered not in themselves." We have seen that the duties of bishop and pastor are to see, and feed ; and, of all who do so, it is said, " He that 190 watereth, shall be watered also himself." But the reverse is truth also. He that watereth not, shall be withered himself, and he that seeth not, shall himself be shut out of sight, shut into the perpetual prison-house. And that prison opens here, as well as hereafter : he who is to be bound in heaven 195 must first be bound on earth. That command to the strong angels, of which the rock-apostle is the image, "Take him, and bind him hand and foot, and cast him out," issues, in its measure, against the teacher, for every help withheld, and for 388 ENGLISH LITERATURE 200 every truth refused, and for every falsehood enforced; so that he is more strictly fettered the more he fetters, and farther outcast, as he more and more misleads, till at last the bars of the iron cage close upon him, and as "the golden opes, the iron shuts amain." 205 We have got something out of the lines, I think, and much more is yet to be found in them ; but we have done enough by way of example of the kind of word-by-word examina- tion of your author which is rightly called "reading;" watching every accent and expression, and putting ourselves 210 always in the author's place, annihilating our own person- ality, and seeking to enter into his, so as to be able assuredly to say, "Thus Milton thought," not "Thus I thought, in mis-reading Milton." And by this process you will gradually come to attach less weight to your own "Thus I thought" at 215 other times. You will begin to perceive that what you thought was a matter of no serious importance ; that your thoughts on any subject are not perhaps the clearest and wisest that could be arrived at thereupon : in fact, that unless you are a very singular person, you cannot be said to 220 have any "thoughts" at all; that you have no materials for them, in any serious matter ; 1 no right to " think," but only to try to learn more of the facts. MATTHEW ARNOLD A Definition of Culture (From Culture and Anarchy : Chap. I, " Sweetness and Light ") The disparagers of culture make its motive curiosity; sometimes, indeed, they make its motive mere exclusiveness and vanity. The culture which is supposed to plume itself 1 Modern "Education" for the most part signifies giving people the faculty of thinking wrong on every conceivable subject of importance to them. [Ruskin's note.] MATTHEW ARNOLD 389 on a smattering of Greek and Latin is a culture which is begotten by nothing so intellectual as curiosity ; it is valued 5 either out of sheer vanity and ignorance OB else as an engine of social and class distinction, separating its holder, like a badge or title, from other people who have not got it. No serious man would call this culture, or attach any value to it, as culture, at all. To find the real ground for the very 10 different estimate which serious people will set upon culture, we must find some motive for culture in the terms of which may lie a real ambiguity; and such a motive the word curiosity gives us. I have before now pointed out that we English do not, 15 like the foreigners, use this word in a good sense as well as in a bad sense. With us the word is always used in a some- what disapproving sense. A liberal and intelligent eager- ness about the things of the mind may be meant by a foreigner when he speaks of curiosity, but with us the word always 20 conveys a certain notion of frivolous and unedifying activ- ity. In the Quarterly Review, some little time ago, was an estimate of the celebrated French critic, M. Sainte-Beuve, and a very inadequate estimate it in my judgment was. And its inadequacy consisted in this ; that in our English 25 way it left out of sight the double sense really involved in the word curiosity, thinking enough was said to stamp M. Sainte- Beuve with blame if it was said that he was impelled in his operations as a critic by curiosity, and omitting either to perceive that M. Sainte-Beuve himself, and many other 30 people with him, would consider that this was praiseworthy and not blameworthy, or to point out why it ought really to be accounted worthy of blame and not of praise. For as there is a curiosity about intellectual matters which is futile, and merely a disease, so there is certainly a curiosity, a 35 desire after the things of the mind simply for their own sakes and for the pleasure of seeing them as they are, which is, 390 ENGLISH LITERATURE in an intelligent being, natural and laudable. Nay, and the very desire to see things as they are implies a balance and 40 regulation of mind which is not often attained without fruit- ful effort, and which is the very opposite of the blind and diseased impulse of mind which is what we mean to blame when we blame curiosity. Montesquieu says : " The first motive which ought to impel us to study is the desire to 45 augment the excellence of our nature, and to render an intelligent being yet more intelligent." This is the true ground to assign for the genuine scientific passion, however manifested, and for culture, viewed simply as a fruit of this passion ; and it is a worthy ground, even though we let the 50 term curiosity stand to describe it. But there is of culture another view, in which not solely the scientific passion, the sheer desire to see things as they are, natural and proper in an intelligent being, appears as the ground of it. There is a view in which all the love of 55 our neighbour, the impulses towards action, help, and be- neficence, the desire for removing human error, clearing human confusion, and diminishing human misery, the noble aspiration to leave the world better and happier than we found it, motives eminently such as are called social, 60 come in as part of the grounds of culture, and the main and preeminent part. Culture is then properly described not as having its origin in curiosity, but as having its origin in the love of perfection ; it is a study of perfection . It moves by the force, not merely or primarily of the scientific passion 65 for pure knowledge, but also for the moral and social passion for doing good. As, in the first view of it, we took for its worthy motto Montesquieu's words : " To render an intel- ligent being yet more intelligent!" so, in the second view of it, there is no better motto which it can have than these 70 words of Bishop Wilson : " To make reason and the will of God prevail !" MATTHEW ARNOLD 391 Estimate of Emerson (From Discourses in America : " Emerson ") Forty years ago, when I was an undergraduate at Oxford, voices were in the air there which haunt my memory still. Happy the man who in that susceptible season of youth hears such voices ! they are a possession to him for ever. No such voices as those which we heard in our youth at 5 Oxford are sounding there now. Oxford has more criti- cism now, more knowledge, more light; but such voices as those of our youth it has no longer. The name of Cardi- nal Newman is a great name to the imagination still; his genius and his style are still things of power. But he has 10 adopted, for the doubts and difficulties which beset men's minds to-day, a solution which, to speak frankly, is impos- sible. Forty years ago he was in the very prime of life ; he was close at hand to us at Oxford ; he was preaching in St. Mary's pulpit every Sunday ; he seemed about to transform 15 and to renew what was for us the most national and natural institution in the world, the Church of England. Who could resist the charm of that spiritual apparition, gliding in the dim afternoon light through the aisles of St. Mary's, rising into the pulpit, and then, in the most entrancing of 20 voices, breaking the silence with words and thoughts which were a religious music, subtle, sweet, mournful ! I seem to hear him still. Or, if we followed him back to his seclu- sion at Littlemore, that dreary village by the London road, who could resist him there either, welcoming back to the 25 severe joys of church-fellowship, and of daily worship and prayer, the firstlings of a generation which had well-nigh forgotten them? But there were other voices sounding in our ear besides Newman's. There was the puissant voice of Carlyle ; then 30 fresh, comparatively sound, and reaching our hearts with 392 ENGLISH LITERATURE true, pathetic eloquence. A greater voice still, the great- est voice of the century, came to us in those youthful years through Carlyle : the voice of Goethe. The large, 35 liberal view of human life in Wilhelm Meister, how novel it was to the Englishman in those days ! and it was salutary, too, and educative for him, doubtless, as well as novel. And besides those voices, there came to us in that old Oxford time a voice also from this side of the Atlantic, 40 a clear and pure voice, which for my ear, at any rate, brought a strain as new, and moving, and unforgettable, as the strain of Newman, or Carlyle, or Goethe. Mr. Lowell has well described the apparition of Emerson to your young genera- tion here, in that distant time of which I arn speaking, and 45 of his workings upon them. He was your Newman, your man of soul and genius visible to you in the flesh, speaking to your bodily ears, a present object for your heart and imagination. That is surely the most potent of all influences ! nothing can come up to it. To us at Oxford Emerson was 50 but a voice speaking from three thousand miles away. But so well he spoke, that from that time forth Boston Bay and Concord were names invested to my ear with a sentiment akin to that which invests for me the names of Oxford and of Weimar; and snatches of Emerson's strain fixed them- 55 selves as imperishably in my mind as any of the eloquent words which I have been just now quoting. "Then dies the man in you; then once more perish the buds of art, poetry, and science as they have died already in a thousand thousand men." "What Plato has thought, he may think; 60 what a saint has felt, he may feel ; what at any time has befallen any man, he can understand." "Trust thyself! every heart vibrates to that iron string. Accept the place the Divine Providence has found for you, the society of your contemporaries, the connexion of events. Great men have 65 always done so, and confided themselves childlike to the MATTHEW ARNOLD 393 genius of their age; betraying their perception that the Eternal was stirring at their heart, working through their hands, predominating in all their being. And we are now men, and must accept in the highest spirit the same tran- scendent destiny ; and not pinched in a corner, not cowards 70 fleeing before a revolution, but redeemers and benefactors, pious aspirants to be noble clay plastic under the Almighty effort, let us advance and advance on chaos and the dark ! " These lofty sentences of Emerson, and a hundred others of like strain, I have never lost out of my memory ; I never 75 can lose them. We have not in Emerson a great poet, a great writer, a great philosophy-maker. His relation to us is not that of one of those personages ; yet it is a relation' of, I think, even superior importance. His relation to us is more like 80 that of the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius. Marcus Aurelius is not a great writer, a great philosophy-maker; he is the friend and aider of those who would live in the spirit. Emerson is the same. He is the friend and aider of those who would live in the spirit. All the points in think- 85 ing which are necessary for this purpose he takes, but he does not combine them into a system, or present them as a regular philosophy. Combined in a system by a man with the requisite talent for this kind of thing, they would be less useful than as Emerson gives them to us ; and the man 90 with the talent so to systematise them would be less impres- sive then Emerson. They do very well as they now stand ; like "boulders," as he says; in "paragraphs incompressible, each sentence an infinitely repellent particle." In such sentences his main points recur again and again, and become 95 fixed in the memory. 394 ENGLISH LITERATURE Happiness in labour, righteousness, and veracity; in all the life of the spirit ; happiness and eternal hope ; that 'was Emerson's gospel. I hear it said that Emerson 100 was too sanguine; that the actual generation in America is not turning out so well as he expected. Very likely he was too sanguine as to the near future ; in this country it is difficult not to be too sanguine. Very possibly the present generation may prove unworthy of his high hopes ; even 105 several generations succeeding this may prove unworthy of them. But by his conviction that in the life of the spirit is happiness, and by his hope that this life of the spirit will come more and more to be sanely understood, and to pre- vail, and to work for happiness, by this conviction and 110 hope Emerson was great, and he will surely prove in the end to have been right in them. In this country it is difficult, as I said, not to be sanguine. Very many of your writers are over-sanguine, and on the wrong grounds. But you have two men who in what they have written show their lissanguineness in a line where courage and hope are just, where they are also infinitely important, but where they are not easy. The two men are Franklin and Emerson. 1 These 1 I found with pleasure that this conjunction of Emerson's name with Franklin's had already occurred to an accomplished writer and delightful man, a friend of Emerson, left almost the sole survivor, alas ! of the famous literary generation of Boston, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes. Dr. Holmes has kindly allowed me to print here the ingenious and interest- ing lines, hitherto unpublished, in which he speaks of Emerson thus : " Where in the realm of thought, whose air is song, Does he, the Buddha of the West belong ? He seems a winged Franklin, sweetly wise, Born to unlock the secret of the skies ; And which the nobler calling if 'tis fair Terrestrial with celestial to compare To guide the storm-cloud's elemental flame, Or walk the chambers whence the lightning came Amidst the sources of its subtile fire, And steal their effluence for his lips and lyre? " [Arnold's note.] MATTHEW ARNOLD 395 two are, I think, the most distinctively and honourably American of your writers ; they are the most original and the most valuable. 120 Shakespeare Others abide our question. Thou art free. We ask and ask Thou smilest and art still, Out-topping knowledge. For the loftiest hill Who to the stars uncrowns his majesty, Planting his steadfast footsteps in the sea, 5 Making the heaven of heavens his dwelling-place, Spares but the cloudy border of his base To the f oiled searching of mortality ; Ami thou, who didst the stars and sunbeams know, Self -schooled, self-scanned, self-honored, self-secure, 10 Didst tread on earth unguessed at. Better so 1 All pains the immortal spirit must endure, All weakness which impairs, all griefs which bow, Find their sole speech in that victorious brow. Memorial Verses April, 1850 Goethe in Weimar sleeps, and Greece, Long since, saw Byron's struggle cease. But one such death remained to come ; The last poetic voice is dumb We stand to-day by Wordsworth's tomb. 5 When Byron's eyes were shut in death, We bowed our head and held our breath. He taught us little ; but our soul Had felt him like the thunder's roll. With shivering heart the strife we saw 10 396 ENGLISH LITERATURE Of passion with eternal law ; And yet with reverential awe We watched the fount of fiery life Which served for that Titanic strife. 15 When Goethe's death was told, we said : Sunk, then, is Europe's sagest head. Physician of the iron age, Goethe has done his pilgrimage. He took the suffering human race, 20 He read each wound, each weakness clear ; And struck his finger on the place, And said : Thou ailest here, and here ! He looked on Europe's dying hour Of fitful dream and feverish power ; 25 His eye plunged down the weltering strife, The turmoil of expiring life He said : The end is everywhere, Art still has truth, take refuge there! And he was happy, if to know 30 Causes of things, and far below His feet to see the lurid flow Of terror, and insane distress, And headlong fate, be happiness. And Wordsworth ! Ah, pale ghosts, rejoice I 35 For never has such soothing voice Been to your shadowy world conveyed, Since erst, at morn, some wandering shade Heard the clear song of Orpheus come Through Hades, and the mournful gloom. 40 Wordsworth has gone from us and ye, Ah, may ye feel his voice as we ! He too upon a wintry clime Had fallen on this iron time Of doubts, disputes, distractions, fears. 45 He found us when the age had bound Our souls in its benumbing round ; MATTHEW ARNOLD 397 He spoke, and loosed our heart in tears. He laid us as we lay at birth On the cool flowery lap of earth, Smiles broke from us and we had ease ; 60 The hills were round us, and the breeze Went o'er the sun-lit fields again ; Our foreheads felt the wind and rain. Our youth returned ; for there was shed On spirits that had long been dead, 55 Spirits dried up and closely furled, The freshness of the early world. Ah ! since dark days still bring to light Man's prudence and man's fiery might, Time may restore us in his course 60 Goethe's sage mind and Byron's force ; But where will Europe's latter hour Again find Wordsworth's healing power ? Others will teach us how to dare, And against fear our breast to steel ; 65 Others will strengthen us to bear But who, ah ! who, will make us feel ? The cloud of mortal destiny, Others will front it fearlessly But who, like him, will put it by ? 70 Keep fresh the grass upon his grave, O Rotha, with thy living wave ! Sing him thy best ! for few or none Hears thy voice right, now he is gone. Requiescat Strew on her roses, roses, And never a spray of yew I In quiet she reposes ; Ah, would that I did too ! 398 ENGLISH LITERATURE 5 Her mirth the world required ; She bathed it in smiles of glee. But her heart was tired, tired, And now they let her be. Her life was turning, turning, 10 In mazes of heat and sound ; But for peace her soul was yearning, And now peace laps her round. Her cabined, ample spirit, It fluttered and failed for breath ; 15 To-night it doth inherit The vasty hall of death. The Fall of Sohrab (Frcrm Sohrab and Rustum; He spoke, and Rustum answered not, but hurled His spear; down from the shoulder, down it came As on some partridge in the corn a hawk That long has towered in the airy clouds 5 Drops like a plummet ; Sohrab saw it come, And sprang aside, quick as a flash : the spear Hissed, and went quivering down into the sand, Which it sent flying wide ; then Sohrab threw In turn, and full struck Rustum's shield ; sharp rang, 10 The iron plates rang sharp, but turned the spear. And Rustum seized his dub, which none but he Could wield : an unlopped trunk it was, and huge, Still rough like those which men in treeless plains To build them boats fish from the flooded riven, 15 Hyphasis or Hydaspes, when, high up By their dark springs, the wind in wintertime Has made in Himalayan forests wrack, And strewn the channels with torn boughs so huge The dub which Rustum lifted now, and struck MATTHEW ARNOLD 399 One stroke ; but again Sohrab sprang aside, 20 Lithe as the glancing snake, and the club came Thundering to earth, and leaped from Rustum's hand. And Rustum followed his own blow, and fell To his knees, and with his fingers clutched the sand. And now might Sohrab have unsheathed his sword, 2o And pierced the mighty Rustum while he lay Diny, and on his knees, and choked with sand ; But he looked on, and smiled, nor bared his sword, But courteously drew back, and spoke, and said : "Thou strikest too hard ! that club of thine will float 30 Upon the summer-floods, and not my bones. But rise, and be not wroth ! not wroth am I ; No, when 1 see thee, wrath forsakes my soul. Thou sayst thou art not Rustum : be it so. Who art thou then, that canst so touch my soul? 35 Roy as I am. I have seen battles too Have waded foremost in their bloody waves. And heard their hollow roar of dying men ; But never was my heart thus touched before. Are they from Heaven, these softenings of the heart ? 40 O thou old warrior, let us yield to Heaven ! Come, plant we here in earth our angry spears, And make a truce, and sit upon this sand, And pledge each other in red wine, like friends, And thou shalt talk to me of Rustum's deeds. 45 There are enough foes in the Persian host, Whom I may meet, and strike, and feel no pang; Champions enough Afrasiab has, whom thou Mayst fight : fight ftan, when they confront thy spear! But oh. let there be peace 'twist thee and nu SO He ceased : but while he spake, Rustum had risen, And stood erect, trembling with rage : his dub He left to lie, but had regained his spear. Whose fiery point now in his mailed right-hand Blaied bright and baleful, like that autumn-star, 55 The baleful sign of fevers : dust had soiled 400 ENGLISH LITERATURE His stately crest, and dimmed his glittering arms. His breast heaved, his lips foamed, and twice his voice Was choked with rage : at last these words broke way : 60 "Girl ! nimble with thy feet, not with thy hands 1 Curled minion, dancer, coiner of sweet words ! Fight, let me hear thy hateful voice no more ! Thou art not in Afrasiab's gardens now With Tartar girls, with whom thou art wont to dance ; 65 But on the Oxus-sands, and in the dance Of battle, and with me, who make no play Of war ; I fight it out, and hand to hand. Speak not to me of truce, and pledge, and wine 1 Remember all thy valor : try thy feints 70 And cunning ! all the pity I had is gone ; Because thou hast shamed me before both the hosts With thy light skipping tricks, and thy girl's wiles." He spoke, and Sohrab kindled at his taunts, And he too drew his sword : at once they rushed 75 Together, as two eagles on one prey Come rushing down together from the clouds, One from the east, one from the west ; their shields Dashed with a clang together, and a din Rose, such as that the sinewy woodcutters 80 Make often in the forest's heart at morn, Of hewing axes, crashing trees such blows Rustum and Sohrab on each other hailed. And you would say that sun and stars took part In that unnatural conflict ; for a cloud 85 Grew suddenly in Heaven, and darked the sun Over the fighters' heads ; and a wind rose Under their feet, and moaning swept the plain, And in a sandy whirlwind wrapped the pair. In gloom they twain were wrapped, and they alone ; 90 For both the on-looking hosts on either hand Stood in broad daylight, and the sky was pure, And the sun sparkled on the Oxus stream. But in the gloom they fought, with bloodshot eyes MATTHEW ARNOLD 401 And laboring breath ; first Rustum struck the shield Which Sohrab held stiff out ; the steel-spiked spear 95 Rent the tough plates, but failed to reach the skin, And Rustum plucked it back with angry groan. Then Sohrab with his sword smote Rustum's helm, Nor clove its steel quite through ; but all the crest He shore away, and that proud horse-hair plume, 100 Never till now defiled, sank to the dust ; And Rustum bowed his head ; but then the gloom Grew blacker, thunder rumbled in the air, And lightnings rent the cloud ; and Ruksh, the horse, Who stood at hand, uttered a dreadful cry ; 105 No horse's cry was that, most like the roar Of some pained desert lion, who all day Hath trailed the hunter's javelin in his side, And comes at night to die upon the sand. The two hosts heard that cry, and quaked for fear, 110 And Oxus curdled as it crossed his stream. But Sohrab heard, and quailed not, but rushed on, And struck again ; and again Rustum bowed His head ; but this time all the blade, like glass, Sprang in a thousand shivers on the helm, 115 And in his hand the hilt remained alone. Then Rustum raised his head ; his dreadful eyes Glared, and he shook on high his menacing spear, And shouted, Rustum I Sohrab heard that shout, And shrank amazed : back he recoiled one step, 120 And scanned with blinking eyes the advancing form ; And then he stood bewildered ; and he dropped His covering shield, and the spear pierced his side. He reeled, and staggering back, sank to the ground ; And then the gloom dispersed, and the wind fell, 125 And the bright sun broke forth, and melted all The cloud ; and the two armies saw the pair Saw Rustum standing, safe upon his feet, And Sohrab, wounded, on the bloody sand. Then with a bitter smile, Rustum began : 130 402 ENGLISH LITERATURE "Sohrab, thou thoughtest in thy mind to kill A Persian lord this day, and strip his corpse, And bear thy trophies to Afrasiab's tent. Or else that the great Rustum would come down 135 Himself to fight, and that thy wiles would move His heart to take a gift, and let thee go. And then that all the Tartar host would praise Thy courage or thy craft, and spread thy fame, To glad thy father in his weak old age. 140 Fool, thou art slain, and by an unknown man I Dearer to the red jackals shalt thou be Than to thy friends, and to thy father old." And, with a fearless mien, Sohrab replied : "Unknown thou art; yet thy fierce vaunt is vain. 145 Thou dost not slay me, proud and boastful man ! No ! Rustum slays me, and this filial heart. For were I matched with ten such men as thee, And I were that which till to-day I was, They should be lying here, I standing there. 150 But that beloved name unnerved my arm That name, and something, I confess, in thee, Which troubles all my heart, and made my shield Fall ; and thy spear transfixed an unarmed foe. And now thou boastest, and insultest my fate. 155 But hear thou this, fierce man, tremble to hear ! The mighty Rustum shall avenge my death ! My father, whom I seek through all the world, He shall avenge my death, and punish thee 1 " Dover Beach The sea is calm to-night, The tide is full, the moon lies fair Upon the straits ; on the French coast the light Gleams and is gone ; the cliffs of England stand, 5 Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay. Come to the window, sweet is the night-air I MATTHEW ARNOLD 403 Only, from the long line of spray Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land, Listen ! you hear the grating roar Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling, 10 At their return, up the high strand, Begin, and cease, and then again begin, With tremulous cadence slow, and bring The eternal note of sadness in. Sophocles long ago 15 Heard it on the ^Egean, and it brought Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow Of human misery ; we Find also in the sound a thought, Hearing it by this distant northern sea. 20 The Sea of Faith Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled. But now I only hear Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, 25 Retreating, to the breath Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear And naked shingles of the world. Ah, love, let us be true To one another ! for the world, which seems 30 To lie before us like a land of dreams, So various, so beautiful, so new, Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain ; And we are here as on a darkling plain 35 Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight, Where ignorant armies clash by night. 404 ENGLISH LITERATURE Geist's Grave Four years ! and didst thou stay above The ground, which hides thee now, but four ? And all that life, and all that love, Were crowded, Geist ! into no more ? 5 Only four years those winning ways, Which make me for thy presence yearn, Call'd us to pet thee or to praise, Dear little friend ! at every turn ? That loving heart, that patient soul, 10 Had they indeed no longer span, To run their course, and reach their goal, And read their homily to man ? That liquid, melancholy eye, From whose pathetic, soul-fed springs 15 Seem'd surging the Virgilian cry, The sense of tears in mortal things That steadfast, mournful strain, consoled By spirits gloriously gay, And temper of heroic mould 20 What, was four years their whole short day ? Yes, only four ! and not the course Of all the centuries yet to come, And not the infinite resource Of nature, with her countless sum 25 Of figures, with her fulness vast Of new creation evermore, Can ever quite repeat the past, Or just thy little self restore. Stern law of every mortal lot ! 30 Which man, proud man, finds hard to bear, And builds himself I know not what Of second life I know not where. MATTHEW ARNOLD 405 But thou, when struck thine hour to go, On us, who stood despondent by, A meek last glance of love didst throw, 35 And humbly lay thee down to die. Yet would we keep thee in our heart Would fix our favourite on the scene, Nor let thee utterly depart And be as if thou ne'er hadst been. 40 And so there rise these lines of verse On lips that rarely form them now ; While to each other we rehearse : Such ways, such arts, such looks hadst thou ! We stroke thy broad brown paws again, 45 We bid thee to thy vacant chair, We greet thee by the window-pane, We hear thy scuffle on the stair ; We see the flaps of thy large ears Quick raised to ask which way we go ; 50 Crossing the frozen lake, appears Thy small black figure on the snow ! Nor to us only art thou dear Who mourn thee in thine English home ; Thou hast thine absent master's tear, 55 Dropt by the far Australian foam. Thy memory lasts both here and there, And thou shalt live as long as we. And after that thou dost not care ! In us was all the world to thee. 60 Yet, fondly zealous for thy fame, Even to a date beyond our own We strive to carry down thy name, By mounded turf, and graven stone. 406 ENGLISH LITERATURE 65 We lay thee, close within our reach, Here, where the grass is smooth and warm, Between the holly and the. beech, Where oft we watch'd thy couchant form, Asleep, yet lending half an ear 70 To travellers on the Portsmouth road ; There choose we thee, O guardian dear, Mark'd with a stone, thy last abode ! Then some, who through this garden pass, When we too, like thy self, are clay, 75 Shall see thy grave upon the grass, And stop before the stone, and say : People who lived here long ago Did by this stone, it seems, intend To name for future times to know 80 The dachs-hound, Geist, their little friend. ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON Ulysses on Old Age (From Ulysses) There lies the port ; the vessel puffs her sail ; There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners, Souls that have toiled, and wrought, and thought with me, That ever with a frolic welcome took 5 The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed Free hearts, free foreheads, you and I are old ; Old age hath yet his honor and his toil. Death closes all ; but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, 10 Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks ; The long day wanes ; the slow moon climbs ; the deep Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends, ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 407 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. Push off, and sitting well in order smite 15 The sounding furrows ; for my purpose holds To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths Of all the western stars, until I die. It may be that the gulfs will wash us down ; It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, 20 And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. Though much is taken, much abides ; and though We are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven ; that which we are, we are ; One equal temper of heroic hearts, 25 Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. (From In Memoriam) I I held it truth, with him who sings To one clear harp in divers tones, That men may rise on stepping-stones Of their dead selves to higher things. But who shall so forecast the years 5 And find in loss a gain to match ? Or reach a hand thro' time to catch The far-off interest of tears ? Let Love clasp Grief lest both be drown'd, Let darkness keep her raven gloss : 10 Ah, sweeter to be drunk with loss, To dance with death, to beat the ground, Than that the victor Hours should scorn The long result of love, and boast, "Behold the man that loved and lost, 15 But all he was is overworn." 408 ENGLISH LITERATURE XXVII I envy not in any moods The captive void of noble rage, The linnet born within the cage, 20 That never knew the summer woods : I envy not the beast that takes His license in the field of time, Unfetter'd by the sense of crime, To whom a conscience never wakes ; 25 Nor, what may count itself as blest, The heart that never plighted troth But stagnates in the weeds of sloth ; Nor any want-begotten rest. I hold it true, whate'er befall ; 30 I feel it, when I sorrow most ; 'Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all. cvi Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, The flying cloud, the frosty light : 35 The year is dying in the night ; Ring out, wild bells, and let him die. Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring, happy bells, across the snow : The year is going, let him go ; 40 Ring out the false, ring in the true. Ring out the grief that saps the mind, For those that here we see no more ; Ring out the feud of rich and poor ; Ring in redress to all mankind. ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 409 Ring out a slowly dying cause, 45 And ancient forms of party strife ; Ring in the nobler modes of life, With sweeter manners, purer laws. Ring out the want, the care, the sin, The faithless coldness of the times ; 50 Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes, But ring the fuller minstrel in. Ring out false pride in place and blood, The civic slander and the spite ; Ring in the love of truth and right, 55 Ring in the common love of good. Ring out old shapes of foul disease ; Ring out the narrowing lust of gold ; Ring out the thousand wars of old, Ring in the thousand years of peace. 60 Ring in the valiant man and free, The larger heart, the kindlier hand ; Ring out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be. cxxx Thy voice is on the rolling air ; G5 I hear thee where the waters run ; Thou standest in the rising sun, And in the setting thou art fair. What art thou then ? I cannot guess ; But tho' I seem in star and flower 70 To feel thee some diffusive power, I do not therefore love thee less : My love involves the love before ; My love is vaster passion now ; Tho' mix'd with God and Nature thou, 75 I seem to love thee more and more. 410 ENGLISH LITERATURE Far off thou art, but ever nigh ; I have thee still, and I rejoice ; I prosper, circled with thy voice ; 80 I shall not lose thee tho' I die. Home They Brought Her Warrior Dead (From The Princess) Home they brought her warrior dead ; She nor swooned nor uttered cry : All her maidens, watching, said, "She must weep or she will die." 5 Then they praised him, soft and low, Called him worthy to be loved, Truest friend and noblest foe ; Yet she neither spoke nor moved. Stole a maiden from her place, 10 Lightly to the warrior stepped, Took the face-cloth from the face ; Yet she neither moved nor wept. Rose a nurse of ninety years, Set his child upon her knee 15 Like summer tempest came her tears "Sweet my child, I live for thee." Geraint's Strange Petition (From Idylls of the King : " The Marriage of Geraint ") But while the women thus rejoiced, Geraint Woke where he slept in the high hall, and call'd For Enid, and when Yniol made report Of that good mother making Enid gay 5 In such apparel as might well beseem His princess, or indeed the stately Queen, He answer'd : "Earl, entreat her by my love, ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 411 Albeit I give no reason for my wish, That she ride with me in her faded silk." Yniol with that hard message went ; it fell 10 Like flaws in summer laying lusty corn : For Enid, all abash'd she knew not why, Dare not to glance at her good mother's face, But silently, in all obedience, Her mother silent too, nor helping her, 15 Laid from her limbs the costly-broider'd gift, And robed them in her ancient suit again, And so descended. Never man rejoiced TMore than Geraint to greet her thus attired ; And glancing all at once as keenly at her 20 As careful robins eye the delver's toil, Made her cheek burn and either eyelid fall, But rested with her sweet face satisfied ; Then seeing cloud upon the mother's brow, Her by both hands he caught, and sweetly said : 25 "O my new mother, be not wroth or grieved At thy new son, for my petition to her. When late I left Caerleon, our great Queen, In words whose echo lasts, they were so sweet, Made promise that, whatever bride I brought, 30 Herself would clothe her like the sun in heaven. Thereafter, when I reach'd this ruin'd hall, Beholding one so bright in dark estate, I vow'd that, could I gain her, our fair Queen, No hand but hers, should make your Enid burst 35 Sunlike from cloud and likewise thought perhaps, That service done so graciously would bind The two together ; fain I would the two Should love each other : how can Enid find A nobler friend ? Another thought was mine : 40 I came among you here so suddenly That tho' her gentle presence at the lists Might well have served for proof that I was loved, 412 ENGLISH LITERATURE I doubted whether daughter's tenderness, 45 Or easy nature, might not let itself Be moulded by your wishes for her weal ; Or whether some false sense in her own self Of my contrasting brightness overbore Her fancy dwelling in this dusky hall ; 50 And such a sense might make her long for court And all its perilous glories : and I thought, That could I someway prove such force in her Link'd with such love for me that at a word, No reason given her, she could cast aside 55 A splendor dear to women, new to her, And therefore dearer ; or if not so new, Yet therefore tenfold dearer by the power Of intermitted usage ; then I felt That I could rest, a rock in ebbs and flows, 60 Fixt on her faith. Now, therefore, I do rest, A prophet certain of my prophecy, That never shadow of mistrust can cross Between us. Grant me pardon for my thoughts ; And for my strange petition I will make 65 Amends hereafter by some gaudy-day, When your fair child shall wear your costly gift Beside your own warm hearth, with, on her knees, Who knows ? another gift of the high God, Which, maybe, shall have learn'd to lisp you thanks." 70 He spoke : the mother smiled, but half in tears, Then brought a mantle down and wrapt her in it, And claspt and kiss'd her, and they rode away. Gareth's Combat with the Noonday Sun (From Idylls of the King: " Gareth and Lynette ") So when they touch'd the second river-loop, Huge on a high red horse, and all in mail Burnish'd to blinding, shone the Noonday Sun ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 413 Beyond a raging shallow. As if the flower That blows a globe of after arrowlets 5 Ten-thousand-fold had grown, flash'd the fierce shield, All sun ; and Gareth's eyes had flying blots Before them when he turn'd from watching him. He from beyond the roaring shallow roar'd, "What doest thou, brother, in my marches here?" 1C And she athwart the shallow shrill'd again, "Here is a kitchen-knave from Arthur's hall Hath overthrown thy brother, and hath his arms." "Ugh !" cried the Sun, and, vizoring up a red And cipher face of rounded foolishness, 15 Push'd horse across the foamings of the ford, Whom Gareth met mid-stream ; no room was there For lance or tourney-skill ; four strokes they struck With sword, and these were mighty ; the new knight Had fear he might be shamed ; but as the Sun 20 Heaved up a ponderous arm to strike the fifth, The hoof of his horse slipt in the stream, the stream Descended, and the Sun was wash'd away. Then Gareth laid his lance athwart the ford ; So drew him home ; but he that fought no more, 25 As being all bone-batter'd on the rock, Yielded ; and Gareth sent him to the King. "Myself when I return will plead for thee. Lead, and I follow." Quietly she led. "Hath not the good wind, damsel, changed again?" 30 "Nay, not a point; nor art thou victor here. There lies a ridge of slate across the ford ; His horse thereon stumbled ay, for I saw it. "'O sun' not this strong fool whom thou, Sir Knave, Hast overthrown thro' mere unhappiness 35 'O sun, that wakenest all to bliss or pain, O moon, that layest all to sleep again, Shine sweetly : twice my love hath smiled on me.' 414 ENGLISH LITERATURE "What knowest thou of love-song or of love? 40 Nay, nay, God wot, so thou were nobly born, Thou hast a pleasant presence. Yea, perchance, "'O dewy flowers that open to the sun, O dewy flowers that close when day is done, Blow sweetly : twice my love hath smiled on me.' 45 "What knowest thou of flowers, except, belike, To garnish meats with ? hath not our good King Who lent me thee, the flower of kitchendom, A foolish love for flowers ? what stick ye round The pasty ? wherewithal deck the boar's head ? 50 Flowers ? nay, the boar hath rosemaries and bay. "'O birds that warble to the morning sky, O birds that warble as the day goes by, Sing sweetly : twice my love hath smiled on me.' "What knowest thou of birds, lark, mavis, merle, 55 Linnet ? what dream ye when they utter forth May-music growing with the growing light, Their sweet sun-worship ? these be for the snare So runs thy fancy these be for the spit, Larding and basting. See thou have not now 60 Larded thy last, except thou turn and fly." The Revenge A BALLAD OF THE FLEET I At Flores in the Azores Sir Richard Grenville lay, And a pinnace, like a fluttered bird, came flying from far away : "Spanish ships of war at sea ! we have sighted fifty-three !" Then sware Lord Thomas Howard : "'Fore God, I am no coward; 5 But I cannot meet them here, for my ships are out of gear, And the half my men are sick. I must fly, but follow quick. We are six ships of the line ; can we fight with fifty-three ? " ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 415 ii Then spake Sir Richard Grenville : "I know you are no coward ; You fly them for a moment to fight with them again. But I've ninety men and more that are lying sick ashore. 10 I should count myself the coward if I left them, my Lord Howard, To these Inquisition dogs and the devildoms of Spain." in So Lord Howard passed away with five ships of war that day, Till he melted like a cloud in the silent summer heaven ; But Sir Richard bore in hand all his sick men from the land 15 Very carefully and slow, Men of Bideford in Devon, And we laid them on the ballast down below : For we brought them all aboard, And they blessed him in their pain, that they were not left to Spain, 20 To the thumb-screw and the stake, for the glory of the Lord. IV He had only a hundred seamen to work the ship and to fight, And he sailed away from Flores till the Spaniard came in sight, With his huge sea-castles heaving upon the weather bow. "Shall we fight or shall we fly ? 25 Good Sir Richard, tell us now, For to fight is but to die ! There'll be little of us left by the time this sun be set." And Sir Richard said again : "We be all good English men. Let us bang these dogs of Seville, the children of the devil, 30 For I never turned my back upon Don or devil yet." Sir Richard spoke and he laughed, and we roared a hurrah, and so The little Revenge ran on sheer into the heart of the foe, With her hundred fighters on deck, and her ninety sick below ; For half of their fleet to the right and half to the left were seen, 35 And the little Revenge ran on through the long sea-lane between. 416 ENGLISH LITERATURE VI Thousands of their soldiers looked down from their decks and laughed, Thousands of their seamen made mock at the mad little craft Running on and on, till delayed 40 By their mountain-like San Philip that, of fifteen hundred tons, And up-shadowing high above us with her yawning tiers of guns, Took the breath from our sails, and we stayed. VII And while now the great San Philip hung above us like a cloud Whence the thunderbolt will fall 45 Long and loud, Four galleons drew away From the Spanish fleet that day, And two upon the larboard and two upon the starboard lay, And the battle-thunder broke from them all. VIII 50 But anon the great San Philip, she bethought herself and went, Having that within her womb that had left her ill content ; . And the rest they came aboard us, and they fought us hand to hand, For a dozen times they came with their pikes and musqueteers, And a dozen times we shook 'em off as a dog that shakes his ears 55 When he leaps from the water to the land. IX And the sun went down, and the stars came out far over the summer sea, But never a moment ceased the fight of the one and the fifty-three. Ship after ship, the whole night long, their high-built galleons came, Ship after ship, the whole night long, with her battle-thunder and flame: ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 417 Ship after ship, the whole night long, drew back with her dead and her shame. 60 For some were sunk and many were shattered, and so could fight no more God of battles, was ever a battle like this in the world before ? For he said, "Fight on ! fight on !" Though his vessel was all but a wreck ; And it chanced that, when half of the short summer night was gone, 65 With a grisly wound to be dressed he had left the deck, But a bullet struck him that was dressing it suddenly dead, And himself he was wounded again in the side and the head, And he said, "Fight on ! fight on !" XI And the night went down, and the sun smiled out far over the summer sea, 70 And the Spanish fleet with broken sides lay round us all in a ring ; But they dared not touch us again, for they feared that we still could sting, So they watched what the end would be. And we had not fought them in vain, But in perilous plight were we, 75 Seeing forty of our poor hundred were slain, And half of the rest of us maimed for life In the crash of the cannonades and the desperate strife : And the sick men down in the hold were most of them stark and cold, And the pikes were all broken or bent, and the powder was all of it spent ; 80 And the masts and the rigging were lying over the side ; But Sir Richard cried in his English pride : "We have fought such a fight for a day and a night As may never be fought again ! We have won great glory, my men ! 85 418 ENGLISH LITERATURE And a day less or more At sea or ashore, We die does it matter when ? Sink me the ship, Master Gunner - - sink her, split her in twain ! 90 Fall into the hands of God, not into the hands of Spain !" XII And the gunner said, "Ay, ay," but the seamen made reply : "We have children, we have wives, And the Lord hath spared our lives. We will make the Spaniard promise, if we yield, to let us go ; 95 We shall live to fight again and to strike another blow." And the lion there lay dying, and they yielded to the foe. XIII And the stately Spanish men to their flagship bore him then, Where they laid him by the mast, old Sir Richard caught at last, And they praised him to his face with their courtly foreign grace ; 100 But he rose upon their decks, and he cried : "I have fought for Queen and Faith like a valiant man and true ; I have only done my duty as a man is bound to do. With a joyful spirit I Sir Richard Grenville die!" And he fell upon their decks, and he died. xrv 105 And they stared at the dead that had been so valiant and true, And had holden the power and glory of Spain so cheap That he dared her with one little ship and his English few ; Was he devil or man ? He was devil for aught they knew, But they sank his body with honor down into the deep, 110 And they manned the Revenge with a swarthier alien crew, And away she sailed with her loss and longed for her own ; When a wind from the lands they had ruined awoke from sleep, And the water began to heave and the weather to moan, And or ever that evening ended a great gale blew, 115 And a wave like the wave that is raised by an earthquake grew, ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 419 Till it smote on their hulls and their sails and their masts and their flags, And the whole sea plunged and fell on the shot-shattered navy of Spain, And the little Revenge herself went down by the island crags To be lost evermore in the main. The Charge of the Heavy Brigade at Balaclava OCTOBER 25, 1854 The charge of the gallant three hundred, the Heavy Brigade ! Down the hill, down the hill, thousands of Russians, Thousands of horsemen, drew to the valley and stay'd ; For Scarlett and Scarlett's three hundred were riding by When the points of the Russian lances arose in the sky ; 5 And he call'd, "Left wheel into line!" and they wheel'd and obey'd. Then he looked at the host that had halted he knew not why, And he turn'd half round, and he bade his trumpeter sound To the charge, and he rode on ahead, as he waved his blade To the gallant three hundred whose glory will never die 10 "Follow," and up the hill, up the hill, up the hill, Follow'd the Heavy Brigade. II The trumpet, the gallop, the charge, and the might of the fight ! Thousands of horsemen had gather'd there on the height, With a wing push'd out to the left and a wing to the right, 15 And who shall escape if they close ? but he dash'd up alone Thro' the great gray slope of men, Sway'd his sabre, and held his own Like an Englishman there and then. All in a moment follow 'd with force 20 Three that were next in then" fiery course, 420 ENGLISH LITERATURE Wedged themselves in between horse and horse, Fought for their lives in the narrow gap they had made Four amid thousands ! and up the hill, up the hill, 25 Gallopt the gallant three hundred, the Heavy Brigade. in Fell like a cannon-shot, Burst like a thunder-bolt, Crash'd like a hurricane, Broke through the mass from below, 30 Drove through the midst of the foe, Plunged up and down, to and fro, Rode flashing blow upon blow, Brave Inniskillens and Greys Whirling their sabres in circles of light ! 35 And some of us, all in amaze, Who were held for a while from the fight, And were only standing at gaze, When the dark-muffled Russian crowd Folded its wings from the left and the right, 40 And roll'd them around like a cloud, O, mad for the charge and the battle were we, When our own good redcoats sank from sight, Like drops of blood in a dark-gray sea, And we turn'd to each other, whispering, all dismay'd, 45 "Lost are the gallant three hundred of Scarlett's Brigade !" IV "Lost one and all" were the words Mutter'd in our dismay ; But they rode like victors and lords Thro' the forest of lances and swords 50 In the heart of the Russian hordes, They rode, or they stood at bay Struck with the sword-hand and slew, Down with the bridle-hand drew ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 421 The foe from the saddle and threw Underfoot there in the fray 55 Ranged like a storm or stood like a rock In the wave of a stormy day ; Till suddenly shock upon shock Stagger'd the mass from without, Drove it in wild disarray, 60 For our men gallopt up with a cheer and a shout, And the foemen surged, and waver'd and reel'd, Up the hill, up the hill, up the hill, out of the field, And over the brow and away. Glory to each and to all, and the charge that they made 1 65 Glory to all the three hundred, and all the Brigade I The Throstle "Summer is coming, summer is coming ! I know it, I know it, I know it. Light again, leaf again, life again, love again I" Yes, my wild little Poet. Sing the new year in under the blue. 5 Last year you sang it as gladly. "New, new, new, new !" Is it then so new That you should carol so madly ? Love again, song again, nest again, young again," Never a prophet so crazy ! 10 And hardly a daisy as yet, little friend, See, there is hardly a daisy. "Here again, here, here, here, happy year!" O warble unchidden, unbidden ! Summer is coming, is coming, my dear, 15 And all the winters are hidden. 422 ENGLISH LITERATURE Crossing the Bar Sunset and evening star, And one clear call for me ! And may there be no moaning of the bar, When I put out to sea, 5 But such a tide as moving seems asleep, Too full for sound and foam, When that which drew from out the boundless deep Turns again home. Twilight and evening bell, 10 And after that the dark ! And may there be no sadness of farewell, When I embark ; For though from out our bourne of Time and Place The flood may bear me far, 15 I hope to see my Pilot face to face When I have crossed the bar. ROBERT BROWNING Song from Pippa Passes The year's at the spring And day's at the morn ; Morning's at seven ; The hillside's dew-pearled ; The lark's on the wing ; The snail's on the thorn ; God's in his heaven All's right with the world ! ROBERT BROWNING 423 How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Air I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris, and he ; I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three ; "Good speed !" cried the watch, as the gate-bolts undrew; "Speed !" echoed the wall to us galloping through; Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest, 5 And into the midnight we galloped abreast. Not a word to each other ; we kept the great pace Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our place ; I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight, Then shortened each stirrup, and set the pique right, 10 Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chained slacker the bit, Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit. 'Twas moonset at starting ; but while we drew near Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight dawned clear ; At Boom, a great yellow star came out to see ; 15 At Dtiffeld, 'twas morning as plain as could be ; And from Mecheln church-steeple we heard the half-chime, So Joris broke silence with, "Yet there is time !" At Aershot, up leaped of a sudden the sun, And against him the cattle stood black every one, 20 To stare through the mist at us galloping past, And I saw my stout galloper Roland at last, With resolute shoulders, each butting away The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray : And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear bent back 25 For my voice, and the other pricked out on his track ; And one eye's black intelligence, ever that glance O'er its white edge at me, his own master, askance ! And the thick heavy spume-flakes which aye and anon His fierce lips shook upwards in galloping on. 30 By Hasselt, Dirck groaned ; and cried Joris, "Stay spur! Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault's not in her. 424 ENGLISH LITERATURE We'll remember at Aix" for one heard the quick wheeze Of her chest, saw the stretched neck and staggering knees, 35 And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank, As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank. So, we were left galloping, Joris and I, Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky ; The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh, 40 'Neath our feet broke the brittle bright stubble like chaff ; Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang white, And "Gallop," gasped Joris, "for Aix is in sight !" "How they'll greet us !" and all in a moment his roan Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as a stone ; 45 And there was my Roland to bear the whole weight Of the news which alone could save Aix from her fate, With his nostrils like pits full of blood to the brim, And with circles of red for his eye-sockets' rim. Then I cast loose my buffcoat, each holster let fall, 60 Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt and all, Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted his ear, Called my Roland his pet-name, my horse without peer ; Clapped my hands, laughed and sang, any noise, bad or good, Till at length into Aix Roland galloped and stood. 55 And all I remember is friends flocking round As I sat with his head 'twixt my knees on the ground ; And no voice but was praising this Roland of mine, As I poured down his throat our last measure of wine, Which (the burgesses voted by common consent) 60 Was no more than his due who brought good news from Ghent. ROBERT BROWNING 425 Incident of the French Camp You know, we French stormed Ratisbon : A mile or so away, On a little mound, Napoleon Stood on our storming-day ; With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, 5 Legs wide, arms locked behind, As if to balance the prone brow Oppressive with its mind. Just as perhaps he mused "My plans That soar, to earth may fall, 10 Let once my army-leader Lannes Waver at yonder wall," Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew A rider, bound on bound Full-galloping ; nor bridle drew 15 Until he reached the mound. Then off there flung in smiling joy, And held himself erect By just his horse's mane, a boy : You hardly could suspect 20 (So tight he kept his lips compressed, Scarce any blood came through) You looked twice ere you saw his breast Was all but shot in two. "Well," cried he, "Emperor, by God's grace 25 We've got you Ratisbon ! The Marshal's in the market-place, And you'll be there anon To see your flag-bird flap his vans Where I, to heart's desire, 30 Perched him ! " The chief's eye flashed ; his plans Soared up again like fire. 426 ENGLISH LITERATURE The chief's eye flashed ; but presently Softened itself, as sheathes 35 A film the mother-eagle's eye When her bruised eaglet breathes ; "You're wounded !" "Nay," the soldier's pride Touched to the quick, he said : "I'm killed, Sire !" And, his chief beside, 40 Smiling the boy fell dead. My Last Duchess That's my last Duchess painted on the wall Looking as if she were alive. I call That piece a wonder, now : Fra Pandolf's hands Worked busily a day, and there she stands. 5 Will't please you sit and look at her ? I said "Fra Pandolf" by design, for never read Strangers like you that pictured countenance, The depth and passion of its earnest glance, But to myself they turned (since none puts by 10 The curtain I have drawn for you, but I) And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst, How such a glance came there ; so, not the first Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, 'twas not Her husband's presence only, called that spot 15 Of joy into the Duchess' cheek : perhaps Fra Pandolf chanced to say, "Her mantle laps Over my lady's wrist too much," or "Paint Must never hope to reproduce the faint Half-flush that dies along her throat :" such stuff 20 Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough For calling up that spot of joy. She had A heart how shall I say? too soon made glad, Too easily impressed ; she liked whate'er She looked on, and her looks went everywhere. 25 Sir, 'twas all one ! My favor at her breast, The dropping of the daylight in the West, ROBERT BROWNING 427 The bough of cherries some officious fool Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule She rode with round the terrace all and each Would draw from her alike the approving speech, 30 Or blush, at least. She thanked men, good ! but thanked Somehow I know not how as if she ranked My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name With anybody's gift. Who'd stoop to blame This sort of trifling ? Even had you skill 35 In speech (which I have not) to make your will Quite clear to such an one, and say, "Just this Or that in you disgusts me ; here you miss, Or there exceed the mark" and if she let Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set 40 Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse, E'en then would be some stooping ; and I choose Never to stoop. Oh, sir, she smiled, no doubt, Whene'er I passed her ; but who passed without Much the same smile ? This grew ; I gave commands ; 45 Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands As if alive. Will 't please you rise ? We'll meet The company below then. I repeat, The Count your master's known munificence Is ample warrant that no just pretence 50 Of mine for dowry will be disallowed ; Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowed At starting, is my object. Nay, we'll go Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though, Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity, 55 Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me ! Home-Thoughts, from Abroad Oh, to be in England Now that April's there, And whoever wakes in England Sees, some morning, unaware, 428 ENGLISH LITERATURE 6 That the lowest boughs and the brush-wood sheaf Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf, While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough In England now ! And after April, when May follows, 10 And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows ! Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge Leans to the field and scatters on the clover Blossoms and dewdrops at the bent spray's edge That's the wise thrush ; he sings each song twice over, 15 Lest you should think he never could recapture The first fine careless rapture ! And though the fields look rough with hoary dew, All will be gay when noontide wakes anew The buttercups, the little children's dower 20 Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower ! Rabbi Ben Ezra Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be, The last of life, for which the first was made : Our times are in his hand 5 Who saith, "A whole I planned, Youth shows but half; trust God : see all, nor be afraid !" Not that, amassing flowers, Youth sighed, "Which rose make ours, Which lily leave and then as best recall?" 