Thus much being understood, I shall proceed to examine thoroughly a fragment of Scott's Lowland Scottish dialect; not choosing it of the most beautiful kind; on the contrary, it shall be a piece reaching as low down as he ever allows Scotch to go—it is perhaps the only unfair patriotism in him, that if ever he wants a word or two of really villainous slang, he gives it in English or Dutch—not Scotch.
I had intended in the close of this paper to analyse and compare the characters of Andrew Fairservice and Richie Moniplies for examples, the former of innate evil, unaffected by external influences, and undiseased, but distinct from natural goodness as a nettle is distinct from balm or lavender; and the latter of innate goodness, contracted and pinched by circumstance, but still undiseased, as an oak-leaf crisped by frost, not by the worm. This, with much else in my mind, I must put off; but the careful study of one sentence of Andrew's will give us a good deal to think of.
I take his account of the rescue of Glasgow Cathedral at the time of the Reformation.
Ah! it's a brave kirk—nane o' yere whigmaleeries and curliewurlies and opensteek hems about it—a' solid, weel-jointed mason-wark, that will stand as lang as the warld, keep hands and gunpowther aff it. It had amaist a douncome lang syne at the Reformation, when they pu'd doun the kirks of St. Andrews and Perth, and thereawa', to cleanse them o' Papery, and idolatry, and image-worship, and surplices, and sic-like rags o' the muckle hure that sitteth on seven hills, as if ane wasna braid eneugh for her auld hinder end. Sae the commons o' Renfrew, and o' the Barony, and the Gorbals, and a' about, they behoved to come into Glasgow ae fair morning, to try their hand on purging the High Kirk o' Popish nicknackets. But the townsmen o' Glasgow, they were feared their auld edifice might slip the girths in gaun through siccan rough physic, sae they rang the common bell, and assembled the train-bands wi' took o' drum. By good luck, the worthy James Rabat was Dean o' Guild that year—(and a gude mason he was himsell, made him the keener to keep up the auld bigging), and the trades assembled, and offered downright battle to the commons, rather than their kirk should coup the crans, as others had done elsewhere. It wasna for luve o'Paperie—na, na!—nane could ever say that o' the trades o' Glasgow—Sae they sune came to an agreement to take a' the idolatrous statues of sants (sorrow be on them!) out o' their neuks—And sae the bits o' stane idols were broken in pieces by Scripture warrant, and flung into the Molendinar burn, and the auld kirk stood as crouse as a cat when the flaes are kaimed aff her, and a'body was alike pleased. And I hae heard wise folk say, that if the same had been done in ilka kirk in Scotland, the Reform wad just hae been as pure as it is e'en now, and we wad hae mair Christian-like kirks; for I hae been sae lang in England, that naething will drived out o' my head, that the dog-kennel at Osbaldistone-Hall is better than mony a house o' God in Scotland.
Ah! it's a brave kirk—nane o' yere whigmaleeries and curliewurlies and opensteek hems about it—a' solid, weel-jointed mason-wark, that will stand as lang as the warld, keep hands and gunpowther aff it. It had amaist a douncome lang syne at the Reformation, when they pu'd doun the kirks of St. Andrews and Perth, and thereawa', to cleanse them o' Papery, and idolatry, and image-worship, and surplices, and sic-like rags o' the muckle hure that sitteth on seven hills, as if ane wasna braid eneugh for her auld hinder end. Sae the commons o' Renfrew, and o' the Barony, and the Gorbals, and a' about, they behoved to come into Glasgow ae fair morning, to try their hand on purging the High Kirk o' Popish nicknackets. But the townsmen o' Glasgow, they were feared their auld edifice might slip the girths in gaun through siccan rough physic, sae they rang the common bell, and assembled the train-bands wi' took o' drum. By good luck, the worthy James Rabat was Dean o' Guild that year—(and a gude mason he was himsell, made him the keener to keep up the auld bigging), and the trades assembled, and offered downright battle to the commons, rather than their kirk should coup the crans, as others had done elsewhere. It wasna for luve o'Paperie—na, na!—nane could ever say that o' the trades o' Glasgow—Sae they sune came to an agreement to take a' the idolatrous statues of sants (sorrow be on them!) out o' their neuks—And sae the bits o' stane idols were broken in pieces by Scripture warrant, and flung into the Molendinar burn, and the auld kirk stood as crouse as a cat when the flaes are kaimed aff her, and a'body was alike pleased. And I hae heard wise folk say, that if the same had been done in ilka kirk in Scotland, the Reform wad just hae been as pure as it is e'en now, and we wad hae mair Christian-like kirks; for I hae been sae lang in England, that naething will drived out o' my head, that the dog-kennel at Osbaldistone-Hall is better than mony a house o' God in Scotland.
