READING POETRY
Nothing so brings out the music and the structural beauty of poetry as
reading it aloud, and many who have cared nothing for verse in any of
its forms learn to love it when they hear it read frequently by a
sympathetic voice. Children love the nursery rhymes largely because they
have heard them and have caught the sound and rhythm more than the
meaning. It is the lively music more than the whimsical meaning that has
made the rhymes popular. When the time comes that children begin to lose
their interest and consider poetry beneath them, their flagging
attention often may be aroused and new interest created by simply
reading new selections aloud to them and talking with them about the
meaning and beauties of the poems.
On page 410 of Volume One is Longfellow's exquisite poem, _The Reaper
and the Flowers_. We can imagine a little family group reading this some
quiet evening when the lamp throws shadows into the corners and the
bed-time hour draws near. No one could call the children in on a fine
summer day, and, when fresh from their play, the blood is bounding
through their veins, expect them to be touched by delicate sentiment, or
to appreciate musical numbers. Literature has something for every hour,
every mood, every circumstance. It may be that there is one little
vacant chair in this family circle, or that from some neighbor's family
a child has gone. Fear clutches at the youthful hearts and Grief
shudders behind each chair. Even the warm bed in the dark room is a
dread, for we have so surrounded death with mystery and terror that even
the young are aghast when it is mentioned. But our best-loved poet has a
cheering message for every one, and into this little group the parent
brings it. In soft and sympathetic voice he reads aloud, giving the slow
and gentle music of the lines time to steal into the youthful hearts.
As he reads, he pauses now and then to speak to his little audience,
watching ever not to be sharp in his questionings or anything but kindly
in his comments. Something like the following might be the way he brings
out the meaning:
"'There is a Reaper, whose name is Death,
And, with his sickle keen,
He reaps the bearded grain at a breath,
And the flowers that grow between.'
"A _Reaper_--a man walking in the grain, cutting it as he goes. Not with
a machine such as we see on the farm nowadays, but with a short curved
blade which the poet calls a sickle. It is a _keen_ blade the sickle
has, and with every stroke ripened grain and all the little flowers that
have grown up among it fall to the ground. But the poet means more. He
thinks that the Reaper is Death, that the _bearded grain_ is the men and
women who have lived to a ripe old age and who are ready to die, ready
for the rewards of a long and well-spent life. But alas, the _flowers_
fall with the ripened grain: sometimes little children must die,
although dearly would we like to keep them with us.
"Then the Reaper speaks: 'Shall I have nothing fair and beautiful, must
I have nothing but dry and bearded grain? I love these beautiful
flowers; their fragrance is dear to me. Yet I will give them back again;
some time you may see them again.'
"So Death looked at the little children with tears filling his kindly
eyes. As they faded and drooped he kissed them gently and took them
softly and sorrowfully into his arms. He was gathering these lovely
innocents to take them to his Lord, where in Paradise they might be
happy evermore, without any of the privations and sufferings that come
to every one who grows up.
"As he wept, not for the little children, but for all who stay behind,
he continued to speak smilingly through his tears to the sorrowing ones
on earth:
"'Christ needs these dear ones, these flowerets gay: to him they are
tokens dear of the earth where once he played and sang on the hills of
Judea. Can you not trust them to him who said, "Suffer little children
to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the Kingdom of
God?" Have no fear; I am but moving them into the bright heavenly
mansions, where they shall rest safely in the bosoms of the saints and
angels.'
"And the mother, who loved them so, gave up her darling ones, for she
saw, even through her tears, how happy they must be in their new home.
"'O not in cruelty, not in wrath,
The Reaper came that day;'
it was a young and beautiful Angel, not the hideous Death in black robes
and hood scarce hiding his bony head, that
"'visited the green earth,
And took the flowers away.'
"Does Death seem so terrible now? Although we must always see the vacant
chair and know that a loved one has gone forever, can we not realize
that it is we who suffer, and not the one who has been taken from among
us? Is it not selfish to grieve?"
Shall we fear Death any more? When the parent has read the poem once
more from beginning to end in silence, except as the soft words fall
from his lips, will not the hearers feel inspired to be better and
nobler boys and girls, men and women? Will darkness have more fear for
them? Will they not then go to their rooms and lie down peacefully to
sleep?
There are other poems for other hours. Some day when you wish a bit of
fun with your children you will find humorous poems in many of the
books. One is in Volume IV, on page 57. Nearly every stanza contains a
"joke": a pun, if you please, usually. Perhaps you and your children
will find them all easily, and perhaps you will not. In the last stanza
is the "joke" proper, the thing for which the rhymes were written. It is
an old joke, surely enough, and you have seen others like it; but it is
funny still and perhaps a little caustic. Not all men whom the world
calls good are good beneath the surface. Perhaps you know of cases in
which "the Dog it was that died."
Another humorous poem to use in this connection is _Echo_ (Volume III,
page 286).
Between the two extremes mentioned above are selections for all moods
and all kinds of people. The things to be remembered in reading with
children are, that poetry must be understood to be appreciated; that it
must be heard until the mind is trained to receive it through the eye
instead of the ear; that it appeals to the feelings more than to the
will; that it must be interpreted by the light of experience, and hence
must be adapted to the age of the reader. A person would not read _The
Reaper and the Flowers_ at a dancing party, nor _The Elegy on the Death
of a Mad Dog_ before a funeral.
Below are a few studies more complete and of different types.
_The Brown Thrush_
(Volume I, page 147)
We find great charm in this short lyric, for its form is unusual, its
music joyous and its sentiment fine. Three lines of four feet each, a
line of three feet, two lines of two feet each, and one line of three
feet make up each stanza. The accent in each foot is on the last
syllable, but some of the feet are only two syllables long. It's a merry
meter. It scarcely can be read without stirring a rollicking melody in
the ears of the listener. That's the art in the poem. The sentiment is
as fine as the music. "The world's running over with joy! I'm as happy
as happy can be." If the little brown thrush keeps singing that song the
heart of everyone who hears it will overflow with joy. But it would be
easy, very easy indeed, to stop the joyous song of the thrush by
meddling with the five pretty eggs, and when the thrush changed his
happy song to harsh notes of fear and reproach, the light of joy would
fade from our day as quickly as from his.