10 Not that, admiring stars, It yearned, "Nor Jove, nor Mars; Mine be some figured flame which blends, transcends them all ! " Not for such hopes and fears Annulling youth's brief years, 15 Do I remonstrate : folly wide the mark ! ROBERT BROWNING 429 Rather I prize the doubt Low kinds exist without, Finished and finite clods, untroubled by a spark. Poor vaunt of life indeed, Were man but formed to feed 20 On joy, to solely seek and find and feast ; Such feasting ended, then As sure an end to men ; Irks care the crop-full bird ? Frets doubt the maw-crammed beast ? Rejoice we are allied 25 To that which doth provide And not partake, effect and not receive ! A spark disturbs our clod ; Nearer we hold of God Who gives, than of his tribes that take, I must believe. 30 Then, welcome each rebuff That turns earth's smoothness rough, Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand but go ! Be our joys three-parts pain ! Strive, and hold cheap the strain ; 35 Learn, nor account the pang ; dare, never grudge the throe ! For thence, a paradox Which comforts while it mocks, Shall life succeed in that it seems to fail : What I aspired to be, 40 And was not, comforts me : A brute I might have been, but would not sink i' the scale. What is he but a brute Whose flesh has soul to suit, Whose spirit works lest arms and legs want play ? 45 To man, propose this test Thy body at its best, How far can that project thy soul on its lone way ? 430 ENGLISH LITERATURE Yet gifts should prove their use : 50 1 own the Past profuse Of power each side, perfection every turn : Eyes, ears took in their dole, Brain treasured up the whole ; Should not the heart beat once "How good to live and learn"? 55 Not once beat "Praise be thine ! I see the whole design, I, who saw power, see now love perfect too : Perfect I call thy plan : Thanks that I was a man ! 60 Maker, remake, complete, I trust what thou shalt do"? For pleasant is this flesh ; Our soul, in its rose-mesh Pulled ever to the earth, still yearns for rest : Would we some prize might hold 65 To match those manifold Possessions of the brute, gain most, as we did best I Let us not always say, "Spite of this flesh to-day I strove, made head, gained ground upon the whole !" 70 As the bird wings and sings, Let us cry, "All good things Are ours, nor soul helps flesh more, now, than flesh helps soul ! " Therefore I summon age To grant youth's heritage, 75 Life's struggle having so far reached its term : Thence shall I pass, approved A man, for aye removed From the developed brute ; a god, though in the germ. And I shall thereupon 80 Take rest, ere I be gone Once more on my adventure brave and new : ROBERT BROWNING 431 Fearless and unperplexed, When I wage battle next, What weapons to select, what armour to indue. Youth ended, I shall try 85 My gain or loss thereby ; Leave the fire ashes, what survives is gold : And I shall weigh the same, Give life its praise or blame : Young, all lay in dispute ; I shall know, being old. 90 For note, when evening shuts, A certain moment cuts The deed off, calls the glory from the grey : A whisper from the west Shoots "Add this to the rest, 95 Take it and try its worth : here dies another day." So, still within this life, Though lifted o'er its strife, Let me discern, compare, pronounce at last, "This rage was right i' the main, 100 That acquiescence vain : The Future I may face now I have proved the Past." For more is not reserved - To man, with soul just nerved To act to-morrow what he learns to-day : 105 Here, work enough to watch The Master work, and catch Hints of the proper craft, tricks of the tool's true play. As it was better, youth Should strive, through acts uncouth, 110 Toward making, than repose on aught found made : So, better, age, exempt From strife, should know, than tempt Further. Thou waitedst age : wait death nor be afraid ! 432 ENGLISH LITERATURE 115 Enough now, if the Right And Good and Infinite Be named here, as thou callest thy hand thine own, With knowledge absolute, Subject to no dispute 120 From fools that crowded youth, nor let thee feel alone. Be there, for once and all, Severed great minds from small, Announced to each his station in the Past ! Was I, the world arraigned, 125 Were they, my soul disdained, Right ? Let age speak the truth and give us peace at last ! Now, who shall arbitrate? Ten men love what I hate, Shun what I follow, slight what I receive ; 130 Ten, who in ears and eyes Match me : we all surmise, They this thing, and I that : whom shall my soul believe ? Not on the vulgar mass Called "work," must sentence pass, 135 Things done, that took the eye and had the 'price ; O'er which, from level stand, The low world laid its hand, Found straightway to its mind, could value in a trice : But all, the world's coarse thumb 140 And finger failed to plumb, So passed in making up the main account ; All instincts immature, All purposes unsure, That weighed not as his work, yet swelled the man's amount 145 Thoughts hardly to be packed Into a narrow act, Fancies that broke through language and escaped ; ROBERT BROWNING 433 All I could never be, All, men ignored in me, This, I was worth to God, whose wheel the pitcher shaped. 150 Ay, note that Potter's wheel, That metaphor ! and feel Why time spins fast, why passive lies our clay, Thou, to whom fools propound, When the wine makes its round, 155 "Since life fleets, all is change; the Past gone, seize to-day !" Fool ! All that is, at all, Lasts ever, past recall ; Earth changes, but thy soul and God stand sure : What entered into thee, 160 That was, is, and shall be : Time's wheel runs back or stops : Potter and clay endure. He fixed thee 'mid this dance Of plastic circumstance, This Present, thou, forsooth, wouldst fain arrest : 165 Machinery just meant To give thy soul its bent, Try thee and turn thee forth, sufficiently impressed. What though the earlier grooves, Which ran the laughing loves 170 Around thy base, no longer pause and press ? What though, about thy rim, Skull-things in order grim Grow out, in graver mood, obey the sterner stress? Look not thou down but up ! 175 To uses of a cup, The festal board, lamp's flash and trumpet's peal, The new wine's foaming flow, The Master's lips aglow ! Thou, heaven's consummate cup, what needst thou with earth's wheel? 180 434 ENGLISH LITERATURE But I need, now as then, Thee, God, who mouldest men ; And since, not even while the whirl was worst, Did I to the wheel of life 185 With shapes and colors rife, Bound dizzily mistake my end, to slake thy thirst : So, take and use thy work, Amend what flaws may lurk, What strain o' the stuff, what warpings past the aim ! 190 My times be in thy hand ! Perfect the cup as planned ! Let age approve of youth, and death complete the same ! Epilogue to Asolando At the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, When you set your fancies free, Will they pass to where by death, fools think, imprisoned Low he lies who once so loved you, whom you loved so, 5 -Pity me? Oh, to love so, be so loved, yet so mistaken ! What had I on earth to do With the slothful, with the mawkish, the unmanly ? Like the aimless, helpless, hopeless, did I drivel 10 Being who ? One who never turned his back but marched breast forward, Never doubted clouds would break, Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph, Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, 15 Sleep to wake. No, at noonday in the bustle of man's work-time Greet the unseen with a cheer ! Bid him forward, breast and back as either should be, "Strive and thrive !" cry "Speed, fight on, fare ever 20 There as here!" ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 435 ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 1 Dorado i It seems as if a great deal were attainable in a world where there are so many marriages and decisive battles, and where we all, at certain hours of the day, and with great gusto and despatch, stow a portion of victuals finally and irre- trievably into the bag which contains us. And it would 5 seem also, on a hasty view, that the attainment of as much as possible was the one goal of man's contentious life. And yet, as regards the spirit, this is but a semblance. We live in an ascending scale when we live happily, one thing leading to another in an endless series. There is always 10 a new horizon for onward-looking men, and although we dwell on a small planet, immersed in petty business and not enduring beyond a brief period of years, we are so constituted that our hopes are inaccessible, like stars, and the term of hoping is prolonged until the term of life. To be truly 15 happy is a question of how we begin and not of how we end, of what we want and not of what we have. An aspiration is a joy forever, a possession as solid as a landed estate, a fortune which we can never exhaust and which gives us year by year a revenue of pleasurable activity. To have 20 many of these is to be spiritually rich. Life is only a very dull and ill-directed theatre unless we have some interests in the piece ; and to those who have neither art nor science, the world is a mere arrangement of colours, or a rough foot-way where they may very well break their shins. It 25 is in virtue of his own desires and curiosities that any man continues to exist with even patience, that he is charmed by the look of things and people, and that he wakens every morning with a renewed appetite for work and pleasure. Virginibus Puerisque, published by Charles Scribner's Sons. Reprinted by permission. 436 ENGLISH LITERATURE 30 Desire and curiosity are the two eyes through which he sees the world in the most enchanted colours : it is they that make women beautiful or fossils interesting : and the man may squander his estate and come to beggary, but if he keeps these two amulets he is still rich in the possibilities of pleasure. 35 Suppose he could take one meal so compact and compre- hensive that he should never hunger any more; suppose him, at a glance, to take in all the features of the world and allay the desire for knowledge; suppose him to do the like in any province of experience would not that man be in 40 a poor way for amusement ever after ? One who goes touring on foot with a single volume in his knapsack reads with circumspection, pausing often to re- flect, and often laying the book down to contemplate the landscape or the prints in the inn parlour; for he fears to 45 come to an end of his entertainment, and be left companion- less on the last stages of his journey. A young fellow re- cently finished the works of Thomas Carlyle, winding up, if we remember aright, with the ten note-books upon Fred- erick the Great. "What!" cried the young fellow in con- 50 sternation, "is there no more Carlyle? Am I left to the daily papers?" A more celebrated instance is that of Alex- ander, who wept bitterly because he had no more worlds to subdue. And when Gibbon had finished the Decline and Fall, he had only a few moments of joy ; and it was with 55 a "sober melancholy" that he parted from his labours. Happily we all shoot at the moon with ineffectual arrows ; our hopes are set on inaccessible El Dorado; we come to an end of nothing here below. Interests are only plucked up to sow themselves again, like mustard. You would 60 think, when the child was born, there would be an end to trouble ; and yet it is only the beginning of fresh anxieties ; and when you have seen it through its teething and its education, and at last its marriage, alas ! it is only to have ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 437 new fears, new quivering sensibilities, with every day; and the health of your children's children grows as touching a 65 concern as that of your own. Again, when you have married your wife, you would think you were got upon a hilltop, and might begin to go downward by an easy slope. But you have only ended courting to begin marriage. Falling in love and winning love are often difficult tasks to overbearing 70 and rebellious spirits ; but to keep in love is also a business of some importance, to which both man and wife must bring kindness and goodwill. The true love story commences at the altar, when there lies before the married pair a most beautiful contest of wisdom and generosity, and a lifelong 75 struggle towards an unattainable ideal. Unattainable? Ay, surely unattainable, from the very fact that they are two instead of one. "Of making books there is no end," complained the Preacher ; and did not perceive how highly he was praising 80 letters as an occupation. There is no end, indeed, to making books or experiments, or to travel, or to gathering wealth. Problem gives rise to problem. We may study forever, and we are never as learned as we would. We have never made a statue worthy of our dreams. And when we have 85 discovered a continent, or crossed a chain of mountains, it is only to find another ocean or another plain upon the further side. In the infinite universe there is room for our swiftest diligence and to spare. It is not like the works of Carlyle, which can be read to an end. Even 90 in a corner of it, in a private park, or in the neighbour- hood of a single hamlet, the weather and the seasons keep so deftly changing that although we walk there for a life- time there will be always something new to startle and delight us. 95 There is only one wish realizable on the earth; only one thing that can be perfectly attained : Death. And from a 438 ENGLISH LITERATURE variety of circumstances we have no one to tell us whether it be worth attaining. 100 A strange picture we make on our way to our chimseras, ceaselessly marching, grudging ourselves the time for rest ; indefatigable, adventurous pioneers. It is true that we shall never reach the goal ; it is even more than probable that there is no such place ; and if we lived for centuries and were 105 endowed with the powers of a god, we should find ourselves not much nearer what we wanted at the end. O toiling hands of mortals ! O unwearied feet, travelling ye know not whither ! Soon, soon, it seems to you, you must come forth on some conspicuous hilltop, and but a little way fur- 110 ther, against the setting sun, descry the spires of El Dorado. Little do ye know your own blessedness ; for to travel hope- fully is a better thing than to arrive, and the true success is to labour. NOTES THESE notes are intended to assist the student to such informa- tion only as is necessary to understanding the texts, and cannot readily be obtained by the student himself. Dates of composition and biographical details are not given, as a rule, because access to some history of literature is assumed. If no such history is in the student's hands, one or more of the standard works should be avail- able for reference. Perhaps the best one- volume work is that by Saintsbury (Longmans). An excellent book for the field indicated by its title is Hinchman and Gummere's Lives of Great English Writers (Houghton). Larger works of great value, accessible in most public libraries, are the Dictionary of National Biography (Mac- millan, 70 vols.) ; Garnett and Gosse's Illustrated History of English Literature (Macmillan, 4 vols.) ; the Cambridge History of English Literature (Putnams, 14 vols.). Words are not explained here if satisfactory definitions are to be found easily in such dictionaries as Webster's Secondary School Dic- tionary (American Book Co.), the Desk Standard (Funk and Wag- nails), or the Concise Oxford. Note on Variations in Spelling. In the texts the editor has aimed to follow the spelling of the particular authors ; in commenting on passages in these notes he uses the spellings that in his opinion have the sanction of the best usage to-day. This, while it seems a sound method to the editor, gives rise to some apparent inconsistencies. It is well known that British usage favors the form -our for many words in which American usage favors -or; and it does not seem necessary to normalize to the extent of changing either set of forms here. In the writing of proper names the difference is even more noticeable. Ben Jonson, for example, appears to have written "Shakespeare" (see page 92); Coleridge, "Shakspeare" (page 247); Carlyle, "Shakspear" (page 342). The editor, following Kittredge, Wendell, Dowden, and the New Shakspere Society prefers " Shakspere." Tennyson writes gray in one poem and grey in another ; fixed in one, fixt in another. Gray writes even in one line in the Elegy, ev'n in another. Throughout the volume effort has been made to reproduce faithfully the exact language of the authors. 439 440 NOTES [PAGES 1-2 Beowulf. A brief account of this anonymous Anglo-Saxon hero-poem should be read in some history of English literature. Professor Gummere in his translation has used the old rhyme- scheme, in which the two half -lines were united by alliteration (initial rhyme). Note spake . . . said, jewel . . . enjoy . . . jocund, Beowulf . . . battle-weeds; in line 14 the alliteration is of vowels every . . . earl . . . other any vowel alliterating with itself or with any other vowel. In the first selection Wealhtheow, wife of Hrothgar (line 22), king of the Danes, presents a jewel to Beowulf with a speech of gratitude to him for slaying the monster Grendel. 3. battle-weeds translates the Anglo-Saxon for "armor." Professor Gummere's word gives the alliteration, and is a compound of the kind favored by the old poets. Cf. bench-boards (25), beer-carouser (26) ; in the second selection sword-hungry (7), bandy-of-battle (29), bone-rings (37) every one of which is a close rendering of a compound in the original. Anglo-Saxon had not such a stock of synonyms from various sources as Modern English has, and it made up for the lack by compounding freely. 5. striplings, the young Danes who were present. 16. thanes, nobles. 19. Wyrd, fate. 27. Literally, "ready to go [to death], and doomed." Beer-carouser is used with no thought of condemnation. The warrior so designated, ^Eschere, is elsewhere referred to as Hrothgar's chief councilor. 30. athel- ing, noble. 36. sovran, old and etymologically more correct spelling of "sovereign." It is a word worth investigation by the student. The Fight. During the night, after Wealhtheow's presentation of the jewel, the mother of Grendel came to the hall Heorot (see line 58), and made off with ^Eschere. Beowulf volunteered to seek vengeance upon her in her home beneath the water. 1. Beowulf's nation are called Geats, War-Geats, Sea-Geats, Weder-Geats, and sometimes Weders. The significance of this last term is unknown. 8. guest in the earlier days was used of a hostile, as well as of a friendly, visitor. It is a cognate of the Latin hostis, an enemy or stranger. 13. sark, a good Anglo-Saxon word, survives in modern Scotch. See Burns's Tarn O' Shanter, line 150. 15. hent, seized. 16. bairn, her son Grendel. 20. Ecgtheow's son, Beowulf, eg is pronounced like dg in modern "edge." 23. holy God. The allu- sions to Christianity are due to a working-over of the poem in Eng- land. The original form of the story was purely pagan. PAGES 2-11] NOTES 441 28. Eotens, giants, or monsters. No ordinary sword could defeat them because all such were under a spell, or " conjured." 33. The Danes were sometimes called Scyldings, because the ruling dynasty was descended from Scyld (pronounce "Shild"). 37. bone-rings, neck. 42. heaven's candle is a favorite metaphor in our older poetry for "sun." 44. Hygelac was king of the Geats. 58. Heo- rot, the name of Hrothgar's hall, means " hart" or " stag." The hall was so named "from decorations in the gables that resembled the antlers of a deer." (Gummere.) C.DMON. The Paraphrase derives its chief interest for modern readers from certain resemblances between it and Paradise Lost. In the opinion of some scholars, it is "not impossible" that Milton knew the old poem; in the opinion of others, it is "unlikely." CYNEWTJLF is the greatest single name in Anglo-Saxon Christian poetry, though probably much verse has been wrongly attributed to him. The second passage given in the text is of interest because of the rare internal rhyme of lines 6-10, retained in the translation. BEDA wrote his history in Latin, and it was translated by Alfred the Great or under his supervision. 2. Ceolwulf was king of Northumbria from 729 to 737. His chief claim to remembrance, says the Dictionary of National Biography, is that Beda dedicated this history to him. Coming of the Angles. 2. Martianus was emperor of Rome ; Britain was at the time a Roman province. 5. the aforesaid king was the legendary Vortigern. 9. the foe were the Picts. 25. The Old Saxons lived in what is now Holstein. 29. Angulus, modern Schleswig. 51. Chaldees . . . burned . . . Jerusalem; see 2 Kings, XXV, 9-10. ALFRED THE GREAT. This Preface was a sort of circular letter sent to all bishops. Of all the manuscripts extant, only the one here followed has inserted the name of the bishop for whom it was intended. 16. on this side of the Humber, the south side, where Alfred had authority. 30. very few of the virtues; the old English might also mean "very few [loved] the virtues." 59. ye, all the bishops. 73. The title of Gregory's book is Cura Pastoralis. 81. A mancus had a value of about sixty cents; each clasp was worth, then, about thirty dollars. 83. minster, cathedral. 442 NOTES [PAGES 11-17 The Chronicle. It is scarcely worth while to identify the per- sons and places mentioned in these selections from the Chronicle. The entries given will show how entirely without method the earlier chronicles were. The monasteries kept these records ; and for any year the events recorded are merely those that happened to stick in the memory of the monk assigned to the task. To the Chronicle, however, all historians of England are greatly indebted. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is one of the finest Middle Eng- lish romances, most of which, including Sir Gawain, are anonymous. In the portion of the romance preceding our first selection a name- less huge knight, clad all in green, had come to Arthur's court on New Year's Day, and challenged any knight of the Round Table to give him a blow, and to promise a year later to seek the Green Knight and take a similar blow in return. Gawain accepts the challenge; and in the paragraph given Gawain is armed preparatory to setting out in search of his adversary. 10. byrnie, coat of mail. 16. bawd- rick, spelled also " baldric," a belt or sash. Gawain Keeps his Pledge. The blow which the Green Knight took from Gawain at Arthur's court severed his head. The Green Knight then seized the head in his hand, mounted his horse; and urging Gawain to keep the appointment a year later, he rode away. Such marvelous incidents are common in the medieval romances; but ordinary mortals did not possess such powers, as is indicated when Gawain says (line 35) : " If my head fall on the stones I can- not replace it." It may be noted that the Gawain of Tennyson's Idylls is a very different character from the Gawain of the medieval verse romances. In the latter he is one of the finest figures; the soul of courtesy, bravery, and honor. GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH'S History, though accepted as true throughout the Middle Ages, is now understood to be in large meas- ure fiction. Subsequent literature is largely indebted to Geoffrey for preserving many legends of Arthur, which have furnished in- spiration for many poets. 2. Legions is the name given by the Romans to Caerleon upon Usk, in southern Wales, the seat of Arthur's court. 24. Caliburn, called by Tennyson "Excalibur," following the Celtic and French forms rather than the Latin. 25. Avallon, the "Land of the Blessed" in Celtic mythology, has been by some identified with Glastonbury in Somersetshire, Arthur's burial place. 53. with his PAGES 17-21] NOTES 443 Caliburn alone. "Long time ago," or "Once upon a time," it was common for heroes to perform such deeds. 56. Colgrin, Bardulph, and Cheldric were the Saxon leaders. WICLIF. The passage from Wiclif (Matthew V, 1-12) is given in the original so that, the modern version being easily accessible, the student may get some idea of the language and manner of writ- ing of the time. It should be compared with Tyndale's version (page 68), as well as with the King James and the American Revised versions. The symbol 3 in this passage stands sometimes for gh, sometimes for y. LANGLAND. A brief account of the Vision should be read in a history of English literature or an encyclopedia. The first 34 and the last 14 lines of the Prologue are given. 12. wist, knew. 42. " God save you, Dame Emma." Probably a popular song of the day. Langland's use of the old alliterative rhyme (see Beowulf and notes) may be seen in many lines of the translation. MANDEVILLE'S Travels, like Geoffrey's History, found general acceptance in the Middle Ages, though its extravagance is very manifest to-day. The " Christian " empire of Pr ester John was sup- posed to be somewhere in the interior of Asia. 5. scripture, writ- ing. 12. barrettes, frauds, cautels, craftinesses. 20. in no man- ner season, at no time of year. 22. navy, ship. 27. to man's meat, for man's food. 28. journeys, days' travel. 33. flome, river. 44. of faerie, from fairyland. CHAUCER. Since a translation into Modern English accompanies the original, these notes do not usually give meanings of individual words. Where the Middle English is idiomatic, and therefore does not admit of literal translation, the idiom is explained. Suggestions for reading Chaucer. As in Latin, every word has as many syllables as it has vowels and diphthongs, except when final e is elided before a following vowel. For example, sole (line 1) and swete (5) are two syllables each : Aprille (1) is three syllables; but droghte (2) is only one syllable, as is veyne (3). a long (Aprille, 1 ; bathed, 3) is sounded as in modern father. a short (whan, that, 1), the same sound less prolonged. e long, also ee (eek, swete, 5) like a in ate. e short (hem, 11) as in get. i (or y) long (Aprille, 1 ; melodye, 9) as in machine. 444 NOTES [PAGES 22-23 i (or y) short (with, 1 ; y-ronne, 8) as in in. o long, also oo (sote, 1 ; goon, 12) as in vote. o short (on, 12) as in modern on. u long (nature, 11) as in French iMture, or German grun. u short (fid, 22 ; 6u<, 35) as in full, never as in modern but. ai, ay, ei, ey (veyne, 3 ; lay, 20) as in eight. au, aw (straunge, 13) like ow in cow. ou, ow (shoures, 1 ; yow, 38) as in you. All consonants are sounded. The only variations from modern English are ch, always as in which; and h (medial) and gh, like ch in German nicht. Prologue. 1. Whan that. As late as Shakspere's time "that" is often used after other conjunctions where the present idiom re- gards it as superfluous. Cf. lines 18, 41, 68, 149, etc. his is the possessive form of the neuter as well as the masculine pronoun regularly in English until the beginning of the seventeenth century. 5. Zephirus, the south wind. 7. The sun is called "young" in April because in Chaucer's time the year began with the vernal equinox. The adoption of January as the first month dates from the eighteenth century. 8. Ram (Aries) is the sign of the zodiac extending from about the middle of March to the middle of April. April covered half of the Ram and half of the Bull (Taurus) . y-ronne. y is the sign of the past participle, found in Anglo-Saxon and modern German as ge. 9. fowl for "bird" is the Anglo-Saxon fugol, same as German vogel. 11. hem and hir are the old forms of "them" and " their." 15. The old shire is found in the names of counties in many states as well as in England e.g., Hampshire, Wiltshire. 17. martir, Thomas a Becket, murdered in Canterbury Cathedral. for to seke. The use of "for" with the infinitive is regular until the seventeenth century. Cf . the King James (or Authorized) Version of the Bible, Matthew XI, 8: "What went ye out for to see?" seke in this line is not, of course, the same word as seke in the next, though they are spelled the same in Middle English. 19. Bifel. Omission of impersonal subject will be found fre- quently. 20. A tabard was a sort of vest, or sleeveless coat. The inn was named from its sign, which contained such a coat. South- work, on the south side of the Thames, is now a part of London. 29. atte, a common contraction of "at the." 33. The subject of made is " we," supplied (as the modern English idiom does not allow) from our in the next line. PAGES 24-30] NOTES 445 42. A Prioress was head of a priory, ranking next to an Abbess. 44. As Saint Loy, or Eligius, was reputed not to swear at all, an oath by him was no oath at all. Swearing was so general in earlier times that even the failure of an eminently religious woman to do so was cause for remark. 48-50. These lines are no reflection on the Prioress's French. They mean merely that she had not the Parisian accent. 51 ff. The account of her table manners agrees with the rules of conduct set down in many books of the time, and is meant to indicate that her manners were good. It should be re- called that forks had not then been invented. 51. with-alle has no modern equivalent and does not need to be translated. " Withal " is a word very much overworked to-day, especially by students. 58. ferthing; literally, a "fourth" part (cf. "farthing," a fourth of an English penny, equivalent to half a cent). 70. of smale houndes is the French idiom. 73. men, one, any one. Same as German man and French on. 76. eyen, a survival of the Anglo-Saxon "weak" declension, which formed the plural in -an. The only modern survivals of it are "oxen" and the poetic "kine." "Chil- dren" and "brethren" are irregular formations. 83. "A pair of beads," i.e., a rosary. After each ten beads of one material (here coral) there is a larger bead of different material or color, called a "gaud." 86. Amor (love), in the Prioress's vocabulary, was the sort mentioned in 1 Corinthians XIII ("charity" in the King James version is an inaccurate translation). 95. him was lever; literally, it was more pleasing to him. lever is the comparative of "leef," which survives in modern colloquial usage as "leave" "I'd as leave go." 99. In medieval tunes "philosopher" meant "alche- mist" as well as student of philosophy. The next line is a sly thrust at the alchemists, who sought to turn base metals into gold. 111. for the nones; literally, for that one time. The phrase is seldom used in its literal sense, and is indeed often best not trans- lated. 117-8. These lines are a good instance of the poet's keen observation, as well as of his humorous mixture of incongruous things, as it thoughte me; an impersonal construction similar to the "methinks" occasionally heard to-day. 121. Persoun is modern "parson." 135. ne . . .nat. . .ne; a good example of the double negative, which was correct in the old language, but is forbidden by modern grammar. 137. ferrest, if still preserved, would be "farrest." 166. for the nones. Cf. the translation, and the note on line 111 ; also the translation of line 172. 446 NOTES [PAGES 31-34 175. The prize in such contests was usually a ram. Notice that Chaucer gives most space here to a description of the Miller's ap- pearance. Contrast with the Clerk, where four lines are deemed sufficient. 