English Verse Part 35

In general, the blank verse of all these poets shows the influence of the couplet and lacks flexibility. Thus Mr. Symonds says: "The use of the couplet had unfitted poets for its composition. Their acquired canons of regularity, when applied to loose and flowing metre, led them astray.... Hence it followed, that when blank verse began again to be written, it found itself very much at the point where it had stood before the appearance of Marlowe. Even Thomson ... wrote stiff and languid blank verse with monosyllabic terminations and monotonous cadences--a pedestrian style." (_Blank Verse_, pp. 61, 62.)[33]

Here unmolested, through whatever sign The sun proceeds, I wander; neither mist, Nor freezing sky nor sultry, checking me, Nor stranger intermeddling with my joy.

Even in the spring and playtime of the year, That calls the unwonted villager abroad With all her little ones, a sportive train, To gather kingcups in the yellow mead, And prink their hair with daisies, or to pick A cheap but wholesome salad from the brook, These shades are all my own. The timorous hare, Grown so familiar with her frequent guest, Scarce shuns me; and the stockdove unalarmed Sits cooing in the pine-tree, nor suspends His long love-ditty for my near approach.

Drawn from his refuge in some lonely elm That age or injury has hollowed deep, Where on his bed of wool and matted leaves He has outslept the winter, ventures forth To frisk awhile, and bask in the warm sun, The squirrel, flippant, pert, and full of play.

He sees me, and at once, swift as a bird, Ascends the neighboring beech; there whisks his brush, And perks his ears, and stamps and scolds aloud, With all the prettiness of feigned alarm, And anger insignificantly fierce.

(COWPER: _The Task_, book VI. ll. 295-320. 1785.)

"The blank verse of Cowper's _Task_ is admirably adapted to the theme,"

says Professor Corson. "Cowper saw farther than any one before him had seen, into the secrets of the elaborate music of Milton's blank verse, and availed himself of those secrets to some extent--to as far an extent as the simplicity of his themes demanded." (_Primer of English Verse_, p. 221.) Professor Ward speaks, however, of the "lumbering movement" of Cowper's blank verse as being in contrast to "the neatness and ease of his rhymed couplets." (_English Poets_, vol. iii. p. 432.) Cowper prided himself, not without reason, on the individuality of his blank verse. In a letter to the Rev. John Newton (Dec. 11, 1784) he said: "Milton's manner was peculiar. So is Thomson's. He that should write like either of them, would, in my judgment, deserve the name of a copyist, but not of a poet.... Blank verse is susceptible of a much greater diversification of manner than verse in rhyme: and why the modern writers of it have all thought proper to cast their numbers alike, I know not." In another letter (to Lady Hesketh, March 20, 1786) Cowper reveals his careful study of Milton's verse: "When the sense requires it, or when for the sake of avoiding a monotonous cadence of the lines, of which there is always danger in so long a work, it shall appear to be prudent, I still leave a verse behind me that has some uneasiness in its formation. It is not possible to read _Paradise Lost_, with an ear for harmony, without being sensible of the great advantage which Milton drew from such a management.... Uncritical readers find that they perform a long journey through several hundred pages perhaps without weariness; they find the numbers harmonious, but are not aware of the art by which that harmony is brought to pa.s.s, much less suspect that a violation of all harmony on some occasions is the very thing to which they are not a little indebted for their gratification."

Thou too, h.o.a.r Mount! with thy sky-pointing peaks, Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard, Shoots downward, glittering through the pure serene Into the depth of clouds, that veil thy breast-- Thou too again, stupendous Mountain! thou That as I raise my head, awhile bowed low In adoration, upward from thy base Slow travelling with dim eyes suffused with tears, Solemnly seemest, like a vapory cloud, To rise before me--Rise, O ever rise, Rise like a cloud of incense from the earth!

Thou kingly spirit throned among the hills, Thou dread amba.s.sador from Earth to Heaven, Great Hierarch! tell thou the silent sky, And tell the stars, and tell yon rising sun, Earth, with her thousand voices, praises G.o.d.

(COLERIDGE: _Hymn before Sunrise, in the Vale of Chamouni_, ll. 70-85.

1802.)

It was a den where no insulting light Could glimmer on their tears; where their own groans They felt, but heard not, for the solid roar Of thunderous waterfalls and torrents hoa.r.s.e, Pouring a constant bulk, uncertain where.

Crag jutting forth to crag, and rocks that seem'd Ever as if just rising from a sleep, Forehead to forehead held their monstrous horns; And thus in thousand hugest phantasies Made a fit roofing to this nest of woe.

Instead of thrones, hard flint they sat upon, Couches of rugged stone, and slaty ridge Stubborn'd with iron. All were not a.s.sembled: Some chain'd in torture, and some wandering.