_The Child's World_
(Volume II, page 66)
The unique measures of this brief poem make a melodious whole that every
child will appreciate. Unless some care is taken in reading it aloud,
however, much of its beauty will be lost. This is particularly true of
the first stanza, from the first and last lines of which a syllable has
been omitted. The absence of these syllables must be indicated by pauses
or by giving more time to the word "great" in the first line, and to the
word "world" in the last line. The idea may be indicated by supposing
that the word "O" has been omitted from the beginning of the first and
last line. The first line of the last couplet is peculiar in that every
one of the four feet contains three syllables with the accent on the
last. All the other lines consist each of four feet of either two or
three syllables. Technically the poem is anapestic tetrameter much
varied by the introduction of iambic feet. (See the studies in meter,
Volume VII, pages 2 and 13.)
The rhymes are all in couplets and are perfect. The stanzas, like
paragraphs, indicate changes in thought. Its pleasing unity rests in the
fact that it is all a child's thoughts about the world. It is logical, a
real leading up of thought to natural climax. The child begins with
wonder and a sense of beauty around her. The world is great and wide
and wonderful and beautiful. She thinks of the sea she has read about
or seen and thinks of the wonderful water curling up in waves above the
shore. To her the world is the land with the wonderful growing grass
upon its broad breast, and this marks the end of her first thought--the
great world is beautifully dressed.
Next as she sits on the brow of the hill and gazes over the lowland the
breezes blow her hair about her face and her mind passes to the
wonderful air that as wind shakes the trees, ripples the water, whirls
the mills and sings through the trees on the tops of the hills.
Thought wanders on to the nodding wheat, the rivers, cliffs, and
islands, to the cities and the people everywhere for thousands of miles.
What is the effect of this vastness on the thought of a child? Can you
not realize for yourself any clear night that you may gaze at the
numberless stars in the arching skies? How small, how infinitely little
are we in all the great universe! Have we the imagination to grasp the
saving thought that comes so naturally into the clear mind of the child?
Though I am so small, so insignificant, I can think and love, but the
wonderful earth can not. A philosophy well worth keeping, is it not?
_Seven Times One_
(Volume II, page 119)
Jean Ingelow's poem has in it many things to interest a child, but there
may be some things that will be clearer for explanation.
Stanza 1. In England the daisy grows wild almost everywhere, a little,
low plant which produces its heads of white, pink-tipped flowers from a
rosette of leaves. In the United States we often see daisies in
cultivation but they are nowhere native. The child is at her seventh
birthday and has learned her multiplication table, the "sevens".
Nowadays in our schools the children do not have the drudgery of
committing the long tables to memory as their grand-parents did. Our
little friend thinks that as she has lived seven years that makes her
"seven times one are seven."
Stanza 2. One is so old at seven, so very old--why one can even write a
letter. But now with the birthday lessons learned she can think of other
things; for instance there are the lambs who play always, for they have
no lessons to learn. They are not old and they are "only one times one,"
not "seven times one," which are seven.
Stanza 3. She has seen the moon when it was full and bright and gave a
wondrous light, but now it is only a pale crescent in the sky and its
light is failing. Certainly the moon is failing and not like the child
improving each day.
Stanza 4. Occasionally the child has done wrong and been punished, and
perhaps the moon has done something wrong way up there in heaven so that
God has hidden its face. If that is true she hopes soon God will forgive
the poor moon and allow it to shine once more with its silver light.
Stanza 5. Isn't "velvet bee" a happy expression? Then the bee gathers
the yellow pollen from the flowers, mixes and shapes it into little
pellets and fastens them in golden balls on its thighs to carry into the
hive where it will serve as "bee bread" to feed the young bees. In the
wet places grow the marsh marigolds, or cowslips as they are sometimes
called, bright golden flowers like the buttercups. To the bee and the
cowslips the little child joyfully cries: "Give me your golden honey to
hold, for I am seven years old and know what to do with it."
Stanza 6. The columbine is the graceful little flower we so often hear
called honeysuckle. Five deep curved nectar-bearing tubes project
backward from the flower itself. By opening the blossom in the right way
the child of fanciful ideas may see shapes that remind her of turtle
doves.
The cuckoo-pint (by the way, the _i_ is short as in _pit_) does not grow
in the United States. It has spotted leaves, large and triangular, and
the "bell" is an upright green cup in which stands a tall column, the
"clapper." It is called cuckoo-pint because it blossoms about the time
the cuckoo returns to England. Our nearest approach to the flower is the
"Jack-in-the-Pulpit" or Indian Turnip.
It is perfectly safe for the columbine to unfold its wrapper and the
cuckoo-pint to toll its bell in the presence of a maiden so old. She
will not destroy them.
Stanza 7. In the United States we have no wild linnet, though we
sometimes hear song-birds called by that name. The English linnet is a
little sparrow with striped back and a purple crown and breast. He
resembles our purple finch and our redpoll. He is one of the famous
songsters of the English lanes and fields.
No young lady of seven would be so thoughtless as to steal away the
young linnets, so the old bird may freely point out the nest.
At what time of the year does the little girl's birthday come?
_The First Snowfall_
(Volume II, page 403)
A. _The Author._ For a sketch of the life of James Russell Lowell, see
Volume VII, page 411.
B. _The Meaning._ Words and Phrases:
"Gloaming"; early evening.
"Silence." The snow is called a silence, because it hushes noise, or
prevents it.
"Pine and fir and hemlock"; three evergreen trees.
"Ermine"; the fur from a northern animal of the same name. It is very
soft and white. Earls, nobles of rank, wore ermine on their robes to
show their high birth.
"Pearl"; a white, lustrous jewel, or the beautiful lining of some sea
shells.
"Carrara"; a town in Italy, whence comes the finest white marble. Here
Carrara means _costly marble_.
"Swan's down." Swans have fine soft down between their feathers. It
protects them from cold in winter, and in summer they line their nests
with it.
"Noiseless work"; covering everything with snow.
"Mound"; grave.
"Auburn"; a beautiful cemetery near Boston.
