“And as, from top of some steep hill, the Lightener strips a cloud
_And lets a great sky out of Heaven_, in whose delightsome light
All prominent foreheads, forests, towers, and temples cheer the sight.’
(Book XVI. v. 286.)
The lion “lets his rough brows down so low they hide his eyes”; the
flames “wrastle” in the woods; “rude feet dim the day with a fog of
dust;” and so in a hundred other instances.
For an example of his more restrained vigor, take the speech of Sarpedon
in the Twelfth Book of the Iliad, and for poetic beauty, the whole story
of Ulysses and Nausikaa in the Odyssey. It was here that Keats made
himself Grecian and learned to versify.
Mr. Hooper has done his work of editing well. But he has sometimes
misapprehended his author, and distorted his meaning by faulty
punctuation. In one of the passages already cited, Mr. Hooper’s text
stands thus: “Lest I be prejudiced with opinion, to dissent of
ignorance, or singularity.” All the commas which darken the sense should
be removed. Chapman meant to say, “Lest I be condemned beforehand by
people thinking I dissent out of ignorance or singularity.” (Iliad Vol.
I. p. 23.) So on the next page the want of a hyphen makes nonsense: “And
saw the round coming [round-coming] of this silver bow of our Phoebus,”
that is, the crescent coming to the full circle. In the translations,
too, the pointing needs reformation now and then, but shows, on the
whole, a praiseworthy fidelity. We will give a few examples of what we
believe to be errors on the part of Mr. Hooper, who, by the way, is
weakest on points which concern the language of Chapman’s day. We follow
the order of the text as most convenient.
“Bid” (Il. i.) is explained to mean “threaten, challenge,” where “offer”
would be the right word.
“And cast
The offal of all to the deep.” (Il. i. 309.)
Surely a slip of Chapman’s pen. He must have intended to write “Of all
the offal,” a transversion common with him and needed here to avoid a
punning jingle.
“So much I must affirm our power exceeds th’ inhabitant.” (Il. ii. 110.)
Mr. Hooper’s note is “inhabiters, viz. of Troy.” “Inhabitant” is an
adjective agreeing with “power.” Our power without exceeds that within.
“Yet all this time to stay,
Out of our judgments, for our end, and now to take our way
Without it were absurd and vile.” (Il. ii, 257.)
A note on this passage tells us that “out of judgments” means “against
our inclinations.” It means simply “in accordance with our good
judgment,” just as we still say “out of his wisdom.” Compare Il. iii.
63,
“Hector, because thy sharp reproof is _out of justice_ given, I
take it well.”
“And as Jove, brandishing a star which men a comet call, Hurls out
his curled hair abroad, that from his brand exhals A thousand
sparks.” (Il. iv. 85.)
Mr. Hooper’s note is “‘_Which men a comet call_’--so both the folios.
Dr. Taylor has printed ‘_which man a comet calls_.’ This certainly suits
the rhyme, but I adhere to Chapman’s text.” Both editors have
misunderstood the passage. The fault is not in “call” but in “exhals,” a
clear misprint for “exhall,” the spelling, as was common, being
conformed to the visible rhyme. “That” means “so that” (a frequent
Elizabethan construction) and “exhall” is governed by “sparks.” The
meaning is, “As when Jove, brandishing a comet, hurls out its curled
hair so that a thousand sparks exhale from its burning.”
“The _evicke_ skipping from the rock.”
Mr. Hooper tells us, “It is doubtful what this word really is. Dr.
Taylor suggests that it may probably mean the _evict_, or doomed
one--but? It is possible Chapman meant to Anglicize the Greek αἴξ; or
should we read Ibex, as the αἴξ ἴξαλος was such?” The word means the
_chamois_, and is merely the English form of the French _ibiche_. Dr.
Taylor’s reading would amaze us were we not familiar with the
commentators on Shakespeare.
“And now they _out-ray_ to your fleet.” (Il. v. 793.)
“_Out-ray_--spread out in array; abbreviated from array. Dr. Taylor says
‘rush out,’ from the Anglo-Saxon ‘_rean_,’ to flow; but there seems no
necessity for such an etymology.” We should think not! Chapman, like
Pope, made his first sketch from the French, and corrected it by the
Greek. Those who would understand Chapman’s English must allow for
traces of his French guide here and there. This is one of them, perhaps.