Now this sentence is in the first place a piece of Scottish history of quite inestimable and concentrated value. Andrew's temperament is the type of a vast class of Scottish—shall we call it 'sow-thistlian'—mind, which necessarily takes the view of either Pope or saint that the thistle in Lebanon took of the cedar or lilies in Lebanon; and the entire force of the passions which, in the Scottish revolution, foretold and forearmed the French one, is told in this one paragraph; the coarseness of it, observe, being admitted, not for the sake of the laugh, any more than an onion in broth merely for its flavour, but for the meat of it; the inherent constancy of that coarseness being a fact in this order of mind, and an essential part of the history to be told.
Secondly, observe that this speech, in the religious passion of it, such as there may be, is entirely sincere. Andrew is a thief, a liar, a coward, and, in the Fair service from which he takes his name, a hypocrite; but in the form of prejudice, which is all that his mind is capable of in the place of religion, he is entirely sincere. He does not in the least pretend detestation of image worship to please his master, or any one else; he honestly scorns the 'carnal morality[171]as dowd and fusionless as rue-leaves at Yule' of the sermon in the upper cathedral; and when wrapt in critical attention to the 'real savour o' doctrine' in the crypt, so completely forgets the hypocrisy ofhis fair service as to return his master's attempt to disturb him with hard punches of the elbow.
Thirdly. He is a man of no mean sagacity, quite up to the average standard of Scottish common sense, not a low one; and, though incapable of understanding any manner of lofty thought or passion, is a shrewd measurer of weaknesses, and not without a spark or two of kindly feeling. See first his sketch of his master's character to Mr. Hammorgaw, beginning: 'He's no a'thegither sae void o' sense, neither;' and then the close of the dialogue: 'But the lad's no a bad lad after a', and he needs some carefu' body to look after him.'
Fourthly. He is a good workman; knows his own business well, and can judge of other craft, if sound, or otherwise.
All these four qualities of him must be known before we can understand this single speech. Keeping them in mind, I take it up, word by word.
You observe, in the outset, Scott makes no attempt whatever to indicate accents or modes of pronunciation by changed spelling, unless the word becomes a quite definitely new and scarcely writeable one. The Scottish way of pronouncing 'James,' for instance, is entirely peculiar, and extremely pleasant to the ear. But it is so, just because it doesnotchange the word into Jeems, nor into Jims, nor into Jawms. A modern writer of dialects would think it amusing to use one or other of these ugly spellings. But Scott writes the name in pure English, knowing that a Scots reader will speak it rightly, and an English one be wise in letting it alone. On the other hand he writes 'weel' for 'well,' because that word is complete in its change, and may be very closely expressed by the doublee. The ambiguous 'u's in 'gude' and 'sune' are admitted, because far liker the sound than the doubleowould be, and that in 'hure,' for grace' sake, to soften the word;—so also 'flaes' for 'fleas.' 'Mony' for 'many' is again positively right in sound, and 'neuk' differs from our 'nook' in sense, and is not the same word at all, as we shall presently see.
Secondly, observe, not a word is corrupted in any indecent haste, slowness, slovenliness, or incapacity of pronunciation. There is no lisping, drawling, slobbering, or snuffling: thespeech is as clear as a bell and as keen as an arrow: and its elisions and contractions are either melodious, ('na,' for 'not,'—'pu'd,' for 'pulled,') or as normal as in a Latin verse. The long words are delivered without the slightest bungling; and 'bigging' finished to its lastg.
I take the important words now in their places.
Brave.The old English sense of the word in 'to go brave' retained, expressing Andrew's sincere and respectful admiration. Had he meant to insinuate a hint of the church's being too fine, he would have said 'braw.'
Kirk.This is of course just as pure and unprovincial a word as 'Kirche,' or 'église.'
Whigmaleerie.I cannot get at the root of this word, but it is one showing that the speaker is not bound by classic rules, but will use any syllables that enrich his meaning. 'Nipperty-tipperty' (of his master's 'poetry-nonsense') is another word of the same class. 'Curlieurlie' is of course just as pure as Shakespeare's 'Hurly-burly.' But see first suggestion of the idea to Scott at Blair-Adam (L. vi. 264).
Opensteek hems.More description, or better, of the later Gothic cannot be put into four syllables. 'Steek,' melodious for stitch, has a combined sense of closing or fastening. And note that the later Gothic, being precisely what Scott knew best (in Melrose) and liked best, it is, here as elsewhere, quite as much himself[172]as Frank, that he is laughing at, when he laughswithAndrew, whose 'opensteek hems' are only a ruder metaphor for his own 'willow-wreaths changed to stone.'
Gunpowther.'-Ther' is a lingering vestige of the French '-dre.'
Syne.One of the melodious and mysterious Scottish words which have partly the sound of wind and stream in them, and partly the range of softened idea which is like a distance of blue hills over border land ('far in the distant Cheviot's blue'). Perhaps even the least sympathetic 'Englisher' might recognise this, if he heard 'Old Long Since' vocally substitutedfor the Scottish words to the air. I do not know the root; but the word's proper meaning is not 'since,' but before or after an interval of some duration, 'as weel sune as syne.' 'But first on Sawnie gies a ca', Syne, bauldly in she enters.'