"Babes in the Wood"; an allusion to the old story of the children who
were lost in the woods, and whom the robins covered with leaves to
protect them.
"All-father"; God, the Father of all.
"Leaden"; gray and heavy, lead-colored.
"Arched"; curved.
"Deep-plunged woe"; a sorrow that plunged us deep in misery.
"Eyes that saw not." His eyes were so filled with tears that he could
not see "Mabel," who is really his daughter Rose.
"_My_ kiss was given to her sister." He was thinking so deeply of his
lost daughter, that it seemed almost as though he kissed the dead lips.
"Folded close." The soft, downy snow made him think of a soft, warm
covering for the form of his little one.
C. _Form and Structure._
There are ten stanzas of four verses (lines) each, with the rhymes at
the ends of the second and fourth verses only. The word _snow_ is used
four times in rhymes; the words rhyming with it are _crow_, _below_,
_woe_ and _know_. All the rhymes in the poem are perfect.
The meter is varied iambic trimeter. The first and third lines of each
stanza have an added unaccented syllable, while the second and fourth
have just three full feet. Anapestic feet are used freely to improve the
music; in fact, they are nearly as numerous as the iambic feet.
The scansion of the first stanza may be indicated thus:
The-snow´|had-be-gun´|in-the-gloam´|ing
And-bus´|i-ly-all´|the-night´
Had-been-heap´|ing-field´|and-high´|way
With-a-si´|lence-deep´|and-white´
The scansion of the sixth stanza may be shown as follows:
Up-spoke´|our-own´|lit-tle-Ma´|bel
Say-ing-Fa´|ther-who-makes´|it-snow´
And-I-told´of-the-good´|All-Fa´|ther
Who cares´|for-us-here´|be-low´
They are musical stanzas, and the finely chosen words add much to the
melody.
D. _Sentiment._ Lowell had a little daughter, Blanche, who died shortly
before this poem was composed, so we may be sure that it was written
from a full heart. He begins by giving us one of the most beautiful
pictures of a snow-storm and of a snow-covered world that was ever
written.
(Compare Lowell's other description of winter to be found in the second
part of _The Vision of Sir Launfal_ and Whittier's description in
_Snow-Bound_.)
When he has made us feel the softness, gentleness and beauty of the snow
and caused us to forget that it is cold and damp, he speaks of himself.
We can see him sitting by the window looking out upon the beautiful
pearl-clad world. He brings us right into his own presence and we can
almost see the flocks of startled brown snowbirds whirling by. Not till
now, when we are fully in sympathy with him, does he let us know that he
has met with a deep, heart-breaking loss. Now we know what the soft
flakes are hiding from sight, and our hearts go out with his.
Then his innocent little daughter comes in with the simple, commonplace
question which he answers so touchingly. Can you not see him with his
arm around the child, telling her of the care of the Father who loves
little children so dearly? Yet his mind cannot free itself wholly from
his first great sorrow, though he remembers that calmness, resignation,
and gentle patience fell over his heart as the soft snow falls flake by
flake from the leaden sky.
To the child, however, he speaks words that she will not fully
understand until she, too, is grown and has met with sorrow: "It is only
the merciful Father, darling, who can make fall that gentle comfort that
heals and hides all suffering."
Once more our hearts are wrung with sympathy when with tear-filled eyes
he gives the little maiden by his side the kiss that was for the silent
lips in sweet Auburn. The little one, kissing back, could not know the
grief of her father's heart or realize that another form than hers was
clasped in his embrace.
How much better we know the great poet when he tells us his personal
griefs in so touching a manner! How sweet is the lesson of patience and
resignation when communicated in such a beautiful poem!
E. _Beauty and Effectiveness in Phrasing._ Where in literature will you
find more beautiful phrases, more effective figures, than abound in this
poem? Notice particularly the following, and try to determine why each
is remarkable:
"With a silence deep and white."
"Ermine too dear for an earl."
"Stiff rails softened to swan's down."
"The noiseless work of the sky."
"the leaden sky
That arched o'er our first great sorrow."
"The scar of our deep-plunged woe."
"Folded close in deepening snow."
F. _Conclusion._ _The First Snowfall_ is one of the most perfect poems
in our language. In beauty of composition, of music, of sentiment, and
in deep religious feeling it can scarcely be excelled. Be guarded how
you teach it; treat it reverently. Try to cause the children to love it,
to wish to memorize it. If you see that you are not securing these
results, leave the poem and take up something else. It is almost a sin
to spoil it for any person.
_The Potato_
(Volume II, page 467)
Thomas Moore's amusing stanza may seem silly to some people, but those
who have a sense of humor will be delighted with the whimsical
conception of a potato with so independent a spirit. It usually spoils
humor to comment upon it. To explain a joke is to kill it. The sense of
humor is contagious. Children will laugh when older people smile just
from sympathy. When they ask "what's the joke?" it is time to explain.
Even then it is best to give merely facts and let the joke make its own
way. Laughter lightens many a heavy burden, and a sense of humor is a
saving grace. Cultivate it by indirection.
_Origin of the Opal_
(Volume II, page 480)
The opal is a beautiful stone which seen at different angles and in
different lights seems to glow with various colors. The polished
surface may seem, as you first look at it, to be only a milky white.
Turn it a little and it glows a bright flame color with green lights
round the margin. Turned a little more it shows violet and silver. Other
shades mingle with these, all coming and going as light and position
vary. A fine opal is a wonderfully brilliant precious stone.
The idea of the poem, too, is beautiful. Here is a transparent dewdrop;
in it is the flame of the last ray of sun. As the drop lies in the
violet it takes that color, and steals from the rose her delicate
shades. From the sky it draws the blue, from a leaf its green and
silver. When all these colors have been taken in, the drop is congealed,
and imprisoned in its heart are the fiery flame, the rich violet, the
rose tints, the skyey blue, the delicate green and the gleaming silver.
This is the opal.
_The Barefoot Boy_
(Volume IV, page 3)
On page 5 occur the lines,
"Mine, on bended orchard trees,
Apples of Hesperides!"
