Southey also made some changes in the structure of the verse, which were of questionable propriety. Feeling probably the restriction of this metre upon his rapid pen, and fearing, as he says, lest the metre should " appear forced and exotic," he took the license" of using any foot of two or three syllables at the beginning of a line." Thus the following lines are, we suppose, to be read as we have marked them. Upon all seas and shores, wheresoever her rights were offended— And my feet, methought, sunk and I fell precipitate. StartingIn this license Southey broke in upon the harmony and distinctive character of the verse; which demands, in Latin, a long, in Eng. lish, an accented syllable for its first. To commence the verse with one or more short syllables, is to obliterate almost entirely the distinction between dactylic and anapæstic measure, and certainly to diminish the melody of the hexameter. The verse of Evangeline is based on accent. Longfellow has however rejected this license of Southey, and has confined his lines to the model of the ancient metre. He has therefore been more successful in forming a melodious measure than most of the poets who have before him used this metre. No one can fail to perceive the beauty and melody of the following extract; and even the English reader will have no difficulty in marking the feet: Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flowing beside them, Thousands of throbbing hearts, where theirs are at rest and forever, Thousands of toiling hands, where theirs have ceased from their labors, It reminds us of what may have been its model, the well known, Hos ego versiculos feci; tulit alter honores. Sic vos non vobis, &c. The lines are as smooth as Coleridge's couplet, describing and exemplifying the hexameter. Strongly it bears us along in swelling and limitless billows, Indeed, with a single exception, we have never seen any English hexameters as melodious as most of the lines in Evangeline. It shows an evident improvement upon the metre of the translation from the Swedish, which we referred to above. Although it is accent and not quantity which must make the feet of an English hexameter, still quantity, as governed by the rules of Latin prosody, is not wholly to be disregarded. In any metre, two lines may be equally correct, and yet one may be more melodious than the other; and especially is this true in the metre which we are considering. Where, as in anapæstic and dactylic metres, two unaccented syllables come together, it is important to the melody, as a general rule, that the unaccented syllables should also be short; otherwise the movement of the verse is heavy. By the well known rules of Latin prosody, a vowel followed immediately by two consonants (except a mute and a liquid) is long. The same thing must be true in English. Our ears indeed are generally not keen enough, or perhaps are too much accustomed to such instances, to perceive this lengthening of the vowel, or, as we should probably say, of the syllable. So long as the syllable is unaccented we do not observe whether it is long or short. Still a little attention will show us that such a lengthening of the syllable does somewhat impede the flow of the verse; and this is more perceptible, when, as is not uncommon, three consonants come together. This can be better shown by an example. The line given by Coleridge as an instance of a perfect hexameter, may be called perfect both by the Latin and the English rules. God ! came down with a shout; our Lord with the sound of a trumpet. For in the fourth foot, though the, i, in "with," is followed by two consonants, yet but one, th, would be sounded ordinarily in our reading. It is this observance of the Latin rules which makes the hexameters, which we quoted from Sydney, so melodious. Similar instances we may find in Evangeline; for example, She was a woman now with the heart and hopes of a woman— But such lines as these are, and perhaps from the nature of the language must be comparatively rare. Nearly approaching to these, however, are lines like the following, from Evangeline, Lucky was he who found that stone in the nest of the swallow; or as it might be written, Lucky was he who found that stone i' the nest o' the swallow; Thus we have in Milton, and rolled In billows, leave i' th' midst a horrid vale. In examining this point, it should be observed, that we are to look not at the consonants which are written, but at those which are pronounced. Thus we may call the following line perfect, even according to the strictest rules: Hailing his slow approach with words of affectionate welcome. For the participial termination, ng, is a simple sound; and where a consonant is doubled, we ordinarily pronounce but one and the letter, w, though ranked sometimes as a consonant, is little more than a vowel, in its effect on the melody. We would not venture to say, that our poets should always be restricted to these rules, in the hexameter; yet there seems to