Behoved(to come). A rich word, with peculiar idiom, always used more or less ironically of anything done under a partly mistaken and partly pretended notion of duty.
Siccan.Far prettier, and fuller in meaning than 'such.' It contains an added sense of wonder; and means properly 'so great' or 'so unusual.'
Took(o' drum). Classical 'tuck' from Italian 'toccata,' the preluding 'touch' or flourish, on any instrument (but see Johnson under word 'tucket,' quotingOthello). The deeper Scottish vowels are used here to mark the deeper sound of the bass drum, as in more solemn warning.
Bigging.The only word in all the sentence of which the Scottish form is less melodious than the English, 'and what for no,' seeing that Scottish architecture is mostly little beyond Bessie Bell's and Mary Gray's? 'They biggit a bow're by yon burnside, and theekit it ow're wi rashes.' But it is pure Anglo-Saxon in roots; see glossary to Fairbairn's edition of the DouglasVirgil, 1710.
Coup.Another of the much-embracing words; short for 'upset,' but with a sense of awkwardness as the inherent cause of fall; compare Richie Moniplies (also for sense of 'behoved'): 'Ae auld hirplin deevil of a potter behoved just to step in my way, and offer me a pig (earthern pot—etym. dub.), as he said "just to put my Scotch ointment in;" and I gave him a push, as but natural, and the tottering deevil coupit owre amang his own pigs, and damaged a score of them.' So also Dandie Dinmont in the postchaise: ''Od! I hope they'll no coup us.'
The Crans.Idiomatic; root unknown to me, but it means in this use, full, total, and without recovery.
Molendinar.From 'molendinum,' the grinding-place. I do not know if actually the local name,[173]or Scott's invention.Compare Sir Piercie's 'Molinaras.' But at all events used here with bye-sense of degradation of the formerly idle saints to grind at the mill.
Crouse.Courageous, softened with a sense of comfort.
Ilka.Again a word with azure distance, including the whole sense of 'each' and 'every.' The reader must carefully and reverently distinguish these comprehensive words, which gather two or more perfectly understood meanings into onechordof meaning, and are harmonies more than words, from the above-noted blunders between two half-hit meanings, struck as a bad piano-player strikes the edge of another note. In English we have fewer of these combined thoughts; so that Shakespeare rather plays with the distinct lights of his words, than melts them into one. So again Bishop Douglas spells, and doubtless spoke, the word 'rose,' differently, according to his purpose; if as the chief or governing ruler of flowers, 'rois,' but if only in her own beauty, rose.
Christian-like.The sense of the decency and order proper to Christianity is stronger in Scotland than in any other country, and the word 'Christian' more distinctly opposed to 'beast.' Hence the back-handed cut at the English for their over-pious care of dogs.
I am a little surprised myself at the length to which this examination of one small piece of Sir Walter's first-rate work has carried us, but here I must end for this time, trusting, if the Editor of theNineteenth Centurypermit me, yet to trespass, perhaps more than once, on his readers' patience; but, at all events, to examine in a following paper the technical characteristics of Scott's own style, both in prose and verse,together with Byron's, as opposed to our fashionably recent dialects and rhythms; the essential virtues of language, in both the masters of the old school, hinging ultimately, little as it might be thought, on certain unalterable views of theirs concerning the code called 'of the Ten Commandments,' wholly at variance with the dogmas of automatic morality which, summed again by the witches' line, 'Fair is foul, and foul is fair,' hover through the fog and filthy air of our prosperous England.
John Ruskin.
'He hated greetings in the market-place, and there were generally loiterers in the streets to persecute himeither about the events of the day, or about some petty pieces of business.'
These lines, which the reader will find near the beginning of the sixteenth chapter of the first volume of theAntiquary, contain two indications of the old man's character, which, receiving the ideal of him as a portrait of Scott himself, are of extreme interest to me. They mean essentially that neither Monkbarns nor Scott had any mind to be called of men, Rabbi, in mere hearing of the mob; and especially that they hated to be drawn back out of their far-away thoughts, or forward out of their long-ago thoughts, by any manner of 'daily' news, whether printed or gabbled. Of which two vital characteristics, deeper in both the men, (for I must always speak of Scott's creations as if they were as real as himself,) than any of their superficial vanities, or passing enthusiasms, I have to speak more at another time. I quote the passage just now, because there was one piece of the daily news of the year 1815 which did extremely interest Scott, and materially direct the labour of the latter part of his life; nor is there any piece of history in this whole nineteenth century quite so pregnant with various instruction as the study of the reasons which influenced Scott and Byron in their opposite views of the glories of the battle of Waterloo.