Cus, and Gyges, and Briareus, Typhon, and Dolor, and Porphyrion, With many more, the brawniest in a.s.sault, Were pent in regions of laborious breath; Dungeon'd in opaque element, to keep Their clenched teeth still clench'd, and all their limbs Lock'd up like veins of metal, crampt and screw'd; Without a motion, save of their big hearts Heaving in pain, and horribly convuls'd With sanguine feverous boiling gurge of pulse.

(KEATS: _Hyperion_, book II. 1820.)

"In Keats at last," says Mr. Symonds, "we find again that inner music which is the soul of true blank verse.... His _Hyperion_ is sung, not written.... Its music is fluid, bound by no external measurement of feet, but determined by the sense and intonation of the poet's thought, while like the crotalos of the Athenian flute-player, the decasyllabic beat maintains an uninterrupted undercurrent of regular pulsations."

(_Blank Verse_, p. 64.)

I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still, sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue. And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man: A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things.

(WORDSWORTH: _Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey_. 1798.)

Let not high verse, mourning the memory Of that which is no more, or painting's woe Or sculpture, speak in feeble imagery Their own cold powers. Art and eloquence, And all the shows o' the world, are frail and vain To weep a loss that turns their lights to shade.

It is a woe 'too deep for tears,' when all Is reft at once, when some surpa.s.sing Spirit, Whose light adorned the world around it, leaves Those who remain behind, not sobs or groans, The pa.s.sionate tumult of a clinging hope; But pale despair and cold tranquillity, Nature's vast frame, the web of human things, Birth and the grave, that are not as they were.

(Sh.e.l.lEY: _Alastor_, ll. 707-720. 1815.)

The old order changeth, yielding place to new, And G.o.d fulfils himself in many ways, Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.

Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me?

I have lived my life, and that which I have done May He within himself make pure! but thou, If thou shouldst never see my face again, Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer Than this world dreams of. Wherefore let thy voice Rise like a fountain for me night and day.

For what are men better than sheep or goats That nourish a blind life within the brain, If, knowing G.o.d, they lift not hands of prayer Both for themselves and those who call them friend?

For so the whole round earth is every way Bound by gold chains about the feet of G.o.d.

But now farewell. I am going a long way With these thou seest--if indeed I go (For all my mind is clouded with a doubt)-- To the island-valley of Avilion; Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies Deep-meadow'd, happy, fair with orchard-lawns And bowery hollows crown'd with summer sea, Where I will heal me of my grievous wound.

(TENNYSON: _Idylls of the King; The Pa.s.sing of Arthur_. 1869.)

But that large-moulded man, His visage all agrin as at a wake, Made at me thro' the press, and, staggering back With stroke on stroke the horse and horseman, came As comes a pillar of electric cloud, Flaying the roofs and sucking up the drains, And shadowing down the champaign till it strikes On a wood, and takes, and breaks, and cracks, and splits, And twists the grain with such a roar that Earth Reels, and the herdsmen cry; for everything Gave way before him: only Florian, he That loved me closer than his own right eye, Thrust in between; but Arac rode him down: And Cyril seeing it, push'd against the Prince, With Psyche's color round his helmet, tough, Strong, supple, sinew-corded, apt at arms; But tougher, heavier, stronger, he that smote And threw him: last I spurr'd; I felt my veins Stretch with fierce heat; a moment hand to hand, And sword to sword, and horse to horse we hung, Till I struck out and shouted; the blade glanc'd; I did but shear a feather, and dream and truth Flow'd from me; darkness closed me; and I fell.

(TENNYSON: _The Princess_, v. 1847.)

She knew me, and acknowledg'd me her heir, Pray'd me to keep her debts, and keep the Faith; Then claspt the cross, and pa.s.s'd away in peace.

I left her lying still and beautiful, More beautiful than in life. Why would you vex yourself, Poor sister? Sir, I swear I have no heart To be your queen. To reign is restless fence, Tierce, quart, and trickery. Peace is with the dead.

Her life was winter, for her spring was nipt; And she loved much: pray G.o.d she be forgiven.

(TENNYSON: _Queen Mary_, V. v. 1875.)

Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, That brings our friends up from the underworld, Sad as the last which reddens over one That sinks with all we love below the verge; So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more.

Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns The earliest pipe of half-awaken'd birds To dying ears, when unto dying eyes The cas.e.m.e.nt slowly grows a glimmering square; So sad, so strange, the days that are no more.

(TENNYSON: _The Princess_, iv.; "Tears, Idle Tears." 1847.)

The blank verse of Tennyson is probably to be regarded as the most masterly found among modern poets.[34] Its flexibility is almost infinite, yet never unmelodious. The last of the specimens just quoted ill.u.s.trates his use of blank verse for short lyrical poems,--an unusual and notable achievement. Perhaps only Collins's _Ode to Evening_ can be compared with his success in this direction, and Collins used a more elaborate strophe to fill, in part, the place of rime. Of the unrimed lyrics in _The Princess_, Mr. Symonds says that they "are perfect specimens of most melodious and complete minstrelsy in words." In the "Tears, Idle Tears," he goes on to say, the verse "is divided into periods of five lines, each of which terminates with the words 'days that are no more.' This recurrence of sound and meaning is a subst.i.tute for rhyme, and suggests rhyme so persuasively that it is impossible to call the poem mere blank verse." See also the specimens on p. 144 above.