181-3. Cf. line 118, and note. 184. The change of position of letters nosethirles to "nostrils," called "metathesis," occurs in a number of English words. Chaucer's brid thus becomes "bird," his crulle becomes "curly." 189. The milling of grain was done on shares, and this miller managed to get his share three times. 190. Millers tested the grain with their thumbs; hence, one who did it well, and thus increased his profits, might be said to have a golden thumb. It may be, however, that Chaucer has in mind the proverb, "An honest miller has a thumb of gold"; in which case, since no miller has a thumb of gold, he is saying that there are no honest millers, par dee, from French par dieu, literally, "by God," but in Chaucer's time hardly more than an emphatic bit of slang. 194. A Pardoner had a license, sometimes forged, to sell pardons and indulgences. A full and most interesting account of them is found in Ambassador Jusserand's English Wayfaring Life, pp. 308- 337. 195. Rouncival, a hospital in London. 196. court of Rome, the Pope's. Court is used in the same sense as when we speak of a secular ruler's (king's or emperor's) court. 197. "Com hider," probably a popular song of the day. Cf . Langland, line 42, and note. 207. him thoughte. See note on line 117. 209. eyen. Cf. line 76, and note. 210. vernicle, a copy of the handkerchief in St. Peter's Cathedral upon which a picture of Christ was said to have been miraculously imprinted. According to the legend, St. Veronica wiped Christ's face with it on the way to Calvary. 216. Berwick and Ware are far apart, fro Berwick unto Ware means "from one end of England to the other." 219. lady. This word, in Middle English as in Anglo-Saxon, had no -s in the genitive. "Lady Day" (see dictionary) is a modern survival of the idiom. 228. than that. Cf. note on whan that, line 1. 231. attelaste. Cf. line 29, and note. 232. This line means that he performed well his part of the church service ; particularly as indicated by the two lines following, though we learn that he was also a good preacher. 234. alderbest, best of all. alder is for alter (cf. Line 321 below), genitive plural of al, all. 243. The Bell was another inn named from its sign. 249. our hoste; his name is given elsewhere as Harry Bailly. The picture of him in these closing lines of the Prologue is one of Chaucer's best, PAGES 34-39] NOTES 447 and is more fully drawn in several links connecting the tales. 250. far to. Cf. note on line 17. han, contraction of haven, have, mar- shal in a hall, director of banquets. 252. Chepe, Cheapside, a dis- trict of London. 258. The host saw that the bills were paid before he became friendly with the company. 266. He also assumed that money was a first consideration with others. 271. confort. The change of n to m in modern English, called "partial assimilation," is for ease in pronunciation. 275. if yow liketh; another impersonal construction like those in lines 207 and 117. 282. seche is the form used in the Southern dialect, as seke (line 17) is that used in the Northern. A similar difference is seen in place-names derived from Latin castra, which became Lancaster in the North, but Winchester in the South. Chaucer wrote in the Midland dialect, which was naturally a sort of compromise ; and he used besides forms taken from both geographical extremes. 298. Harry Bailly's eye for business is again evident. If the prize- winner is to have a supper at the expense of the rest, doubtless the rest will eat with him; and Harry uses very specific language to make sure that the feast will be at the Tabard. 321. was our oiler cok, was cock of us all ; i.e., roused us, as the cock rouses people by crowing. 324. the watering of Saint Thomas, a place to water horses, was a few miles on the road to Canterbury. 328. "If evening song and morning song agree"; that is, if your decision this morning agrees with that of last night. 333. ferrer. Cf. note on line 137. 337. neer is comparative of " nigh" ; " next " is the old superlative. Modern English has taken the old compara- tive for the positive, and on that has formed a regular comparative and superlative. The Pardoner's Tale. This tale forms the greater part of a sermon on the Pardoner's favorite text Radix malorum est cupi- ditas (1 Timothy VI, 10 "Avarice is the root of evils"). Nearly 200 lines omitted here (coming between our lines 14 and 15) give numerous examples from Biblical and secular history to show the evils resulting from "wine and drunkenness." The sermon has a prologue of 134 lines in which the Pardoner explains in detail to the Pilgrims his manner of preaching. He is for once in his life very honest, and shows that in the pulpit he attacks the very vice he uses avarice. The Pardoner, portrayed in the general prologue, in the prologue to his own story, in the story itself, and in a dia- logue with the host following it, is one of Chaucer's best-drawn 448 NOTES [PAGES 40-44 figures, and is wholly true to fact. Most pardoners were rascals of the worst kind, against whom the Pope's orders and the efforts of bishops were for a long time powerless. 12. Swearing by God's (that is, Christ's) eyes, nails, head, etc., was formerly common. The modern " zounds," still occasionally heard, is the only survival of this practice. It means " by God's wounds." Line 13 refers to the Crucifixion. 15. three. When the Pardoner, after a long digression on "wine and drunkenness," returns to his tale, it occurs to him that he can be more effective with a limited number of " rioters," instead of the indefinite " com- pany " with which he began. 17. for to drinke. See note on Pro- logue, 17. 19. Note that the pronoun subject of the verb is omitted, an idiom often found as late as Shakspere. Modern Eng- lish permits the omission only of the object pronoun. 20. gan callen; merely the past tense. If he had meant "began to call," he would have written " bigan to." 26. pardee. See note on Prologue, 190. 32. mo is not a cut form of " more." It is derived from Anglo-Saxon ma, while " more " is from mar a, though both Anglo-Saxon words mean the same. " mo " and " more " are distinguished as late as Shakspere ; the former is equivalent to our "more" (cf. Macbeth, 5.3.35: "Send out mo horses"), the latter to our "greater " (cf. Macbeth, 1. 7. 50) : " then you were a man ; And, to be mare than what you were, you would Be so much more the man." 33. this pestilence is an allusion to the great plague that swept over England in the latter part of the fourteenth century. 46. God- des armes, and Goddes digne bones (line 49) are illustrations of "tear- ing God's body to pieces." (See note on line 12.) 56. Togidres is an old genitive form used adverbially. Of many such in earlier days, "needs " (" I must needs go "), " else " (originally ettes), and the time adverbs "once" (ones), "twice," "thrice" are survivals. 72. artow, art thou; and 73, livestow, livest thou, are spellings due to pronunciation. Note that although to-day we write "don't you," "can't you," etc., we almost habitually say "donchoo," "canchoo," etc. 74. gan loke. See note on line 20. 75. For the double nega- tive, cf. Prologue, 135, and note. 88. The old man kept all his earthly possessions in a chest. 97-8. See Leviticus XIX, 32. PAGES 45-53] NOTES 449 102. wher ye go or ryde, literally, wherever you walk or ride. 106. partest, departest. For the same use in a modern work see the first line of Gray's Elegy: " The curfew tolls the knell of parting day." 124. A gold florin, first coined in 1343, was of the value of six shillings. The modern English florin is silver, and of the value of two shillings. 170. noot = ne woot, do not know. 173. shrew. Note that this is now used only as feminine and with a very special- ized meaning. 198. Cf. Prologue, 29 and 231, and notes on these lines. 202. Satan was once given permission to bring one of the faithful to sorrow. See Job I, 12 ; II, 6. 215. nis = ne is, is not. Cf . noot, line 170. 219. sterve, die, is the same word as the German sterben. In modern English its meaning has been specialized, and its spelling changed to " starve." With sterve and sterben may be compared English "knave" and German knabe, where besides the change of consonant the English word, as in the case of sterve, has been specialized. The student who cares to know of other similar changes of meaning will find an interesting chapter on the subject in Greenough and Kittredge's Words and Their Ways in English Speech (chap. XVII). 228. shoop, literally, shaped. The verb belonged to the " strong " conjugation in Anglo-Saxon and Middle English. Cf. storven, line 242. 232. There are few tales with so skillful a conclusion as this. Chaucer gives abundant details in pre- paring for the climax; but when he comes to the tragic moment, he wastes no words in telling how they killed each other, contenting himself with saying that both sides carried out their plans. Chaucers Wordes. 2. Boece, Chaucer's translation of The Con- solations of Philosophy, by Boethius, a Roman philosopher of the sixth century. Troilus, Chaucer's long poem, Troilus and Cressida. POPULAR BALLADS. Sir Patrick Spens. 1. Dumferling, for " Dunfermline," a town sixteen miles northwest of Edinburgh, the seat of a royal palace. Many Scottish kings are buried there. 6. (who) sat. See note on Chaucer's Pardoner's Tale, 19. Cf. line 12. 9. has written. Note how much narrative is omitted between lines 8 and 9. Cf. the omission between 20 and 21. The ballads are always notable for condensation and directness, braid, Scotch for "broad"; here in the sense of "open," "clear." 30. shoon, old form for " shoes." 32. swam aboon, floated on the 450 NOTES [PACKS 54-61 surface of the water. 38. kerns, combs. For the form, cf. Ger- man kamm. 27-8. Another version of the ballad reads here : " It's a token, maister, or ye were born, It will be a deadly storm." 31. or, ere. In or ere (line 35) the ere is redundant. 41. Aber- dour is doubtless for " Aberdeen," the form found in other versions of the ballad. Bonnie George Campbell. Other versions have "James " instead of George. Some editors have given this ballad a definite historical setting; but as Professor Child says: "Campbells enow were killed, in battle or feud ... to forbid a guess as to an individual James or George grounded upon the slight data afforded by the ballad." 1. Hielands, the Scottish Highlands. 2. Toy, a river in the Lowlands. 10. greeting fu' sair, weeping very sorely. 12. rivin', tearing. 15. loom, empty, big, build. Lord Randal. In addition to numerous British versions of this ballad, there are related ballads in nearly all European languages. Kemp Owyne. Disenchantment by a kiss is a widespread theme in folk-lore. See "The Enchanted Dragon," in Fairy Tales of All Nations, dee, do. 11. Kemp, champion. Owyne, found in medieval romances as "Owain," " Ywein," "Yvain," is modern "Owen." 12. borrow, set free, ransom. 51. brand, sword. Robin Hood's Death and Burial. The second and last lines of the first stanza are a meaningless refrain, a feature frequently found in primitive verse intended to be sung. Cf. the song in As You Like It, 5. 3 : " It was a lover and his lass, With a hey and a ho and a hey nonino." 10. The practice of "letting blood" was formerly common as a remedy for all sorts of diseases. 11. Kirkly, probably Kirkstall Abbey, in Yorkshire, the "Robin Hood country." 16. ring, the "knocker" which formerly served as the modern doorbell. 48. dree, endure. We should now say "run." CAXTON. 5. clerk, scholar. 27. doubted, was apprehensive. 45. that common English, etc. Some idea of the differences in dia- lects of Caxton's day may be got by noting the modern equivalents of various old forms. "Church" and "kirk," for instance, are PAGES 61-68] NOTES 451 merely different pronunciations of Anglo-Saxon cirice. See note on Chaucer's Prologue, 282. 48. Zealand, a province of Holland. 49. Foreland, a headland near Dover. 56. In Middle English there were two forms for the plural of egg the "weak" form eyren (see note on Chaucer's Prologue, 76) and the " strong " eggys (modern "eggs"). The first of these disappeared in the first half of the sixteenth century. 68. uplandish first meant pertaining to uplands ; later, pertaining to country districts. From the latter it came to mean "uncultured," "unrefined," the sense in Caxton. MALORY. 2. the French book has not been identified. Malory obtained his material from various sources. 3. estates, classes of people; in England, the lords spiritual, the lords temporal, and the. commons, or. See note on Sir Patrick Spens, line 31. 17. scripture. See note on Mandeville, line 5. 22. let purvey, cause to be provided. 33. livelihood, liveliness. 35. nourished, foster. 41. the lady, the queen, Guinevere. WYATT. 1. fowls, birds. See note on Chaucer's Prologue, 9. 5. other, others. 12. eyen. See note on Caxton, line 56. 14. glead, gleed, fire. SURREY. Description of Spring. 1. soote, sweet. 2. eke, also. 4. turtle-dove. 5. summer is often used in the older poetry for "spring." spray, branch. 8. flete, float. 11. mings, mingles, mixes. Death of Priam. Surrey's translation of the JEneid is memor- able as the first English use of blank verse, the meter of the Eliza- bethan drama, and of most of the long poems in English literature from Paradise Lost to Idylls of the King. 5. Hecuba, Priam's wife. 14. ne, nor. 15. Hector was the great champion of the Trojans. He was slain by Achilles (see lines 41-4). 21. Pyrrhus, son of Achilles, called also (line 53) Neoptolem. 40. thou, Pyrrhus. 51. Pelide, Achilles. The name means "son of Peleus." 53. swerved out of kind, turned from his natural self. TYNDALE. This selection, like the same passage from Wiclif's translation (see page 17), is printed with all its peculiarities of spell- ing as a specimen of early sixteenth century English. LYLY. Queen Elizabeth. Lyly's absurd adulation of the Queen is typical of the attitude of the period toward her. She was a great 452 NOTES [PAGES 68-73 sovereign, and the development of the national life under her rule was most marked; but impartial historians do not see her as any such paragon as she is here presented. Lyly also set a fashion in writing, called from his romance "euphuism," the chief characteris- tics of which may be seen in the very first sentence overworking of the balanced structure and antithesis, and frequent use of allit- eration (prisoner prince, castle crown) and play on words (head) . 1. This queen, Mary, who died in 1558. 4. Elizabeth was a prisoner during the early part of Mary's reign, but not at the time of Mary's death. Lyly could not resist the opportunity for an- tithesis and alliteration. 9. Praxiteles, Greek sculptor. 10. her son, Cupid. 16. Zeuxis, Greek painter. 23. Apelles, Greek painter. 28. color, portray. 53. tickle, ticklish, uncertain. 54. twist, slender thread. Cupid and Campaspe. This charming little song is from one of Lyly's comedies, Alexander and Campaspe. SIDNEY. Between 1575 and 1600 a large number of sonnets were written. It was the fashion to write series ("sequences ") of them in honor of a loved one. Sidney's 108 record an unhappy love affair. XV. 2. Parnassus, mountain in Greece sacred to the Muses. 4. poesie, poetry, with perhaps a pun on "posy." wring, force. 7. Petrarch. See page 477, note on Scorn not the Sonnet, 4 ff . 8. deni- zen'd wit, words naturalized in English. 9. far-fet, far-fetched. 10. touch, feeling. The poet says that any one who wants the most beautiful comparisons need only draw from Stella's looks. XXXI. 4. archer, Cupid. 5. On that following a conjunction, see note on Chaucer's Prologue, line 1. Arcadia is a pastoral romance, somewhat like a novel. Sidney wrote it for his sister, the Countess of Pembroke, and it was not published until after his death. 11. withal, at the same time. 16. accompanable, having the possibility of company. 18. Musi- dorus, Claius (22), and Kalander (34) are characters in the story. 20-21. "the one lacking no plenty, the other having no plenty but of things lacking." This is a good specimen of "euphuistic" writing. 29. unhospitable, inhospitable. SPENSER'S spelling and vocabulary are not characteristic of the time, but intentionally archaic. The adding of superfluous letters (as in hollownesse, 1, deare, 2), and the omission of usual letters (as PAGES 74-78] NOTES ' 453 in brightnes, 5), result in a queer looking page at first; but this sort of difficulty is only apparent. His archaic words make use of a large dictionary essential. For The Faerie Queene he invented a stanza, since called the "Spenserian," the scheme of which (rhyme- order and length of lines) should be worked out by the student. Of other poems in this measure perhaps the most famous are Byron's Childe Harold and Keats's Eve of St. Agnes, both of which are repre- sented in this volume. 3. then, than. 5. her, i.e., beauty's. 8. perst, pierced. 9. dy, die. 11. Una is the personification of truth in an elabo- rate allegory running through the poem. 17. her knight, the Red Cross Knight, hero of Book I of The Faerie Queene; typifies Holi- ness. 8. deryv'd, diverted. 21. preace, press. 37. fortuned, chanced. 39. salvage, savage. 42. attonce, at once, corse, body. 43. pray, prey, ny, nigh. 45. forse, force. 48. weet, know. 53. gan melt. See note on Chaucer's Pardoner's Tale, 20. Spenser's sonnet-sequence (see introductory note on Sidney), called Amoretti, consists of eighty-eight sonnets addressed to Eliza- beth Boyle, afterwards his wife. XXXIV. 5. wont, was accustomed. LXXIX. 1. credit, believe. 8. ensue, succeed, follow. Prothalamion was written for the wedding of two daughters of the Earl of Worcester. It tells of a visit by the prospective brides to Essex House (the stately place of line 11), on the Thames near London. This house had been the home of the Earl of Leicester, patron of Spenser until his death in 1588 (see lines 12-13), and was now occupied by the Earl of Essex (the noble peer of line 19). The selection in the text, comprising the last three stanzas of the poem, is sufficient to give the student an impression of the poet's smooth, musical verse. Spenser is known as "the poet's poet," and Pro- thalamion shows admirably the quality that has brought him the designation. 2. my most kyndly nurse is the poet's tribute to the city of his birth. 6-10. These lines refer to the Temple, once headquarters of the Knights Templar, but now for a long time occupied chiefly by lawyers. 9. wont; see note on sonnet XXXIV, 5. 14. whose want, the lack of whom, i.e., of Leicester. 21. Essex had laid waste the city of Cadiz in Spain. 22. The "pillars of Hercules" are promontories on the Strait of Gibraltar. 30. forraine, foreign. 31. Elisa is Queen Elizabeth. 38. Hesper, the evening star. 454 NOTES [PAGKS 78-85 43. Two gentle knights, the bridegrooms. 47. twins of Jove, Castor and Pollux, the constellation Gemini in the bauldricke of the heavens (48), i.e., the Zodiac. BACON. Of Adversity. 1. Seneca, Roman philosopher and writer of tragedies ; first century . 11. transcendences, exaggerations. 20. in a mean, with moderation. 21. temperance, moderation. 26. David's harp, the book of Psalms. 37. incensed, set on fire, as in a censer. Of Marriage and Single Life. 2. impediments, hindrances. 11. impertinences, things having no pertinence, i.e., not pertaining to themselves. 19. liberty, desire for liberty. 20. humorous, subject to humors, or moods. 25. churchmen, priests, preachers. 27. indifferent, undesirable. 30. hortatives, exhortations. 35. ex- haust, exhausted. 40. Vetulam, etc. " He preferred his old wife to immortality." Ulysses was offered immortality by the goddess Calypso if he would live with her ; but he declined and went back to Penelope. 46. quarrel, excuse. 47. one of the wise men, Thales, Greek philosopher. Of Wisdom for a Man's Self. 1. shrewd, harmful. 6. right earth, merely earth, earthy. 7. his, its, i.e., the earth's. See note on Chaucer's Prologue, line 1. 15. eccentric to, having a different center, i.e., aim, motive. 18. accessory, subordinate. 26. bias upon their bowl, weight upon the ball used in bowling, which makes its course a curve. 27. after the model of, shaped to accord with. 32. and, if. 35. respect, consideration. 44. sui, etc., " lovers of themselves without a rival." Of Youth and Age. 5. invention, ingenuity. 10. Severus, Roman emperor, third century. 11. Juventutem, etc. "He spent a youth full of errors, even of acts of madness." 14. Cosmus, Cosimo de Medici. 15. Gaston de Fois, French general, sixteenth century. 16. composition, disposition. 20. them, old men. 21. abuseth, deceives. 28. absurdly modifies pursue, care not, do not hesitate. 35. compound, mix. 39. extern, external. 43. the text. See Joel II, 28. 52. Hermogenes, Greek, second century. 57. Tully, better known by his last name Cicero. Hor- tensius, Cicero's greatest rival. Idem, etc. "He continued the same when it was no longer becoming." 60. Scipio, Roman general. Livy, Roman historian. 61. Ultima, etc. "His end fell below his beginning." PAGES 86-90] NOTES 455 Of Studies. 10. humour, peculiarity. 14. contemn, despise, consider of little value. 16. without, beyond. 22. curiously, with great care. 31. present, quick. 35. Abeunt, etc. " Studies develop into habits." 36. stand, hindrance. 45. cymini sec- tores, hair-splitters; persons given to making fine distinctions. 48. receipt, remedy. Bacon's condensed style produces many memorable passages. The last essay alone contains a number of sayings that have almost become proverbs. MARLOWE. A Boast of Tamburlaine is a typical example of what Ben Jonson called " Marlowe's mighty line." Tamburlaine was a Scythian shepherd who aspired to conquer the whole world, and almost succeeded in doing so. Marlowe makes him almost the personification of the desire for power. 6. Cynthia, the moon. 10. your turning spheres, the stars. 13. Bithynia, in ancient times, a country in Asia Minor. 14. ex- halation; five syllables here. The suffix -lion is frequently counted as two syllables in poetry. 20. Clymene's son, Prometheus. 21. axle-tree, axis. SHAKSPERE. Since considerations of space prevent printing a complete play here, the greatest of all English poets is represented by some songs and sonnets. The Elizabethan Age is almost as notable for lyric verse as for dramatic ; and Shakspere surpassed all writers in both fields. Over hitt, etc., is a song of Puck, the fairy. 2. thorough is the same as "through." Modern English uses the first exclusively as an adjective, the second as preposition ; but up to the seventeenth century they were used interchangeably. 9. Queen Elizabeth's body-guard, her favorite attendants, were " Gentlemen Pensioners." "They were the handsomest men of the first families, tall, as the cowslip was to the fairy, and shining in their spotted gold coats like that flower under an April sun." Under the greenwood tree celebrates the joys of forest life as seen by an exiled duke and his train. Hark, hark ! the lark. 2. Phcebus, the sun. 4. chaliced, shaped like chalices, or cups. Where the bee sucks is a song by the sprite Ariel, a very different fairy from Puck. 456 NOTES [PAGES 91-94 Sonnets. Many theories have been advanced in explanation of Shakspere's sonnet-sequence (see introductory note on Sidney's Astrophel and Stella, page 16). No evidence has yet been cited to identify with certainty any of the persons alluded to in them, or to show that they record any real experiences or events. Shakspere adopted a new rhyme-scheme which the student should examine and compare with the schemes of Sidney, Spenser, and later writers. BEN JONSON. To the Memory. This tribute by the greatest contemporary of Shakspere's last years was printed in the first col- lected edition of the dramatist's works, known as the First Folio. It was published in 1623, seven years after Shakspere's death. 5. all men's suffrage, all men agree to it. 18. Francis Beaumont was a great dramatist of the day, who wrote most of his plays in con junction with John Fletcher. 25. of years, mature. 27. Lyly, Kyd, and Marlowe were the greatest dramatists before Shakspere. The first wrote comedies; under the influence of which Shakspere wrote his early comedies Love's Labour's Lost and Two Gentlemen of Verona. The other two were writers of tragedy. 29. though thou hadst, etc. This line has been frequently interpreted to mean that Shakspere had no education. Ben Jonson was a classical scholar ; and what he considered small Latin and less Greek might still be a very respectable attainment in those languages. 31. jfischylus, Euripides, and Sophocles were the greatest writers of Greek tragedy ; Pacuvius, Accius, and him of Cordova (i.e., Seneca) the greatest of Roman. 34. buskin stands for tragedy, because in ancient times actors in tragedy wore buskins, or high-heeled boots. Similarly, sock, a slipper worn in comedy, stands for comedy itself. 41. This line, probably the most frequently quoted singio passage about Shakspere, means that his plays are universal in their truth to life. 49. Aristophanes, Greek comic writer; Terr-nee and Plautus, Roman. 52. As, as if. 67. shake a lance may be a pun on the dramatist's name. A writer about the time Shakespere began to write called him a "Shake-scene." 72. Eliza, Queen Elizabeth. 75. rage or influence, power for good or evil. The terms are from the science (so-called) of astrology. HERRICK, CAREW, LOVELACE, and SUCKLING are known as the " Cavalier " poets, because their sympathies were with the Cavaliers, or adherents of the Stuart kings, James I and Charles I. In con- PAGES 95-103] NOTES 457 trast with them were the "Puritans," of whom the chief representa- tive was Milton, and who opposed the Stuart rule and brought about the execution of Charles and the establishment of the Com- monwealth under Cromwell. The Cavaliers, were, of course, the aristocrats; and their poets dealt with lighter subjects, or in a lighter way with serious subjects than did the Puritans. Some his- tory of literature should be consulted for a detailed statement of their characteristics. Corinna's Going A-Maying. Corinna is a fanciful name, not representing, so far as we know, any real person. The same is true of other names in succeeding poems Sapho, Julia, Celia, Lucasta, Althea. 2. god unshorn, the sun in all his brilliance; i.e., not darkened by clouds. 3. Aurora, goddess of dawn. 14. May, May flowers. 17. Flora, goddess of flowers. 22. against, until. 28. beads, prayers. See "rosary" in large dictionary, and note on Chaucer's Prologue, line 83. 35. white-thorn, hawthorn. 48. that. See note on Chaucer's Prologue, line 1. 51. green gown, a tumble on the grass. 65. or or, either or. To Phillis. 19. carcanets, necklaces. 25. wakes, festivals. 30. hey, a country round dance. 46. for to. See note on Chau- cer's Prologue, 17. 47. possets and wassails are mixed drinks. CAREW. Song. 6. orbs; allusion to the "music of the spheres," which should be looked up in the dictionary. 8. nard, a fragrant ointment, or the plant from which that is made. LOVELACE. The two poems given in the text are almost the only poems of real worth written by this poet. In addition to their value as poems, they are memorable for two passages that have become almost proverbial lines 1 1-12 of the first, and 25-26 of the second. To Althea. 10. allaying, diluting. Thames means merely "water." SUCKLING. Constant Lover. 12. stays, delays. 13. The grammatical error in this line will be found occasionally in the best poets, and is not always justifiable, as it is here, by the requirements of rhyme. MILTON. L' Allegro and II Penseroso are companion pictures, giving the views of life held by the "cheerful" man and the "con- templative" man. They are composed on the same plan, each 458 NOTES [PAGES 103-107 presenting an ideal day. The parallelism is clearly indicated ; and the student should note the time-references, and work out the two schemes for a day's occupation. 2. Cerberus, the three-headed dog that guarded the entrance to Hades. 3. Stygian cave, the region where the river Styx flows, i.e., Hades. 4. This line is one of the best examples of "onomat- opoeia," or the use of words whose sound contributes to the sense. Note the number of hissing sounds. 5. uncouth, unknown; the etymological meaning. 10. In the land of the Cimmerians there was no sun, according to Homer (Odyssey, XI). 12. yclept, called. Euphrosyne, one of the three Graces. 29. Hebe, goddess of youth. 31. Care is the object of derides; that (i.e., "sport") is the subject. 45. to come is in the same construction as to live (39), and to hear (41). L'Allegro, the cheerful man (me, line 38), likes to come to his window and welcome the morning. 62. liveries, costumes, colors. 67. tells his tale, counts his sheep. This old sense of tell is found in "teller," one who counts money in a bank, or one who counts votes in a legislative body. 70. landskip; old spelling of "landscape." round, for "around," is here an adverb ; it is subject of measures. 77. Towers and battlements. Milton here probably gives a bit of realism, alluding to the towers of Windsor Castle, which could be seen from his home at Horton. 80. cynosure means, first, the constellation familiarly known as the "Little Dipper," which contains the pole-star. It later was used for the pole-star alone, from which it came to mean (as here) any center of attraction. 83 ff. Corydon, Thyrsis, Phillis, Thestylis are stock names in pastoral poetry. 85. messes, dishes. 91. secure is used here in its etymological sense, "free from care." 94. rebeck was somewhat like the modern fiddle. 103-4. she . . . he, narrators of the stories of line 101. friar's lantern, will o' the wisp. 110. lubber, clumsy. 120. weeds, garments; in this sense the word is now limited to the phrase "widow's weeds." 122. influence. The word is bor- rowed from the science of astrology. Cf. Jonson's To the Memory of Shakespeare, 75. 125. Hymen, god of marriage. 132. sock, comedy. See note on Jonson's To the Memory of Shakespeare, 35. Ben Jonson's comedies are noted for the learning displayed in them, as Shakspere's are noted for their native genius. PAGES 107-110] NOTES 459 136. Lydian airs, one of the Greek modes of music, soft and sweet. The others were the Dorian, bold and brave; and the Phrygian, brisk and spirited. 139. bout, turn. 145 ff. When Eurydice, wife of Orpheus, was taken to the land of shades (Hades), Pluto was prevailed on by Orpheus 's music to let her go back to earth with him on condition that the musician should not look behind him on the journey. When they had nearly reached safety, Orpheus turned to be sure Eurydice was following, and she was snatched back to Hades. II Penseroso. 3. bested (accented on second syllable), profit. 6. fond, foolish. 