According to the old Greeks, there lay far to the west, in the ocean, a
wonderful island where were kept, under the guard of a gruesome dragon,
the beautiful golden apples which Gaea gave as a wedding present to
Zeus. The Hesperides were the three daughters of Night, who ruled the
guardian dragon. These golden apples, then, came to be known as the
apples of Hesperides. When Hercules in his madness had slain his three
children he was condemned to do whatever his cousin Eurystheus demanded
for his purification. His tasks came to be known as the Twelve Labors of
Hercules, and the eleventh was to obtain the golden apples from the
Hesperides. He accomplished this task among the others, but the apples
were subsequently restored. To the barefoot boy the apples of his New
England tree were as choice as the golden ones of the Greek myth.
Do not fail to see the exquisite picture painted by these beautiful
descriptive lines on pages 5 and 6.
"O'er me, like a regal tent,
Cloudy-ribbed, the sunset bent,
Purple-curtained, fringed with gold,
Looped in many a wind-swing fold."
_The Bugle Song_
(Volume VI, page 133)
Among the many charming lyrics which Tennyson has written, there are few
more musical or more delicately beautiful than _The Bugle Song_. It may
be appreciated better perhaps if we have knowledge of its setting. It
occurs in _The Princess_, and has no immediate connection with anything
that precedes or follows.
Three pairs of youthful lovers have been climbing above a lovely glade
wherein is pitched the tent of the Princess. As they climbed, "Many a
little hand glanced like a touch of sunshine on the rocks, and many a
light foot shone like a jewel set in the dark crag." They wound about
the cliffs, and out and in among the copses, striking off pieces of
various rocks and chattering over their stony names, until they reached
the summit and the sun grew broader as he set and threw his rosy light
upon the heights above the glade. When in this poetic vein Tennyson has
described the scene, he throws in _The Bugle Song_ without any comment.
We will understand it better if we paraphrase it briefly. Let us imagine
ourselves standing on some peak and looking over a scene lighted by the
setting sun.
"The splendor falls on castle walls
And snowy summits old in story."
The light in long quivering beams is thrown across the lakes, and a wild
cataract, made glorious by the golden light, leaps down a neighboring
precipice. At this moment, somewhere in the distance we hear a bugle
which sets wild echoes flying in every direction about us. As these
echoes die away,
"O hark, O hear! how thin and clear,
And thinner, clearer, farther going,"
there comes reflected to us from cliff and abrupt promontory the faint
sound of the little horns of Fairyland. To them the purple glens reply
in echoes gently dying into silence. O love, those echoes die away in
the rich sky, and faint into nothingness on hill and field and river;
but echoes of our thoughts, our feelings, of ourselves, roll on from one
soul to another and grow in power forever and forever.
The music in the lyric is dependent upon the choice of words and the
arrangement of words. The words are chosen because of their meaning and
because of the sounds which compose them. They are so arranged that the
sequence is melodious and that the accents fall where needed to perfect
the meter. The first three lines are perfectly smooth and regular, but
the fourth is an abrupt change; "And the wild cataract leaps in glory"
suggests power and strong interrupted motion. The last two lines of the
stanza are somewhat irregular in meter, and the double repetition of the
last word suggests the time elapsing while the echoes are flying back
and forth between the surrounding cliffs, growing fainter and fainter
with each repetition. In reading we show this: "Blow, bugle," is the
original sound; we pause for the echoes to answer, "dying, dying,
dying."
In the second stanza the poet has selected words in which the vowels
have thin and delicate sounds:
"how thin and clear,
And thinner, clearer, farther going!"
So soft are the echoes that they suggest to the poet the delicate
refrain from the musical instruments of fairies, and he describes it in
the poetic phrase,
"The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!"
The meter of the last stanza, which is more irregular than the others,
we can indicate as follows:
O love´|they die´|in yon´|rich sky´
They faint´|on hill´|or field´|or riv´|er:
Our ech´|oes roll´|from soul´|to soul´,
And grow´|for ev´|er and´|for ev´|er
Blow, bu´|gle, blow´|--set´|the wild ech´|oes fly´|ing,
And an´|swer, ech´|oes, an´|swer, dy´|ing, dy´|ing, dy´|ing.
In the next to the last line there are five feet and one added syllable,
if we consider that the pause which we naturally make before the word
_set_ is equivalent to a syllable. In the last line there are six feet
with an added syllable. This additional foot which appears in the last
line of every stanza is introduced to imitate the lingering death of the
echoes.
After this study of the poem it should be read several times aloud in an
effort to bring out the music; the first stanza in the pitch of ordinary
conversation, with force in the fourth line and lingering intonations in
the last line. The pitch of the second stanza should be higher, and it
will be easily attained because of the predominance of the thin vowels.
The third stanza calls for a pitch lower than the first and a slowness
and solemnity of movement quite in contrast to the moderate rate of the
first and the liveliness and gaiety of the second. It will be seen in
these readings that there is an overlying melody in the stanzas, quite
distinct from the rhythm that depends upon the meter, and that in the
reading the meter naturally falls subservient to the melody of the
phrases. In fact, in a poem of this kind the meter should be forgotten
in the reading, which should give itself wholly to bringing out the
meaning expressively, and to making the voice harmonize with the rich
music of the lines.
An analysis of _The Bugle Song_ will seem superfluous to the cultivated
reader, but if these suggestions help the learner to see something new,
to feel more acutely, to realize beauty more abundantly, their purpose
is accomplished.
_The Petrified Fern_
(Volume VII, page 77)
Some day when you want an interesting and delightful nature lesson that
is a little out of the ordinary, get, if you can, a fossil fern. If you
are in the city, doubtless you can get one from the museum, or, better
yet, you may find that among your pupils there is someone who has such a
specimen carefully treasured away. In some localities where the
limestone rock comes to the surface, especially in the coal measures,
these petrified ferns are very numerous. Show this to the class and get
them all interested in it.
If you cannot get a specimen to use, you can find a picture in the
encyclopedia or geology, or you can tell the pupils how in some places
it is possible to pick up from among the rocks on the surface of the
ground oblong pieces perhaps a half inch thick, in which, when they are
split open, you can see the impression of a fern, every vein showing
plainly and looking as clear in the dull gray as it showed when alive in
its green dress.