But I quote it for another reason also. The principal greeting which Mr. Oldbuck on this occasion receives in the market-place, being compared with the speech of AndrewFairservice, examined in my first paper, will furnish me with the text of what I have mainly to say in the present one.
'"Mr. Oldbuck," said the town-clerk (a more important person, who came in front and ventured to stop the old gentleman), "the provost, understanding you were in town, begs on no account that you'll quit it without seeing him; he wants to speak to ye about bringing the water frae the Fairwell spring through a part o' your lands."
'"What the deuce!—have they nobody's land but mine to cut and carve on?—I won't consent, tell them."
'"And the provost," said the clerk, going on, without noticing the rebuff, "and the council, wad be agreeable that you should hae the auld stanes at Donagild's Chapel, that ye was wussing to hae."
'"Eh?—what?—Oho! that's another story—Well, well, I'll call upon the provost, and we'll talk about it."
'"But ye maun speak your mind on't forthwith, Monkbarns, if ye want the stanes; for Deacon Harlewalls thinks the carved through-stanes might be put with advantage on the front of the new council-house—that is, the twa cross-legged figures that the callants used to ca' Robbin and Bobbin, ane on ilka door-cheek; and the other stane, that they ca'd Ailie Dailie, abune the door. It will be very tastefu', the Deacon says, and just in the style of modern Gothic."
'"Good Lord deliver me from this Gothic generation!" exclaimed the Antiquary,—"a monument of a knight-templar on each side of a Grecian porch, and a Madonna on the top of it!—O crimini!—Well, tell the provost I wish to have the stones, and we'll not differ about the water-course.—It's lucky I happened to come this way to-day."
'They parted mutually satisfied; but the wily clerk had most reason to exult in the dexterity he had displayed, since the whole proposal of an exchange between the monuments (which the council had determined to remove as a nuisance, because they encroached three feet upon the public road) and the privilege of conveying the water to the burgh, through the estate of Monkbarns, was an idea which had originated with himself upon the pressure of the moment.'
In this single page of Scott, will the reader please note the kind of prophetic instinct with which the great men of every age mark and forecast its destinies? The water from the Fairwell is the future Thirlmere carried to Manchester; the 'auld stanes'[174]at Donagild's Chapel, removed as anuisance,foretell the necessary view taken by modern cockneyism, Liberalism, and progress, of all things that remind them of the noble dead, of their father's fame, or of their own duty; and the public road becomes their idol, instead of the saint's shrine. Finally, the roguery of the entire transaction—the mean man seeing the weakness of the honourable, and 'besting' him—in modern slang, in the manner and at the pace of modern trade—'on the pressure of the moment.'
But neither are these things what I have at present quoted the passage for.
I quote it, that we may consider how much wonderful and various history is gathered in the fact, recorded for us in this piece of entirely fair fiction, that in the Scottish borough of Fairport, (Montrose, really,) in the year 17— of Christ, the knowledge given by the pastors and teachers provided for its children by enlightened Scottish Protestantism, of their fathers' history, and the origin of their religion, had resulted in this substance and sum;—that the statues of two crusading knights had become, to their children, Robin and Bobbin; and the statue of the Madonna, Ailie Dailie.
A marvellous piece of history, truly: and far too comprehensive for general comment here. Only one small piece of it I must carry forward the readers' thoughts upon.
The pastors and teachers aforesaid, (represented typically in another part of this errorless book by Mr. Blattergowl) arenot, whatever else they may have to answer for, answerable for these names. The names are of the children's own choosing and bestowing, but not of the children's own inventing. 'Robin' is a classically endearing cognomen, recording theerrantheroism of old days—the name of the Bruce and of Rob Roy. 'Bobbin' is a poetical and symmetrical fulfilment and adornment of the original phrase. 'Ailie' is the last echo of 'Ave,' changed into the softest Scottish Christian name familiar to the children, itself the beautiful feminine form of royal 'Louis;' the 'Dailie' again symmetrically added for kinder and more musical endearment. The last vestiges, you see, of honour for the heroism and religion of their ancestors, lingering on the lips of babes and sucklings.
But what is the meaning of this necessity the children find themselves under of completing the nomenclature rhythmically and rhymingly? Note first the difference carefully, and the attainment of both qualities by the couplets in question. Rhythm is the syllabic and quantitative measure of the words, in which Robin, both in weight and time, balances Bobbin; and Dailie holds level scale with Ailie. But rhyme is the added correspondence of sound; unknown and undesired, so far as we can learn, by the Greek Orpheus, but absolutely essential to, and, as special virtue, becoming titular of, the Scottish Thomas.
The 'Ryme,'[175]you may at first fancy, is the especially childish part of the work. Not so. It is the especially chivalric and Christian part of it. It characterises the Christian chant or canticle, as a higher thing than a Greek ode, melos, or hymnos, or than a Latin carmen.