10. pensioners. See note on Shakspere's Over hill, over dale, line 9. Morpheus, god of sleep and dreams. 18. Since Memnon was the handsomest, of men, the poet infers that his sister was the most beautiful of women. 19. starred Ethiop queen, Cassiope, changed into the constellation Cassiopeia. 29. Ida was a mountain near Troy. 39. commercing, communing. 56. Philomel, the nightingale. L'Allegro's bird (line 42) is the lark, bird of morning. 59. Cynthia, the moon. 76. This line is another good instance of onomatopreia, producing a very different effect from line 4 of L' Allegro. 83-84. The bellman used to go about the streets at night, says an old chronicler, to ' ' give warning of fire and candle, and to help the poor and to pray for the dead." His cries are given in a poem by Herri ck as follows: " From noise of scare-fires rest ye free, From murder, Benedicite ! From all mischances that may fright Your pleasing slumbers in the night, Mercy secure ye all, and keep The goblin from ye while ye sleep ! " 87. the Bear, the constellation known also as the " Great Dipper." Since in the latitude of England it never sets, to outwatch it means to stay awake all night. 88. thrice-great is merely a translation of "Trismegistus." This Hermes was a philosopher in ancient Egypt, unsphere, recall from the sphere or region in which he now dwells. 91. forsook. The use of past tense instead of participle is allowed by "poetic license" when the meter requires a shorter word. 95. consent, sympathy. 99-100. These lines give the subjects treated in ancient tragedy. 102. buskined, tragic. See note on Jonson's To the Memory of Shakespeare, 34. Cf. L' Allegro, 132, and note. 460 NOTES ' [PAGES 110-114 104. Musaeus, a mythical poet, son of Orpheus. 105-8. See note on U Allegro, 145. 109. him, etc., Chaucer. The story here alluded to, given to the Squire in the Canterbury Tales, was left unfinished by the poet. 113. virtuous, having magic virtue (power). 123. tricked, adorned. 124. Attic boy, Cephalus, beloved of Aurora (Morn). 125. kerchieft, wearing a cloud as a head-cover- ing. Look up "kerchief" for etymology and original meaning. 134. Sylvan, a woodland deity. 140. profaner, more vulgar , or common. 148. The antecedent of his is Sleep. 153. good modifies spirit. 154. Genius, spirit. 156. pale, enclosure. 159. "Windows richly decorated with Bible stories." 162. quire, old spelling of "choir." 170. spell, study. Lycidas. The learned Friend was Edward King, a companion of Milton's at Christ College, Cambridge (lines 23-31). He was something of a poet ; and Milton puts his memorial in the form of a "pastoral" poem, as if one shepherd lamented the death of another. Many of the names and allusions are taken from famous pastoral poets of ancient times e.g., Damoetas (36), Amaryllis (68), Neaera (69), Arethuse (85; river celebrated by Theocritus), Hindus (86; river near Virgil's home), Alpheus (132; river god), and Lycidas. Lines 1-5 may be paraphrased as follows : " After some years of silence I again seek rewards as poet ; and, under stress, I must take them before my time." 15-16. Sisters, etc., the Muses, born at the Pierian spring, situated at the foot of Mount Olympus. 20. lucky, favorable. 25. lawns, pastures. 29. battening, fatten- ing. The passage beginning with line 23 means that they studied and wrote together. 33. oaten flute, the musical instrument of shepherds, according to pastoral poets. 54. Mona, the island of Anglesey, north of Wales, a home of the Druids. 55. Deva, the river Dee, on which is situated the city of Chester, from which King sailed. It is called a wizard stream be- cause many legends were associated with it. 56. fondly, foolishly (because his dreaming was of no avail). 58. the Muse, Calliope. 61 ff. rout, etc. Thracian women tore Orpheus to pieces and threw his head into the Hebrus, which washed it ashore on the island of Lesbos. 64-84. These lines, in which the poet digresses from his theme, lament the low state of poetry : 67-69 may indicate Milton's opinion of Cavalier poetry. 64. what boots it, of what use is it. 75. Fury, Atropos, the third Fate, who cuts the thread of life. PAGES 115-118] NOTES 461 Clotho, the first Fate, spins the thread ; Lachesis, the second, twists it. 77. Phoebus, Apollo, god of poetry. 88. This line means that the poet has finished his digression and is returning to his main line of thought. 90. "That plead in the name of the god of the sea." 96. Hippotades, ^Eolus, god of the winds. 99. Panope, a sea-nymph. 101. built in the eclipse. In ancient times (not Milton's), when the cause of eclipses was not known, things done during such periods were supposed to be un- lucky. 103. Camus, god of the river Cam, on which Cambridge (seat of Milton's and King's university) was located. 106. flower, hyacinth, said to have on its petals the Greek for "alas." 108-31. For comment on these lines, see our selection from Ruskin, pages 382-8. 124. See notes on L' 'Allegro, 4, and II Penseroso, 76. 133. Sicilian Muse, muse of pastoral poetry; so called from Theocritus, the greatest pastoral poet of ancient times, who lived in Sicily. 136. use, dwell. 142. rathe, early. This word is found now in the comparative form only, " rather." 151. laureate hearse, bier decked with laurel. 158. monstrous world, world of monsters. 160. fable, i.e., fabled home, Land's End, called Bellerium by the Romans. 161. On St. Michael's Mount, near Land's End, the Archangel Michael was said to have appeared ; and there is still a superstition that the mount is guarded by him. 162. Namancos, on which was located the castle of Bayona, will not be found on modern maps. An old atlas locates it in Spain, near Cape Finisterre. 163. Angel, Michael, ruth, pity. 176. unexpressive, inexpres- sible. 184. in thy large recompense, as thy large reward. 186. un- couth may be understood either in its old sense, "unknown," or in its present sense, "rude" or "uncultivated." 189. Doric, pastoral. Theocritus wrote in the Doric dialect. Truth and Conformity. Areopagitica (Are6paglt'ia) is a long essay addressed by Milton to Parliament in opposition to an order "to regulate printing," which required "that no book, pamphlet, or paper be henceforth printed, unless the same be first approved and licensed" by officials appointed for that purpose. It is a time- honored argument for the freedom of the press, of which a great deal of discussion has recently taken place in connection with the publication of war news. The title is from an oration by Isocrates before the Areopagus, or high council of Athens. 3. The temple of Janus. The gates of the temple were open in 462 NOTES [PAGES 118-123 times of war, closed in times of peace. Milton means that at the time he wrote Truth and Falsehood were at war. 5. winds of doctrine. See Ephesians IV, 14. 9. her confuting, confuting by her. 12. discipline of Geneva, doctrines of the Presbyterians of Milton's day. 13. fabricked, fabricated. 17. to seek for wis- dom. See Matthew XIII, 44. 38. Micaiah did. See 1 Kings XXII, 1-28. 44. hand-writing nailed to the cross. See Colossians II, 14. 45. See, e.g., Galatians V, 1. His doctrine. See Romans XIV, 5-9. 54. a linen decency refers to the use of vestments, and means "a mere external orderliness." It was a ghost because, though the wearing of vestments had been suppressed, the spirit of it still lingered. 67. subdichotomies, minor divisions. 70. wheat from the tares. See Matthew XIII, SIR THOMAS BROWNE was, politically, a neutral during the Civil War and the Commonwealth. He took up his residence in a se- cluded country place, and wrote his Religio Medici (" Religion of a Physician") chiefly to examine his own beliefs. Though a member of the Church of England, he was an early example of a thorough- going religious "liberal." Heaven and Hell. 10. about, i.e., upon. 14. Legion. See Mark V, 1-9. 15. Anaxagoras, Greek philosopher, fifth century B.C. conceited, conceived, thought. 16. Magdalene. See Luke VIII, 2. 18. ubi (Latin conjunction, "where"), self, circum- ference, environment. Sir Thomas says that a devil would be miser- able without being in hell. 34. fear, venerate, revere, hold in religious awe. Charity. For the sense in which Sir Thomas uses the word charity, see our note on Chaucer's Prologue, line 86. 6. anatomy, analysis. 8. consorts, agrees. 13. common viands, regular food. 29. composition, agreement. 30. conceit, idea, notion. 39. Laz- arus. See Luke XVI, 19 ff. 41. wear our liveries, agree with our reasons. 45. caitiff, cowardly. SAMUEL PEPYS did not aim to be a man of letters. His Diary was written in a shorthand system of his own devising, and he left the MS. to Magdalen College, Cambridge. When it was deciphered, it was found to contain much of interest and value concerning the life of London from 1660 to 1669, with many shrewd observations on great persons of the Restoration period. PAGES 123-131] NOTES 463 The Tempest. 1. at the office. Pepys was secretary to the Admiralty. 2. at noon. Regular performances were held in the afternoon until a much later date, because of lack of facilities for lighting the theaters. As late as 1765 the chief theater in London was lighted by six chandeliers containing candles, and no footlights. The word "matinee," which we now use for the afternoon perform- ance, originally designated one held in the morning. Look up the derivation of the word. 4. girl, maid. 6. The King was Charles II. 37. blacklead, pencil writing. Pepys was an incessant theater goer, and his notes of the performances he witnessed are a valuable record of the theater of his day. The Great Fire. This account, one of the longest entries in the Diary, makes no pretensions to literary merit ; yet it is admirable in the vivid and realistic details given. Notes on the localities men- tioned would serve little purpose without a map. DRYDEN. This version of The Tempest (which was probably the one Pepys saw) was one of the earliest alterations of Shakspere's plays. In their original form they did not measure up to the taste of the Restoration ; and for half a century writers good, bad, and indifferent rewrote and "improved" them. Romeo and Juliet and King Lear were changed so as to end happily ; the Merchant of Venice was so changed that Shylock became a comic figure. Dryden had a hand in altering several plays, among others Macbeth and Antony and Cleopatra. The literary ideals of the alterers may be seen in the remarks just made and in the lines 39-46 of the present selection, in which the addition of "a man -who had never seen a woman" is called "an excellent contrivance." Davenant, whom Dryden so highly commends, had in reality very slight literary ability. The Preface is included here for the light it throws on the taste of the period, and as a good specimen of the prose of Dryden the "father of modern English prose." 51. were. The slip in grammar is Dryden's. 59. old Latin proverb : Posteriores enim cogitationes sapientiores solent esse free translation : " second thoughts are wisest." Mac Flecknoe. This poem is a satire on Thomas Shadwell, a literary rival of Dryden. The men had been friends; but their friendship was turned into enmity by a sharp attack made on Dryden by Shadwell, to which Mac Flecknoe was the reply. Richard Fleck- noe was a very dull Irish poet, who had died some years before this 464 NOTES [PAGES 132-137 poem was written. Dryden represents Shadwell as a son of Flecknoe, chosen by the latter to succeed him on the throne of dullness. 3. Augustus, named by Julius Caesar as his successor, came into power at the age of eighteen, and became "master of all things" (his own words) at thirty-two. 15 ff. Dryden's lines are in the language of satire, not that of truth. Shadwell was by no means so contemptible a writer as Dryden asserts his plays, in fact, compare favorably with most of Dryden's. 25. goodly fabric. Shadwell was very fat. 29. Here again Dryden uses the unfair language of satire. Thomas Heywood and James Shirley were late Elizabethan dramatists who did not deserve such characteriza- tion. 33. Norwich drugget, rough cloth. 36. Shadwell imitated Ben Jonson in distinguishing his characters by particular " humours," that is, whims or idiosyncrasies. 42. tympany, inflation or distention; hence, figuratively here, bombast. 43. tun, a large barrel. 44. kilderkin, a small barrel. 48. If this line had been fact, the question arises why Dryden wrote so extended and vicious a reply to Shadwell. 50. Flecknoe was Irish, but Shadwell was not. 52. An iambic foot of poetry con- sists of an unaccented syllable followed by an accented. Satire was usually written in iambics, as is Mac Flecknoe. 56. Alluding to Shadwell's fondness for puns, which, however, was shared by virtually all the comic writers of his day. 57-58. Shadwell was a skillful musician. 60. Bruce and Longville were characters in Shadwell's plays. 64-65. The young prophet was, of course, Shadwell ; his father was Flecknoe. Under Milton's Pictitre. The poet of Greece was Homer ; the poet of Italy, Dante. JOHN BUNYAN. The student unacquainted with Bunyan and his greatest work, from which our selection is taken, should look them up in some history of literature. The Pilgrim's Progress is one of the world's great allegories, a form of story in which charac- ters are personifications of abstract qualities and characteristics. Christian and Faithful, on a journey from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City, stopped at the town of Vanity, where a fair was being held. Their behavior there led to their trial and con- demnation, as set forth in the selection. 88. an act of Pharaoh. See Exodus I, 22. 91. an act of Neb- uchadnezzar. See Daniel III, 6. 95. an act of Darius. See PAGES 138-148] NOTES 465 Daniel VI, 4-9. Bunyan was not a well-educated man ; but he knew his Bible, and drew most of his inspiration from it. 136. Now I saw, i.e., in a vision. The story of the whole book is given " after the similitude of a dream." Faithful's end is taken, of course, from that of Elijah. See 2 Kings II, 11. SWIFT. The Battle of the Books is one of a number of writings arising from a controversy whether ancient or modern writers are superior. The ancient and modern books in St. James's library are engaged in fight, when their attention is attracted (see lines 105-8) by the dispute of the spider and the bee. This appeared to Msop very "parallel and adapt" (line 126) to the larger dispute, as he proceeded to demonstrate. 17. expatiating is used here in its etymological sense, "walking about." 29. toils, snares. 42. droll, be humorous. 58. true spirit of controversy. Cf . Sir Thomas Browne on the subject, Charity, 60 ff. 99. whether, which. 115 ff. These lines refer to Dryden's modernizing of ^Esop's Fables. 116. tore; old form of the parti- ciple. 154-6. The period of the Restoration and the early part of the eighteenth century is notable for satire. Swift himself is undoubtedly the greatest satirist in the language. Argument against Abolishing Christianity (somewhat abridged in our text) is a specimen of Swift's keenest sarcasm and irony, and every line must be read from this point of view. No one, of course, had proposed to abolish Christianity; but "all parties seem so unanimously determined upon the point, as we cannot but allow from their actions, their discourses, and their writings" (lines 13-15). The essay is in reality a discourse on the manifest irreligion of the people. 6. the Union, of England and Scotland, confirmed in 1707. 49. broke (old form for " broken"), tortured on the rack. 59. deo- rum, etc. " Offences to the gods are the gods' concern." From the Annals of Tacitus, I, 73. 70. the allies; i.e., those of England in the War of the Spanish Succession, terminated in 1713 by the Treaty of Utrecht. 86. a perfect cavil. In reading such phrases as this it must be remembered that Swift is making only a fine pretense of seriousness. 99. rendezvouses, meeting-places; rendez- vous (French) means, "assemble yourselves." 136. different to is the usual British form for the American " dif- ferent from." It should be noted that the expression "different 466 NOTES [PAGES 148-166 than," though frequently heard, is neither British, nor American, nor Irish. 153. daggled-tail, untidy, ill-kept. The more common word is "draggle-tailed." 173. Asgill, Toland, and Tindal were religious writers of Swift's day whose views were particularly ob- noxious to him. DEFOE. The Education of Women shows very advanced thinking for the author's day. 4. parts, accomplishments. 48. The meaning of this sentence is clearer if we supply the word "even" before if. 92. essay is used in its original (etymological) sense of "trial." Author's Preface. Robinson Crusoe is the first of Defoe's adven- ture stories, which entitle him in the opinion of many to be called the founder of the modern novel. The pretense of editing the story of a man's life was widely accepted as fact. Crusoe's Situation. 4. merchandise, business. 14. battle. Dunkirk was taken from the Spaniards by the French in 1658. Crusoe's Landing. 3. coup de grace (French), a deadly stroke. 79. to let him blood. See note on Robin Hood's Death and Burial, 10. How Crusoe Baked Bread. 18. whelming upon, turning over upon so as to cover. 22. mere is used in its old positive sense, in- stead of its modern negative sense. It means, virtually, " first class." STEELE. Prospectus. 38 ff. White's, noted as a gambling house. Will's, the resort of literary men. When Steele was young, Dryden was the most famous man frequenting Will's. (See Ma- caulay's account of it in this volume, page 329.) Grecian, resort of lawyers. St. James's, resort of Whig politicians. 48. plain Spanish, a simple wine. 49. Kidney, a well-known waiter; with a pun, perhaps, on "kidney" in the sense of "temperament," "dis- position." 56. casting a figure, making a calculation based on the positions of the planets ; alluding to the practice of astrology. Mr. Bickerstaff Visits a Friend. Steele conducted The Taller under the name of " Isaac Bickerstaff ." 6. want, lack, monitor, adviser. 31. It was formerly the custom to speak of unmarried women as "mistress." 37. Teraminta, a fanciful name, represent- ing no person in particular. 97. baby, doll. 98. gossiping, christening. 117. full-bottomed periwigs, wigs full and large at the bottom. 119. open-breasted, with waistcoat unbuttoned. 147. Don Belianis, Guy, the Seven Champions, Bevis, popular figures PAGES 166-180] NOTES 467 in romance. 153. Hickerlhrift, hero of fairy tales. 155. The most famous exploit of St. George was his slaying the dragou (the devil) and his rescue from it of the maiden (the church). The Editor's Troubles. 10. a paper office. Fifteen years after this number of The Taller there were published two large volumes of original letters received but not printed by the editor. 17. Temple- bar separated the City of London proper from Westminster, the section occupied by the court and the aristocracy. 18. the liber- ties, the City. 21. Wapping and Rotherhithe, the shipping section of the city. 29. news from Flanders, news of the War of the Spanish Succession. 36. Ad Aulam, "To the Court"; Ad Academiam, " To the Learned " ; Ad Populum, " To the Populace " ; Ad Clerum, "To the Clergy." 52. groat, fourpence. 58. conceits, witty expressions. 81. my aunt Margery. In number 151 of The Taller was told how Mrs. Margery Bickerstaff, great aunt of Isaac, was tricked by her family into remaining single, in order that they might inherit her fortune. 83. Maud the milkmaid. In number 75 it was told that Sir Walter Bickerstaff, an ancestor of Isaac, had married a milkmaid. 106. suddenly, soon. ADDISON. The Campaign was written by request of the govern- ment to celebrate the victory of Marlborough at the battle of Blen- heim (War of the Spanish Succession). 2. joined was pronounced in the early part of the eighteenth century so that it was a perfect rhyme for find. Frozen Words. 5. Sir John Mandeville, reputed author of a volume of travels. See page 21, and note. 8. Ferdinand Mendez Pinto, a Portuguese of the sixteenth century. He was soldier arid sailor, merchant and doctor, missionary and ambassador; was taken prisoner thirteen times, and sold into slavery seventeen. His Peregrination is at times inaccurate ; but present opinion is that he did not wilfully misrepresent things by his " unbounded imagination." 17-18. Addison is, of course, speaking ironically. 30. Hudibras, a poem by Samuel Butler, satirizing the Puritans. It was immensely popular during the latter part of the seventeenth century. 92. Wap- ping. See note on Steele, The Editor's Troubles, 21. 112. post- humous, after death. 135. kit, a kind of stringed instrument. 141. tuer le temps (French), to pass the time. Mr. Spectator. 2. black, dark. 33. nonage, minority. 35. parts, abilities. 88. Whigs and Tories, the chief political parties. 468 NOTES [PAGES 180-192 Addison was a Whig. 111. spoken to. In parliamentary lan- guage, one speaks to a question, resolution, or subject under con- sideration. 131. The dub was, of course, a fiction. Most of the numbers of The Spectator were written by Addison, a somewhat smaller number by Steele, and a few by others. The " Club " that figures in the papers was made up of a country squire (Sir Roger de Coverley), a retired soldier, a lawyer, a merchant, a gentleman of leisure, and a clergyman. 134. Little Britain, a street. Vision of Mirzah. 1. at Grand Cairo. See page 179, line 53. Addison's discovery of manuscripts, both for this story and for Frozen Words, is, of course, part of the fiction. The stories are his own. 11. Bagdat, for Bagdad, a section of Turkey in Asia. 30. Genius, a spirit. 62. threescore and ten, the Biblical allotment of years to man. See Psalms XC, 10. 66. According to the Bible, men lived much longer in the early days of the world than now. Methuselah, the oldest man, is said to have lived 969 years. See Genesis V, 27. 95. bubbles, worthless things to the gaining of which some men devote their whole lives. POPE. 2. Pierian spring. See note on Lycidas, 15. 3-4. On the rhyme, see note on Addison's Marlborough, 2. THOMSON was one of the first poets to break away from the in- fluence of Pope; shown here in his use of blank verse instead of rhymed couplets, and in his theme (line 3) scenes and objects of nature. Spring. 20-21. Aries, the Ram; and Taurus, the Bull, signs of the Zodiac. See note on Chaucer's Prologue, 8. 37. glebe, soil. JOHNSON. Chesterfield aspired to a reputation as a patron of literature. He was famed for his elegant manners ; and at the time of Johnson's call upon him (17 ff.), he was not prepossessed with the manners of the uncourtly scholar. 13. Le vainqueur, etc. (French) , ' ' the conqueror of the conqueror of the earth. " . 30. shep- herd in Virgil; in the poet's eighth Eclogue. 32 ff. The remainder of the letter is a specimen of the finest satire in the language. In his dictionary, probably remembering Chesterfield, Johnson defined patron as "commonly a wretch who supports with insolence, and is paid with flattery." 37. solitary. Johnson's wife had died three years before. PAGES 193-200] NOTES 469 Letter to Macpherson. Macpherson had published some poems which he claimed to be translations from the ancient Gaelic poet, Ossian. Johnson asserted that they were forgeries; Macpherson wrote threatening him with personal violence; this letter, Johnson told Boswell, "put an end to our correspondence." 10. your Homer. Macpherson had made a prose translation of the Iliad. On the Art of Flying. Rasselas was the fourth son of the Em- peror of Abyssinia. According to custom he, with his brothers and sisters, was "confined in a private palace till the order of succession should call him to the throne. The place which the wisdom or policy of antiquity had destined for the residence of the Abyssinian princes was a spacious valley, surrounded on every side by moun- tains. The only passage by which it could be entered was a cavern that passed under a rock. The outlet of the cavern was concealed by a thick wood, and the mouth which opened into the valley was closed with gates of iron forged by the artificers of ancient days, so massy that no man could without the help of engines open or shut them." (Chapter I.) 95 ff . This passage is of special interest in view of the use of air- ships in war to-day (1917). Johnson's words, however, can hardly be considered as prophecy. BOSWELL. This First Meeting took place in 1763; Johnson was fifty-five years old. Dairies was a bookseller. 11. Reynolds was the most famous portrait painter of the day. He made several portraits of Johnson. 35. Miss Williams, a dependent of John- son's. 40. Garrick, then the greatest actor and theatrical manager of London, had been a pupil of Johnson 's ; and the two had come to the great city together to seek their fortune. Character of Goldsmith. 6. Edward Malone, editor of Shak- spere, and friend of Boswell. 20. He had sagacity, etc. This sen- tence, with its many high-sounding polysyllables, is very much in Johnson's own manner. Boswell was very jealous of any one who enjoyed Johnson's favor as Goldsmith did ; a fact which prevented his giving an altogether fair picture of Goldsmith. 32. Nihil, etc. Inaccurately quoted from Johnson's Latin epitaph on Goldsmith, in Westminster Abbey : Qui nullum fere scribendi genus non tetigit, nullum quod tetigit non ornavit " who failed to touch scarcely any kind of writing, and failed to adorn no kind that he touched." 37. parterre, a flower garden arranged on some formal design. 470 NOTES [PAGES 200-207 43. un elourdi, a rattle-brain. 54. Fantoccini, a puppet-show. 76. The Traveller; or, A Prospect of Society, is a poem in which Goldsmith drew a series of pictures of foreign scenes. 81. Mrs. Piozzi, intimate friend of Johnson for twenty years. Her Anecdotes of Johnson and her letters are said to be second only to Boswell in interest. Sir John Hawkins published a life of Johnson a few years before Boswell. Johnson's Manner of Talking. 8. strongly impregnated, etc., thoroughly filled with the spirit of Johnson. GOLDSMITH. 1. Auburn is not an individual village. It con- tains some features from Lissoy in Ireland, Goldsmith's early home, and some from other villages both in England and Ireland. 4. part- ing, departing. 10. cot, cottage. 12. decent, comely. Cf. II Penseroso, 36. 27. mistrustless, free from mistrust or suspicion. smutted, dirty. The phrase means that the youth was entirely un- conscious of the fact that his face was dirty. 34. all these charms are fled. Goldsmith wrote this poem to lament the moving of popu- lation from the country to the cities. 38. The preacher, like his village, is not a photograph, but a composite picture. It is drawn from the poet's father and from his brother ; and some characteris- tics (as, for instance, line 60) are from the writer himself. The Schoolmaster is a description chiefly of Goldsmith's early teacher, "Paddy" Byrne. 16. cipher, work out arithmetical problems. 17. presage, foretell. 18. gauge, calculate the capacity of barrels. The Retaliation, a series of humorous characterizations of his friends, was written in reply to an epigram on Goldsmith by the actor Garrick : "Here lies Nolly Goldsmith, for shortness called Noll, Who wrote like an angel, but talked like poor Poll." 6. Townshend was a Whig member of Parliament. 7-8. These lines commemorate Burke's lack of ability as a speaker. The House of Commons would not stay to hear his speeches, though they read them, when printed, with enthusiasm. BURKE. The Letter to the Sheriffs, addressed really to the whole body of voters in Bristol, which Burke represented in Parlia- ment, was occasioned by the passage of bills granting letters of PAGES 209-215] NOTES 471 marque and suspending the Habeas Corpus Act in certain cases. (See any history of the United States for explanation of the meaning and objects of these bills.) It expresses the same thoughts as Burke's better known speeches On Conciliation and On Taxation of the American Colonies. He never wavered in his opposition to the course of government or in his prediction of defeat for it. 53. court gazette, official publication of the government. 62. author, etc., Thomas Paine, whose Common Sense appeared several months before the Declaration of Independence. Letter to a Noble Lord. A pension had been granted to Burke by the Crown, and the grant had been attacked by the Duke of Bedford and the Earl of Lauderdale. The Letter, addressed to a kinsman of the Marquis of Rockingham, a great benefactor of Burke, is a review of his services to his country and a defense of the grant. A proposal to make Burke a peer, with the title of Lord Beaconsfield, had been abandoned when Burke's son died. 12. HE, Burke's son Richard. COLLINS. This Ode was written in memory of British soldiers who fell during the War of the Austrian Succession. Ode to Evening. 1. oaten stop. See note on Lycidas, 33. 7. brede, embroidery, wove, for "woven." See note on II Pen- seroso, line 91. 11-12. Cf. Lycidas, 28. 21. folding star, the star indicating the hour when flocks should be put into the fold. 23 ff. Hours elves nymph Pleasures; these are all subjects to prepare. 41. wont, is accustomed. 49. Sylvan shed, trees. 51, 52. thy refers here, as everywhere else in the poem, to " evening." GRAY. The Elegy is probably the most famous English poem composed between Milton and Wordsworth, and its author is by most critics ranked as the greatest poet in that period. 1. parting, departing. 7. beetle. Cf. Ode to Evening, 11-12. 26. glebe, soil. 32. This line may be called the "text" of the poem. 35. hour is the subject of awaits. 39. fretted vault, ceil- ing ornamented with carvings. 41. storied urn, burial urn orna- mented with pictures. 43. provoke, call forth. 45-48. " Per- haps in this neglected spot is laid some heart once filled with inspiration : hands that might have governed a nation or might have written great and moving poetry." This paraphrase may help to interpret other stanzas, e.g., 57-60. 52. genial, natural. 472 NOTES [PAGES 215-220 53-56. This stanza, despite a century and a half of wearisome quotation and mis-quotation, may still be kept in mind as a speci- men of truly great poetry. 57. John Hampden was a prominent Puritan who refused to pay taxes levied illegally by Charles I. 60. The eighteenth century, as a rule, believed that Cromwell's personal ambition was responsible for the bloodshed of the Civil War. 71. (to) heap, etc. Modifies forbade (67). It means, "write flattering poetry to gain fame and wealth." Cf. Lycidas, 64- 69. 73. far, i.e., they being far. 81. unlettered muse, the un- trained poets who wrote the inscriptions on their tombs. 89. part- ing. See note on line 1. 95. chance, perchance. 