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I steal by lawns and grassy plots,
I slide by hazel covers;
I move the sweet forget-me-nots
That grow for happy lovers.

I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance,
Among my skimming swallows;
I make the netted sunbeams dance
Against my sandy shallows.

I murmur under moon and stars
In brambly wildernesses;
I linger by my shingly bars,
I loiter round my cresses;

And out again I curve and flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever.

HELPS TO STUDY
Notes and Questions

These stanzas are part of a longer poem called "The Brook."'

In this poem Tennyson personifies the brook. Why?

In what lines do the words and the rhythm suggest the sound of the brook?

Which lines do this most successfully?

Point out words that seem to you especially appropriate in giving the thought.

Where in the poem do we find a

meaning for the following lines: "Oh! of all the songs sung

No songs are so sweet As the songs with refrains

Which repeat and repeat."

How does the repetition of "chatter'' influence the melody of the first line in the sixth stanza! How does it affect the thought? Find another place in the poem

where an expression is repeated. Was this done for the sake of the rhythm, or the thought, or for both?

Alliteration is the repetition of the same letter or sound at the beginning of two or more words in close succession.

Find lines in which alliteration is

used e. g. "sudden sally," "field and fallow,' etc. What does this add to the poem?

Indicate the rhythm of the first four lines by placing them in these

15

SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE *

SIDNEY LANIER

OUT of the hills of Habersham,
Down the valleys of Hall,

I hurry amain to reach the plain,
Run the rapid and leap the fall;
Split at the rock and together again,
Accept my bed, or narrow or wide,
And flee from folly on every side

With a lover's pain to attain the plain
Far from the hills of Habersham,
Far from the valleys of Hall.

All down the hills of Habersham,

All through the valleys of Hall,

The rushes cried, "Abide, abide,"
The wilful water-weeds held me thrall,
The laving laurel turned my tide,

* From "Poems of Sidney Lanier"; copyright 1884, 1891, by Mary D. Lanier; published by Charles Scribner's Sons.

The ferns and the fondling grass said, "Stay,"
The dewberry dipped for to work delay,
And the little reeds sighed, "Abide, abide,”

Here in the hills of Habersham,

Here in the valleys of Hall.

High o'er the hills of Habersham,

Veiling the valleys of Hall,

The hickory told me manifold

Fair tales of shade; the poplar tall
Wrought me her shadowy self to hold;
The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine,
Overleaning, with flickering meaning and sign,
Said: "Pass not so cold, these manifold
Deep shades of the hills of Habersham,
These glades in the valleys of Hall."

And oft in the hills of Habersham,
And oft in the valleys of Hall,

The white quartz shone, and the smooth brook stone
Did bar me of passage with friendly brawl;
And many a luminous jewel lone

(Crystals clear or a-cloud with mist,

Ruby, garnet, or amethyst)

Made lures with the lights of streaming stone
In the clefts of the hills of Habersham,

In the beds of the valleys of Hall.

But oh not the hills of Habersham,
And oh! not the valleys of Hall

Avail; I am fain for to water the plain.
Downward the voices of Duty call;

Downward to toil and be mixed with the main.
The dry fields burn and the mills are to turn,
And a myriad flowers mortally yearn,

And the lordly main from beyond the plain
Calls o'er the hills of Habersham,

Calls through the valleys of Hall.

HELPS TO STUDY

Biographical and Historical: The South has given us two most melodious singers, Poe and Lanier. When only nineteen Sidney Lanier enlisted in the Confederate army, and the close of the war found him broken in health, with little else in the world than a brave wife and a brave heart. When his health permitted he played the flute in an orchestra in Baltimore. The rhythm, the rhyme and the melodious words of his poetry all show him the passionate lover of music that he was. Among his prose writings, "The Boy's Froissart" and "The Boy's King Arthur'' are of especial interest to young readers.

Notes and Questions

Find the Chattahoochee river on your map with its source in the "hills of Habersham" and its course through the "valleys of Hall.''

Compare this poem with Tennyson's "The Brook."

What is peculiar in the phrases: "run the rapid," "flee from folly," "'wilful waterweeds," "laving laurel," etc.

Find alliteration in other lines. What is added to the poem by alliteration?

Notice the rhythm in the third line of the first stanza.

"laving laurel'

"fondling grass''

Words and Phrases for Discussion

"lordly main" "run the rapid" “friendly brawl" "leap the fall'’ "made lures'' "hurry amain'

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'veiling the valleys' "flickering meaning''

"the mills are to turn"

"I am fain for to water the plain'

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THE CATARACT OF LODORE

ROBERT SOUTHEY

"How does the water

Come down at Lodore?"

My little boy asked me
Thus, once on a time;
And, moreover, he tasked me
To tell him in rhyme.
Anon at the word,

There first came one daughter,

And then came another,

To second and third

The request of their brother,
And to hear how the water
Comes down at Lodore,
With its rush and its roar,

As many a time

They had seen it before.

So I told them in rhyme—
For of rhymes I had store;
And 'twas my vocation
For their recreation

That so I should sing;
Because I was Laureate
To them and the king.

From its sources, which well
In the tarn on the fell;

From its fountains

In the mountains,
Its rills and its gills;

Through moss and through brake,

It runs and it creeps
For a while, till it sleeps
In its own little lake.
And thence, at departing,