Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins Part 12

Now melting upward through the sloping scale Swell'd the sweet strain to a melodious wail; Now ringing clarion-clear to whence it rose Slumber'd at last in one sweet, deep, heart-broken close.

_1862-1868_ After the relics of his school-poems follow the poems written when an undergraduate at Oxford, of which there are four in this book--Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 52, all dating about 1866. Of this period some ten or twelve autograph poems exist, the most successful being religious verses worked in Geo. Herbert's manner, and these, I think, have been printed: there are two sonnets in Italian form and Shakespearian mood (refused by 'Cornhill Magazine'); the rest are attempts at lyrical poems, mostly sentimental aspects of death: one of them 'Winter with the Gulf-stream'

was published in 'Once a Week', and reprinted at least in part in some magazine: the autograph copy is dated Aug. 1871, but G. M. H. told me that he wrote it when he was at school; whence I guess that he altered it too much to allow of its early dating. The following is a specimen of his signature at this date.

Gerard M. Hopkins.

July 24, 1866.

Transcriber's note: This signature and date is displayed as a handwritten image in the original.

_1868-1875_ After these last-mentioned poems there is a gap of Silence which may be accounted for in his own words from a letter to R. W. D. Oct. 5, '78: 'What (verses) I had written I burnt before I became a Jesuit (i.e. 1868) and re- solved to write no more, as not belonging to my profession, unless it were by the wish of my superiors; so for seven years I wrote nothing but two or three little presentation pieces which occasion called for. But when in the winter of '75 the Deutschland was wrecked in the mouth of the Thames and five Franciscan nuns, exiles from Germany by the Falck Laws, aboard of her were drowned I was affected by the account and happening to say so to my rector he said that he wished some one would write a poem on the subject. On this hint I set to work and, though my hand was out at first, produced one. I had long had haunting my ear the echo of a new rhythm which now I realised on paper. ... I do not say the idea is altogether new . . . but no one has professedly used it and made it the principle throughout, that I know of. ... However I had to mark the stresses . . . and a great many more oddnesses could not but dismay an editor's eye, so that when I offered it to our magazine _The Month_ . . . they dared not print it.'

Of the _two or three presentation pieces_ here mentioned one is certainly the Marian verses 'Rosa mystica', published in the 'The Irish Monthly', May '98, and again in Orby s.h.i.+pley's 'Carmina Mariana', 2nd series, p. 183: the autograph exists.

Another is supposed to be the 'Ad Mariam', printed in the 'Stonyhurst Magazine', Feb. '94. This is in five stanzas of eight lines, in direct and competent imitation of Swinburne: no autograph has been found; and, unless Fr. Hopkins's views of poetic form had been provisionally deranged or suspended, the verses can hardly be attributed to him without some impeachment of his sincerity; and that being altogether above suspicion, I would not yield to the rather strong presumption which their technical skill supplies in favour of his authors.h.i.+p. It is true that the 'Rosa mystica' is somewhat in the same light lilting man- ner; but that was probably common to most of these festal verses, and 'Rosa mystica' is not open to the positive objections of verbal criticism which would reject the 'Ad Mariam'. He never sent me any copy of either of these pieces, as he did of his severer Marian poems (Nos. 18 and 37), nor mentioned them as productions of his serious Muse. I do not find that in either cla.s.s of these attempts he met with any appreciation at the time; it was after the publication of Miles's book in 1894 that his co-religionists began to recognize his possible merits, and their enthusiasm has not perhaps been always wise.

It is natural that they should, as some of them openly state they do, prefer the poems that I am rejecting to those which I print; but this edition was undertaken in response to a demand that, both in England and America, has gradually grown up from the genuinely poetic interest felt in the poems which I have gradually introduced to the public:--that interest has been no doubt welcomed and accompanied by the applause of his particular religious a.s.sociates, but since their purpose is alien to mine I regret that I am unable to indulge it; nor can I put aside the overruling objection that G. M. H. would not have wished these 'little presentation pieces' to be set among his more serious artistic work. I do not think that they would please any one who is likely to be pleased with this book.

1. ST. DOROTHEA. Written when an exhibitioner at Balliol College. Contemporary autograph in A, and another almost identical in H, both undated. Text from A. This poem was afterwards expanded, shedding its relative pro- nouns, to 48 lines divided among three speakers, 'an Angel, the protonotary Theophilus, (and) a Catechumen': the grace and charm of original lost:--there is an auto- graph in A and other copies exist. This was the first of the poems that I saw, and G. M. H. wrote it out for me (in 1866?).