113. the next (morn). COWPER prefaced The Task with these words: "The history of the following production is briefly this : A lady, fond of blank verse, demanded a poem of that kind from the Author, and gave him the Sofa for a subject. He obeyed ; and having much leisure, connected another subject with it ; and pursuing the train of thought to which his situation and train of mind led him, brought forth at length, instead of the trifle which he at first intended, a serious affair a Volume." The poem, as Cowper truly said, " cannot boast a regular plan " ; nor has it a clearly-marked central theme. It contains some satirical passages, some political, some descriptive ; but the passages of greatest merit are reflective in character, like that given in this volume. The title of Book II, "The Time-Piece," Cowper thought was very appropriate. It "is intended to strike the hour that gives notice of approaching judgment, dealing pretty largely in the signs of the times." The Task was written in 1783-4; after much agi- tation the slave trade was abolished in England in 1808 ; slavery itself was abolished in all British colonies in 1834. The first line of the Selection is an echo of Jeremiah IX, 2. Sonnet. Mrs. Unwin was Cooper's closest friend and faithful companion for some thirty years. 8. This line makes a claim found in many poets ; it is almost a regular feature of Elizabethan sonnet-sequences. BURNS. To a Mouse. 1. sleekit, sleek. 4. bickerin, hurry- ing, brattle, scamper. 5. laith, loath. rin, run. 6. pattle, PAGES 220-225] NOTES 473 plow spade. 13. whyles, sometimes. 14. maun, must. 15. daimen icker, occasional ear of grain, thrave, shock. 17. lave, remainder. 20. silly, weak, wa's, walls, win's, winds. 21. big, build. 22. foggage, rank grass. 24. snell, sharp. 29. coulter, plow. 31. stibble, stubble. 34. but, without, hold, hold, home. 35. thole, endure. 36. cranreuch, frost. 37. no thy lane, not alone. 40. a-gley, awry. To a Mountain Daisy. 3. stoure, dust. 15. glinted, glanced. 21. bield, shelter. 23. histie, barren. 29. plow-share. 31 ff. When Burns moralizes, he frequently drops into English. 39. The card is that of the compass. Tarn 0' Shanter is Burns's only tale. It is probable that the ex- periences at the inn are much like many of the poet's own 7 he sat far too often "bousing at the nappy." A public-house in Ayr said to be Burns's favorite resort is called Tarn O' Shanter Inn. The motto of the poem is from a translation of the sixth book of the JEneid by Gawin (or Gavin) Douglas, a Scotch poet who died in 1522. Brownyis (brownies) and Bogillis (bogles, bogies) are goblins or spirits. 1. chapman billies, peddler fellows. 2. drouthy, dry, thirsty. 4. tak the gate, take the road, go home. 5. bousing, drinking. nappy, ale. 6. fou, full, unco, very. 8. mosses, marshes. slaps, holes in fences. 13. fand, found. 14. frae, from, ae, one. 15-16. The poet's tribute to his birthplace. 18. as taen, as to have taken. 19. skellum, rascal. 20. bletherin, idle-talking. blellum, babbler. 23. ilka, every, melder, grinding. 24. siller, silver, money. 25. naig, nag, horse, ca'd, driven. "That you and the blacksmith got roaring full for every horse that was shod." 28. Kirkton, Churchtown ; probably no particular village is referred to. 30. Doon. Ayr was on the river Doon. 31. warlocks, wizards, mirk, dark. 33. gars me greet, makes me weep. 39. ingle, chimney corner. 40. reamin swats, foaming ale. 41. Souter, shoemaker. 43. lo'ed, loved. 59-66. Cf. note on To a Mountain Daisy, line 31. It may be questioned whether the Scotch poem is improved by this bit of sentimental English. Evanishing (66) certainly seems not to fit. 61. Supply "that" before falls. 67. tether, hold back. 69. This line means " midnight." 71. sic, such. 78. Deil, devil. 81. skelpit, hurried, dub, puddle. 82. despising, regardless of. 84. crooning, etc., humming some old Scotch song. 86. 474 NOTES [PAGES 226-230 bogles, spirits, "spooks." 88. ghaists, ghosts. houlets, owls. 90. smoored, smothered, birks, birches, meikle stane, big stone. 93. whins, furze, cairn, pile of stone. 95. aboon, above. 96. St. Mungo was the patron saint of Alloway, but no legend is known of him or his "mither" to explain why Mungo's Well was so called. 102. bleeze, blaze. 103. bore, crevice. 105. John Barleycorn, whiskey. 107. tippenny, twopenny ale. 108. usquebae, whiskey. 109. See note on line 40. 110. fair play, if you gave him only fair play, boddle, a copper. 114. unco, marvelous. 116. cotillion is here accented on the first and last syllables. brent-new, brand-new. 117. hornpipes, etc., Scotch dances. 119. winnock bunker, window-seat. 121. towzie tyke, shaggy dog. 122. gie, give. 123. gart them skirl, made them shriek. 124. dirl, rattle. 127. cantraip sleight, magic trick. 130. holy (holy) table, the communion table. 131. aims, irons. 132. unchris- tened bairns, unbaptized infants. 133. rape, rope. 134. gab, mouth. 139. ain, own. 140. stack, stuck. 143. glow'r'd, stared. 147. cleekit, joined hands. 148. carlin, witch, swat and reekit, reeked with sweat. 149. coost, cast, dud- dies, clothes ("duds")- 150. linket, went at it. sark, smock. 151. queans, young girls. 152. A', all. 153. creeshie, greasy. 154. seventeen hunder, very fine. 155. kend, knew, fu' brawlie, very well. 156. wawlie, good- looking. 157. core. Same as "corps." 158. Carrick is the district of Ayrshire south of the Doon. Carrick shore, then, is the south shore of the river. 161. shook, threshed, corn, grain. bear, barley. 163. cutty sark, short undergarment, harn, coarse linen. 166. vauntie, proud. 168. coft, bought. 169. twa pund Scots was equivalent to about eighty cents. 171. cour, bend down. 173. lap and flang, leaped and flung. 174. souple, supple, jad, "jade," lass (in either a good or a bad sense). 176. een, eyes. 177. fidg'd, fidgeted. 178. hatched, squirmed. 179. syne, then. 180. tint, lost. 185. bizz, buzz. fyke, noise. 186. byke, hive. 187. pussie is a hare, open, bark; predicate of foes. 192. eldritch, uncanny. 193. fairin, reward. 198. brig, bridge. 202. fient, "fiend," devil. 205. ettte, intention. 206. wist, knew. Auld Lang Syne, days of long ago. 9. pint-stowp, drinking- cup. be your pint-stowp, be good for (pay for) your own drink. 13. braes, hillsides. 14. gowans, daisies. 15. fit, foot. PAGES 230-236] NOTES 475 17. paidled, paddled, burn, brook. 18. dine, dinner. 19. braid, broad. 21. fiere, comrade. 23. guid-wittie, good-willed, friendly. waught, draught. Willie Brewed. This poem is printed as a good specimen of Burns's "convivial" verse, which all too frequently commemorated real events. Willie was William Nichol ; Rob was the poet himself ; Allan was Allan Masterton, a musician, who afterwards set the lines to music. 8. bree, brew. 14. lift, sky. 15. wyle, entice. Flow Gently. This poem is said to be a most faithful description of the little river about fifteen miles east of Ayr; but no original for "Mary" has been found. A Man's a Man. The theme of this poem was probably sug- gested by Pope's line, "An honest man's the noblest work of God." (See Memorable Couplets, page 188.) Burns quoted Pope's line in his Cotter's Saturday Night (line 166). Supply "a man" after is there. 8. gowd, gold. 9. hamely, homely, plain. 10. hodden- gray, clothes made of coarse cloth. 17. birkie, fellow. 20. coo/, fool. 22. riband (ribbon) and star are badges of different orders of knighthood. 28. mauna fa', cannot accomplish. 36. gree, prize. WORDSWORTH. Much of what the poet says in his famous Preface is commonplace now; but in 1800 his theory was revolu- tionary, and aroused great opposition among the critics. The ideal of Pope, which was essentially artificial, had dominated English poetry for a century; and the new poetry of Wordsworth and his followers was harshly condemned for a long time. 50. meanness, insignificance. 65. all good poetry, etc. This description, one realizes, is far from true. It applies to lyric poetry, but certainly not to long poems like Paradise Lost or Wordsworth's own Prelude and Excursion. Even a good poet can hardly be spontaneous for 10,000 lines. Passages Dealing with Poetry in General. Wordsworth is now recognized as one of the greatest English critics. Among the passages given none would be more helpful for men to understand and act upon than that in line 23. Ability to appreciate great poetry is a valuable accomplishment for a "practical," busy man. 25. Sir Joshua Reynolds, see note on Boswell, First Meeting, line 11. As first president of the Royal Academy Reynolds delivered a number of Discourses on Painting, in the seventh of which he treated the subject of taste in art. 476 NOTES [PAGES 237-244 Expostulation and Reply. The Matthew of this poem (line 15) is supposed to be William Taylor, Wordsworth's teacher at Hawks- head, located on Esthwaite lake (13). The Tables Turned. 6. lustre is the object of has spread. 21 ff. This stanza "has been censured for exaggeration, but Words- worth means that in communion with external nature a moment may come which will evoke from the heart more moral energy than can be taught by books." (Dowden.) 28. to dissect, in the act of dissecting or analyzing. She Was a Phantom refers to the poet's wife. 27. Note that the important word in this line is not perfect, but woman, which is set over against spirit in 29. I Wandered. Lines 21-22, felt by many readers to be the best in the poem, were written by Mrs. Wordsworth. Happy Warrior. "The above verses were written soon after tidings had been received of the death of Lord Nelson, which event directed the author's thoughts to the subject" (Wordsworth's note) ; but some particulars of Nelson's conduct prevented the poet from " thinking of him with satisfaction in reference to the idea of what a warrior ought to be." Some features in the character, the poet said, were taken from his brother John, captain of an East Indiaman, who was lost at sea. "The characteristics insisted on are," in the words of Dowden, "high aims, cultivation of the intel- lect, moral rectitude, the power to educe good from evil, tenderness, placability, purity, fortitude, obedience to the law of reason, the choice of right means as well as right ends, fidelity, joy in domestic pleasures, heroism in great crises of life." Influence of a Mountain-peak. The sub-title of the Prelude is, "Growth of a Poet's Mind; An Autobiographical Poem." The passage records an incident of his school days at Hawkshead. 1. her refers to Nature, mentioned in a previous line. 17. elfin pinnace, fairy boat. 22. The huge peak is easily identified as Old Wetherlam, about five miles from Hawkshead. 23. instinct, imbued, filled. 24. struck, i.e., with the oars. Westminster Bridge. " Written on the roof of a coach on my way to France." (Wordsworth's note.) His sister Dorothy, who accompanied him, wrote in her Journal: "We left London on Saturday morning at half past five or six. We mounted the Dover coach at Charing Cross. It was a beautiful morning. The city, St. Paul's with the river, and a multitude of little boats, made a PAGES 245-249] NOTES 477 most beautiful sight. The houses were not overhung by their cloud of smoke, and they were spread out endlessly, yet the sun shone so brightly that there was something like the purity of one of Nature's own grand spectacles." London, 1802. This sonnet is the poet's lament for England's lack of sympathy with the ideals of the French Revolution. "Nuns Fret Not." 3. pensive citadels, places where they may give themselves to meditation without interruption. 6. Furness fells, hills in Westmoreland County, northwestern part of England, the section where Wordsworth lived for about seventy of his eighty years. 8. In truth ... no prison is. Cf. Lovelace, To Althea (pages 101-102), specially lines 25-26. " The World is too Much with Us." Wordsworth means that he would rather be a believer in false deities and have some feeling for the divine in Nature than be a professed Christian and have no such feeling at all. 10. "A Pagan nourished in a faith proved to be untrue." 13. Proteus and Triton were pagan gods of the sea. "Scorn not the Sonnet." 1. Critic . . . honours. The sonnet had fallen into disfavor in the eighteenth century. Very few son- nets were composed in England between Milton (died 1674) and Wordsworth (began this form of composition about 1800). 2. with this key, etc. Wordsworth accepted the theory that Shakspere's sonnets are autobiographical. See our note, page 20. 4 ff. Pe- trarch, Tasso, and Dante were the most distinguished Italian sonnet writers; Camoens was a Portuguese. These and Spenser (line 10) wrote in honor or memory of loved ones. Milton's eighteen sonnets (alas, too few!), sixteen of which were written during the Civil War, cover a wide range of subjects. COLERIDGE. Table Talk is a collection of Coleridge's chance com- ments, published after his death by his nephew. Besides being a great poet, Coleridge was the founder of modern English literary criticism ; and in this field his greatest accomplishment was his in- terpretation of Shakspere. Kubla Khan. Coleridge says that he composed two to three hundred lines on this subject "in a profound sleep." When he awoke he began to write it out ; but after completing fifty-four lines he was interrupted by "a person on business," and could never recollect the rest. Kubla was khan or emperor of China in the thirteenth century; 478 NOTES [PAGES 249-253 Xanadu was his city of residence. 13. athwart a cedarn cover, across a cedar wood. 19. momently, every moment. 41. Mount Abora probably had no existence outside of the poet's imagination. What the complete poem might have been it is idle to conjecture. The fragment is highly mystical and unintelligible ; but its musical quality is apparent to all, and poets and critics have always felt in it poetical merit of the first order. BYRON. Lachin y Gair (pronunciation indicated in the last line of each stanza) appeared in Hours of Idleness, Byron's first volume, published when he was nineteen years old. The mountain, says Byron in a note, " towers proudly preeminent in the northern High- lands, near Invercauld. It is certainly one of the most sublime and picturesque amongst our 'Caledonian Alps.' Its appearance is of a dusky hue, but the summit is the seat of eternal snows. Near Lachin y Gair I spent some of the early part of my life, the recollec- tion of which has given birth to these stanzas." 5. Caledonia, Scotland. 10., plaid. " This word is erroneously pronounced plod; the proper pronunciation (according to the Scotch) is shown by the orthography." (Byron's note.) 25-26. " I allude here to my maternal ancestors, the Gordons, many of whom fought for the unfortunate Prince Charles, better known by the name of the Young Pretender." (Byron's note.) 27. Culloden, scene of the final defeat of the Young Pretender by the English. Charles was the grandson of James II, deposed by Parliament, and received support from France in his efforts to regain the crown of England for the Stuarts. 30. Braemar is in the Highlands. 31. pibroch, bag- pipe. 36. Albion's plain, England. Wordsworth. Byron's Hours of Idleness was severely criticized in the Edinburgh Review, and English Bards and Scotch Reviewers: A Satire was his reply. Being "very young and very angry," he hit promiscuously, and lived to regret many sharp passages in the poem. In his own copy he wrote opposite the passage on Wordsworth. " Un- just." 1. thy refers to Robert Southey, as founder of the "Lake School" of poetry. 2. apostate, one who has forsaken his faith. Words- worth's "apostasy" is unhesitatingly set forth in his Preface (see page 233) as well as in his poems. 5-6. See The Tables Turned, paee 238. 13-15. Referring to a poem by Wordsworth called The Idiot Boy. 20. Bard, Wordsworth. PAGES 253-259] NOTES 479 The Bull-Fight. 4. lated, belated, wight, person. 19. sheen, brightness, glittering ornaments. 41. croupe, for "croupade," a particular kind of leap. 57. brast, archaic for "burst." 60. brand, sword. 62. conynge, cunning, skillful. Waterloo. The scene of this justly famous passage was a ball given in Brussels by the Duchess of Richmond June 15, 1815. The Battle of Quatre-Bras, the first of the engagements which culminated at Waterloo, June 18, took place the day after the ball. 19-27. Frederick William, Duke of Brunswick, nephew of George III, was killed at the head of his troops at Quatre-Bras. His father (25) had fallen at Auerstadt in the campaign of 1806 against Napo- leon. 26. quell, satisfy. 35. eyes is subject of should meet. 46. "'Cameron's Gathering, " rallying-cry of the Highland clan of the Camerons. 47. Lochiel, chief of the Camerons. Albyn, Gaelic name of Scotland. 54. Evan's, Donald's fame. Sir Evan fought against Cromwell ; h's grandson Donald fought for the Young Pre- tender and was wounded at Culloden (see note on Lachin y Gair, 27) ; his great-great-grandson, John Cameron, was mortally wounded at Quatre-Bras. 55. Ardennes is for "Soignies," the forest between Brussels and Waterloo. To Thomas Moore was written on the eve of the poet's final depar- ture from England in 1816. Moore was Byron's literary executor and biographer. Stanzas, Epigram, and On my Thirty-third Birthday express the height of Byron's cynicism, evidence of which is found throughout his works. " I have not loved the world, nor the world me," he writes in Childe Harold; and again, " 'Tis but a worthless world to gain or lose." In his diary for Jan. 21, 1821, he wrote, in a quite different tone : " To-morrow is my birthday I shall have completed thirty and three years of age ! and I go to bed with a heaviness of heart at having lived so long, and to so little purpose. I don't regret them so much for what I have done, as for what I might have done." John Bull (Epigram, 4) is England personified, or the typical Englishman. See Irving's essay on "John Bull" in The Sketch Book. Don Juan is a poem of 16,000 lines in which "every mood of Byron's complex and paradoxical nature is vividly reflected." The poet called it an "epic"; but it is "an epic without a plan, and, rightly speaking, without a hero." It is a wholly destructive satire on life, with, nevertheless, some splendid lyric and narrative passages. 480 NOTES [PAGES 259-268 The meter, ottava rima, borrowed from the Italians, is peculiarly suitable for satiric poetry. SHELLEY is universally admitted to be high in the first rank of lyric poets. His poems have for most readers little meaning ; they are intensively "subjective"; a reader is likely to be strongly attracted by them or strongly repelled. They are in the highest degree "poetical," and annotation can be of little service to them. " The adjectives impracticable, unavailing, and unsatisfying are as applicable to, Shelley and his poetry as are winged, luminous, angelic, and divine." (Schelling, The English Lyric, page 178.) " No poet, wrote Mrs. Shelley, "was ever warmed by a more genuine and un- forced inspiration." And of The Cloud and To a Skylark she said : "They were written as his mind prompted, listening to the carol- ing of the bird, aloft in the azure sky of Italy ; or marking the cloud as it sped across the heavens, while he floated in his boat on the Thames." See Wordsworth, page 235, line 65, and note. West Wind. 21. Mcenad, a devotee of Bacchus. 32. pumice means, of volcanic origin ; but the fact contributes nothing to one's understanding of the poem. Baice's Bay is part of the Bay of Naples. There was once a large city at Baiae, now mostly submerged (33-35). 56. The adjectives admirably described the poet. The student should read a good sketch of his life. The Cloud. 31. sanguine, blood-red; the etymological sense of the word. 81. cenotaph, a tomb for a person buried elsewhere. Skylark. The poem falls into four main divisions : direct descrip- tion of the lark's flight and song (1-30) ; description of the lark by comparisons (31-60) ; appeal to know the source of the lark's " rap- ture" (61-75) ; explanation of the superiority of the bird's song to the poet's (76-105). i KEATS. George Chapman was a late Elizabethan dramatist and poet. His translation of Homer is, according to Saintsbury, "the only really good one" in English verse, realms (1), kingdoms (2), and demesne (6) have almost the same meaning. It would be a good exercise for the student to look them up in a large dictionary, and try to see what shades of meaning Keats meant to convey. 11. It was Balboa, not Cortez, who discovered the Pacific; but the beauty of the sonnet is not in the least marred by the error. 14. Darien, the Isthmus of Panama. The sonnet may be para- PAGES 268-270] NOTES 481 phrased as follows : " I have read a great deal of good poetry ; I had often heard of the beauties of Homer; but I did not know Homer [because of my ignorance of Greek] until I became acquainted with Chapman's translation. Then I felt as does an astronomer when he discovers a new planet; or like the great explorer when he discovered the Pacific Ocean stricken into silence by wonder." Grasshopper and Cricket. This sonnet was written by Keats in a friendly competition with Leigh Hunt. The latter was not a great poet ; but it may be questioned whether his sonnet, which we quote for comparison, is inferior to Keats's. " Green little vaulter in the sunny grass, Catching your heart up at the feel of June, Sole voice that's heard amid the lazy noon, When even the bees lag at the summoning brass ; And you, warm little housekeeper, who class With those who think the candles come too soon, Loving the fire, and with your tricksome tune Nick the glad silent moments as they pass ; O sweet and tiny cousins, that belong, One to the fields, the other to the hearth, Both have your sunshine ; both, though small, are strong At your clear hearts ; and both seem given to earth To ring in thoughtful ears this natural song Indoors and out, summer and winter, Mirth." Grecian Urn. It appears that Keats had no individual urn in mind, but combined features found in many specimens and features of his own imagining. He gives such full details that the reader should have no difficulty in forming a clear mental picture of the legend (5) on it. 3. sylvan, of the woods. 7. Tempe, a beautiful valley in Thessaly. Arcady, Arcadia, a district in Greece inhabited by a pastoral people, and noted as a place of quiet and contentment. 10. timbrel, a sort of drum. 11-12. Heard . . . sweeter. The poet seems to say that he can imagine, more beautiful music than has ever been composed. 13. sensual, bodily. 15-30. These lines refer to the " legend " on the urn, which can not change. 28. pas- sion is object of above. 41. brede, "braid," embroidery not, of course, in its literal sense. 44. tease . . . thought, exhaust our powers of thinking. 49-50. Keats was a strong believer in the theory of " art for art's sake," which says that art is justified if it 482 NOTES [PAGES 270-275 pleases, whether it teaches anything or not. The idea is well put in The Rhodora of Emerson : " If eyes were made for seeing, Then Beauty is its own excuse for being." Eve of St. Agnes. The tradition upon which this poem is founded is set forth in lines 46-54. St. Agnes' Eve, that is, the eve before St. Agnes's Day, is January 20. The scenes of the poem are various parts of a medieval baron's castle. 5. A beadsman was a pensioner whose business it was to pray for the soul of his benefactor, told his rosary, counted his beads (each of which stood for a prayer). See notes on L' Allegro, 67, and Chau- cer's Prologue, 83. 14-16. The images of dead knights and ladies were in the posture of prayer in oratories (i.e., little chapels with al- tars), inclosed by railings described as purgatorial because of the dis- comfort suggested. The whole poem is distinguished for its pictorial quality. Note the number of passages appealing to all the senses. 21. flattered, beguiled, charmed. "Tears," says Leigh Hunt in an extended comment on this word, "are the tributes, more or less worthy, of self-pity to self-love." 31. snarling describes the sound as it seemed to Porphyro (75). 34-36. Another "pictorial" pas- sage. 37. argent, bright (like silver). 58. train was explained by Keats as referring to the ladies' robes. 70. amort, without spirit ; literally, as if dead French a la mort. 71. On St. Agnes's Day it was customary to sacrifice two lambs, which were shorn the next day. 81. sooth, truth. Cf. "soothsayer." 83-84. The household of Madeline was at enmity with that of Porphyro. Cf . 98- 104. 105. gossip, companion. This is a good word to investigate. 111. Well-a-day! alas! 115. holy loom, the loom on which the wool from St. Agnes's lambs was made into cloth. Cf. 71, and note. 120. Only a person with supernatural power, such as a witch, could hold water in a sieve. 126. mickle, much. 158. plaining, archaic for "complaining." 171. Since Merlin paid, etc. "The monstrous debt was his monstrous existence which he owed to a demon and repaid when he died or disappeared through the working of one of his own spells by Vivien." See the story in Tennyson's Merlin and Vivien, one of the Idylls of the King. 173. cates, delicacies. 174. tambour, a kind of drum, frame, a round frame like the edge of a tambour, used to hold cloth for em- broidering. PAGES 276^285] NOTES 483 193. missioned, sent, unaware, unexpectedly. 208. The three stanzas following are perhaps the most famous and effective picture in the entire poem, if not in the whole range of English literature. Keats delighted in sense impressions. One will be repaid by a study of the details here, and an effort to realize the picture. 214. heraldries, coats of arms. 218. gules, the term used in her- aldry for " red." The colors of this stanza are due to the many- colored window. 241. swart, swarthy, dark. Paynims, pagans. This line has been variously explained. It may mean a missal (i.e., prayer-book) on which is a picture of pagans praying ; or, a missal clasped in a pagan country. 253-275. This passage should be compared with 208-234. 257. Morpheus was the god of sleep. Morphean amulet, a charm to produce sleep. 262. azure-lidded. Keats's fondness for pictures led him to coin words that would express a great deal. 266. soother, more soothing or pleasing. 270. Samarcand is a city in Asia noted for its manufactures of .ilk. Lebanon, a range of mountains, also located in Asia, was famous in ancient times for its cedars. Com- pare this line with L' Allegro, 4, and II Penseroso, 76 ; and see the notes on those lines. 277. eremite, hermit, worshiper. 285. carpet, table-cover. 292. Provence, a district of southern France, famous for its literature, especially lyric poetry. La belle dame sans merci, the beautiful lady without pity. Keats wrote a poem with this French phrase for title. 317. Voluptuous, giving pleasure. 344. a boon; because it served to cover the noise of the elopement Porphyro was about to propose. 349. Rhenish, Rhine wine, mead, a mixed drink. 377. aves, prayers ; specifically, the prayer to the Virgin Mary, beginning Ave Maria, " Hail, Mary," of which a hundred and fifty are said in " telling the beads." See lines 5-6. LAMB. Roast Pig. Lamb did, in fact, get the central idea of this story from his friend M. (Thomas Manning) ; but there is no Chinese manuscript back of it, and many details are of Lamb's in- vention. 10. elder brother, earlier practice. 15. lubberly, awk- ward. 20. antediluvian, before the Flood. 21. new-farrowed, new-born. 26. tenement here means merely " house." 37. a premonitory moistening, his mouth watered in anticipation of the treat. 58. lower regions, stomach. 88. mess, dish, food. 103. assize town, place for holding court 484 NOTES [PAGES 285-293 but in England, not China. The whole proceedings are English; likewise the insurance offices (123), which, needless to say, had no existence in ancient China. 128. John Locke was a great English philosopher of the seventeenth century. 142. mundus edibilis, world of things to eat. 143. princeps obsoniorum, chief of tidbits. 147. amor immunditioe, love of dirt. 150. prceludium, prelude. The Latin terms and the high-sounding words are part of Lamb's burlesque tone. 153. tegument, skin. 165. ambrosian, like ambrosia, the food of the gods. 178. conversation, mode of life; a use of the word common in the Authorized Version of the Bible e.g., in Psalms XXXVII, 14. 180. Ere, etc. From Coleridge's Epitaph on an In- fant. 182. clown, rustic. 184. hath a fair sepulchre, etc. A humorous allusion to the last two lines of Milton's On Shakspere : " And so sepulchred in such pomp dost lie That kings for such a tomb would wish to die." 187. Sapors, flavors. 213. villatic, belonging to the villa or farm. The quoted phrase is from Milton's drama, Samson Agonistes. 217. like Lear. See Shakspere's King Lear, 2. 4. 253. 253. nice, discriminating. 258. intenerating and dulcifying, making tender and sweet. 265. St. Omer's, a college in France, which Lamb never attended. 268. per flagellationem extremam is translated by the phrase preceding. 276. barbecue, roast whole. Lamb here dis-\ tinguishes between the whole hogs (grown porkers of line 144) and the weakling (the young and tender suckling of line 145). shalots are a kind of onion, which he would permit in roasting the hog, but not the young pig. Dream-Children. This essay in connection with the preceding shows how well Lamb understood "the intertwining of the ludicrous and pathetic elements in human nature." Such an understanding is an essential characteristic of every real humorist. Lamb had a grandmother named Field who was housekeeper " in a great house" ; and other details of the essay are known to come from the author's life and experiences. There is, however, insufficient evidence for the existence of a real Alice W n whom he courted for seven years ; and Lamb's well-known "habit of embroidering fiction upon fact" for- bids us to accept readily any identification of her. 14. the Robin Redbreasts covered the murdered children's bodies with leaves. 41. Psaltery, the book of Psalms. 96. JohnL , PAGES 294-299] NOTES 485 or James Elia (line 151), is Lamb's older brother, whose death started the train of thought that produced this essay. 137. re-presentment, reincarnation. 147. Lethe, the river of forget fulness in the other world. 151. Bridget Elia was the name under which Lamb's sister Mary often appeared in his essays. DE QUINCEY. Meeting with Lamb. When this meeting took place, Lamb was not a distinguished writer ; and De Quincey " sought his acquaintance rather under the reflex honor he had enjoyed of being known as Coleridge's friend than for any which he yet held directly and separately in his own person." 2. The Temple was the residence of lawyers and law students. 30. no man, etc. This was " late in 1804 or early in 1805 " ; that is, some six or seven years after the publication of Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Cole- ridge. See our introductory note on Wordsworth. 