If, then, you consent with me thus far in theory, let us now
drive at practice. You have (we will say) a class of thirty or
forty in front of you. We will assume that they know _a-b, ab,_
can at least spell out their words. You will choose a passage for
them, and you will not (if you are wise) choose a passage from
"Paradise Lost": your knowledge telling you that "Paradise Lost"
was written, late in his life, by a great _virtuoso,_ and older
men (of whom I, sad to say, am one) assuring you that to taste
the Milton of "Paradise Lost" a man must have passed his
thirtieth year. You take the early Milton: you read out this, for
instance, from "L'Allegro":
Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee
Jest and youthful Jollity,
Quips, and Cranks, and wanton wiles,
Nods and Becks, and wreathed Smiles
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sport that wrinkled Care derides,
And Laughter holding both his sides....
Go on: just read it to them. They won't know who Hebe was, but
you can tell them later. The metre is taking hold of them (in my
experience the metre of "L'Allegro" can be relied upon to grip
children) and anyway they can see `Laughter holding both his
sides': they recognise it as if they saw the picture. Go on
steadily:
Come, and trip it as ye go,
On the light fantastick toe;
And in thy right hand lead with thee
The Mountain Nymph, sweet Liberty;
And, if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew--
Do not pause and explain what a Nymph is, or why Liberty is the
'Mountain Nymph'! Go on reading: the Prince has always to break
through briers to kiss the Sleeping Beauty awake. Go on with the
incantation, calling him, persuading him, that he is the Prince
and she is worth it. Go on reading--
Mirth, admit me of thy crew,
To live with her, and live with thee,
In unreprovéd pleasures free;
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And singing startle the dull night,
From his watch-towre in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise.
At this point--still as you read without stopping to explain, the
child certainly feels that he is being led to something. He knows
the lark: but the lark's 'watch-towre'--he had never thought of
that: and 'the dappled dawn'-yes that's just _it,_ now he comes
to think:
Then to come, in spite of sorrow,
And at my window bid good-morrow,
Through the sweet-briar or the vine
Or the twisted eglantine;
While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of Darkness thin;
And to the stack, or the barn door,
Stoutly struts his dames before:
Oft listening how the hounds and horn
Cheerily rouse the slumbering Morn,
From the side of some hoar hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill:
Sometime walking, not unseen,
By hedgerow elms on hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate,
Where the great sun begins his state,
Robed in flames and amber light,
The clouds in thousand liveries dight;
While the ploughman, near at hand,
Whistles o'er the furrow'd land,
And the milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his sithe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Don't stop (I say) to explain that Hebe was (for once) the
legitimate daughter of Zeus and, as such, had the privilege to
draw wine for the gods. Don't even stop, just yet, to explain who
the gods were. Don't discourse on amber, otherwise ambergris;
don't explain that 'gris' in this connexion doesn't mean
'grease'; don't trace it through the Arabic into Noah's Ark;
don't prove its electrical properties by tearing up paper into
little bits and attracting them with the mouth-piece of your pipe
rubbed on your sleeve. Don't insist philologically that when
every shepherd 'tells his tale' he is not relating an anecdote
but simply keeping tally of his flock.
Just go on reading, as well as you can; and be sure that when the
children get the thrill of it, for which you wait, they will be
asking more questions, and pertinent ones, than you are able to
answer.