[361-1] In some of our American towns and cities a curfew bell is rung
as a signal that the children must leave the streets and go to their
homes. Many years ago it was the custom in English villages to ring a
bell at nightfall as a signal for people to cover their fires with ashes
to preserve till morning, and as a signal for bed. The word _curfew_, in
fact, is from the French, and means _cover fire_.
[361-2] The word _knell_ suggests death, and gives the first mournful
note to the poem.
[361-3] The sheep are shut up for the night in the _folds_ or pens. What
are the _tinklings_? Why should they be called _drowsy_?
[362-4] The poem is supposed to have been written in the yard of
Stoke-Pogis church, a little building with a square tower, the whole
covered with a riotous growth of ivy vines. The church is in the
country, not many miles from Windsor Castle; and even to this day the
beautiful landscape preserves the rural charms it had in Gray's time. We
must not suppose that Gray actually sat in the churchyard and wrote his
lines. As a matter of fact, he was a very careful and painstaking
writer, and for eight years was at work on this poem, selecting each
word so that it should express just the shade of meaning he wanted and
give the perfect melody he sought. However, he did begin the poem at
Stoke in October or November of 1742 and continued it there in November,
1749; but it was finished in Cambridge in June, 1750.
[362-5] _Reign_ here means _dominion_ or _possessions_. Why is the bird
called a _moping_ owl? Why is her reign _solitary_? What word is
understood after _such_ in the third line of this stanza?
[362-6] _Rude_ means _uneducated_, _uncultured_, not _ill-mannered_.
[362-7] A clarion is a loud, clear-sounding trumpet.
[362-8] In the church are the tombs of the wealthy and titled of the
neighborhood, and in the building and on the walls are monuments that
tell the virtues of the lordly dead. It is outside, however, under the
sod, in their narrow cells, that the virtuous poor, the real subjects of
the poet's thoughts, lie in quiet slumbers.
[362-9] What evening cares has the busy housewife? Was she making the
clothes of her children, knitting, mending, darning, after the supper
dishes were put away?
[363-10] Where were the children? Were they waiting for their father's
return? To whom would they run to tell of his coming?
[363-11] The _glebe_ is the turf. Why should it be called _stubborn_?
[363-12] _Jocund_ means _joyful_.
[363-13] The word _Ambition_ begins with a capital letter because Gray
speaks of ambition as though it were a person. The line means, "Let not
ambitious persons speak lightly of the work the rude forefathers did."
[363-14] The inevitable hour (death) alike awaits the boast of heraldry,
the pomp of power, and all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave.
[363-15] This is perhaps the most famous stanza in the poem. The
following story is told of General Wolfe as he was leading his troops to
the daring assault on Quebec in 1759: "At past midnight, when the
heavens were hung black with clouds, and the boats were floating
silently back with the tide to the intended landing-place at the chosen
ascent to the Plains of Abraham, he repeated in low tones to the
officers around him this touching stanza of Gray's _Elegy_. 'Now,
gentlemen,' said Wolfe, 'I would rather be the author of that poem than
the possessor of the glory of beating the French to-morrow!' He fell the
next day, and expired just as the shouts of the victory of the English
fell upon his almost unconscious ears."
[364-16] Now, an aisle is the passageway between the pews or the seats
in a church or other public hall: in the poem it means the passageways
running to the sides of the main body of the church.
[364-17] A storied urn is an urn-shaped monument on which are inscribed
the virtues of the dead. Why should a _bust_ be called _animated_? What
is the _mansion_ of _the fleeting breath_?
[364-18] In this instance _provoke_ means what it originally meant in
the Latin language; namely, _call forth_.
[364-19] The line means, "Some heart once filled with the heavenly
inspiration."
[364-20] A poet or musician is said to sing, and the lyre is the
instrument with which the ancients accompanied their songs. _To wake to
ecstasy the living lyre_ is to write the noblest poetry, to sing the
most inspired songs.
[364-21] The books of the ancients were rolls of manuscripts. Did any of
those persons resting in this neglected spot ever write great poetry,
rule empires or sing inspiring songs? If not, what prevented them from
doing such things if they had the ability?
[365-22] At first this stanza was written thus:
"Some village Cato, who with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood;
Some mute, inglorious Tully here may rest;
Some Caesar guiltless of his country's blood."
It is interesting to notice that at his first writing Gray selected
three of the famous men of antiquity, but in his revision he substituted
the names of three of his own countrymen. Who were Hampden, Milton and
Cromwell?
[365-23] The three stanzas beginning at this point make but one
sentence. Turned into prose the sentence would read: "Their lot forbade
them to command the applause of listening senates, to despise the
threats of pain and ruin, to scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, and
read their history in a nation's eyes: their lot not only circumscribed
their growing virtues but confined their crimes as well; it forbade them
to wade through slaughter to a throne and shut the gates of mercy on
mankind, to hide the struggling pangs of conscious truth, to quench the
blushes of ingenuous shame, and to heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride
with incense kindled at the Muse's flame."
[365-24] This line means that they could not become rulers by fighting
and killing their fellowmen as Napoleon did not long afterward.
[366-25] Many of the English poets wrote in praise of the wealthy and
titled in order to be paid or favored by the men they flattered. Gray
thinks that such conduct is disgraceful, and rejoices that the rude
forefathers of the hamlet were prevented from writing poetry for such an
end. The Greeks thought poetry was inspired by one of the Muses, and
genius is often spoken as a flame.
[366-26] _Madding_ means _excited_ or _raging_.
[366-27] The _frail memorials_ were simple headstones, similar to those
one may see in any country graveyard in America. On such headstones may
often be seen _shapeless sculpture_ that would almost provoke a smile,
were it not for its pathetic meaning. A picture of Stoke-Pogis
churchyard shows many stories of the ordinary type.
[366-28] The rhymes were _uncouth_ in the sense that they were unlearned
and unpolished.
[366-29] What facts were inscribed on the headstones? _Elegy_ here means
_praise_. Where were the texts strewn? Why were the texts called _holy?_
What was the nature of the texts? Can you think of one that might have
been used?
[367-30] This is one of the difficult stanzas, and there is some dispute
as to its exact meaning, owing to the phrase, _to dumb forgetfulness a
prey_. Perhaps the correct meaning is shown in the following prose
version: "For who has ever died (resigned this pleasing, anxious being,
left the warm precincts of this cheerful day), a prey to dumb
forgetfulness, and cast not one longing, lingering look behind?"
[367-31] _Thee_ refers to the poet, Gray himself. The remainder of the
poem is personal. Summed up briefly it means that perhaps a sympathetic
soul may some day come to inquire as to the poet's fate, and will be
told by some hoary-headed swain a few of the poet's habits, and then
will have pointed out to him the poet's own grave, on which may be read
his epitaph.
[368-32] _Due_ means _appropriate_ or _proper_.
[368-33] As first written, the poem contained the following stanza,
placed before the epitaph; but in the final revision Gray rejected it as
unworthy. It seems a very critical taste that would reject such lines as
these:
"There scatter'd oft, the earliest of the year,
By hands unseen are show'rs of violets found:
The redbreast loves to build and warble there,
And little footsteps lightly print the ground."