34. that Coleridge and that Wordsworth, the men as they seemed at that time. 40. Pariahs, outcasts. 44. bravura, pretentious exhibition ; al- luding to the two preceding paragraphs. 45. a position, etc. In 1838, when this passage was written, Wordsworth and Coleridge were universally recognized as great poets. 57. let the reader figure, I say. Repeated from line 48 to remind the reader of the point of the sentence. De Quincey was much given to digressions, but rarely failed to use this excellent means of keeping the reader on the main track of his thought. 72. canon, standard. 75. allow yourself in, permit yourself to indulge in. An uncommon but correct idiom. 80. The many men, etc. Ancient Mariner, 23&-7. 83. Wap- ping. See note on 167, 21. Apostrophe to Opium. De Quincey began the use of opium to alleviate suffering from neuralgia while he was a student at Oxford. He knew nothing of the drug; but he lived to discover that the suffering it can cause is infinitely greater than that arising from the bodily ills it aims to abate. The first three quotations in this pas- sage are from Wordsworth: the pangs, etc., from White Doe of Rylslone; Wrongs unredressed, etc., from book III of The Excursion ; from the anarchy, etc., from book IV c" The Excursion; dishonour of the grave is apparently an allusion to 1 Corinthians XV, 43. 15. Phidias and Praxiteles were great Greek sculptors. 16. Baby- lon became famous for its magnificence under Nebuchadnezzar, sixth century B.C. Hekatompylos means the "hundred-gated," and 486 NOTES [PAGES 299-311 designates the Egyptian city of Thebes. The Grecian Thebes was "seven-gated." Incident of the Malay. When the genuineness of this incident was questioned, De Quincey said it was "recorded most faithfully." 6. amongst English mountains. The author was living at Grasmere in Westmoreland County, northwestern part of England. 7. De Quincey may have had in mind any one of several seaports on the western coast. 49. Anastasius, an anonymous novel, very popular when the Confessions were written. 50. Adelung's " Mithridates," a work on languages by a famous German philologist. 88. a-muck. " See the common accounts in any eastern traveler or voyager of the frantic excesses committed by Malays who have taken opium, or are reduced to desperation by ill luck at gambling." (De Quincey 's note.) From Pleasure to Pain. 6. an Iliad of woes. The subject of Homer's Iliad is " Achilles' wrath, to Greece the direful spring t Of woes unnumbered." Cicero in one of his letters to Atticus says : " An Iliad of woes [Latin malorum] hangs over us." On Reading Aloud. 1. in medias res, into the middle of the sub- ject. 3. acme, highest point. 13. Kemble and Mrs. Siddons were the foremost Shaksperean actors of De Quincey's day. 17. Overstep, etc. Quoted from Hamlet's advice to the players : Hamlet, act 3, scene 2. . 20. Samson Agonistes, hero of Milton's drama of that name. 23. Margaret was Mrs. De Quincey. SCOTT. The time of The Bride of Lammermoor is the end of the seventeenth century. Sir William Ashton, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland, had acquired the estate of Ravenswood, of the former owners of which he had been an enemy. Edgar, called the Master of Ravenswood, was the last representative of the dispos- sessed family. Soldier, Rest! is the song sung by Ellen Douglas to James Fitz- James on his arrival at the Douglas castle. Here's a Health. Woodstock is a Royalist picture of the period of the Commonwealth (1652). The king treated is Charles II, restored to the throne eight years after the time of the story. PAGES 312-323] NOTES 487 Escape of Marmion. Marmion, having been sent on a mission to Scotland by Henry VIII, was entertained by Douglas at the request of King James of Scotland. Douglas had evidence that his guest was guilty oi forgery and worse crimes, and therefore declined to take his hand at parting. 3. Surrey was commander of the English forces, which met the Scottish at Flodden Field shortly after the scene given here. 8. Clara was an heiress whom Marmion hoped to marry. 13. plain, complain. 16. T&ntallon was Douglas's castle. 39. Douglas had the title of Earl of Angus. 56. Saint Bride, or Bridget, was the favorite saint of Angus. There was a shrine to her in Bothwell Castle, near Glasgow. 58. portcullis, a gate, usually of iron, which ran up and down in grooves. 60. rowel, spur. 82. (iawain Douglas was a poet (see introductory note to Tarn O' Shanter), and later, though not at the time of Marmion, a bishop. AUSTEN. The passage from Pride and Prejudice illustrates well Sir Walter Scott's criticism of the author's work: "That young lady had a talent for describing the involvements and feelings and characters of ordinary life which is to me the most wonderful I ever met with." It would be well to compare it with the selection from The Bride of Lammermoor, in which there is so much more action than here, and so much less clear portrayal of character. Miss Austen's conversation, in which she always excelled, should also be compared with Sir Walter's. Elizabeth Bennet stands for the "Prejudice" of the title; Mr. Darcy (page 317), nephew of Lady Catherine de Bourgh, for the " Pride." After a long period of failure to understand each other, a mutual attraction had arisen, rumor of which had finally reached Lady Catherine. 42. Rosings, the De Bourgh estate. 43. Sir William Lucas, friend of the Bennets, whose daughter Charlotte (line 52) had married Mr. Collins (line 49), rector of the parish in which Lady Catherine lived. 235. Lady Catherine did not know that her nephew Darcy had a much larger hand in the " business" of the marriage, and that only love of Elizabeth had moved him to do so. 241. Pemberley, Mr. Darcy's estate in Derbyshire. MACAULAY. 8. Who wrote, etc. See note on Goldsmith's The Retaliation, page 470. 9. La Fontaine, the famous French writer of fables, was exceedingly absent-minded, and otherwise peculiar ; but 488 NOTES [PAGES 323-326 Macaulay forces the point in calling him a simpleton. 10. Hier- ocles, a Greek philosopher of the fifth century. The humorous stories to which Macaulay refers are now known to be not the work of Hierocles. 19. Paul Pry, a character in a comedy by John Poole, described as "an idle, inquisitive, meddlesome fellow, who has no occupation of his own, and is forever poking his nose into other people's affairs." 27. Tacitus, Roman historian, wrote a biography of Agricola, Roman governor of Britain in the first century. Edward Hyde, first Earl of Clarendon, English statesman of the seventeenth century, and Count Vittorio Alfieri, Italian dramatist of the eight- eenth century, wrote autobiographies. Samuel Johnson wrote lives of a number of English poets. This selection shows Macaulay's literary style in characteristic fashion. He is always clear and forci- ble; but his prejudices and his fondness for antithesis led him to great exaggerations. Note, for example, line 12, If . . . writer; and the last sentence ; and compare Carlyle's estimate of Boswell a few pages further on. Trial of Hastings. 1. Court. See lines 19-23. Hastings, the first governor-general of India, was impeached by the House of Com- mons for high crimes and misdemeanors, and was tried by the House of Lords. 5. Westminster, that part of London where the Houses of Parliament are located. 22. Hastings had deposed Cheyte Sing, Rajah of Benares, and had obtained money illegally from him and from the Begums of Oude. 25. the hall of William Rufus, so called because begun by that king, is now a vestibule to the Houses of Parliament. 27. Francis Bacon, the essayist, was convicted of corruption as a judge. 28. Somers, Lord Chancellor from 1696 to 1700, was impeached after leaving office, but was acquitted when his accusers declined to appear against him. The Earl of Strafford, Charles the First's chief adviser, despite his eloquence, was executed early in the session of the Long Parliament. 30. Charles the First was condemned to death as " tyrant, traitor, and murderer." 36. Garter King-at-arms, head of the heralds' college, which had supervision over coats-of-arms, genealogies, etc. 39. Upper House, House of Lords. 47. Prince of Wales, afterward King George IV. 49 ff . This paragraph is another fine specimen of Macaulay's style, which some critics condemn as " rhetoric." The writer cer- tainly knew what he wanted to accomplish to present a striking picture, and scarcely any will question his success. The use of the PAGES 326-330] NOTES 489 adverb there to introduce ten of the thirteen sentences keeps the reader's mind fixed on the place. The second sentence contains & general statement, with some striking figures of speech; and a number of specific statements follow. 58. Siddons. See note on De Quincey, On Reading Aloud, line 14. 60. historian, etc., Ed- ward Gibbon. 65. The painter is Reynolds (line 66) ; the scholar- is Parr (line 69). For Reynolds, see note on Boswell, First Meeting > line 11. Samuel Parr was noted for the breadth as well as the extent of his learning. 74. her to whom, etc., Mrs. Fitzherbert, a Roman Catholic lady, whom the Prince of Wales could not legally marry. 76. the beautiful mother, Mrs. Sheridan, whose three daughters were noted for their beauty. She was a famous singer, and was painted as Saint Cecilia, the patron saint of music, by Reynolds. 79. bril- liant society, etc. A number of the leading spirits in all walks of life, who frequented the "assemblies" of Elizabeth, wife of Edward, Montague, grandson of the Earl of Sandwich. 81. whose lips, etc. It was said that a kiss from the Duchess of Devonshire persuaded a voter to vote for Charles James Fox in the election of 1780. Fox was one of the managers of the impeachment proceedings. London Coffee-Houses. Compare with this selection Steele's Prospectus (page 160) and Addison's Mr. Spectator (page 176). Macaulay's chapter deals with the year 1685 (see line 85) ; but the coffee-houses remained an important "institution" until well into the eighteenth century. 12. Commonwealth, the government of England between the execution of Charles I and the establishment of Cromwell's Protectorate 1649-1653. The first coffee-house was opened in 1652. 22. fourth Estate. See note on Malory, line 3 (page 451). 25. Thomas Osborne, Earl of Danby, was Lord Treas- urer and first minister of the Crown, from 1673 to 1678. 47. from Paris. During the rule of Cromwell, Charles II and many of the nobility had lived in Paris ; and at the Restoration of Charles (1660) they brought back French fashions. 52. Lord Foppington, char- acter in Vanbrugh's comedy, The Relapse. His dialect consisted chiefly of some affected pronunciations. 55. down, rustic. 68. PerrauU, champion of modern writers as opposed to ancient. Boileau, champion of the ancients. See introductory note to Swift, Spider and the Bee, page 465. 71. Venice Preserved was a popular tragedy by Thomas Otway in 1682. 79. Dryden was Poet Laure- ate until the Revolution of 1688. 80. Racine and Bossu were famous French writers of the day. 490 NOTES [PAGES 330-334 Battle of Ivry celebrates the victory of Henry IV, king of Navarre and leader of the Huguenots after Coligni's deatjh, over the Holy League in 1590. 6. Rochette, headquarters of the Huguenots. 14. AppenzeU, a district of Switzerland, spears, troops. 15. Henry I of Lorraine, third Duke of Guise, was killed two years before Ivry. His brood means all such opponents of the rightful monarch. 16. Charles of Lorraine, Duke of Mayenne, brother of Henry I, commanded the League's forces, truncheon, staff of authority. 17. Seine, river running through Paris. It was empurpled by the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day. 18. Coligni, leader of the Huguenots, slain in the Massacre. 30. oriflamme, standard, en- sign ; originally the particular ensign of the king of France. 34. Guel- ders, Gelderland, a province of Holland. Almayne, Germany. 36. Lilies were the royal device of France from the sixth century. They were called golden lilies by the Italian poet Tasso in his Jeru- salem Delivered. 38. the snow-white crest, the white plume (29) on Navarre's helmet. 42. Charles of Lorraine, Duke d'Aumale, one of the leaders of the Holy League. Flemish count, Philip of Egmont (14). 47-48. The League included Catholics from other countries as well as France. Henry's command was intended to propitiate the French Catholics, with a view to a united country when he should be secure on the throne. 54. Maxilian, Lord of Rosny and Duke of Sully, was one of Henry's most capable and loyal supporters. 61. Soldiers from both Austria and Switzerland were engaged in the battle. 63. Philip II, King of Spain, who was aiding the Roman Catholics against Navarre, pistoles, money. The pistole was a gold coin of varying value. 66. St. Genevieve was the patron saint of Paris. Her burghers, then, were the citizens of the city. CARLYLE. This passage on Boswell is from a review of Croker's edition of the Life of Johnson, previously reviewed by Macaulay. (See page 323, and note.) Carlyle's essay is in reality an answer to Macaulay, and gives a much fairer picture of both Johnson and Boswell. 16. solid pudding, income from his book. 23. Time. Carlyle, doubtless under the influence of his German studies, used capital letters much more freely than is (or was) common among English writers. 35. Shakespeare Jubilee, held at Stratford in 1769. Bos- well appeared at a masquerade dressed as a Corsican warrior, in com- pliment to Paoli, the hero of Corsica, whom Boswell admired greatly. PAGES 334-338] NOTES 491 The ribbon on his cap on this occasion was not Corsica Boswell, but "Viva la Liberia." Macaulay got the story wrong, and Carlyle followed him in the error. 49. flunky, a footman. 56. Boswell's father was Laird of Auchinleck. Touchwood is Carlyle's nickname; cf. sulphur-brand, line 64. 58. schoolmaster, Dr. Johnson, who attempted to conduct a private school before coming to London. 69. Boswell's social position is set forth in de- tail in the following sentences. 75. Dominie, schoolmaster. 78. pragmatical, self-important. 79. atmosphere of Heraldry, where blood and ancestry were of much importance. 80. Gamaliel. See Acts V, 34. 87. Advocates, lawyers. 100. gulosity, gluttony, greediness. gigmanity. From the time of Thurtell's trial (Carlyle's note) " 'gig' became Carlyle's pet symbol for respectability." 129. Carlyle errs here. Johnson, when Boswell became ac- quainted with him, was the foremost man of letters in England, and was receiving large returns for his labor. 132. glass of fashion. An allusion to Ophelia's speech, Hamlet, act 3, scene 1, line 161 ff. ; as is also the observed of innumerable observers (142). 139. lick- spittles, flatterers. Cf. plate-licker, line 151. 150. The Feast of Tabernacles took place at the end of the harvest of fruit, oil, and wine, and was the most joyful of all feasts. See Numbers XXIX, 12-40. 153. The blind old woman was Miss Williams, a dependent of Johnson's. 167. The meaning of Spanielship, a word of Carlyle's coining, can be easily understood. 173. The Outer-House is the great hall in the Parliament House at Edinburgh where the Court of Sessions sits. The domestic Outer-House would be the entrance hall to Johnson's residence, where Boswell might be thought of as sitting and deciding who should enter. Johnson was called "Ursa Major," the Great Bear, by Boswell's father. Henry Erskine was a prominent Scotch statesman and wit. Burns. This passage is from the fifth of a series of six lectures. In the others Carlyle treated the hero as Divinity, Prophet, Poet, Priest (preacher), and King. In this lecture he spoke of Samuel Johnson (line 15) and Jean Jacques Rousseau (16), in addition to Burns. He introduced his first lecture with this sentence: "We have undertaken to discourse here for a little on Great Men, their manner of appearance in our world's business, how they shaped them- selves in the world's history, what ideas men formed of them, what work they did ; on Heroes, namely, and on their reception and per- formance ; what I call Hero-worship and the Heroic in human affairs." 492 NOTES [PAGES 338-345 2. sincerity. Cf. The Hero as Prophet: "I should say sincerity, a deep, great, genuine sincerity, is the first characteristic of all men in any way heroic." In an essay on Burns written twelve years before the lecture Carlyle had said: "The excellence of Burns is, indeed, among the rarest, whether in poetry or prose : his Sincerity, his indisputable air of Truth." 10. Odin, the chief god of the Scandinavian mythology, is the central figure in The Hero as Divin- ity. 12 ff. To appreciate this essay fully, the student should read some good sketch of Burns's life. 30. The world, etc. One of Carlyle's striking aphorisms. 46. phasis; same as "phase." 54 . Napoleon obtained his first commission, the Artillery Lieutenancy, at the age of seventeen. 60. cynosure. See note on U Allegro, 80. Adversity, etc. Another sentence of Carlyle's that has come to be almost a proverb. 69. "rank is but," etc. From A Man's a Man, page 232, line 7. 80. After the Edinburgh visit, Burns took up farming near Dumfries, where he died eight years later, unquestionably as a result of too much convivial company. Definition of History. David Hume, English, eighteenth cen- tury, wrote History of England. William Robertson, Scotch, eighteenth century, several histories. Herodotus, Greek, fifth cen- tury B.C., history of the Persian invasion of Greece. Jean Frois- sart, French, fourteenth century, history of several countries of Europe. 25. Carlyle probably has in mind the definition of Thu- cydides: "History is philosophy teaching by examples." 31 ff. The first Duke of Marlborough, hero of the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1713), asserted that he knew no English history except what he learned from Shakspere. 44. Monkish Annalists, monks who kept record of events year by year. 46. missal, church service book, breviary, prayer book. Carlyle means that the monks wrote, not as unprejudiced historians, but from the point of view of the Church. DICKENS. Preface to "Oliver Twist." 16. Hogarth, English satiric painter of the eighteenth century; famous for his subjects from low life. 44. The editor has been unable to identify Mas- saroni. He offers the guess that the name is an invention of Dickens, to give a high-sounding foreign designation to the typical, more or less attractive, rogue of the earlier picaresque novels. 45. Bill Sikes is one of the most vicious of the criminal gang in Oliver Twist. Nancy is his life companion. 56. "The Artful PAGES 346-356] NOTES 493 Dodger" is a member of the gang who does nothing worse than steal. 99. Jacob's Island, described in chapter 50 of the novel, was in the worst part of London's shipping quarter. It was "sur- rounded by a muddy ditch known in the days of this story as Folly Ditch . . . every repulsive lineament of poverty, every loathsome indication of filth, rot, and garbage ; all these ornament the banks of Folly Ditch." Mr. Micawber is one of the most famous and delightfully amusing characters in Dickens's most famous novel. His characteristics are shown in the selection an "imposing" appearance, a grandilo- quent manner of speaking, frequent and fragmentary literary allu- sions, and some pet phrases such as " in short, " " waiting for something to turn up." 25. Murdstone, David's stepfather. 93. This "in short " refers to visits to the pawnbroker. 115. Take him, etc. A comic reminiscence of Hamlet's eulogy on his father : "He was a man, take him for all in all, I shall not look upon his like again." 127. nineteen (pounds) nineteen (shillings) six (pence) ; that is, ten or fifteen cents less than twenty pounds. Twenty pounds ought (for "naught") and six means sixpence more than twenty pounds. Uriah Heep is the "villain" of David's story, though in our selec- tion he appears to be merely an unattractive character. His pecul- iarities, like Mr. Micawber's, are on the surface, and the author seldom writes a page about him without mentioning them his red hair, his long, "clammy" hands, his "umble" disposition, his way of writhing (line 114). 57. William Tidd's Practice of the Court of King's Bench was a real authority on common-law practice in Dickens's day. 76. a numble is merely, of course, Uriah's way of saying "an umble." GEORGE ELIOT. Mrs. Tulliver, with her children, Tom and Maggie, and her niece, Lucy Deane, is visiting her sister, Mrs. Pullet, at Garum Firs. Maggie has been guilty of several accidents before this chapter, being so exceptionally unfortunate as to offend her be- loved brother. She feels that she is in everybody's disfavor, and is therefore not inclined to be agreeable to anybody. 18. Medusa's hair was so beautiful that Minerva out of jealousy transformed it into snakes. Her head was then so terrible to look upon that all who did so were turned into stone. All the author 494 NOTES [PAGES 359-373 means to say is that Maggie looked very fierce, with her snakes cropped refers to Maggie's having cut off her own hair in a fit of anger. 112. Tt ft^yc6os, Greek, "something great." 151. corpus delicti, body of the chosen (or favored). 231. spud, a kind of spade. THACKERAY. Vanity Fair is a satire on "Society." Rebecca, or "Becky," Sharp, an adventuress, married Captain Rawdon Crawley in expectation that he would inherit largely from a rich old aunt. The aunt disinherited him, but he became Colonel in the Waterloo cam- paign, after which he left the army. Soon afterwards the two went to London to live "on nothing a year" that is, by the Colonel's gambling and his wife's cleverness. Her principal victim was Lord Steyne (pronounced like ."stain"), a wealthy, unprincipled Marquis. 5. bonne, nursemaid. 60. Magasin des Modes, a French fashion journal. 79. Holland, a fabric of cotton or linen ; so called because first made in Holland. 124. maitre d'hotel, steward. Washington Irving. Nil Nisi Bonum means "nothing except good." In a sentence elsewhere in the essay Thackeray wrote : "And so with Macaulay's style there may be faults, of course what critic can't point them out? But for the nonce we are not talk- ing about faults : we want to say nil nisi bonum." 1. John Gibson Lockhart was Sir Waller Scott's son-in-law, as well as his literary executor. 6. Irving had many characteristics leading to his being called the Goldsmith of his day. Macaulay was the greatest historian of the day, as Gibbon was of the preceding century. 15. pater patriae, father of his country. 50. The medal was that of the Royal Society of Literature. 64. diplomatized. Irving received the degree of Doctor of Civil Law from Oxford. Note 1 . Two Kings, etc. Alluding to an incident in an old farce called The Rehearsal. 131. Joseph Rene Bellot was a young Frenchman who was lost in the Arctic ice while a member of the party searching for Sir John Franklin. HUXLEY. This extract is from a lecture to workingmen, to whom Huxley gave much thought and time. "If I am to be remembered at all," he once said, "I would rather it should be as a man who did his best to help the people than by any other title." He labored continually to make science intelligible and useful to unscientific people. 34. Moliere, greatest French writer of comedy. The play referred to by Huxley is called Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme (the "Mid- PAGES 378-389] NOTES 495 die Class Gentleman")- 181. these kind is no longer considered good usage, "kind" is singular. 193. vera causa, true cause. 257. Sir Isaac Newton demonstrated the law of gravitation. Pierre Simon, Marquis de Laplace, French astronomer who framed the "nebular hypothesis." 278. You may have hypotheses, and hypotheses; that is, "there is an enormous difference in the value of hypotheses." RUSKIN'S interpretation of Milton is really a lesson in what "is rightly called 'reading'" (see line 208). 11. pilot, the Apostle Peter, who was a fisherman on Galilee, and, Milton assumes, pilot of his boat. 14. mitred, wearing a miter, or bishop's hat. Peter is said by the Roman Catholic Church to have been the first bishop of Rome. 24. are sped, have prospered. 25. list, please. 26. pipes. See note on Lycidas, 33. 47. Ruskin uses bishop here in its usual New Testament sense synonymous with "elder," or priest. 48. episcopal power, power of a bishop. 49. that text. See Matthew XVI, 17-19. 82. lords over. 1 Peter V, 3. 116. Ruskin may use Bill and Nancy in a general sense, as we say "every Tom, Dick, and Harry." Or he may have in mind Dickens's Oliver Twist (see Preface, page 343 ff ., and notes), though it is not re- corded that Nancy ever struck Bill Sikes. 121. Salisbury steeple is the highest among the English cathedrals 404 feet. 147 ff . Both quotations are from John III, 8. 164. cretinous, idiotic. 166. sectarians, bigoted adherents of any sect. 179. The inter- pretation of Dante is in the ninth book of Purgatory, lines 68-121 of Gary's translation. 187. have taken. Luke XI, 52. 190. He that watereth. Proverbs XI, 25. 197. rock-apostle, Peter. The name is from the Greek petros, a stone. See reference on line 49. Take him. See Matthew XXII, 13. Ruskin's conclusion is ex- pressed too strongly. Every reader has a right to his own thoughts about an author after he clearly understands what that author says. ARNOLD. For the source of the title, Sweetness and Light, see Swift's The Spider and the Bee, pages 138-143. 23. Arnold was a great admirer of Sainte-Beuve, and the most distinguished English representative of the Frenchman's "school" of criticism. 25. in our English way. Arnold persistently pointed out the defects of English life, and his words were not without effect. In the words of another great critic, Sir Leslie Stephen, Arnold "applied good whole- 496 NOTES [PAGES 390-396 some irritants to our stolid self-satisfaction." 43. Montesquieu, famous French philosophical writer of the eighteenth century. His best-known work is L' Esprit des Lois ("Spirit of the Laws") ; but the quotation in the text is from his Discourse on the Motives Which Ought to Impel Us to Study. 70. Thomas Wilson was Bishop of the Isle of Man from 1697 to 1755. Arnold considered his work "the very best, perhaps, which our race and nation can do in the way of religious writing." Estimate of Emerson. - Considerations of space led the editor to omit a number of sentences from the first two paragraphs of the selection. None of those omitted deal with Emerson. 8. Newman was not a Cardinal when Arnold was at Oxford, but a minister in the Church of England. His "solution" of his doubts, which Arnold calls "impossible," was his entrance into the Church of Rome. 35. Arnold heard two of his "voices" when he read Goethe's Wil- helm Meister's Apprenticeship in Carlyle's translation. The aim of that book is expressed by an English critic thus : "That we should give unity to our lives by devoting them with hearty enthusiasm to some pursuit, and that the pursuit is assigned to us by nature through the capacities she has given us." 42. James Russell Lowell wrote a most appreciative and entertain- ing essay on Emerson the Lecturer. 54. Weimar, Goethe's home. 81. The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, emperor from 161 to 180 A.D., show that he preserved "hi a time of universal corruption, unreality, and self-indulgence, a nature sweet, pure, self-denying, unaffected." Shakespeare. 1 . Others abide our question, other writers endure (and, in some sense, answer) our questioning (about their lives and experiences). Arnold in this sonnet says that Shakspere did not reveal himself, but by his understanding of mankind's pains (12), weakness, and griefs (13) was able to speak for the whole race of man. 8. the foiled searching of mortality, the search of mortals, which is foiled. Memorial Verses. 2. Byron died in Greece in 1824, where he had gone to assist the Greeks in their struggle for independence. 10. the strife was in Byron's soul. He was a rebel against society, and set at naught its conventions. 18. Physician of the iron age. In clas- sical mythology the iron age, following the golden, the silver, and the bronze, was the age "wherein toil and selfishness are the burden of a degenerate mankind." (New International Dictionary.) Arnold PAGES 396-403] NOTES 497 says Goethe's mission was to relieve this. 23 ff . Goethe died in 1832, having seen England lose her American colonies ; France set aside her rulers in a bloody "Reign of Terror" ; and England, with Prussia's aid, defeat Napoleon's scheme to dominate Europe. 38-39. See note on L' Allegro, 145. 72. Rotha, usually "Rothay," a stream flowing by Grasmere churchyard, within a few feet of Words- worth's grave. Requiescat. The Latin title of this dirge means, " May she rest." On tombs it is usually followed by in pace, "in peace." The poem was written of no individual ; but some one has suggested that the second stanza would apply well to some great comic actress. 2. The yew is found much in cemeteries. 13. cabined, confined in small space, as in a cabin. The poem is an expression of Arnold's "world- weariness," characterized by lines 42-44 of Memorial Verses, where he is speaking of Wordsworth. Fall of Sohrab. The story of Sohrab and Rustum is taken from a Persian epic poem, Shah Nameh (the "Book of Kings"), the Iliad and Odyssey of Persian literature. Arnold's "episode" narrates the portion of the story familiar in folk-lore as the " f ather-and-son com- bat." Sohrab, champion of the Tartars, has been chosen by his general, Afrasiab, to fight in single combat with a champion of the Persians. The latter choose Rustum, who does not know that Sohrab is his son, but who tries to dissuade him from fighting because of his youth and inexperience. Sohrab asks if his opponent is not Rustum, the latter evades the question, and the combat begins. 13 ff. like those . . . boughs. Long, formal comparisons and similes are features of the epic style. Cf. 75-77, 79-81. 15. Hy- phasis, Hydaspes, rivers in northern India. 17. wrack, ruin. 119 ff. The effect of the "shouted" name is explained by Sohrab, lines 150-153. 122-123. Rustum's conduct contrasts most unfa- vorably with Sohrab's (23-29), as do his words (131-142) with Sohrab's (30-50). Sohrab, after his fall, proves by a mark on his arm that he is Rustum's son ; whereupon the broken-hearted Rustum admits his identity, and announces that he will burn hie .tents, quit the Persian host, and take Sohrab's body home for burial. Dover Beach. The French coast opposite Dover is nearer England than at any other point. The distance from Dover to Calais is only 21 miles. 