Tell the story of the fern something after this fashion:
"Hundreds and hundreds of years ago, so many years, in fact, that none
of us can tell how many, somewhere in a valley, there grew a beautiful
little fern, green and slender. It was as tender and delicate as the
ones you can find in the woods now, and grew in just such a shady place.
When the breezes crept down under the trees they waved the fern
gracefully about so that it gently touched the tall rushes that grew
above it and cast little shadows on the moss at its feet. Now and then
a playful sunbeam darted through the crevices in the leaves and found
the fern, and at night drops of dew stole silently in and made a
glistening crown upon its head. But there were no children then to find
it. It was long, long ago, when the earth was young, and nowhere on its
broad surface was a single human child.
"Out in the silent sea fishes larger than any that can be found now were
swimming about. Across the plains of the earth animals of wonderful
shapes and enormous size stalked clumsily and found their way into
stately forests. No man ever saw growing such trees as waved their giant
branches over the earth, for then Nature made things on a grander scale
than she does now. The little fern, however, was wild and simple, and
lived in its home unnoticed and uncared for by any of the great
creatures or the mighty trees. Still it grew on modestly in its own
sweet way, spreading its fronds and becoming more beautiful every day.
"Then suddenly one day the earth heaved up its mighty rocks and threw
them about in every direction. The strong currents of the ocean broke
loose and flooded over the land. They drowned the animals, moved the
plain, tore down the haughty woods and cast the great trunks about like
straw. They broke the little fern from its slender stalk, and burying it
deep in soft moist clay, hid it safely away.
"Many, many long centuries have passed since the day the useless little
fern was lost. Millions of human beings have come upon the earth, have
lived and been happy, have suffered, passed away, and have been
forgotten. The soft, moist clay that clasped the fern hardened into rock
and kept safely in its strong prison the delicate little frond.
"Then one day, not long ago, a thoughtful man studying Nature's secrets
far and wide found up in a valley where a stream had worn a deep
fissure, a queer little rock. When he looked at it, he saw running over
it a strange design, as though some fairy with its magic pencil had
drawn the outline of a fern with every vein distinct, showing in every
line the life of the long-lost plant. It was the fern I told you about.
"Isn't it strange that so delicate a thing as a fern could be kept clear
and fine through all those thousands of years when the earth was
changing and growing, and then finally be thrown up where a man could
find it and read its whole history? The poet, Mary Bolles Branch, saw
the little fern and wrote the beautiful lines which I now want to read
to you."
(Here read the poem, _The Petrified Fern_, found in _Journeys_, Volume
VII, page 77.)
There are very few words or expressions in the poem that will require
any explanation. At the end of the first stanza the phrase "keeping
holiday" means that as there were no human beings on the earth, there
was no real work being done.
At the end of the first line in the second stanza the word _main_ is an
old term that means _ocean_.
The last two lines of the third stanza are meant to show how different
life has been on the planet since man came. Until he appeared there was
no real agony; there was pain, for animals can suffer, but it takes a
mind and soul to know agony. Man cannot live except with suffering and
at a bitter cost.
Until the last two lines of the fourth stanza are reached the poem is
merely a beautiful and musical narrative. The last two lines are the
thought that comes to the poet when she considers the history of the
little fern. It is thinking such thoughts as this that make the poet
different from ordinary men. You and I might see the impression of the
fern and think it beautiful, but its beauty would not suggest to us the
comforting idea that
* * * "God hides some souls away
Sweetly to surprise us, the last day."
Our own poet Longfellow, in _The Builders_, voices a similar thought
when he says:
"Nothing useless is, or low;
Each thing in its place is best;
And what seems but idle show
Strengthens and supports the rest."
After you have presented these thoughts, read the poem again to the
children. Call attention to its musical structure, its simplicity, the
beauty of its expressions, and then read it a third time. It is one of
those beautiful things which may well be committed to memory.
It will be found very helpful, too, for the children to write the story
in prose and try to bring out the meaning. Let them use freely the words
of the poem, but a different arrangement of words, so that there shall
be left no trace of rhyme or meter in their prose.
[Illustration: ROBERT SOUTHEY
WILLIAM COWPER
ROBERT BURNS
LORD BYRON
JOHN KEATS
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE]
_The Forsaken Merman_
(Volume VII, page 180)
One of the satisfactory poems for study in the middle years of school
life is the one whose name heads this paragraph. It is a great favorite
with most children who know it, but it has not found its way largely
into school use. For both of these reasons it is worthy of study.
I. _Preparation and General Plan._ Let the children read in turn, each
taking one stanza, and if a second reading seems desirable let them
exchange stanzas so that each will have a part new to himself. Be sure
to have a final reading, by yourself or by the best reader among the
children, which shall be continuous and without interruption; otherwise
the beautiful unity of idea and the relation of the different parts will
be overlooked.
II. _Words and Phrases and Sentences._ It is well to begin with the
study sentence by sentence. See that the meaning is clear. The following
suggestions may be of assistance:
_Page 180, line 6._ "Wild white horses"; the breakers, where the waves
are beaten into foam and flying spray.
_Line 7._ "Champ"; gnash their bits.
_Page 182, line 4._ "Stream." The ocean currents resemble streams of
water on land.
_Line 8._ "Mail"; scales. How could the snakes _dry_ their mail?
_Line 10._ "Unshut." Do fish have eyelids? Is a whale a fish? Does a
whale have eyelids? Do most people think of a whale as a fish?
_Line 18._ "Sate" is an old form for "sat." Can you find other old or
unusual words or expressions? Why does the poet use them?
_Line 25._ "Merman." The literature of the ancients contained frequent
allusions to mermaids, who were strange creatures with heads of
beautiful, long-haired maidens, but with scaly bodies and the tails of
fish. In pictures they are usually represented as sitting upon reefs
holding a mirror in one hand and combing their long locks with the
other. Holmes, in _The Chambered Nautilus_, speaks of the "cold
sea-maids" who "rise to sun their streaming hair." Mermen were not so
often spoken of, but there are some allusions to them. In later times
the mermaids were considered more as fairies, and there were many
stories of human children being taken to live with the mermaids, and of
the latter coming upon land to live like men and women. There was, too,
a belief that sea-folk had no souls, and that a person who went to live
with them would lose his soul. The beautiful picture on page 181 shows
the forsaken family.