2. HEAVEN HAVEN. Contemporary autograph, on same page with last, in H. Text is from a slightly later autograph undated in A. The different copies vary.

3. HABIT OF PERFECTION. Two autographs in A; the earlier dated Jan. 18, 19, 1866. The second, which is a good deal altered, is apparently of same date as text of No. 2.

Text follows this later version. Published in Miles.

4. WRECK OF THE DEUTSCHLAND. Text from B, t.i.tle from A (see description of B on p. 94). In 'The Spirit of Man'

the original first stanza is given from A, and varies; otherwise B was not much corrected. Another transcript, now at St. Aloysius' College, Glasgow, was made by Rev. F. Bacon after A but before the correction of B.

This was collated for me by the Rev. Father Geoffrey Bliss, S.J., and gave one true reading. Its variants are distin- guished by G in the notes to the poem.

The labour spent on this great metrical experiment must have served to establish the poet's prosody and perhaps his diction: therefore the poem stands logically as well as chronologically in the front of his book, like a great dragon folded in the gate to forbid all entrance, and confident in his strength from past success. This editor advises the reader to circ.u.mvent him and attack him later in the rear; for he was himself shamefully worsted in a brave frontal a.s.sault, the more easily perhaps because both subject and treatment were distasteful to him. A good method of approach is to read stanza 16 aloud to a chance company.

To the metrist and rhythmist the poem will be of interest from the first, and throughout.

Stanza iv. 1. 7. Father Bliss tells me that the Voel is a mountain not far from St. Beuno's College in N. Wales, where the poem was written: and Dr. Henry Bradley that _moel_ is primarily an adj. meaning _bald_: it becomes a fem, subst. meaning _bare hill_, and preceded by the article _y_ becomes _voel_, in modern Welsh spelt _foel_. This accounts for its being written without initial capital, the word being used genetically; and the meaning, obscured by _roped_, is that the well is fed by the trickles of water within the flanks of the mountains.--Both A and B read _planks_ for _flanks_; G gives the correction.

St. xi. 5. Two of the required stresses are on _we dream_.

St. xii. 8. _reeve_, see note on Author's Preface, p. 101.

St. xiv. 8. _these_. G has _there_; but the words between _shock_ and _these_ are probably parenthetical.

St. xvi. 3. Landsmen may not observe the wrongness: see again No. 17, st. ix, and 39, line 10. I would have cor- rected this if the euphony had not accidentally forbidden the simplest correction.

St. xvi. 7. _foam-fleece_ followed by full stop in A and B, by a comma in G.

St. xix. 3. _hawling_ thus spelt in all three.

St. xxi. 2. G omits _the_.

St. xxvi. 5 and 6. The semicolon is autographic correction in B; the stop at _Way_ is uncertain in A and B, is a comma in G.

St. xxix. 3. _night_ (sic).

8. Two of the required stresses are on _Tarpeian_.

St. x.x.xiv. 8. _s.h.i.+re_. G has _sh.o.r.e_; but _s.h.i.+re_ is doubtless right; it is the special favoured landscape visited by the shower.

5. PENMAEN POOL. Early copy in A. Text, t.i.tle, and punctu- ation from autograph in B, dated 'Barmouth, Merioneth- s.h.i.+re. Aug. 1876'. But that autograph writes _leisure_ for _pleasure_ in first line; _skulls_ in stanza 2; and in stanza 8, _month_ has a capital initial. Several copies exist, and vary.

St. iii. 2. _Cadair Idris_ is written as a note to _Giant's stool_.

St. viii. 4. Several variants. Two good copies read _dark- some danksome_; but the early copy in A has _darksome darksome_, which B returns to.

St. ix. 3. A has _But praise it_, and two good copies _But honour it_.

6. 'THE SILVER JUBILEE: in honour of the Most Reverend James first Bishop of Shrewsbury. St. Beuno's, Vale of Clwyd.

1876, I think.' A.--Text and t.i.tle from autograph in B.

It was published with somebody's sermon on the same occasion. Another copy in H.

7. 'G.o.d'S GRANDEUR. Standard rhythm counterpoised.' Two autographs, Feb. 23, 1877; and March 1877; in A.-- Text is from corrections in B. The second version in A has _lightning_ for _s.h.i.+ning_ in line 2, explained in a letter of Jan. 4, '83. B returns to original word.

8. 'THE STARLIGHT NIGHT. Feb. 24, '77.' Autograph in A.-- 'Standard rhythm opened and counterpointed. March '77.' A.--Later corrected version 'St. Beuno's, Feb. 77'

in B.--Text follows B. The second version in A was published in Miles's book 'Poets and Poetry of the Century'.