15. Sophocles was one of the three greatest writers of Greek tragedy. The poem is thus summarized by Professor Hale 498 NOTES [PAGES 404-410 (Select Poems of Matthew Arnold, xliii) : "We have first a picture of the calm of nature, then the thought of the turbid tides of human- ity, then the thought of the sad incomprehensible waning of faith, and then, as with a sudden pang at heart, he turns to the one beside him" [Ah, love line 29] "as a sort of sole refuge in a confused and ignorant world." It is an expression of despair, but also of a stoical resignation characteristic of the author. Geist's Grave. 15. the Virgilmn cry was Sunt lachrimae rerumf (Mneid, I, 462), freely translated in the next line. 42. After 1867 Arnold wrote very little poetry. Geist's Grave was written in 1881. 55. The absent master was the poet's son Richard. 70. At this time the family were living at Cobham, a few miles south of London on the Portsmouth road. TENNYSON. In Ulysses, of which we give the concluding lines, (about a third of the whole), the old hero and wanderer expresses himself as dissatisfied with the peace and quiet of home life, and as determined to set forth in search of new adventures. The story is from Dante's Inferno, not Homer. 20. the Happy Isles, called also the "Fortunate Islands" and the "Islands of the Blest," were im- agined by the ancients to be "somewhere" in the West. Like the "happy hunting-grounds" of the Indians, they were the abode after death of those favored by the gods. In Memoriam is a poem of a hundred and thirty-three sections or, perhaps better, a collection of so many poems called forth by the death of Tennyson's best friend, Arthur Henry Hallam. They were written during a period of seventeen years, on birthdays, Christmases, New Year's Days, and other anniversaries connected with the friendship. CVI. The time of this section is plainly New Year. It strikes a responsive chord in many hearts to-day (1917) more than half a century after its publication. Home They Brought. This is one of several "intercalary" songs (that is, inserted between the main divisions) in a poem that has had great popularity. The student is probably familiar with two others of these songs the "bugle" song, beginning "The splendor falls- on castle walls," and the lullaby, "Sweet and low." Idylls of the King is a series of narrative poems dealing with King Arthur and his knights. Geraint (g pronounced hard), one of these knights, "a tributary prince of Devon, " had fallen in love with Enid, daughter of Earl Yniol, when Yniol had lost his possessions through PAGES 411-415] NOTES 499 treachery. In the passage immediately preceding that given in our text, the women are preparing a gorgeous gown for Enid's wedding, since her father's lands and fortune have been restored to him. 28. Caerleon. See note on Legions, Geoffrey of Monmouth, line 2. Queen, Guinevere. 66. gaudy-day, feast day. Gareth's Combat. Lynette came to Arthur and asked a knight to do battle for her sister Lyonors, besieged in her own castle by a knight who aimed to force her to marry him. Gareth, a prince dis- guised as a kitchen-knave, asked Arthur to give him the quest, and received it. Lynette, incensed, reviled him on the return journey. Before the meeting with Noonday Sun, Gareth had been victorious in three encounters ; but Lynette was unable to see the truth, and continued her satiric remarks as in our selection. 1. Three river- loops guarding the approach to the castle of Lyonors were held by three brothers of the besieging knight. Gareth had already de- feated the first, who called himself "Morning-Star." 14. vizoring up, raising the vizor of his helmet, so as to cover his cipher (that is, expressionless) face. 30. During the combat with Morning-Star, said Lynette, "The savor of thy kitchen came upon me A little faintlier; but the wind hath changed." 38. twice my love, etc. That is, "her dream that she would find a victorious champion that day a knight who would achieve her quest and become her love has been twice proved true." 36 ff . The punctuation shows that Lynette sings a song of three stanzas (as she does after the first and third combats), interrupting herself with comments. 50. rosemaries and bay were the regular decoration in old times for the boar's head. The Revenge. This poem celebrates a battle with the Spanish Armada in 1591. Tennyson examined several contemporary ac- counts, and made a composite story that is historically accurate. 2. pinnace, a small vessel that was doing scout duty. 12. Inquisi- tion, a court of the Roman Catholic Church for the apprehension and punishment of heretics. In Spain at the time of this battle it was exceptionally cruel. 17. Devon, a county in southwestern England ; Bideford, the village in which Grenville was born. 21. thumbscrew, an instrument of torture much used by the Inquisi- tion to force confessions. 30. Seville (accented on the first syllable) was at this time the capital of Spain. 31. Don, Spanish title 500 NOTES [PAGE8 41^422 equivalent to "Mister." It here means simply "Spaniard." 96. the lion, Grenville. 101. Queen and Faith, Elizabeth and the Church of England. Henry VIII had broken with Rome and had had himself declared head of the Church because the Pope refused to recognize his marriage with Anne Boleyn, mother of Elizabeth. 114. or, before. Charge of the Heavy Brigade. This poem, like the preceding, deals with a real event in the Crimean war. The "three hun- dred" were cut to pieces, but the tide of battle was turned when the rest of the brigade arrived. The more usual spelling of the name is Balaclava. Tennyson follows Kinglake, author of The Invasion of the Crimea, the standard work on the subject. The historian gave the poet some notes, of which the following will make clear the situa- tion of the opposing forces : "Scarlett is marching eastward with his '300' in marching order, when, casting his eyes towards the heights on his left, i.e., towards the north, he sees a host of Russians break- ing over the sky-line and presently advancing downhill towards the south. Thereupon he instantly gives the order 'Left wheel into line!' The effect of this is to make the '300' no longer show their flank to the enemy, but confront him." 21. The three were Scar- lett's aide-de-camp, his trumpeter, and an orderly. 33. The "300" were the Scots Greys and the second squadron of Inniskillings, an Irish regiment of dragoons. Throstle. 7 Tennyson, says Van Dyke, " has caught more of the throbbing and passionate and joyous voices of the world [than has Wordsworth]. And so he is at his best with Nature when he comes to the springtime." In The Throstle, "Immortal youth throbs and pulses. The simple music of joy. . . ." It "sings itself." Crossing the Bar is not, as is popularly supposed, Tennyson's last poem. It was written in the poet's eighty-first year; and his son Hallam said on reading it, "That is the crown of your life's work." Tennyson explained the "Pilot" as "that Divine and Unseen who is always guiding us." Hallam Tennyson adds : "A few days before my father's death he said to me, ' Mind you put Crossing the Bar at the end of my poems.'" BROWNING. Pippa Passes is a drama depicting how Pippa, a little silk-mill girl, spends her one holiday in the year New Year's Day. She "passes" around the town singing, and by her songs, all unknown to herself, influences various people. "The year's at the PAGES 423-427] NOTES 501 spring" is heard by a wicked couple who are by it brought to a realization of their sin, and to repentance. ''That little peasant's voice," says the man, "has righted all again." How They Brought the Good News. Browning said there was " no sort of historical foundation " for this poem. The distance from Ghent (in Belgium) to Aix-la-Chapelle (in Prussia) is over ninety miles ; a horse that could gallop the whole way would indeed be a horse without peer (line 52). 10. pique, pommel of a saddle. 14. Lokeren and the eight other places mentioned are towns on the route. Another "horse" poem of Browning's that would interest most students is Muleykeh. Incident of the French Camp is based on fact, of which, however, the hero was a man, not a boy. 1. Ratisbon (German "Regens- burg"), in Bavaria, was stormed by Napoleon in 1809. 5-6. Browning describes the emperor in the attitude made familiar by many pictures. 7. prone, bending forward. 29. flag-bird. Napoleon's flag had an eagle on it. vans, wings. 35. film is subject of sheathes (34), which means "covers." My Last Duchess. An excellent example of the "dramatic mono- logue," a poetic form created by Browning. Although only one person speaks, the presence of another is implied; and the char- acter, thoughts, and actions of both, and frequently of others not on the scene, are clearly revealed. In My Last Duchess the Duke has just concluded with a certain count's representative arrangements for his marriage with the count's daughter. As the interview closes, the Duke draws a curtain and reveals a portrait of his first wife, which he admires exceedingly as a work of art. In all he says he shows her a most attractive character, and himself most arrogant, selfish, jealous. Lines 45-46 "I gave commands; Then all smiles stopped together," have been by some explained as meaning that the Duke had her put to death. Browning approved this explanation, and then added, "Or he might have had her shut up in a convent." It really is of no importance how she was got out of the way. 47. We'll meet, etc., shows that the Duke and the Count's man have held their interview in an upper apartment while some sort of entertainment was taking place below. 53. Nay, we'll go, etc. The visitor stands back to let his superior go first. 54-56. The Duke calls attention 502 NOTES [PAGES 427-428 to a fine piece of statuary in the lower hall, or perhaps seen outside through a window. His utter heartlessness is shown by his prompt dismissal of the Duchess from his thoughts. 56. Claus of Inns- bruck is an imaginary artist, as is Frd Pandolf of line 3. Home-Thoughts. "The allusion to the English thrush" (lines 14-16), says Professor Phelps, "has given immortality to this poem. Many had observed that the thrush sings a lilt, and immediately repeats it ; but Browning was the first to give a pretty reason for it. The thrush seems to say, ' You think that beautiful melody is an acci- dent? Well, I will show you it is no fluke, I will sing it correctly right over again.'" (Browning: How to Know Him, page 84.) Rabbi Ben Ezra contains many sentiments based on the writings of a famous Jewish scholar of the twelfth century ; but it embodies much of Browning's own " philosophy of life." The poem is difficult, and even close examination will not reveal all its greatness to the student ; but since it has no logical development of thought, much inspiration and other kinds of satisfaction can be got from separate passages. It is one of many poems of Browning which entitle him to the praise Arnold gives Emerson (see page 393) "he is the friend and aider of those who would live in the spirit." The following summary by Berdoe (Browning Cyclopaedia) may assist the student to understand the leading thought of the poem : "According to Rabbi Ben Ezra, man's life is to be viewed as a whole. God's plan in our creation has arranged for youth and age, and no view of life is consistent with it which ignores the work of either. Man is not a bird or a beast, to find joy solely in feasting ; care and doubt are the lif e stimuli of his soul : the Divine spark within us is nearer to God than are the recipients of his inferior gifts. So our rebuffs, our stings to urge us on, our strivings, are the measure of our ultimate success : aspiration, not achievement, divides us from the brute. The body is intended to subserve the highest aims of the soul : it will do so if we live and learn. The flesh is pleasant, and can help soul as that helps the body. Youth must seek its heri- tage in age ; in the repose of age he is to take measures for his last adventure. This he can do with prospect of success proportionate to his use of the past. Wait death without fear, as you awaited age. Sen- tence will not be passed on mere ' work ' done : our purposes, thoughts, fancies, all that the coarse methods of human estimates failed to appreciate, these will be put in the diamond scales of God and credited to us. God is the Potter ; we are clay, receiving our shape and form PAGES 429-438] NOTES 503 and ornament by every turn of the wheel and faintest touch of the Master's hand. The uses of a cup are not estimated by its foot or by its stem ; but by the bowl which presses the Master's lips to slake the Divine thirst. We cannot see the meaning of the wheel and the touches of the potter's hand and instrument ; we know this, and this only, our times are in his hand who has planned a perfect cup." This summary is intended to help one to understand the poem, not to take the place of it. 24. This line is an instance of the harshness not infrequently found in Browning. He had great musical talent, but his poetry is not always harmonious. 40-42. Cf. Stevenson, page 435, line 17 : "An aspiration is a joy forever." 52. dole, share. 75. term, stopping-place. 84. indite, put on. 113. tempt, try. 124- 125. Supply "whom" after 7 and they. 150. The figure of the potter, which is continued to the end of the poem, is from Isaiah LXIV, 8, and Jeremiah XVIII, 2-6. 168. impressed, shaped. 169- 174. The first half of this stanza refers to youth, the last half to age. Epilogue, which appeared first in a volume published the day Browning died, is his confession of faith in a future life of activity and usefulness. Berdoe quotes the following from a London paper a short time after the poet's death : "One evening, just before his death illness, the poet was reading this (the third verse) from a [printer's] proof to his daughter-in-law and sister. He said: 'It almost looks like bragging to say this, and as if I ought to cancel it ; but it's the simple truth : and as it's true, it shall stand.' His faith knew no doubting. In all trouble, against all evil, he stood firm." 5. Supply "will you." 17. unseen, the poet after death. STEVENSON. El Dorado is Spanish, meaning " the golden." The name was applied by Spaniards of the sixteenth century to an imagi- nary city of great wealth in South America, from which it came to mean any place of fabulous wealth. It, then came to have the mean- ing, as in Stevenson, anything valuable, much desired and sought, but unattainable. 15. term, termination. 17. An aspiration is a joy forever. A recollection of the first line of Keats's Endymion "A thing of beauty is a joy forever." 23. piece, play. 34. amulets, charms. 53. Edward Gibbon spent more than twenty years writing his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. 79. Of making, etc. Ecclesiastes XII, 12. 83-85. Cf. Rabbi Ben Ezra, 31-42. INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES ADDISON, JOSEPH, 171-186. Adversity, Of Bacon, 79. jEneid, Preface to Translation of Cazton, 60. jEneid, Translation of (extract) Surrey, 66. ALFRED THE GREAT, 9-11. AUhea, To Lovelace, 101. A Man's a Man for A' That Burns, 232. Amoretti (two sonnets from) Spenser, 76. Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, The (ex- tracts), 11. Arcadia, Description of Sidney, 72. Areopagitica (extract) Milton, 118. Argument against Abolishing Chris- tianity Swift, 144. ARNOLD, MATTHEW, 388406. Asolando, Epilogue to Browning, 434. Astrophel and Stella (two sonnets from) Sidney, 71. As You Like It (song from) Shakspere, 89. Auld Lang Syne Burns, 229. AUSTEN, JANE, 315-323. BACON, FRANCIS, 79-87. Ballads, English and Scottish Pop- ular, 52-60. Banks o' Doon Burns, 233. Battle of Ivry, The Macaulay,' 330. Battle of the Books, The (extract) Swift, 138. Beatitudes, The Tyndale, 68. Beatitudes, The Wiclif, 17. BEDA, 5-8. Beowulf (extracts), 1. Bonnie George Campbell Anony- mous, 54. BOSWELL, JAMES, 197-202. Boswell, James Carlyle, 333. Boswell, James Macaulay, 323. Bride of Lammermoor, The (extract) Scott, 303. BROWNE, SIR THOMAS, 121-124. BROWNING, ROBERT, 422-434. Bull-Fight, The -(from Childe Har- old) Byron, 253. BUNYAN, JOHN, 134-138. BURKE, EDMUND, 207-211. Burke, Edmund (from The Retalia- tion) Goldsmith, 206. BURNS, ROBERT, 220-233. Burns, Robert (from Heroes and Hero-Worship) Carlyle, 338. BYRON, GEORGE NOEL GORDON, LORD. 251-259. CjEDMON, 4. Campaign, The (extract) Addi- son, 172. Canterbury Tales, Prologue Chaucer, 22. CAREW, THOMAS, 99-101. CARLYLE, THOMAS, 333-343. CAXTON, WILLIAM, 60-62. Celia, Song to Jonson, 92. Chapman's Homer, On First Look- ing into Keats, 268. Character of the Happy Warrior Wordsworth, 240. Charge of the Heavy Brigade, The Tennyson, 419. Charity (from Religio Medici) Browne, 122. CHAUCER, GEOFFREY, 22-52. Chaucer (from Table Talk) Cole- ridge, 247. Chaucers Wordes unto Adam Chaucer, 52. Cherry-Ripe Herrick, 97. Chesterfield, Letter to the Earl of Johnson, 191. 506 INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES Childe Harold (extracts) Byron, 253. Christ (extracts) Cynewulf , 4. Chronicle, The Anglo-Saxon (ex- tracts), 11. Cloud, The Shelley, 262. Coffee-houses, London Macaulay, 327. COLERIDGE, SAMUEL TAYLOR, 247- 251. COLLINS, WILLIAM, 211-213. Coming of the Angles Beda, 6. Composed upon Westminster Bridge Wordsworth, 244. Confessions of an English Opium- Eater (extracts) De Quincey, 298. Constant Lover, The Suckling, 102. Corinna's Going A-Maying Her- rick, 94. Couplets from his Poems Pope, 187. COWPER, WILLIAM, 218-219. Crossing the Bar Tennyson, 422. Culture and Anarchy (extract) Arnold, 388. Cupid and Campaspe Lyly, 71. Cymbeline (song from) Shak- spere, 90. CYNEWULF, 4-5. Daisy, To a Mountain Burns, 221. David Copperfield (extracts) Dickens, 346. DEFOE, DANIEL, 150-160. DE QUINCEY, THOMAS, 295-303. Description of Spring Surrey, 65. Deserted Village, The (extracts) Goldsmith, 202. Diary (extracts) Pepys, 124. DICKENS, CHARLES, 343-356. Discourses in A merica : ' ' Emerson ' ' (extract) Arnold, 391. Disdain Returned Carew, 100. Dissertation upon Roast Pig, A Lamb, 282. - Don Juan (stanzas from) Byron, 259. Dover Beach Arnold, 402. Dream, A Midsummer Night's (song from) Shakspere, 89. Dream-Children Lamb, 290. DRYDEN, JOHN, 129-134. Ecclesiastical History, Preface to Beda, 5. Education of Women, The Defoe, 150. El Dorado Stevenson, 435. Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog Goldsmith, 206. Elegy Written in a Country Church- yard Gray, 214. Elia, Essays of Lamb, 282. ELIOT, GEORGE, 356-363. Emerson, Estimate of Arnold, 391. English Bards and Scotch Reviewers : " Wordsworth" Byron, 252. Essay on Criticism (couplets from) Pope, 187. Essay on Man (couplets from) Pope, 187. Essay upon Projects (extract) Defoe, 150. Euphues (extract) Lyly, 69. Evening, Ode to Collins, 212. Eve of St. Agnes, The Keats, 270. Expostulation and Reply Words- worth, 237. Faerie Queene, The (extract) Spenser, 74. Flow Gently, Sweet Afton Burns, 231. Flying, Dissertation on the Art of (from Rasselas) Johnson, 193. Frozen Words Addison, 173. Geist's Grave Arnold, 404. GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH, 16-17. Ghent to Aix, How they Brought the Good News from Browning, 423. GOLDSMITH, OLIVER, 202-207. Goldsmith, Character of Boswell, 199. Grasshopper and the Cricket, On the Keats, 268. GRAY, THOMAS, 214-218. INDEX OF' AUTHORS AND TITLES 507 Grecian Urn, Ode on a Keats, 269. Happy Warrior, Character of the Wordsworth, 240. Heaven and Hell (from Reliffio Medici) Browne, 121. Heroes and Hero-Worship (extract) Carlyle, 338. HERRICK, ROBERT, 94-99. History of England (extract) Macaulay, 327. Home-Thoughts, from Abroad Browning, 427. HOWARD, HENRY, EARL OF SURREY, 65-67. How Roses Came Red Herrick, 96. How Sleep the Brave Collins, 211. How the Lover Perisheth Wyatt, 65. How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix Browning, 423. HUXLEY, THOMAS HENRY, 372- 381. Idylls of the King (extracts) Tennyson, 410. II Penseroso Milton, 108. Incident of the French Camp Browning, 425. In Memoriam (extracts) Tenny- son, 407. In Praise of His Mistress Carew, 99. Invocation (from Christ) Cyne- wulf, 4. Itry, Battle of Macaulay, 330. JOHNSON, SAMUEL, 191-197. Johnson, First Meeting with Boswell, 197. Johnson's Manner of Talking Boswell, 202. JONSON, BEN, 92-94. KEATS, JOHN, 268-281. Kemp Owyne Anonymous, 55. Ruble, Khan Coleridge, 249. Lachin y Gair Byron, 251. Lady of the Lake, The (song from) Scott, 310. L' Allegro Milton, 103. LAMB, CHARLES, 282-294. Lamb, A Meeting with De Quincey, 295. LANOLAND, WILLIAM, 18-20. London, 1802 Wordsworth, 245. Lord Randal Anonymous, 55. LOVELACE, RICHARD, 101-102. Lucasta, To Lovelace, 101. Lycidas Milton, 112. " Lycidas," on Some Lines of Ruskin, 382. LYLY, JOHN, 68-71. "Lyrical Ballads," Preface to (ex- tracts) Wordsworth, 233. MACAULAY. THOMAS BABINGTON, 323-332. Mac Flecknoe Dryden, 132. Macpherson, James, Letter to Johnson, 193. MALORY, SIR THOMAS, 62-65. MANDEVILLE, SIR JOHN, 20-21. Marlborough (from The Campaign) Addison, 171. MARLOWE, CHRISTOPHER, 87-88. Marmion (extract) Scott, 312. Marriage and Single Life, Of Bacon, 80. Memorial Verses Arnold, 395. Mill on the Floss, The (extract) Eliot, 357. MILTON, JOHN. 103-120. Mirzah, The Vision of Addison, 181. Moore, To Thomas Byron, 257. Moral Essays (couplets from) Pope, 188. Morte D' Arthur (extract) Malory, 62. Mountain Daisy, To a Burns, 221. Mouse, To a Burns, 220. My Last Duchess Browning, 426. Nil Nisi Bonum Thackeray. 368. Noble Lord, To a (extract) Burke. 210. 508 INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES Ode: "How Sleep the Brave' 1 Collins, 211. Ode on a Grecian Urn Keats, 269. Ode to Evening Collins, 212. Ode to the West Wind Shelley, 259. Oliver Twist, Preface to Dickens, 343. On First Looking into Chapman's Homer Keats, 268. On his Blindness Milton, 1 18. On the Grasshopper and the Cricket Keats, 268. Opium-Eater, Confessions of an (extracts) De Quincey, 298. Othello (from Table Talk) Cole- ridge, 247. Pardoner's Tale, The Chaucer, 40. Paraphrase, The (extract) Csed- mon, 4. Passionate Shepherd to his Love, The Marlowe, 88. Pastoral Care, Preface to Pope Gregory's Alfred the Great, 9. Patriotism, An Observation on Coleridge, 248. PEPYS, SAMUEL, 124-129. Phillis, To Herrick, 98. Piers the Plowman, The Vision of (extract) Langland, 18. Pilgrim's Progress, The (extract) Bunyan, 134. Pippa Passes (song from) Browning, 422. POPE, ALEXANDER, 187-188. Preface to Oliver Twist Dickens, 343. Preface to Pope Gregory's Pastoral Care Alfred the Great, 9. Preface to Robinson Crusoe De- foe, 153. Prelude, The (extract) Words- worth, 243. Prester John, The Land of Mandeville, 20. Pride and Prejudice (extract) Austen, 315. Princess, The (song from) Tennyson, 410. Prologue to the Canterbury Tales Chaucer, 22. Prothalamion (extract) Spenser, 77. Rabbi Ben Ezra Browning, 428. Rasselas (extract) Johnson, 193. Religio Medici (extracts) Browne, 121. Requiescat Arnold, 397. Retaliation, The (extract) Gold- smith, 206. Revenge, The Tennyson, 414. Roast Pig, Dissertation upon Lamb, 282. Robin Hood's Death and Burial Anonymous, 57. Robinson Crusoe (extracts) Defoe, 153. Roundabout Papers: "Nil Nisi Bonum" Thackeray, 368. RUSKIN, JOHN, 382-388. St. Agnes, The Eve of Keats, 270. Scientific Investigation, The Method of Huxley, 372. SCOTT, SIR WALTER, 303-314. Seasons, The (extracts) Thom- son, 188. Sesame and Lilies (extract) Ruskin, 382. Shakespeare (sonnet) Arnold. 395. Shakespeare, To the Memory of Jonson, 92. SHAKSPERE, WILLIAM, 88-91. SHELLEY, PERCY BYSSHE, 259-268. Sheriffs of Bristol, Letter to (extract) Burke, 207. SIDNEY, SIR PHILIP, 71-73. Sir Patrick Spens Anonymous, 52. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (extracts) Anonymous, 12. Skylark, To a Shelley, 264. Sohrab and Rustum (extract) Arnold, 398. Soldier, Rest! Scott, 310. Sonnet on His Blindness Milton, 118. INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES Sonnet on Shakespeare Arnold, 395. Sonnet to Mrs. Unwin Cowper, 219. Sonnets Keats, 268. Sonnets Shakespere, 91. Sonnets Sidney, 71. Sonnets Spenser, 76. Sonnets Wordsworth, 244. Spectator, The Addison, 177. SPENSER, EDMUND, 74-79. Spring, Description of Surrey, 65. STEELE, RICHARD, SIR, 16O-171. STEVENSON, ROBERT Louis, 435- 438. Studies, Of Bacon, 85. Style, On Coleridge, 248. SUCKLING, SIR JOHN, 102-103. SURREY, EARL, OF, 65-67. SWIFT, JONATHAN, 138-150. Table Talk (extracts) Coleridge, 247. Tables Turned, The Wordsworth, 238. Tamburlaine, A Boast of Mar- lowe, 87. Tarn o' Shanter Burns, 223. Task, The (extract) Cowper, 218. Taller, The Steele, 160; and Addison, 173. Tempest, The (song from) Shak- spere, 90. Tempest, The, Preface to Dryden, 129. Tempest, The Pepys, 124. TENNYSON, ALFRED, LORD, 406- 422. THACKERAY, WILLIAM MAKE- PEACE, 363-372. Thirty-third Birthday, On My Byron, 258. THOMSON, JAMES, 188-191. Throstle, The Tennyson, 421. To the Virgins, To Make Much of Time Herrick, 97. Travels (extract) Mandeville, 20. Twelfth Night (song from) Shak- spere, 90. Two Gentlemen of Verona (song from) Shakspere, 88. TYNDALE, WILLIAM, 68. Ulysses on Old Age Tennyson, 406. Una and the Lion (from The Faerie Queene) Spenser, 74. Under Milton's Picture Dryden, 134. Unwin, Mrs., Sonnet to Cowper, 219. Vanity Fair (extract) Thackeray, 363. Village Preacher, The (from The Deserted Village) Goldsmith, 202. Vision of Mirzah, The Addison, 181. Warren Hastings, Scene at the Trial of Macaulay, 325. Waterloo (from Childe Harold) Byron, 255. Westminster Bridge, Composed upon Wordsworth, 244. West Wind, Ode to the Shelley, 259. WICLIF, JOHN, 17-18. Willie Brewed a Peck o' Maul Burns, 230. Wisdom for a Man's Self, Of Bacon, 82. WORDSWORTH, WILLIAM, 233-246. WYATT, SIR THOMAS, 65. Youth and Age, Of Bacon, 83. INDEX OF FIRST LINES OF POEMS Adam scriveyn, if ever it thee bifalle, 52. All human things are subject to decay, 12. At Flores in the Azores Sir Richard Grenville lay, 414. At length they all to mery London came, 77. At the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, 434. Away, ye gay landscapes, ye gar- dens of roses, 251. Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way, 205. Bring the bowl which you boast, 311. Cherry-ripe, ripe, ripe, I cry, 97. Come, gentle Spring, ethereal mild- ness, come, 190. Come live with me and be my love, 88. Cupid and my Campaspe played, 71. Drink to me only with thine eyes, 92. Earth has not anything to show more fair, 244. Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes, 231. Four years and didst thou stay above, 404. Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, 97. Get up, get up for shame, the blooming morn, 94. Goethe in Weimar sleeps, and Greece, 395. Good people all, of every sort, 206. Grow old along with me, 428. Hail to thee, blithe spirit ! 264. Hark, hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings, 90. Hence, loathed Melancholy, 103. Hence, vain deluding Joys, 108. Here lies our good Edmund, whose genius was such, 206. He that loves a rosy cheek, 100. Her mother died when she was young, 55. Hie upon Hielands, 54. Home they brought her warrior dead, 410. How sleep the brave who sink to rest, 211. I bring fresh showers for the thirst- ing flowers, 262. If ought of oaten stop, or pastoral song, 212. I held it truth, with him who sings, 407. In a summer season, when soft was the sun, 18. In Flaundres whylom was a com- panye, 40. In Xanadu did Kubla Khan, 249. I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris, and he, 423. Is there, for honest poverty, 232. I wandered lonely as a cloud, 240. Let me not to the marriage of true minds, 91. Like as a ship, that through the ocean wide, 76. Live, live with me, and thou shalt see, 98. Loving in truth, and fain in verse my love to show, 71. Mary ! I want a lyre with other strings, 219. 510 INDEX OF FIRST LINES OF POEMS 511 Men call you fair, and you do credit it, 77. Milton! thou shouldat be living at this hour, 245. Much have I travelled in the realms of gold, 268. My boat is on the shore, 257. Now glory to the Lord of Hosts, from whom all glories are, 330. Nuns fret not at their convent's narrow room, 245. Oh for a lodge in some vast wilder- ness, 218. Oh, to be in England, 427. O Mistress mine, where are you roaming? 90. Others abide our question. Thou art free, 395. Out upon it, I have loved, ' 02. Over hill, over dale, 89. O where hae ye been. Lord Randal, my son? 55. O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, 259. O, Willie brewed a peck o' maut, 230. Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, 408. Roses at first were white, 96. St. Agnes' Eve Ah, bitter chill it was ! 270. Scorn not the Sonnet; Critic, you have frowned, 246. See, Winter comes, to rule the varied year, 188. She was a phantom of delight, 239. Should auld acquaintance be for- got, 229. Soldier, rest ! thy warfare o'er, 310. Some fowls there be that have so perfect sight, 65. Strew on her roses, roses, 397. Summer is coming, summer is coming ! 42 1 . Sunset and evening star, 422. Sweet Auburn ! loveliest village of the plain, 202. Tell me not, Sweet, I am unkind, 101. That's my last Duchess painted on the wall, 426. The charge of the gallant three hun- dred, the Heavy Brigade ! 419. The curfew tolls the knell of part- ing day, 214. The king sits in Dumferling toune, 52. The poetry of earth is never dead, 268. The sea is calm to-night, 402. The soote season, that bud and bloom forth brings, 65. The spacious firmament on high, 172. The world is a bundle of hay, 258. The world is too much with us ; late and soon, 246. The year's at the spring, 422. There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail, 406. There was a sound of revelry by night, 255. Thou still unravished bride of quietness, 269. Three poets, in three distant ages born, 134. Through life's dull road, so dim and dirty, 258. Thy voice is on the rolling air, 409. To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name, 92. Under the greenwood tree, 89. Up ! up ! my friend and quit your books, 238. Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow'r, 221. Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie, 220. Whan that Aprille with his shoures sote, 22. When a man hath no freedom to fight for at home, 258. When chapman billies leave the street, 223. When I consider how my light is spent, 118. 512 INDEX OF FIRST LINES OF POEMS When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, 91. When Love with unconfined wings, 101. When Robin Hood and Little John, 57. Where the bees sucks, there suck I, 90. Who is Sylvia ? what is she, 88. Who is the happy Warrior? Who is he, 240. Why so pale and wan, fond lover? 103. Why, William, on that old grey stone, 237. With how sad steps, O Moon, thou climb'st the skies, 72. Would you know what's soft? I dare, 100. Ye banks and braes o' bonie Doon, 233. Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more, 112. You know, we French stormed Ratisbon, 425. You that will a wonder know, 99. CENTRAL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY University of California, San Diego DATE DUE SEP 2 4 I97R SEP 27Kfl CI 39 OUTY t/CSD Li5r. 001 117171 7