_Line 10_, from the bottom. "Leaded panes." The small panes of stained
glass in the church windows are set in narrow leaden frames.
_Page 185, line 4._ "Heaths" and "broom". The English and Scotch
heathers are little bushy shrubs that cover the hills and fields. They
bear beautiful little bell-like pink or white flowers. The trailing
arbutus, the blueberry and the wintergreen are some of our native plants
belonging to the same family. The broom plant is another low shrub that
bears rather large yellow blossoms, shaped like the flowers of peas and
beans. The old-time country-folk used bundles of these shrubs for
brooms.
_Line 10._ There have been several allusions to tides. If the children
do not understand the subject, be sure to explain how different a shore
looks at high and at low tide. The change is most noticeable where the
water is shallow, for then long stretches of sea-bottom may be uncovered
at low tide.
III. _The Story._ Bring out by questions these facts which constitute
the "plot," or incidents:
1. A merman, who has a family of children (five, the artist says, page
181), has been deserted by his human wife.
2. The father and children are on shore trying to persuade the mother to
return. The father feels that all must go back.
3. He begs the children to call their mother once more, for he thinks
that childish voices, wild with pain, may induce her to come.
4. He feels discouraged.
5. He tells how she became alarmed and left them at Easter time to
return to her church and pray, that she might save the soul she feared
she was losing.
6. The father and children had come on shore to find their mother. She
was seen praying in the church, working at her spinning wheel at home,
happy but apparently not wholly forgetful of her family in the sea, for
she sighed and dropped a tear as she looked over the sand to the sea.
7. The father feels that his wife is cruel and faithless and that she
has deserted, forever, himself and his family, the kings of the sea.
IV. _The Characters._ Question the children till they see clearly the
persons.
1. The principal character is the deserted merman, a king of the sea.
Ought he to expect his wife to stay with him?
2. The wife, a human being who has loved a merman, and who has a family
of sea children, but who has suddenly become awakened to the danger to
her soul. Is she selfish? Ought she to have forsaken her family? Can she
really be happy away from her husband and family?
3. The children. How many were there? How old were they? Were there both
boys and girls? Do you think Mr. Reese had a clear idea of the family
when he drew the picture (page 181)? There must have been at least
three, for it is said that the mother tended the youngest well; at least
one girl, for the mother sighed for the strange eyes of a little
mermaiden.
4. The priest.
V. _Pictures._ Two series of pictures are kept side by side all the
time; one of the land, and the other of the sea. Try to create a vivid
scene from each.
_First_, on land: We can see a little town, nestling on the side of a
bleak, wind-swept hill, an old English town with a white stone wall all
around it. On the hill, which is too rough to be cultivated, grow great
fields of heather, studded with the golden blossoms of broom-plant. A
little gray stone church stands surrounded by its yard, where the
village dead are buried, for such was the old custom in England. The
stones are at the head of the graves, and the walls of the church are
rain- and storm-worn, but bright stained-glass windows in the building
and flowers and trees among the graves make the place very beautiful.
Some of the windows are clear, so that you can look through and gaze
along the aisle bordered by high wooden pews and see the priest reading
service, and, by one of the stone pillars, the merman's wife, her eyes
steadily gazing at the bible in her lap. You are privileged, too, to
peep into one of the thatched cottages, and see the mother turning the
old-fashioned spinning wheel. From her house there is a wide view down
the hill, across the bay and out to sea. At high tide the breakers dash
madly against the shore, but at low tide there is a broad strip of
silver sand, rocks covered with sea-weed, and in the low places, creeks
and pools of salt water. Does the artist's picture represent high or low
tide?
_Second_, at sea: Deep beneath the surface of the water where the waves
toss and roar, where the surf and spray dash madly about, are great
caverns strewn with white sand. It is cool down there in the depths, and
the light filtering through the clear green sea is weak and pale. The
water streams through caverns, swaying the exquisite sea-weeds that line
the walls; and outside, round about, whales, sea-snakes and all manner
of water beasts swim in play or struggle for mastery. In one of the
caverns stands a great throne of red gold, ornamented with graceful sea
fringe, pearls and amber. From without one may gaze up to the
amber-colored ceiling, or down to the pavement of lustrous pearl. It was
this wondrous palace that the mermaid abandoned for the sake of her
soul.
VI. _Sentiment._ It is, on the whole, a sad poem, though a few cheering
thoughts are suggested by it. Without an attempt at classification and
analysis, here are a few choice ideas taken in order as they occur:
_Page 180._ "Children's voices should be dear to a mother's ear."
_Page 183._ "Long prayers in the world they say."
_Page 183._ "Oh joy, for the blessed light of the sun!"
_Page 185._ The last stanza shows very pleasingly the faithfulness of
father and children, in contrast to the inconstancy of the mother.
VII. _Beauty._ Besides its sentiment, the poem gives us other beauties
in great number. Here are some of them:
_a. Unity._ The poem has one idea running through it from beginning to
end, an idea that is nowhere lacking, though at first it is not seen.
What is the one idea? Grief, but not bitterness nor anger. Each
succeeding stanza is seen to add something to this idea, till all our
sympathies are enlisted for the forsaken children, more than for the
father who does all the talking.
_b. Meter and Rhyme._ Both meter and rhyme are irregular, but that fact
gives a pleasing variety to the poem and corresponds to the somewhat
abrupt changes in the line of thought that at first make the poem rather
hard to read. The children will be interested in comparing the lengths
of lines in different stanzas and sometimes in different parts of the
same stanza. It is easy to pick out the rhymes, to see how often rhymes
are repeated in a stanza, and whether the lines are in couples or
alternate.
_c. Phrases._ The following lines are quoted as those perhaps best
worth study and remembrance. Let the children determine why they were
selected as beautiful lines; that is, determine in what respect the
lines are beautiful:
"Now the wild white horses play,
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray."
"The far-off sound of a silver bell."
"Where the sea snakes toil and twine,
Dry their mail and bask in the brine."
"A long, long sigh
For the cold, strange eyes of a little Mermaiden."