Think of it, for this again is wonderful! That these children of Montrose should have an element of music in their souls which Homer had not,—which a melos of David the Prophet and King had not,—which Orpheus and Amphion had not,—which Apollo's unrymed oracles became mute at the sound of.
A strange new equity this,—melodious justice and judgment as it were,—in all words spoken solemnly and ritualistically by Christian human creatures;—Robin and Bobbin—by the Crusader's tomb, up to 'Dies iræ, dies illa,' at judgment of the crusading soul.
You have to understand this most deeply of all Christian minstrels, from first to last; that they are more musical, because more joyful, than any others on earth: ethereal minstrels, pilgrims of the sky, true to the kindred points of heaven and home; their joy essentially the sky-lark's, in light, in purity; but, with their human eyes, looking for the glorious appearing of something in the sky, which the bird cannot.
This it is that changes Etruscan murmur into Terza rima—Horatian Latin into Provençal troubadour's melody; not, because less artful, less wise.
Here is a little bit, for instance, of French ryming just before Chaucer's time—near enough to our own French to be intelligible to us yet.
'O quant très-glorieuse vie,Quant cil quit out peut et maistrie,Veult esprouver pour nécessaire,Ne pour quant il ne blasma mieLa vie de Marthe sa mie:Mais il lui donna exemplaireD'autrement vivre, et de bien plaireA Dieu; et plut de bien à faire:Pour se conclut-il que MarieQui estoit à ses piedz sans braire,Et pensait d'entendre et de taire,Estleut la plus saine partie.La meilleur partie esleut-elleEt la plus saine et la plus belle,Qui jà ne luy sera ostéeCar par vérité se fut celleQui fut tousjours fresche et nouvelle,D'aymer Dieu et d'en estre aymée;Car jusqu'au cueur fut entamée,Et si ardamment enflammée.Que tous-jours ardoit l'estincelle;Par quoi elle fut visitéeEt de Dieu premier comfortée;Car charité est trop ysnelle.'
'O quant très-glorieuse vie,Quant cil quit out peut et maistrie,Veult esprouver pour nécessaire,Ne pour quant il ne blasma mieLa vie de Marthe sa mie:Mais il lui donna exemplaireD'autrement vivre, et de bien plaireA Dieu; et plut de bien à faire:Pour se conclut-il que MarieQui estoit à ses piedz sans braire,Et pensait d'entendre et de taire,Estleut la plus saine partie.
La meilleur partie esleut-elleEt la plus saine et la plus belle,Qui jà ne luy sera ostéeCar par vérité se fut celleQui fut tousjours fresche et nouvelle,D'aymer Dieu et d'en estre aymée;Car jusqu'au cueur fut entamée,Et si ardamment enflammée.Que tous-jours ardoit l'estincelle;Par quoi elle fut visitéeEt de Dieu premier comfortée;Car charité est trop ysnelle.'
The only law ofmetre, observed in this song, is that each line shall be octosyllabic:
Qui fut | tousjours | fresche et | nouvelle,D'autre | ment vi | vret de | bien (ben) plaire,Et pen | soit den | tendret | de taire
Qui fut | tousjours | fresche et | nouvelle,D'autre | ment vi | vret de | bien (ben) plaire,Et pen | soit den | tendret | de taire
But the reader must note that words which were two-syllabled in Latin mostly remain yet so in the French.
Lavi| -ede | Marthe | sa mie,
Lavi| -ede | Marthe | sa mie,
althoughmie, which is pet language, loving abbreviation ofamicathroughamie, remains monosyllabic. Butvieelides itsebefore a vowel:
Car Mar- | the me | nait vie | activeEt Ma- | ri-e | contemp | lative;
Car Mar- | the me | nait vie | activeEt Ma- | ri-e | contemp | lative;
and custom endures many exceptions. ThusMariemay be three-syllabled as above, or answer tomieas a dissyllable; butviergeis always, I think, dissyllabic,vier-ge, with even stronger accent on the -ge, for the Latin -go.
Then, secondly, of quantity, there is scarcely any fixed law. The metres may be timed as the minstrel chooses—fast or slow—and the iambic current checked in reverted eddy, as the words chance to come.
But, thirdly, there is to be rich ryming and chiming, no matter how simply got, so only that the words jingle and tingle together with due art of interlacing and answering in different parts of the stanza, correspondent to the involutions of tracery and illumination. The whole twelve-line stanza is thus constructed with two rymes only, six of each, thus arranged:
AAB | AAB | BBA | BBA |
AAB | AAB | BBA | BBA |
dividing the verse thus into four measures, reversed in ascent and descent, ordescantmore properly; and doubtless withcorrespondent phases in the voice-given, and duly accompanying, or following, music; Thomas the Rymer's own precept, that 'tong is chefe in mynstrelsye,' being always kept faithfully in mind.[176]
Here then you have a sufficient example of the pure chant of the Christian ages; which is always at heart joyful, and divides itself into the four great forms, Song of Praise, Song of Prayer, Song of Love, and Song of Battle; praise, however, being the keynote of passion through all the four forms; according to the first law which I have already given in the laws of Fesolé; 'all great Art is Praise,' of which the contrary is also true, all foul or miscreant Art is accusation, διαβολη: 'She gave me of the tree and I did eat' being an entirely museless expression on Adam's part, the briefly essential contrary of Love-song.