be a need of paying some regard to them, especially in the attempt to adopt a novel metre. At least, if they are not to regard the length ening of vowels, by position, (to use the technical term,) they should, we think, avoid the use, in an unaccented line, of a syllable which is plainly long to every ear. Thus, in the line, Still stands the forest primeval, but under the shade of its branches, the word, "stands," is a long syllable, and being in an unaccented part of the line breaks the flow of the verse. So too the last line of the poem before us is open to this same objection. is this, It Speaks and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest. They hand in hand, with wandering steps and slow Instances like these are not uncommon in the poem; but it is ungracious work to look for defects, and we therefore only quote a line or two, for the purpose of illustrating our meaning. There is another fault in some of the lines of Evangeline, which is of the same kind with this. There are many monosyllables in our language which may be used either as accented or as unaccented words. The effect which they have in the verse depends upon the words which are near them. If they are immediately followed by an accented syllable, they are unaccented, and vice versa. Thus in the following line the first "and" is accented, and the second unaccented: And from our bursting barns they would feed their cattle and children. It is necessary that a word so unimportant as a conjunction, if it is to stand at the beginning of a line and therefore be accented, should be followed by a syllable having no stress of the voice. But this rule Longfellow sometimes violates. Thus it is far easier to accent the second syllable in the following line, than the first, which the metre requires: And undisturbed by the dash of their oars and unseen were the sleepers. In such lines as this the dactylic rhythm is not well preserved. The first syllable of the line should always be one which no reader can fail to accent. It may require some pains to accomplish this, but the gain to the melody will repay the exertion. Such are some of the faults which seem to us to be found in the metre of Evangeline; few but too many. No dissection is a pleasant operation, and least of all that in which a cold critic is. the surgeon, and the "disjecta membra poeta" the result. We do not know how we can better reward our readers, if there are any whom we have not wearied out, than by concluding with an extract of a translation into English hexameters of Hector's inter view with Andromache; an extract in which that metre is used with admirable success, and whose melody will recommend it even to the English reader. "Then for another, perchance, thou'lt handle the shuttle in Argos, Sorely against thy will, for force will weigh heavily on thee. Some one, perchance, will say, while he looks at thee bitterly weeping, 'Mong the Dardanian host, when they fought for the safety of Ilion.' Widowed of husband so brave, who might have kept off the enslaver. A FORGOTTEN GRAVE. BY A. MESSLER, D. D. In one of the most retired hamlets in New Jersey there are still to be seen a few marks of an old graveyard. I remember when the dilapidated walls of the old church frowned over it in their gloomy silence, hearing no sabbath music but what the swallow made but for many years they have disappeared, for the utilitarian, even here, has been at work. On the little plot of green sward, where the ancients of the village sleep, there remain a few rude and moss-grown monuments of the dead. The most conspicuous of them is a broad upright marble slab, marked by time and every year sinking deeper and deeper in the soft spongy soil. It has the following inscription: IN MEMORY OF THE HON. CAPT. WILLIAM LESLIE, HE FELL JAN. 3, 1777, AGED PRINCETON. HIS FRIEND BENJAMIN RUSH, M. D. OF HAS CAUSED THIS STONE TO BE ERECTED, AND RESPECT FOR HIS NOBLE FAMILY. A visit to this spot occasioned the following stanzas: Pause stranger by this hillock green And leave a tear of sympathy! He came in hope and youthful pride He fought, was stricken, fell and died; All that was bright in youth he knew; And hoped to inscribe it deep and clear His heart was full of hope and love, They rose in visions on his heart, And rapt his soul in bliss away, Transported from himself apart To live all o'er his childhood's day; The chills of death creep round his heart; Pause stranger! though his dying bed. Here many a soul with pity bled, And strangers gave the mourner's tear. Worth called them forth-they freely flow'd, And warmed his cold and silent tomb; And when the spring's soft zephyrs blow'd These roses grew, and yet they bloom! Oh grave! thou sacred loneiy bed! Could all the tears around thee shed Be gathered-what a sea of wo Would roll its dark waves here below! Oh! thou hast deluged long the carth With show'rs that joy should only give! From Eden's close, and sin's dread birth, Till heaven succeels and glory lives! |