English Satires Part 27

I shall now proceed to the more immediate examination of the poem in its different parts. The beginning, say the critics, ought to be plain and simple--neither embellished with the flowers of poetry, nor turgid with pomposity of diction. In this how exactly does our author conform to the established opinion! He begins thus:

"The Queen of Hearts She made some tarts".

Can anything be more clear! more natural! more agreeable to the true spirit of simplicity? Here are no tropes, no figurative expressions, not even so much as an invocation to the Muse. He does not detain his readers by any needless circ.u.mlocution, by unnecessarily informing them what he _is_ going to sing, or still more unnecessarily enumerating what he _is not_ going to sing; but, according to the precept of Horace:--

_In medias res, Non secus ac notas, auditorem rapit--_

That is, he at once introduces us and sets us on the most easy and familiar footing imaginable with her Majesty of Hearts, and interests us deeply in her domestic concerns. But to proceed--

"The Queen of Hearts She made some tarts, All on a summer's day".

Here indeed the prospect brightens, and we are led to expect some liveliness of imagery, some warmth of poetical colouring; but here is no such thing. There is no task more difficult to a poet than that of rejection. Ovid among the ancients, and Dryden among the moderns, were perhaps the most remarkable for the want of it. The latter, from the haste in which he generally produced his compositions, seldom paid much attention to the _limae labor_, "the labour of correction", and seldom, therefore, rejected the a.s.sistance of any idea that presented itself.

Ovid, not content with catching the leading features of any scene or character, indulged himself in a thousand minutiae of description, a thousand puerile prettinesses, which were in themselves uninteresting, and took off greatly from the effect of the whole; as the numberless suckers and straggling branches of a fruit-tree, if permitted to shoot out unrestrained, while they are themselves barren and useless, diminish considerably the vigour of the parent stock. Ovid had more genius but less judgment than Virgil; Dryden more imagination but less correctness than Pope; had they not been deficient in these points the former would certainly have equalled, the latter infinitely outshone the merits of his countryman. Our author was undoubtedly possessed of that power which they wanted, and was cautious not to indulge too far the sallies of a lively imagination. Omitting, therefore, any mention of sultry Sirius, sylvan shade, sequestered glade, verdant hills, purling rills, mossy mountains, gurgling fountains, &c., he simply tells us that it was "All on a summer's day". For my own part I confess that I find myself rather flattered than disappointed, and consider the poet as rather paying a compliment to the abilities of his readers, than baulking their expectations. It is certainly a great pleasure to see a picture well painted; but it is a much greater to paint it well oneself. This, therefore, I look upon as a stroke of excellent management in the poet. Here every reader is at liberty to gratify his own taste, to design for himself just what sort of "summer's day" he likes best; to choose his own scenery, dispose his lights and shades as he pleases, to solace himself with a rivulet or a horse-pond, a shower or a sunbeam, a grove or a kitchen-garden, according to his fancy. How much more considerate this than if the poet had, from an affected accuracy of description, thrown us into an unmannerly perspiration by the heat of the atmosphere, forced us into a landscape of his own planning, with perhaps a paltry good-for-nothing zephyr or two, and a limited quant.i.ty of wood and water. All this Ovid would undoubtedly have done. Nay, to use the expression of a learned brother commentator--_quovis pignore decertem_, "I would lay any wager", that he would have gone so far as to tell us what the tarts were made of, and perhaps wandered into an episode on the art of preserving cherries.

But _our_ poet, above such considerations, leaves every reader to choose his own ingredients, and sweeten them to his own liking; wisely foreseeing, no doubt, that the more palatable each had rendered them to his own taste, the more he would be affected at their approaching loss.

"All on a summer's day."

I cannot leave this line without remarking that one of the Scribleri, a descendant of the famous Martinus, has expressed his suspicions of the text being corrupted here, and proposes instead of "all on" reading "alone", alleging, in favour of this alteration, the effect of solitude in raising the pa.s.sions. But Hiccius Doctius, a high Dutch commentator, one nevertheless well versed in British literature, in a note of his usual length and learning, has confuted the arguments of Scriblerus. In support of the present reading he quotes a pa.s.sage from a poem written about the same period with our author's, by the celebrated Johannes Pastor[230], int.i.tuled "An Elegiac Epistle to the Turnkey of Newgate", wherein the gentleman declares that, rather indeed in compliance with an old custom than to gratify any particular wish of his own, he is going--

"All hanged for to be Upon that fatal Tyburn tree ".

Now, as nothing throws greater light on an author than the concurrence of a contemporary writer, I am inclined to be of Hiccius' opinion, and to consider the "All" as an elegant expletive, or, as he more aptly phrases it _elegans expletivum_. The pa.s.sage therefore must stand thus:--

"The Queen of Hearts She made some tarts All on a summer's day."

And thus ends the first part, or beginning, which is simple and unembellished, opens the subject in a natural and easy manner, excites, but does not too far gratify our curiosity, for a reader of accurate observation may easily discover that the hero of the poem has not, as yet, made his appearance.

I could not continue my examination at present through the whole of this poem without far exceeding the limits of a single paper. I have therefore divided it into two, but shall not delay the publication of the second to another week, as that, besides breaking the connection of criticism, would materially injure the unities of the poem.

Having thus gone through the first part, or beginning of the poem, we may, naturally enough, proceed to the consideration of the second.

The second part, or middle, is the proper place for bustle and business, for incident and adventure:--

"The Knave of Hearts He stole those tarts".

Here attention is awakened, and our whole souls are intent upon the first appearance of the hero. Some readers may perhaps be offended at his making his _entree_ in so disadvantageous a character as that of a thief. To this I plead precedent.