"A ceiling of amber,
A pavement of pearl."
"Heaths starr'd with broom."
_The Cloud_
(Volume VII, page 257)
This lyric has wonderful beauty. It is one of the most musical of poems,
the ideas are fine and the pictures of surpassing charm. If it lacks the
high message it is still an inspiration, for beauty is always ennobling
to the appreciative.
The charm of _The Cloud_ will appeal to children but it may be
intensified by judicious questioning and comment. As always in trying to
give appreciation of real literature, the teacher in the home or at the
school must be certain of his purpose and must never carry the
instruction too far. He must understand the nature of the reader and
shape his questions accordingly. It is impossible to print anything that
will be helpful equally to all or that can be used in its entirety in
any instance. Do not talk too much about what is evident, and stop at
the first signs of a dawning distaste.
_First Stanza._ It is the cloud that is speaking, and as every cloud is
ever changing, the song of the cloud varies with its condition. It is
now the cloud of the warm summer shower that piles up in snowy billows
on the horizon and rolls over the laughing face of flowering nature.
How do the flowers show that they are thirsting? Will they look
different when their thirst is satisfied? Do leaves dream? Leaves, you
know, are the lungs of plants. May they do more work in the morning, the
evening and the night, than at midday? May they be said to be sleeping
at times? Is the shade of the cloud a help to the leaves? Did you ever
see the leaves of trees turn their glazed upper surfaces toward the
ground and twist up their under sides toward the sky, begging for
moisture? Did you ever notice that the buds of most flowers open in the
night or toward morning? Do the "dews awaken" these? Do clouds cause
dews?
Strictly speaking, no "dews" fall from clouds; but light mist may do so.
Who is the mother of the buds? In what way are they "rocked to rest"?
How does the mother "dance about the sun"? Do you like the sound of the
line, "I wield the flail of the lashing hail"? There are five "l's" in
the line and they give it that liquid sound which you like. Did you ever
see a farmer standing in the midst of a floor covered with stalks of
grain, beating out the kernels with a flail? What does the word "under"
mean here? (An adverb, and means _down_ or _into subjection_.) What does
"it" refer to, in the next to the last line?
_Second stanza._ Who is the pilot of the cloud? Where does he sit? What
lures the pilot? Who are the "genii"? (A _genius_--plural, _genii_--is a
good or evil spirit which was supposed by the ancients to guard a man
and control his destinies. In a sense the spirit of the waters may be
said to control the lightning.) Who move "in the depths of the purple
sea"? (The word "dream" would be written "dreams" in prose. The two
lines mean: "Wherever the lightning thinks the spirit he loves is to be
found.") Who is dissolving in rains? Is there much lightning while the
rain is falling or does it usually precede or follow the heaviest part
of the shower?
_Third Stanza._ "Sanguine" means "blood red"; "rack" or "wrack" is
broken or floating cloud. What is the "morning star"? What is meant by
its "shining dead"? What are the "burning plumes" and what the "meteor
eyes" of the sunrise? What becomes of broken clouds when the sun strikes
them? What is likened to an eagle that is "alit" on a crag? What is the
"airy nest" of the cloud? What is a "brooding" dove? Is a dove more
quiet than other birds? Did you ever see a cloud high in the sky at
early dawn, at sunset, in the night? Does this stanza make you think of
what you have seen, make you see it again more vividly?
_Fourth Stanza._ "Orbed" means "round" like the moon. The woof is the
thread that in weaving is carried by the shuttle through the threads of
the "warp"--here it means the "filling." The ancients considered Diana,
goddess of the moon and of hunting, to be a beautiful girl, haughty and
modest. In pictures she was clothed as a huntress, carried a bow and
arrows and wore a crescent in her hair. Is the moon's light white? Is
that phrase a beautiful one which speaks of the moon as "with white
fire laden"? What is the position of the cloud in this stanza? Is it
between the moon and the earth? Is the cloud the "fleece-like floor" of
the sky? If so, when the cloud speaks of its "tent's thin roof," what is
meant? (Perhaps when the moon looks down the cloud looks like a floor
and when the earth looks up it sees the cloud like a tent.) Whose are
the "unseen feet"? At what do the stars "peer"? What do they see first?
Why do they "turn and flee like a swarm of golden bees"? What do the
stars see when the rent is widened? With what are the rivers, lakes and
seas paved? How can they be paved with moon and stars? Did you ever see
the moon and stars reflected in a lake, the former perhaps making a
broad glittering pavement across the waters? To what does "these" in the
last line refer? Why did not Shelley write "stars" instead of "these"?
Can you see the exquisite night pictures described in these lines?
_Fifth Stanza._ This stanza is characterized by force and intensity of
action; the words and phrases are as apt and beautiful as can be
written.
Have you not seen the west when the clouds appeared a fiery red around
the setting sun? Have you not seen the moon surrounded by bright pearly
clouds? When the winds blow strong and whirl the fleecy clouds through
the sky do not the latter make the mountain tops dim and do not the
stars seem to dash across the heavens in a maddening race? Ever
changing, the clouds constantly rearrange themselves, sometimes bridging
the entire heavens, resting at the horizon upon the mountains as upon
columns.
What is the "triumphal arch"? What are the powers of the air? What is
meant by saying they are "chained to the chair" of the cloud? Is the
"triumphal arch" the "million-colored bow"? What is the "bow" that is
said to be "million-colored"? What wove the soft colors of the
million-colored bow? What is the "sphere fire"? What did it do? Whose
soft colors did it weave? What was the earth doing while the colors were
being woven? Why should the earth be laughing? Why is it spoken of as
the moist earth?
_Sixth Stanza._ A cenotaph in an empty ornamental tomb. The body of the
person to whom the monument has been erected is buried elsewhere.
In what way is a cloud the daughter of the earth and water? In what way
is it the nurseling of the sky? How can a cloud pass through the pores
of the ocean and shores? What are the pores of the ocean and shores? Is
it true that a cloud cannot die? Is the poet true to nature and science
when he says:
"For after the rain, when, with never a stain,
The pavilion of heaven is bare,
And the winds and sunbeams, with their convex gleams,
Build up the dome of the air"?