With these four perfect forms of Christian chant, of which we may take for pure examples the 'Te Deum,' the 'Te Lucis Ante,' the 'Amor che nella mente,'[177]and the 'Chant de Roland,' are mingled songs of mourning, of Pagan origin (whether Greek or Danish), holding grasp still of the races that have once learned them, in times of suffering and sorrow; and songs of Christian humiliation or grief, regarding chiefly the sufferings of Christ, or the conditions of our own sin: while through the entire system of these musical complaints are interwoven moralities, instructions, and related histories, in illustration of both, passing into Epic and Romantic verse, which gradually, as the forms and learnings of society increase, becomes less joyful, and more didactic, or satiric, until thelast echoes of Christian joy and melody vanish in the 'Vanity of human wishes.'
And here I must pause for a minute or two to separate the different branches of our inquiry clearly from one another. For one thing, the reader must please put for the present out of his head all thought of the progress of 'civilisation'—that is to say, broadly, of the substitution of wigs for hair, gas for candles, and steam for legs. This is an entirely distinct matter from the phases of policy and religion. It has nothing to do with the British Constitution, or the French Revolution, or the unification of Italy. There are, indeed, certain subtle relations between the state of mind, for instance, in Venice, which makes her prefer a steamer to a gondola, and that which makes her prefer a gazetteer to a duke; but these relations are not at all to be dealt with until we solemnly understand that whether men shall be Christians and poets, or infidels and dunces, does not depend on the way they cut their hair, tie their breeches, or light their fires. Dr. Johnson might have worn his wig in fulness conforming to his dignity, without therefore coming to the conclusion that human wishes were vain; nor is Queen Antoinette's civilised hair-powder, as opposed to Queen Bertha's savagely loose hair, the cause of Antoinette's laying her head at last in scaffold dust, but Bertha in a pilgrim-haunted tomb.
Again, I have just now used the words 'poet' and 'dunce,' meaning the degree of each quality possible to average human nature. Men are eternally divided into the two classes of poet (believer, maker, and praiser) and dunce (or unbeliever, unmaker, and dispraiser). And in process of ages they have the power of making faithful and formative creatures of themselves, or unfaithful anddeformative. And this distinction between the creatures who, blessing, are blessed, and evermorebenedicti, and the creatures who, cursing, are cursed, and evermoremaledicti, is one going through all humanity; antediluvian in Cain and Abel, diluvian in Ham and Shem. And the question for the public of any given period is not whether they are a constitutional or unconstitutional vulgus, but whether they are a benignant or malignant vulgus. So also, whether it isindeed the gods who have given any gentleman the grace to despise the rabble, depends wholly on whether it is indeed the rabble, or he, who are the malignant persons.
But yet again. This difference between the persons to whom Heaven, according to Orpheus, has granted 'the hour of delight,'[178]and those whom it has condemned to the hour of detestableness, being, as I have just said, of all times and nations,—it is an interior and more delicate difference which we are examining in the gift ofChristian, as distinguished from unchristian, song. Orpheus, Pindar, and Horace are indeed distinct from the prosaic rabble, as the bird from the snake; but between Orpheus and Palestrina, Horace and Sidney, there is another division, and a new power of music and song given to the humanity which has hope of the Resurrection.
Thisis the root of all life and all rightness in Christian harmony, whether of word or instrument; and so literally, that in precise manner as this hope disappears, the power of song is taken away, and taken away utterly. When the Christian falls back out of the bright hope of the Resurrection, even the Orpheus song is forbidden him. Not to have known the hope is blameless: one may sing, unknowing, as the swan, or Philomela. But to have known and fall away from it, and to declare that the human wishes, which are summed in that one—'Thy kingdom come'—are vain! The Fates ordain there shall be no singing after that denial.
For observe this, and earnestly. The old Orphic song, with its dim hope of yet once more Eurydice,—the Philomela song—granted after the cruel silence,—the Halcyon song—with its fifteen days of peace, were all sad, or joyful only in some vague vision of conquest over death. But the Johnsonian vanity of wishes is on the whole satisfactory to Johnson—accepted with gentlemanly resignation by Pope—triumphantly and with bray of penny trumpets and blowing of steam-whistles, proclaimed for the glorious discovery of the civilised ages, by Mrs. Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Adam Smith, andCo. There is no God, but have we not invented gunpowder?—who wants a God, with that in his pocket?[179]There is no Resurrection, neither angel nor spirit; but have we not paper and pens, and cannot every blockhead print his opinions, and the Day of Judgment become Republican, with everybody for a judge, and the flat of the universe for the throne? There is no law, but only gravitation and congelation, and we are stuck together in an everlasting hail, and melted together in everlasting mud, and great was the day in which our worships were born. And there is no Gospel, but only, whatever we've got, to get more, and, wherever we are, to go somewhere else. And are not these discoveries, to be sung of, and drummed of, and fiddled of, and generally made melodiously indubitable in the eighteenth century song of praise?