The hero of the Iliad, as I observed in a former paper, is made to lament very pathetically that "life is not like all other possessions, to be acquired by theft". A reflection, in my opinion, evidently showing that, if he _did_ refrain from the practice of this ingenious art, it was not from want of an inclination that way. We may remember, too, that in Virgil's poem almost the first light in which the pious aeneas appears to us is a deer-stealer; nor is it much excuse for him that the deer were wandering without keepers, for however he might, from this circ.u.mstance, have been unable to ascertain whose property they were, he might, I think, have been pretty well a.s.sured that they were not his.

Having thus acquitted our hero of misconduct, by the example of his betters, I proceed to what I think the master-stroke of the poet.

"The Knave of Hearts He stole those tarts, And--took them--quite away!!"

Here, whoever has an ear for harmony and a heart for feeling must be touched! There is a desponding melancholy in the run of the last line!

an air of tender regret in the addition of "quite away!" a something so expressive of irrecoverable loss! so forcibly intimating the _Ad nunquam reditura!_ "They never can return!" in short, such an union of sound and sense as we rarely, if ever, meet with in any author, ancient or modern. Our feelings are all alive, but the poet, wisely dreading that our sympathy with the injured Queen might alienate our affections from his hero, contrives immediately to awaken our fears for him by telling us that--

"The King of Hearts Called for those tarts".

We are all conscious of the fault of our hero, and all tremble with him, for the punishment which the enraged monarch may inflict:

"And beat the Knave full sore!"

The fatal blow is struck! We cannot but rejoice that guilt is justly punished, though we sympathize with the guilty object of punishment.

Here Scriblerus, who, by the by, is very fond of making unnecessary alterations, proposes reading "score" instead of "sore", meaning thereby to particularize that the beating bestowed by this monarch consisted of twenty stripes. But this proceeds from his ignorance of the genius of our language, which does not admit of such an expression as "full score", but would require the insertion of the particle "a", which cannot be, on account of the metre. And this is another great artifice of the poet. By leaving the quant.i.ty of beating indeterminate, he gives every reader the liberty to administer it, in exact proportion to the sum of indignation which he may have conceived against his hero, that by thus amply satisfying their resentment they may be the more easily reconciled to him afterwards.

"The King of Hearts Called for those tarts, And beat the Knave full sore."

Here ends the second part, or middle of the poem, in which we see the character and exploits of the hero portrayed with the hand of a master.

Nothing now remains to be examined but the third part, or end. In the end it is a rule pretty well established that the work should draw towards a conclusion, which our author manages thus:--

"The Knave of Hearts Brought back those tarts".

Here everything is at length settled; the theft is compensated, the tarts restored to their right owner, and poetical justice, in every respect, strictly and impartially administered.

We may observe that there is nothing in which our poet has better succeeded than in keeping up an unremitted attention in his readers to the main instruments, the machinery of his poem, viz. the _tarts_; insomuch that the afore-mentioned Scriblerus has sagely observed that "he can't tell, but he doesn't know, but the tarts may be reckoned the heroes of the poem". Scriblerus, though a man of learning, and frequently right in his opinion, has here certainly hazarded a rash conjecture. His arguments are overthrown entirely by his great opponent, Hiccius, who concludes by triumphantly asking, "Had the tarts been eaten, how could the poet have compensated for the loss of his heroes?"

We are now come to the _denouement_, the setting all to rights: and our poet, in the management of his moral, is certainly superior to his great ancient predecessors. The moral of their fables, if any they have, is so interwoven with the main body of their work, that in endeavouring to unravel it we should tear the whole. Our author has very properly preserved his whole and entire for the end of his poem, where he completes his main design, the reformation of his hero, thus--

"And vowed he'd steal no more".

Having in the course of his work shown the bad effects arising from theft, he evidently means this last moral reflection to operate with his readers as a gentle and polite dissuasive from stealing.

"The Knave of Hearts Brought back those tarts, And vowed he'd steal no more!"

Thus have I industriously gone through the several parts of this wonderful work, and clearly proved it, in every one of these parts, and in all of them together, to be a "due and proper epic poem", and to have as good a right to that t.i.tle, from its adherence to prescribed rules, as any of the celebrated masterpieces of antiquity. And here I cannot help again lamenting that, by not knowing the name of the author, I am unable to twine our laurels together, and to transmit to posterity the mingled praises of genius and judgment, of the poet and his commentator.

[Footnote 230: More commonly known, I believe, by the appellation of Jack Shepherd.]

POETRY OF THE ANTI-JACOBIN.

(1797-1798.)

LII. THE FRIEND OF HUMANITY AND THE KNIFE-GRINDER.

The _Anti-Jacobin_ was planned by George Canning when he was Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. He secured the collaboration of George Ellis, John Hookham Frere, William Gifford, and some others. The last-named was appointed working editor. The first number appeared on the 20th November, 1797, with a notice that "the publication would be continued every Monday during the sitting of Parliament". A volume of the best pieces, ent.i.tled _The Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin_, was published in 1800. It is almost impossible to apportion accurately the various pieces to their respective authors, though more than one attempt has been made so to do. The following piece is designed to ridicule the extravagant sympathy for the lower cla.s.ses which was then the fashion.

_Friend of Humanity_.

Needy knife-grinder! whither are you going?

Rough is the road, your wheel is out of order-- Bleak blows the blast; your hat has got a hole in't, So have your breeches!

Weary knife-grinder! little think the proud ones, Who in their coaches roll along the turnpike- Road, what hard work 'tis crying all day, "Knives and Scissors to grind O!"