OF FIGURES.
The figures most commonly used in verse are similes and metaphors. A
simile is a figure whereby one thing is likened to another. It is
ushered in by a "like" or an "as."
"Like sportive deer they coursed about"
—_Hood_, _Eugene Aram_.
"Such a brow
His eyes had to live under, clear as flint."
—_Browning_, _A Contemporary_.
"Resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles rain."
—_Longfellow_, _The Day is Done_.
"Look how a man is lower'd to his grave ...
So is he sunk into the yawning wave."
—_Hood_, _Hero and Leander_.
A metaphor is a figure whereby the one thing, instead of being likened
to the other, is, as it were, transformed into it, and is described as
doing what it (the other) does.
"Poetry is
The grandest chariot wherein king-thoughts ride."
—_Smith_, _Life Drama_.
"The anchor, whose giant hand
Would reach down and grapple with the land."
—_Longfellow_, _Building of the Ship_.
Sometimes the two are united in one passage, as in—
"The darkness
Falls from the wings of night,
As a feather is wafted downward."
—_Longfellow_, _The Day is Done_.
The last line is a simile, but "the wings of night" is metaphorical.
"A simile," says Johnson, "to be perfect, must both illustrate and
ennoble the subject; but either of these qualities may be sufficient to
recommend it."
Alliteration, when not overdone, is an exquisite addition to the charm
of verse. The Poet Laureate thoroughly understands its value. Mr
Swinburne allows it too frequently to run riot. Edgar Allan Poe carried
it to extravagance. I select an example from each:—
"The moan of doves in immemorial elms,
And murmur of innumerable bees."
—_Tennyson._
"The lilies and languors of virtue,
For the raptures and roses of vice."
—_Swinburne, Dolores_.
"Come up through the lair of the lion
With love in her luminous eyes."
—_Poe_, _Ulalume_.
The instance from the Poet Laureate is a strong one—the repetition of
the "m" is to express the sound of the bees and the elms. The
alternation in the others is only pleasing to the ear, and the artifice
in the last instance certainly is too obvious. In the Poet Laureate's
lines the alliteration is so ingeniously contrived that one scarcely
would suppose there are as many as seven repetitions of the "m." In
Poe's, one is surprised to find the apparent excess of alliteration is
due to but four repetitions. But the "l's" are identical with the
strongest beats in the line, whereas the "m's" in Tennyson's line are
interspersed with other letters at the beats. He uses this artifice more
frequently than those would suspect who have not closely examined his
poems, for he thoroughly appreciates the truth of the maxim, _ars est
celare artem_. A few lines from "The Princess" will illustrate this:—
"The baby that by us,
Half-lapt in glowing gauze and golden brede,
Lay like a new-fall'n meteor on the grass,
Uncared-for, spied its mother and began
A blind and babbling laughter, and to dance
Its body, and reach its falling innocent arms
And lazy ling'ring fingers."
Here a careful study will reveal alliteration within alliteration, and
yet the effect is perfect, for there is no sign of labour.
Under this category may come, I think, a description of the Rondeau—a
poem of which the first few words are repeated at the end. It was at one
time ruled to be of a certain number of lines, but the restriction
scarcely holds good now. The best rondeau in the language is Leigh
Hunt's:—
"Jenny kiss'd me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in;
Time, you thief, who love to get
Sweets upon your list, put that in!
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad;
Say that health and wealth have miss'd me;
Say I'm growing old, but add—
Jenny kiss'd me!"
Elision must be used with a sparing hand. Generally speaking, a vowel
that is so slightly pronounced that it can be elided, as in
"temperance"—"temp'rance," may just as well be left in, and accounted
for by managing to get the "quantity" to cover it. Where it is too
strongly pronounced, to cut it out is to disfigure and injure the line,
as in the substitution of "wall'wing" for "wallowing." That elision is
often used unnecessarily may be seen in the frequency with which, in
reading verse, we—according to most authorities—elide the "y" of "many"—
"Full many a flower is doom'd to blush unseen."
—_Gray._
Here we are told we elide the "y" of "many," and some would replace
"flower" by "flow'r." Yet to the most sensitive ear these may receive,
in reading, their share of pronunciation, without damage to the flow of
the line, if the reader understands quantity. "To" is often similarly
"elided," as in—
"Can he to a friend—to a son so bloody grow?"
—_Cowley._
On the other hand, it is as well not to make too frequent use of the
accented "ed," as in "amazéd." In "belovéd" and a few more words it is
commonly used, and does not, therefore, sound strange. In others it
gives a forced and botched air to the verse.
In verse some latitude is allowed in arranging the order of words in a
sentence, but it must not be indulged in too freely. A study of the
style of our best poets is the only means of learning what is allowable
and what is not; it is impossible to explain it within the limits of
this treatise. It may, however, be laid down, as a first principle, that
no change in the order of words is admissible, if it gives rise to any
doubt as to their real meaning:—for example, if you wish to say, "the
dog bit the cat," although such an inversion of construction as putting
the objective before, and the nominative after, the verb, is allowed in
verse, it is scarcely advisable to adopt it, and say, "the cat bit the
dog."
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