'Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been;I am also called No-More, Too-Late, Farewell.'
'Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been;I am also called No-More, Too-Late, Farewell.'
'Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been;I am also called No-More, Too-Late, Farewell.'
'Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been;
I am also called No-More, Too-Late, Farewell.'
Pp. 353-7.Andrew Lang.The parodies on the Rossetti and Morris styles are taken from Andrew Lang's essay on Thomas Haynes Bayly inEssays in Little. 'Bayly,' Mr. Lang wrote, in discussing 'Oh, no, we never mention her,' 'had now struck the note, the sweet sentimental note, of the early, innocent, Victorian age.... We should do the trick quite differently now, more like this.' Here follows 'Love spake to me,' of which its author says at the end:
I declare I nearly weep over these lines; for, though they are only Bayly's sentiment hastily recast in a modern manner, there is something so very affecting, mouldy, and unwholesome about them that they sound as if they had been 'written up to' a sketch by a disciple of Mr. Rossetti's.
I declare I nearly weep over these lines; for, though they are only Bayly's sentiment hastily recast in a modern manner, there is something so very affecting, mouldy, and unwholesome about them that they sound as if they had been 'written up to' a sketch by a disciple of Mr. Rossetti's.
So, of—
Gaily the TroubadourTouched his guitar,
Gaily the TroubadourTouched his guitar,
Gaily the TroubadourTouched his guitar,
Gaily the Troubadour
Touched his guitar,
Mr. Lang says, 'Any one of us could get in more local colour for the money, and give the crusader a cithern or citole instead of aguitar,' and in proof gives the 'romantic, esoteric, old French poem, "Sir Ralph."'
The two Swinburne parodies are fromRhymes à la Mode, 1895. An earlierBallade, of which that on p. 35 'is an improved version, was printed in theSt. James's Gazettein 1881. The original of this is Swinburne's 'A Ballad of Burdens'; of 'The Palace of Bric-a-brac,' 'The Garden of Proserpine':
Here, where the world is quiet,Here, where all trouble seemsDead winds' and spent waves' riotIn doubtful dreams of dreams.
Here, where the world is quiet,Here, where all trouble seemsDead winds' and spent waves' riotIn doubtful dreams of dreams.
Here, where the world is quiet,Here, where all trouble seemsDead winds' and spent waves' riotIn doubtful dreams of dreams.
Here, where the world is quiet,
Here, where all trouble seems
Dead winds' and spent waves' riot
In doubtful dreams of dreams.
P. 355.Brahma.Emerson's 'If the red slayer think he slays.' This parody is said to have been an impromptu. It is taken fromNew Collected Rhymes. All the Lang parodies here are given by permission of Messrs. Longman.
Pp. 358-64.A. C. Hilton.The parodies by Hilton appeared in the two numbers ofThe Light Green. They are reprinted here by permission of Messrs. Metcalfe, Cambridge.
The original of 'Octopus' was clearly 'Dolores,' which appeared inPoems and Ballads, First Series, 1866. The fourth stanza of this, with which may be compared the fifth stanza of 'Octopus,' runs:
O lips full of lust and of laughter,Curled snakes that are fed from my breast,Bite hard lest remembrance come afterAnd press with new lips where you pressed.For my heart, too, springs up at the pressure,Mine eyelids, too, moisten and burn;Ah, feed me and fill me with pleasure,Ere pain come in turn.
O lips full of lust and of laughter,Curled snakes that are fed from my breast,Bite hard lest remembrance come afterAnd press with new lips where you pressed.For my heart, too, springs up at the pressure,Mine eyelids, too, moisten and burn;Ah, feed me and fill me with pleasure,Ere pain come in turn.
O lips full of lust and of laughter,Curled snakes that are fed from my breast,Bite hard lest remembrance come afterAnd press with new lips where you pressed.For my heart, too, springs up at the pressure,Mine eyelids, too, moisten and burn;Ah, feed me and fill me with pleasure,Ere pain come in turn.
O lips full of lust and of laughter,
Curled snakes that are fed from my breast,
Bite hard lest remembrance come after
And press with new lips where you pressed.
For my heart, too, springs up at the pressure,
Mine eyelids, too, moisten and burn;
Ah, feed me and fill me with pleasure,
Ere pain come in turn.
P. 365.Home, Sweet Home.This Fantasia is taken fromAirs from Arcady, 1885, by permission of Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons.
P. 374.Ode on a Retrospect.This Ode was put into the mouth of an Eton master named Joynes. Being a Liberal with Nationalist sympathies, he visited a disturbed district in the North of Ireland (presumably in the summer of 1882), and contrived to get himself arrested, and imprisoned for a short time. He then wrote a book or pamphlet on the subject, with the result indicated in the verses, which seem to point to his having withdrawn his work rather than resign his appointment. Mr. Joynes still held his mastership when theRetrospectwas published in November, 1882, and the popularity of the piece at Eton was prodigious, especially the admirable line, 'They snatched a fearful Joynes.'
P. 378.To A. T. M.'The K.' was the 'A. T. M.' to whom the piece is addressed—A. T. Myers (Arthur, a physician of some eminence), the youngest brother of the poet parodied. SirHerbert Stephen (by whose permission his brother's parodies, fromLapsus Calami, are given) states that in the early days of the Society for Psychical Research, founded by F. W. H. Myers, and of the study of the newly-named 'telepathy,' such experiments were frequently tried by the members, and he thinks it highly probable that the incident of Arthur Myers taking peppermint in order to test the ability of an alleged telepathist 'in quite another room' to say what it was, took place in fact as described. 'The K.' was a nickname by which A. T. M. was very generally known among his friends and relations: the reason is obscure.
P. 379.Wake! for the Ruddy Ball.This imitation by Francis Thompson of theRubaiyatwas first printed in Mr. E. V. Lucas'sOne Day with Another. It is here given by permission of Mr. Wilfrid Meynell and of Messrs. Burns and Oates.
P. 382.Robert Fuller Murray.'The Poet's Hat' and 'Andrew M'Crie' are taken, by permission of Messrs. MacLehose and Sons, fromThe Scarlet Gown, 1891, the parodies in which, according to Andrew Lang, are not inferior to Calverley. 'Andrew M'Crie' is an improved edition of the verses originally contributed to theUniversity News-Sheet(St. Andrews) in 1886, entitled 'Albert McGee.'
P. 384.A 'semi' is an undergraduate of the second, a 'tertian' of the third, year.
P. 387.Fish have their times to bite.This parody of Mrs. Hemans, by an unknown author, is taken fromCollege Rhymes, 1861. The original begins:
Leaves have their time to fall,And flowers to wither at the north-wind's breath,And stars to set—but all,Thou hastallseasons for thine own, O Death.
Leaves have their time to fall,And flowers to wither at the north-wind's breath,And stars to set—but all,Thou hastallseasons for thine own, O Death.
Leaves have their time to fall,And flowers to wither at the north-wind's breath,And stars to set—but all,Thou hastallseasons for thine own, O Death.
Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north-wind's breath,
And stars to set—but all,
Thou hastallseasons for thine own, O Death.
P. 390.A Girtonian Funeral.This parody of 'A Grammarian's Funeral' first appeared in theJournal of Education, May 1, 1886, from which it is here reprinted by the permission of the editor. The authorship is unknown.