The word is etymologically unrelated to _array_. It is merely the old
French _oultréer_, a derivative of _ultra_. It means “they pass beyond
their gates even to your fleet.” He had said just before that formerly
“your foes durst not a foot address _without their ports_.” The word
occurs again Il. xxiii. 413.
“When none, though many kings put on, could make his vaunt, he led
Tydides to renewed assault or issued first the dike.” (Il. viii. 217.)
“_Tydides_.--He led Tydides, i. e. Tydides he led. An unusual
construction.” Not in the least. The old printers or authors sometimes
put a comma where some connecting particle was left out. We had just now
an instance where one took the place of _so_. Here it supplies _that_.
“None could make his vaunt that he led (that is, was before) Tydides.”
We still use the word in the same sense, as the “leading” horse in a
race.
“And all did wilfully expect the silver-throned morn.” (Il. viii. 497.)
“_Wilfully_--willingly, anxiously.” _Wishfully_, as elsewhere in
Chapman.
“And as, upon a rich man’s crop of barley or of wheat,
Opposed for swiftness at their work, a sort of reapers sweat.”
“_Opposed_--standing opposite to one another for expedition’s sake.” We
hope Mr. Hooper understood his own note, for it baffles us utterly. The
meaning is simply “pitted against each other to see which will reap most
swiftly.” In a note (Il. xi. 417.) we are told that “the etymology [of
_lucern_] seems uncertain.” It is nothing more than a corruption of the
old French _leucerve_ (_loup-cervier_).
“I would then make-in in deed and steep
My income in their bloods.” (Il. xvii. 481.)
“_Income_--communication, or infusion, of courage from the Gods. The
word in this sense Todd says was a favorite in Cromwell’s time.” A
surprising note! _Income_ here means nothing more than “onfall,” as the
context shows.
“To put the best in _ure_.” (Il. xvii. 545.)
“_Ure_--use. Skinner thinks it a contraction of _usura_. It is frequent
in Chaucer. Todd gives examples from Hooker and L’Estrange.” The word is
common enough, but how Mr. Hooper could seriously quote good old Skinner
for such an etymology we cannot conceive. It does not mean “in use,” but
“to work,” being merely the English form of _en œuvre_, as “manure” is
of _manœuvrer_.
“So troop-meal Troy pursued a while.” (Il. xvii. 634.)
“_Troop-meal_--in troops, troop by troop. So piecemeal. To _meal_ was to
mingle, mix together; from the French _mêler_.... The reader would do
well to consult Dr. Jamieson’s excellent ‘Dictionary of the Scottish
Language’ in voce ‘_mell_.’” No doubt the reader might profit by
consulting it under any other word beginning with M, and any of them
would be as much to the purpose as _mell_. _Troop-meal_, like
_inch-meal_, _piece-meal_, implies separation, not mingling, and is from
a Teutonic root. Mr. Hooper is always weak in his linguistic. In a note
on Il. xviii. 144, he informs us that “To _sterve_ is to _die_; and the
sense of _starve_, with cold or hunger originated in the 17th century.”
We would it had! But we suspect that men had died of both these diseases
earlier. What he should have said was that the restriction of meaning to
dying with hunger was modern.
Il. xx. 239 we have “the God’s” for “the Gods’” and a few lines below
“Anchisiades’” for “Anchisiades’s”; Il. xxi. 407, “press’d” for “prest.”
We had noted a considerable number of other slips, but we will mention
only two more. “Treen broches” is explained to mean “branches of trees.”
(Hymn to Hermes, 227.) It means “wooden spits.” In the Bacchus (28, 29)
Mr. Hooper restores a corrupt reading which Mr. Singer (for a wonder)
had set right. He prints,--
“Nay, which of all the Pow’r fully-divined
Esteem ye him?”
Of course it should be powerfully-divined, for otherwise we must read
“Pow’rs.” The five volumes need a very careful revision in their
punctuation, and in another edition we should advise Mr. Hooper to
strike out every note in which he has been tempted into etymology.