The Fates will not have it so. No word of song is possible, in that century, to mortal lips. Only polished versification, sententious pentameter and hexameter, until, having turned out its toes long enough without dancing, and pattered with its lips long enough without piping, suddenly Astræa returns to the earth, and a Day of Judgment of a sort, and there bursts out a song at last again, a most curtly melodious triplet of Amphisbænic ryme. 'Ça ira.'
Amphisbænic, fanged in each ryme with fire, and obeying Ercildoune's precept, 'Tong is chefe of mynstrelsye,' to the syllable.—Don Giovanni's hitherto fondly chanted 'Andiam, andiam,' become suddenly impersonal and prophetic:Itshall go, and you also. A cry—before it is a song, then song andaccompaniment together—perfectly done; and the march 'towards the field of Mars. The two hundred and fifty thousand—they to the sound of stringed music—preceded by young girls with tricolor streamers, they have shouldered soldier-wise their shovels and picks, and with one throat are singingÇa ira.'[180]
Through all the springtime of 1790, 'from Brittany to Burgundy, on most plains of France, under most city walls, there march and constitutionally wheel to the Ça-iraing mood of fife and drum—our clear glancing phalanxes;—the song of the two hundred and fifty thousand, virgin led, is in the long light of July.' Nevertheless, another song is yet needed, for phalanx, and for maid. For, two springs and summers having gone—amphisbænic,—on the 28th of August 1792, 'Dumouriez rode from the camp of Maulde, eastwards toSedan.'[181]
And Longwi has fallen basely, and Brunswick and the Prussian king will beleaguer Verdun, and Clairfait and the Austrians press deeper in over the northern marches, Cimmerian Europe behind. And on that same night Dumouriez assembles council of war at his lodgings in Sedan. Prussians here, Austrians there, triumphant both. With broad highway to Paris and little hindrance—wescattered, helpless here and there—what to advise? The generals advise retreating, and retreating till Paris be sacked at the latest day possible. Dumouriez, silent, dismissesthem,—keeps only, with a sign, Thouvenot. Silent, thus, when needful, yet having voice, it appears, of what musicians call tenor-quality, of a rare kind. Rubini-esque, even, but scarcely producible to fastidious ears at opera. The seizure of the forest of Argonne follows—the cannonade of Valmy. The Prussians do not march on Paristhistime, the autumnal hours of fate pass on—ça ira—and on the 6th of November, Dumouriez meets the Austrians also. 'Dumouriez wide-winged, they wide-winged—at and around Jemappes, its green heights fringed and maned with red fire. And Dumouriez is swept back on this wing and swept backon that, and is like to be swept back utterly, when he rushes up in person, speaks a prompt word or two, and then, with clear tenor-pipe, uplifts the hymn of the Marseillaise, ten thousand tenor or bass pipes joining, or say some forty thousand in all, for every heart leaps up at the sound; and so, with rhythmic march melody, they rally, they advance, they rush death-defying, and like the fire whirlwind sweep all manner of Austrians from the scene of action.' Thus, through the lips of Dumouriez, sings Tyrtæus, Rouget de Lisle,[182]'Aux armes—marchons!' Iambic measure with a witness! in what wide strophe here beginning—in what unthought-of antistrophe returning to that council chamber in Sedan!
While these two great songs were thus being composed, and sung, and danced to in cometary cycle, by the French nation, here in our less giddy island there rose, amidst hours of business in Scotland and of idleness in England, three troubadours of quite different temper. Different also themselves, but not opponent; forming a perfect chord, and adverse all the three of them alike to the French musicians, in this main point—that while theÇa iraand Marseillaise were essentially songs of blame and wrath, the British bards wrote, virtually, always songs of praise, though by no means psalmody in the ancient keys. On the contrary, all the three are alike moved by a singular antipathy to the priests, and are pointed at with fear and indignation by the pietists, of their day;—not without latent cause. For they are all of them, with the most loving service, servants of that world which the Puritan and monk alike despised; and, in the triple chord of their song, could not but appear to the religious persons around them as respectively and specifically the praisers—Scott of the world, Burns of the flesh, and Byron of the devil.