What is the "cenotaph" of the cloud? Out of what does the cloud rise
again? What is there appropriate in saying that the cloud rises like a
ghost? What is it the cloud builds up again?
Note the following particularly beautiful phrases:
"Leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams."
"Great pines groan aghast."
"The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes."
"The crimson pall of eve."
"The woof of my tent's thin roof."
"My wind-built tent."
"The million-colored bow."
"Nurseling of the sky."
"With never a stain
The pavilion of heaven is bare."
Read aloud the entire lyric till its sweet music is yours. Note the
smooth rhythm, the peculiar adaptation of sound to sense, the flowing
cadences in the lines.
_Ode to a Skylark_
(Volume VII, page 275)
There are three classes of lyrics that are to a greater or less degree
in the nature of an address to some person, place or thing. The elegy is
a lyric address praising the dead, the ode and the sonnet may praise
living or dead. The elegy in its measures partakes of the solemnity of
the grave, the ode is hampered by no such restrictions. Neither is the
sonnet, although by its strict requirements of form it is set off in a
class by itself. In the ode the poet enjoys his greatest freedom, for he
may use any meter, may write at any length and in any manner, grave, gay
or grotesque. Accordingly the odes of our language are most spontaneous,
musical, inspiring and beautiful.
_The Skylark_ is a perfect example of an ode at its best. It is full of
life and joy. It sparkles in every line and vies in music with the song
of the lark himself.
"Hail to thee, _blithe spirit_!--
Bird thou never wert."--
Those two lines are to be taken as the key note of the whole lyric. It
is the spirit of free and perfect melody that Shelley is addressing,
melody that comes from heaven or near it, that bubbles from the full
heart, that is free from rules and conventions, unpremeditated, yet all
art. It is "Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun." "What thou
art we know not," yet thou art like a poet hidden singing hymns
unbidden; like a high-born maiden soothing her love-laden soul in
secret; like a hidden glowworm scattering its hues unbeholden; like a
rose embowered in its leaves making faint the thieving winds with its
heavy scent. Its music surpasses the delicate sounds of vernal showers
on the twinkling grass, the beauty of the rain-awakened flowers, and all
that ever was clear and fresh and joyous. Such is the song.
"What are the thoughts that inspire such heavenly melody?" the poet
cries. "Teach us, teach us thy sweet thoughts. I have never heard such a
flood of rapture so divine. Matched with thy music the noblest marriage
hymn, the grandest Te Deum would be but an empty boast. From what
fountains springs thy happy strain? Is it from fields, or waves or
mountains, from strange shapes of the sky and plain? Is it from
ignorance of pain, from love of thine own kind that the joyous music
comes? Certainly thou lovest, but there can be no weariness in thy keen
joy, no shadow of annoyance. How different we!
"We look before and after,
And pine for what is not:
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.
"Yet if we could scorn
Hate, and pride, and fear;
If we were things born
Not to shed a tear,
I know not how thy joy we ever should come near."
"To me, the poet, thy skill would be better than all the measures of
delightful sound, than all the treasures found in books and if I could
sing one half as well as thou, the world would listen to me entranced as
I am listening to thee."
If the song of the lark is beautiful, the song of the poet is not
surpassed. The riotous spirit of music sings in every line, beauty is
seen in every stanza, is lavished upon every phrase, upon every
melodious verse. The prodigality of beautiful phrases is marvelous. The
phrases descriptive of the bird alone are strikingly apt and numerous:
"Blithe spirit"; "bird thou never wert"; "like a cloud of fire"; "like
an unbodied joy"; "like a star of heaven"; "like a poet hidden in the
light of thought"; "like a highborn maiden in a palace tower"; "like a
glowworm golden"; "like a rose embowered"; "sprite and bird"; "thou
scorner of the ground."
To characterize the song properly, the poet finds it necessary to use
these phrases: "Profuse strains of unpremeditated art"; "shrill
delight"; "keen as are the arrows of that silver sphere"; "all the earth
and air with thy voice is loud"; "a rain of melody"; surpassing the
"sound of vernal showers" and of "rain-awakened flowers" and "all that
ever was joyous, clear and fresh"; "a flood of rapture so divine";
beside it a "hymenæal chorus" or a "triumphal chaunt" is "but an empty
vaunt"; "clear, keen joyance," "notes flow in such a crystal stream."
Besides the ardent appreciation for the beautiful song, the lyric
contains one sad truth exquisitely expressed:
"We look before and after,
And pine for what is not:
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought."
And finally, there is the consummate personal appeal of the poet, which,
if we may judge by the matchless lyric, was answered by the same spirit
that inspired the graceful scorner of the ground:
"Teach me half the gladness
That thy brain must know,
Such harmonious madness
From my lips would flow,
The world should listen then, as I am listening now!"
Compare the following lyric on the same subject by James Hogg:
Bird of the wilderness,
Blithesome and cumberless,
Sweet be thy matin o'er moorland and lea!
Emblem of happiness,
Blest is thy dwelling-place--
O, to abide in the desert with thee!
Wild is thy lay and loud,
Far in the downy cloud
Love gives it energy, love gave it birth.
Where, on thy dewy wing,
Where art thou journeying?
Thy lay is in heaven, thy love is on earth.
O'er fell and mountain sheen,
O'er moor and mountain green,
O'er the red streamer that heralds the day,
Over the cloudlet dim
Over the rainbow's rim,
Musical cherub, soar, singing away!
Then when the gloaming comes,
Low in the heather blooms
Sweet will thy welcome and bed of love be!
Emblem of happiness,
Blest is thy dwelling-place
O, to abide in the desert with thee.
Various interpretations and helpful comments of other kinds may be found
on the following pages:
Volume I, page 95. _The Rock-a-By Lady._
Volume I, page 204. _Old Gaelic Lullaby._
Volume I, page 350. _Keepsake Mill._
Volume I, page 406. _The Fairies._
Volume II, page 482. _In Time's Swing._
Volume IV, page 86. _The Village Blacksmith._
Volume V, page 335. _How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to
Aix._
Volume V, page 396. _The American Flag._
Volume VII, page 345. _The Reaper's Dream._
Volume VIII, page 60. _America._