[1] The Lee is the stream.
[2] I offer some instances of alliteration; but the beauty of such
lines can only be rightly judged by the context.--
"In woods, in waves, in wars, she wonts to dwell
And will be found with peril and with pain."
"Such as a lamp whose life does fade away,
Or as the moon cloathed with cloudy night."
"A world of waters,
Horrible, hideous, roaring with hoarse cry."
"They cherelie chaunt, and rymes at random flung,
The fruitful spawn of their rank fantasies;
They feed the ears of fools with flattery."
"All the day before the sunny rays,
He used to slug or sleep, in slothful shade."
"Unpitied, unplagued, of foe or friend."
"And with sharp shrilling shriek do bootless cry."
"Did stand astonish'd at his curious skill,
With hungry ears to hear his harmony."
[3] Spenser has suffered a criticism from Mr. Campbell, who, a great
poet himself, has otherwise done ample justice to his ancient master.
"It must certainly be owned that in description he exhibits nothing
of the _brief strokes_ and _robust power_ which characterize the
_very greatest poets_." Certain it is Spenser is rarely "brief and
robust;" but contrary natures cannot operate in the same genius. If
Spenser rarely shows the strength and brevity of "the very greatest
poets," so may it be said that "the very greatest poets" rarely rival
the charm of his diffusion; or, as Mr. Campbell himself attests, in
"verse more magnificently descriptive." But the voice of Poetry is
more potent than its criticism, and truly says Mr. Campbell--"We
shall nowhere find more airy and expansive images of visionary
things, a sweeter tone of sentiment, or a finer flush in the colour
of language, than in this RUBENS OF ENGLISH POETRY."
Twining was a scholar, deeply versed in classical lore, which he has
shown to great advantage in his "Version of and Commentary on
Aristotle's Treatise of Poetry." In his Dissertations "On Poetical
and Musical Imitation" prefixed to this work, our critic is quite at
home with Pope and Goldsmith, but he seems wholly shut out from
Spenser! In a note to his first Dissertation he tells us "the
following stanza of SPENSER has been much admired:"--
The joyous birds shrouded in cheareful shade,
Their notes unto the voice attempred sweet;
Th' angelical soft trembling voices made
To th' instruments divine respondence meet;
The silver-sounding instruments did meet
With the base murmurs of the waters-fall;
The waters-fall with difference discreet,
Now soft, now loud, unto the wind did call;
The gentle-warbling wind low answered to all.*
Our critic observes that Dr. Warton says of these lines, that "they
are of themselves a complete concert of the most delicious music."
Indeed, this very stanza in Spenser has been celebrated long before
Joseph Warton wrote, and often since; now listen to our learned
_Twining:_--
"It is unwillingly that I differ from a person of so much taste. I
cannot consider as music, much less as 'delicious music,' a mixture
of incompatible sounds--of sounds musical with sounds unmusical. The
singing of birds cannot possibly be 'attempered' to the notes of a
human voice. The mixture is, and must be, disagreeable. To a person
listening to a concert of voices and instruments, the interruption of
singing-birds, wind, and water-falls, would be little better than the
torment of Hogarth's enraged musician. Further, the description
itself is, like too many of Spenser's, coldly elaborate, and
indiscriminately minute. Of the expressions, some are feeble and
without effect, as 'joyous birds'--some evidently improper, as
'trembling voices' and 'cheerful shades;' for there cannot be a
greater fault in a voice than to be tremulous, and cheerful is surely
an unhappy epithet applied to shade--some cold and laboured, and such
as betray too plainly the necessities of rhyme; such is--
"'The waters-fall with difference discreet.'"
Such is the anti-poetical and technical criticism! Imagine a
music-master, who had never read a line of poetry, attempting to
perform the "delicious music" of our poet--or a singing-master, who
had never heard a "joyous bird," tuning up some fair pupil's
"trembling voice," and we might have expected this criticism from
such "enraged musicians!" Would our critic insist on having a
philharmonic concert, or a simple sonata? He who will not suffer
birds to be "joyous," nor "the shade cheerful," which their notes
make so.
"Th' angelical soft trembling voices made
To th' instruments divine respondence meet,"
the "softness trembling" with the verse; had our critic forgotten
Strada's famed contest of the Nightingale with the Lyre of the poet,
when, her "trembling voice" overcome in the rivalry, she fell on the
strings to die? And what shall we think of the classical critic who
has pronounced that "the descriptions of Spenser are coldly
elaborate"--the most vivid and splendid of our poetry?
But the most curious part remains to be told. This fine stanza of
Spenser is one of his free borrowings, being a translation of a
stanza in Tasso,** excepting the introduction of "the silver-sounding
instruments." The Aeolian harp played on by the musical winds was a
happiness reserved for Thomson. The felicitous copy of Spenser
attracted Fairfax, who, when he came to the passage in Tasso, kept
his eye on Spenser, and has carefully retained "the joyous birds" for
the "vezzosi augelli" of the original.
It is certain that, without poetic sensibility, the most learned
critic will ever find that the utmost force of his logic in these
matters will not lead to reason, but to unreason. Imagination only
can decide on imagination.
* "The Faery Queen," book II. canto xii. st. 71.
** "Gerusalemme Liberata," canto xvi. st. 12.
[4] "The Faery Queen," book III. canto x.
[5] "The Faery Queen," B. III. canto iv, st. 65, and B. I. canto v.
st. 20.
[6] This edition of 1715, from its modernized orthography, and from
greater freedoms taken with the text, is valueless.
[7] Thia famous tourney may be viewed in Hollinshed--"England," 1317,
fo. The four illustrious challengers were, the Earl of Arundel, Lord
Windsor, Sir Fulke Greville, and Sir Philip Sidney.