To contend with this carnal orchestra, the religious world, having long ago rejected its Catholic Psalms as antiquated and unscientific, and finding its Puritan melodies sunk into faint jar and twangle from their native trumpet-tone, had nothing to oppose but the innocent, rather than religious,verses of the school recognised as that of the English Lakes; very creditable to them; domestic at once and refined; observing the errors of the world outside of the Lakes with a pitying and tender indignation, and arriving in lacustrine seclusion at many valuable principles of philosophy, as pure as the tarns of their mountains, and of corresponding depth.[183]
I have lately seen, and with extreme pleasure, Mr. Matthew Arnold's arrangement of Wordsworth's poems; and read with sincere interest his high estimate of them. But a great poet's work never needs arrangement by other hands; and though it is very proper that Silver How should clearly understand and brightly praise its fraternal Rydal Mount, we must not forget that, over yonder, are the Andes, all the while.
Wordsworth's rank and scale among poets were determined by himself, in a single exclamation:—
'What was the great Parnassus' self to thee,Mount Skiddaw?'
'What was the great Parnassus' self to thee,Mount Skiddaw?'
Answer his question faithfully, and you have the relation between the great masters of the Muse's teaching, and the pleasant fingerer of his pastoral flute among the reeds of Rydal.
Wordsworth is simply a Westmoreland peasant, with considerably less shrewdness than most border Englishmen or Scotsmen inherit; and no sense of humour: but gifted (in this singularly) with vivid sense of natural beauty, and a pretty turn for reflections, not always acute, but, as far as they reach, medicinal to the fever of the restless and corrupted life around him. Water to parched lips may be better than Samian wine, but do not let us therefore confuse the qualities of wine and water. I much doubt there being many inglorious Miltons in our country churchyards; but I am very sure there are many Wordsworths resting there, who were inferior to the renowned one only in caring less to hear themselves talk.
With an honest and kindly heart, a stimulating egoism, a wholesome contentment in modest circumstances, and such sufficient ease, in that accepted state, as permitted the passing of a good deal of time in wishing that daisies could see the beauty of their own shadows, and other such profitable mental exercises, Wordsworth has left us a series of studies of the graceful and happy shepherd life of our lake country, which to me personally, for one, are entirely sweet and precious; but they are only so as the mirror of an existent reality in many ways more beautiful than its picture.
But the other day I went for an afternoon's rest into the cottage of one of our country people of old statesman class; cottage lying nearly midway between two village churches, but more conveniently for downhill walk towards one than the other. I found, as the good housewife made tea for me, that nevertheless she went up the hill to church. 'Why do not you go to the nearer church?' I asked. 'Don't you like the clergyman?' 'Oh no, sir,' she answered, 'it isn't that; but you know I couldn't leave my mother.' 'Your mother! she is buried at H—— then?' 'Yes, sir; and you know I couldn't go to church anywhere else.'
That feelings such as these existed among the peasants, not of Cumberland only, but of all the tender earth that gives forth her fruit for the living, and receives her dead to peace, might perhaps have been, to our great and endless comfort, discovered before now, if Wordsworth had been content to tell us what he knew of his own villages and people, not as the leader of a new and only correct school of poetry, but simply as a country gentleman of sense and feeling, fond of primroses, kind to the parish children, and reverent of the spade with which Wilkinson had tilled his lands: and I am by no means sure that his influence on the stronger minds of his time was anywise hastened or extended by the spirit of tunefulness under whose guidance he discovered that heaven rhymed to seven, and Foy to boy.
Tuneful nevertheless at heart, and of the heavenly choir, I gladly and frankly acknowledge him; and our English literature enriched with a new and a singular virtue in theaërial purity and healthful rightness of his quiet song;—butaërialonly,—not ethereal; and lowly in its privacy of light.
A measured mind, and calm; innocent, unrepentant; helpful to sinless creatures and scatheless, such of the flock as do not stray. Hopeful at least, if not faithful; content with intimations of immortality such as may be in skipping of lambs, and laughter of children,—incurious to see in the hands the print of the Nails.
A gracious and constant mind; as the herbage of its native hills, fragrant and pure;—yet, to the sweep and the shadow, the stress and distress, of the greater souls of men, as the tufted thyme to the laurel wilderness of Tempe,—as the gleaming euphrasy to the dark branches of Dodona.
[I am obliged to defer the main body of this paper to next month,—revises penetrating all too late into my lacustrine seclusion; as chanced also unluckily with the preceding paper, in which the reader will perhaps kindly correct the consequent misprints, p. 29, l. 20, of 'scarcely' to 'securely,' and p. 31, l. 34, 'full,' with comma, to 'fall,' without one; noticing besides thatRedgauntlethas been omitted in the italicised list, p. 25, l. 16; and that the reference to note 2 should not be at the word 'imagination,' p. 24, but at the word 'trade,' p. 25, l. 7. My dear old friend, Dr. John Brown, sends me, from Jamieson'sDictionary, the following satisfactory end to one of my difficulties:—'Coup the crans.' The language is borrowed from the 'cran,' or trivet on which small pots are placed in cookery, which is sometimes turned with its feet uppermost by an awkward assistant. Thus it signifies to becompletelyupset.]
John Ruskin.