In the case of both Tennyson and Browning the student should compare the form of the narrative blank verse on the one hand with that of the dramatic on the other. Yet in a sense all Browning's blank verse is dramatic. It is no less flexible than Tennyson's, but (as in most of Browning's poetry) sacrifices more of melody in adapting itself to the thought.

To live, and see her learn, and learn by her, Out of the low obscure and petty world-- Or only see one purpose and one will Evolve themselves i' the world, change wrong to right: To have to do with nothing but the true, The good, the eternal--and these, not alone, In the main current of the general life, But small experiences of every day, Concerns of the particular hearth and home: To learn not only by a comet's rush But a rose's birth,--not by the grandeur, G.o.d, But the comfort, Christ. All this, how far away!

Mere delectation, meet for a minute's dream!-- Just as a drudging student trims his lamp, Opens his Plutarch, puts him in the place Of Roman, Grecian; draws the patch'd gown close, Dreams, "Thus should I fight, save or rule the world!"

Then smilingly, contentedly, awakes To the old solitary nothingness.

So I, from such communion, pa.s.s content.-- O great, just, good G.o.d! Miserable me!

(BROWNING: _The Ring and the Book; Caponsacchi_. 1868.)

_The Ring and the Book_ Professor Corson calls "the greatest achievement of the century ... in the effective use of blank verse in the treatment of a great subject.... Its blank verse, while having a most complex variety of character, is the most dramatic blank verse since the Elizabethan era.... One reads it without a sense almost of there being anything artificial in the construction of the language; ... one gets the impression that the poet thought and felt spontaneously in blank verse." (_Primer of English Verse_, pp. 224, 225.)

This eve's the time, This eve intense with yon first trembling star We seem to pant and reach; scarce aught between The earth that rises and the heaven that bends; All nature self-abandoned, every tree Flung as it will, pursuing its own thoughts And fixed so, every flower and every weed, No pride, no shame, no victory, no defeat; All under G.o.d, each measured by itself.

These statues round us stand abrupt, distinct, The strong in strength, the weak in weakness fixed, The Muse forever wedded to her lyre, Nymph to her fawn, and Silence to her rose: See G.o.d's approval on his universe!

Let us do so--aspire to live as these In harmony with truth, ourselves being true!

Take the first way, and let the second come!

(BROWNING: _In a Balcony_. 1855.)

The very G.o.d! think, Abib; dost thou think?

So, the All-Great were the All-Loving too-- So, through the thunder comes a human voice Saying, "O heart I made, a heart beats here!

Face, my hands fashioned, see it in myself!

Thou hast no power nor may'st conceive of mine, But love I gave thee, with myself to love, And thou must love me who have died for thee."

The madman saith He said so: it is strange.

(BROWNING: _Epistle of Karshish_. 1855.)

G.o.d's works--paint any one, and count it crime To let a truth slip. Don't object, "His works Are here already; nature is complete: Suppose you reproduce her--(which you can't) There's no advantage! you must beat her, then."

For, don't you mark? we're made so that we love First when we see them painted, things we have pa.s.sed Perhaps a hundred times nor cared to see; And so they are better, painted--better to us, Which is the same thing. Art was given for that; G.o.d uses us to help each other so, Lending our minds out.

(BROWNING: _Fra Lippo Lippi_. 1855.)

Of some of Browning's blank verse Mr. Mayor observes: "The extreme harshness of many of these lines is almost a match for anything in Surrey, only what in Surrey is helplessness seems the perversity of strength in Browning.... The Aristophanic vein in Browning is continually leading him to trample under foot the dignity of verse and to shock the uninitiated reader by colloquial familiarities, 'thumps upon the back,' such as the poet Cowper resented; yet no one can be more impressive than he is when he surrenders himself to the pure spirit of poetry, and flows onward in a stream of glorious music, such as that in which Balaustion pictures Athens overwhelmed by an advance of the sea (_Aristophanes' Apology_, p. 2)." (_Chapters on English Metre_, 2d ed., pp. 216, 217.)

But the majestic river floated on, Out of the mist and hum of that low land, Into the frosty starlight, and there mov'd, Rejoicing, through the hush'd Chorasmian waste, Under the solitary moon: he flow'd Right for the Polar Star, past Orgunje, Br.i.m.m.i.n.g, and bright, and large: then sands begin To hem his watery march, and dam his streams, And split his currents; that for many a league The shorn and parcell'd Oxus strains along Through beds of sand and matted rushy isles-- Oxus, forgetting the bright speed he had In his high mountain cradle in Pamere, A foil'd, circuitous wanderer:--till at last The long'd-for dash of waves is heard, and wide His luminous home of waters opens, bright And tranquil, from whose floor the new-bath'd stars Emerge, and shine upon the Aral Sea.