* * * * *
We come next to Mr. W. C. Hazlitt’s edition of Lovelace. Three short
pieces of Lovelace’s have lived, and deserved to live: “To Lucasta from
Prison,” “To Lucasta on going to the Wars,” and “The Grasshopper.” They
are graceful, airy, and nicely finished. The last especially is a
charming poem, delicate in expression, and full of quaint fancy, which
only in the latter half is strained to conceit. As the verses of a
gentleman they are among the best, though not of a very high order as
poetry. He is to be classed with the _lucky_ authors who, without great
powers, have written one or two pieces so facile in thought and
fortunate in phrase as to be carried lightly in the memory, poems in
which analysis finds little, but which are charming in their frail
completeness. This faculty of hitting on the precise _lilt_ of thought
and measure that shall catch the universal ear and sing themselves in
everybody’s memory, is a rare gift. We have heard many ingenious persons
try to explain the _cling_ of such a poem as “The Burial of Sir John
Moore,” and the result of all seemed to be, that there were certain
verses that were good, not because of their goodness, but because one
could not forget them. They have the great merit of being portable, and
we have to carry so much luggage through life, that we should be
thankful for what will pack easily and take up no room.
All that Lovelace wrote beside these three poems is utterly worthless,
mere chaff from the threshing of his wits. Take out the four pages on
which they are printed, and we have two hundred and eighty-nine left of
the sorriest stuff that ever spoiled paper. The poems are obscure,
without anything in them to reward perseverance, dull without being
moral, and full of conceits so far-fetched that we could wish the author
no worse fate than to carry them back to where they came from. We are no
enemies to what are commonly called conceits, but authors bear them, as
heralds say, with a difference. And a terrible difference it is! With
men like Earle, Donne, Fuller, Butler, Marvell, and even Quarles,
conceit means wit; they would carve the merest cherry-stone of thought
in the quaintest and delicatest fashion. But with duller and more
painful writers, such as Gascoyne, Marston, Fe11tham, and a score of
others, even with cleverer ones like Waller, Crashawe, and Suckling,
where they insisted on being fine, their wit is conceit. Difficulty
without success is perhaps the least tolerable kind of writing. Mere
stupidity is a natural failing; we skip and pardon. But the other is
Dulness in a domino, that travesties its familiar figure, and lures us
only to disappoint. These unhappy verses of Lovelace’s had been dead and
lapt in congenial lead these two hundred years;--what harm had they done
Mr. Hazlitt that he should disinter them? There is no such disenchanter
of peaceable reputations as one of these resurrectionmen of literature,
who will not let mediocrities rest in the grave, where the kind sexton,
Oblivion, had buried them, but dig them up to make a profit on their
lead.
Of all Mr. Smith’s editors, Mr. W. Carew Hazlitt is the worst. He is at
times positively incredible, worse even than Mr. Halliwell, and that is
saying a good deal. Worthless as Lovelace’s poems were, they should have
been edited correctly, if edited at all. Even dulness and dirtiness have
a right to fair play, and to be dull and dirty in their own way. Mr.
Hazlitt has allowed all the misprints of the original (or by far the
greater part of them) to stand, but he has ventured on many emendations
of the text, and in every important instance has blundered, and that,
too, even where the habitual practice of his author in the use of words
might have led him right. The misapprehension shown in some of his notes
is beyond the belief of any not familiar with the way in which old books
are edited in England by the job. We have brought a heavy indictment,
and we proceed to our proof, choosing only cases where there can be no
dispute. We should premise that Mr. Hazlitt professes to have corrected
the punctuation.
“And though he sees it full of wounds,
Cruel one, still he wounds it. (p. 34.)
Here the original reads, “Cruel still on,” and the only correction
needed was a comma after “cruel.”
“And by the glorious light
Of both those stars, which of their spheres bereft,
Only the jelly’s left.” (p. 41.)
The original has “of which,” and rightly, for “their spheres bereft” is
parenthetic, and the sense is “of which only the jelly’s left.” Lovelace
is speaking of the eyes of a mistress who has grown old, and his image,
confused as it is, is based on the belief that stars shooting from their
spheres fell to the earth as jellies,--a belief, by the way, still to be
met with in New England.
Lovelace, describing a cow (and it is one of the few pretty passages in
the volume), says,--
“She was the largest, goodliest beast
That ever mead or altar blest,
Round as her udder, and more white
Than is the Milky-Way in night.” (p. 64.)
Mr. Hazlitt changes to “Round was her udder,” thus making that white
instead of the cow, as Lovelace intended. On the next page we read,--
“She takes her leave o’ th’ mournful neat,
Who, by her toucht, now prizeth her life,
Worthy alone the hollowed knife.”