'And, but he's something stain'd
With grief that's beauty's canker, thou might'st call him
A goodly person.'
line 414. Byron, writing to Murray on 3 Feb., 1816, expresses his
belief that he has unwittingly imitated this passage in 'Parisina.'
'I had,' he says, 'completed the story on the passage from Gibbon,
which indeed leads to a like scene naturally, without a thought of
the kind; but it comes upon me not very comfortably.' Byron is quite
right in his assertion that, if he had taken this striking
description of Constance as a model for his Parisina, he would have
been attempting 'to imitate that which is inimitable.' See
'Parisina,' st. xiv:--
'She stood, I said, all pale and still,
The living cause of Hugo's ill.'
Stanza XXII. line 415. a sordid soul, &c. For such a character in
the drama see Lightborn in Marlowe's Edward II, and those trusty
agents in Richard III, whose avowed hardness of heart drew from
Gloucester the appreciative remark:--
'Your eyes drop millstones, when fools' eyes drop tears.'
Richard III, i. 3. 353.
Stanza XXIII. line 438. grisly, grim, horrible; still an effective
poetic word. It is, e.g., very expressive in Tennyson's 'Princess,'
sect. vi, where Ida sees
'The haggard father's face and reverend beard
Of GRISLY twine, all dabbled with the blood,' &c.
See below, III. 382.
Stanza XXV. line 468. 'It is well known, that the religious, who
broke their vows of chastity, were subjected to the same penalty as
the Roman vestals in a similar case. A small niche, sufficient to
enclose their bodies, was made in the massive wall of the convent; a
slender pittance of food and water was deposited in it, and the
awful words, VADE IN PACE, were the signal for immuring the
criminal. It is not likely that, in latter times, this punishment
was often resorted to; but among the ruins of the abbey of
Coldingham, were some years ago discovered the remains of a female
skeleton, which, from the shape of the niche, and position of the
figure, seemed to be that of an immured nun.'--SCOTT.
Lockhart adds:--'The Edinburgh Reviewer, on st. xxxii, POST,
suggests that the proper reading of the sentence is VADE IN PACEM--
not PART IN PEACE, but GO INTO PEACE, or eternal rest, a pretty
intelligible mittimus to another world.'
Stanza XXVII. line 506. my = 'of me,' retains the old genitive force
as in Elizabethan English. Cp. Julius Caesar, i. I. 55:--
'In HIS way
That comes in triumph over Pompey's blood.'
line 516. The very old fancy of a forsaken lover's revenge has been
powerfully utilized in D. G. Rossetti's fascinating ballad, 'Sister
Helen':--
'Pale, pale her cheeks, that in pride did glow,
Sister Helen,
'Neath the bridal-wreath three days ago.'
'One morn for pride and three days for woe,
Little brother!'
Stanza XXVIII. line 520. plight, woven, united, as in Spenser F. Q.,
II. vi. 7:--
'Fresh flowerets dight
About her necke, or rings of rushes PLIGHT.'
lines 524-40. The reference in these lines is to what was known as
the appeal to the judgment of God. On this subject, Scott at the
close of the second head in his 'Essay on Chivalry,' says, 'In the
appeal to this awful criterion, the combatants, whether personally
concerned, or appearing as champions, were understood, in martial
law, to take on themselves the full risk of all consequences. And,
as the defendant, or his champion, in case of being overcome, was
subjected to the punishment proper to the crime of which he was
accused, so the appellant, if vanquished, was, whether a principal
or substitute, condemned to the same doom to which his success would
have exposed the accused. Whichever combatant was vanquished he was
liable to the penalty of degradation; and, if he survived the
combat, the disgrace to which he was subjected was worse than death.
His spurs were cut off close to his heels, with a cook's cleaver;
his arms were baffled and reversed by the common hangman; his belt
was cut to pieces, and his sword broken. Even his horse shared his
disgrace, the animal's tail being cut off, close by the rump, and
thrown on a dunghill. The death-bell tolled, and the funeral service
was said for a knight thus degraded as for one dead to knightly
honour. And if he fell in the appeal to the judgment of God, the
same dishonour was done to his senseless corpse. If alive, he was
only rescued from death to be confined in the cloister. Such at
least were the strict roles of Chivalry, though the courtesy of the
victor, or the clemency of the prince, might remit them in
favourable cases.'
For illustration of forms observed at such contests, see Richard II,
i. 3.
line 524. Each knight declared on oath that he 'had his quarrel
just.' The fall of an unworthy knight is referred to below, VI. 961.
Stanza XXIX. line 545. This illustrates Henry's impulsive and
imperious character, and is not, necessarily, a premonition of his
final attitude towards Roman Catholicism.
line 555. dastard (Icel. doestr = exhausted, breathless; O. Dut.
dasaert = a fool) is very appropriately used here, after the
description above, St. xxii, to designate the poltroon that quails
only before death. Cp. Pope's Iliad, II. 427:--
'And die the dastard first, who dreads to die.'