9. 'SPRING. (Standard rhythm, opening with sprung leadings), May 1877.' Autograph in A.--Text from corrections in B, but punctuation from A. Was published in Miles's book from incomplete correction of A.

10. 'THE LANTERN. (Standard rhythm, with one sprung lead- ing and one line counterpomted.)' Autograph in A.-- Text, t.i.tle, and accents in lines 13 and 14, from corrections in B, where it is called 'companion to No. 26, St. Beuno's '77'.

11. 'WALKING BY THE SEA. Standard rhythm, in parts sprung and in others counterpomted, Rhyl, May '77.'

A. This version deleted in B, and the revision given in text written in with new t.i.tle.--G. M. H. was not pleased with this sonnet, and wrote the following explanation of it in a letter '82: '_Rash fresh more_ (it is dreadful to explain these things in cold blood) means a headlong and exciting new s.n.a.t.c.h of singing, resumption by the lark of his song, which by turns he gives over and takes up again all day long, and this goes on, the sonnet says, through all time, without ever losing its first freshness, being a thing both new and old. _Repair_ means the same thing, renewal, resumption. The _skein_ and _coil_ are the lark's song, which from his height gives the impression of some- thing falling to the earth and not vertically quite but tricklingly or wavingly, something as a skein of silk ribbed by having been tightly wound on a narrow card or a notched holder or as twine or fis.h.i.+ng-tackle unwinding from a _reel_ or _winch_ or as pearls strung on a horsehair: the laps or folds are the notes or short measures and bars of them. The same is called a _score_ in the musical sense of score and this score is "writ upon a liquid sky trembling to welcome it", only not horizontally. The lark in wild glee _races the reel round_, paying or dealing out and down the turns of the skein or _coil_ right to the earth _floor_, the ground, where it lies in a heap, as it were, or rather is all wound off on to another winch, reel, bobbin or spool in Fancy's eye, by the moment the bird touches earth and so is ready for a fresh unwinding at the next flight. _Crisp_ means almost _crisped_, namely with notes.'

12 'THE WINDHOVER. (Falling paeonic rhythm, sprung and outriding.)' Two contemporary autographs in A.--Text and dedication from corrected B, dated St. Beuno's, May 30, 1877. In a letter June 22, '79: 'I shall shortly send you an amended copy of The Windhover: the amendment only touches a single line, I think, but as that is the best thing I ever wrote I should like you to have it in its best form.'

13 'PIED BEAUTY. Curtal Sonnet: sprung paeonic rhythm.

St. Beuno's, Tremeirchion. Summer '77.' Autograph in A.--B agrees.

14 'HURRAHING IN HARVEST: Sonnet (sprung and outriding rhythm. Take notice that the outriding feet are not to be confused with dactyls or paeons, though sometimes the line might be scanned either way. The strong syllable in an outriding foot has always a great stress and after the outrider follows a short pause. The paeon is easier and more flowing). Vale of Clwyd, Sept. 1, 1877.' Auto- graph in A. Text is from corrected B, punctuation of original A. In a letter '78 he wrote: 'The Hurrahing sonnet was the outcome of half an hour of extreme en- thusiasm as I walked home alone one day from fis.h.i.+ng in the Elwy.' A also notes 'no counterpoint'.

15 'THE CAGED SKYLARK. (Falling paeonic rhythm, sprung and outriding.)' Autograph in A. Text from corrected B which dates St. Beuno's, 1877. In line 13 B writes _unc.u.mbered_.

16. 'IN THE VALLEY OF THE ELWY. (Standard rhythm, sprung and counterpointed.)' Autograph in A. Text is from corrected B, which dates as contemporary with No. 15, adding 'for the companion to this see No.' 35.

17. THE LOSS OF THE EURYDICE. A contemporary copy in A has this note: 'Written in sprung rhythm, the third line has 3 beats, the rest 4. The scanning runs on without break to the end of the stanza, so that each stanza is rather one long line rhymed in pa.s.sage than four lines with rhymes at the ends.'--B has an autograph of the poem as it came to be corrected ('83 or after), without the above note and dated 'Mount St. Mary, Derbys.h.i.+re, Apr. '78'.--Text follows B.--The injurious rhymes are partly explained in the old note.

St. 9. _Shorten sail_. The seamans.h.i.+p at fault: but this ex- pression may be glossed by supposing the boatswain to have sounded that call on his whistle.

St. 12. _Cheer's death_, i.e. despair.

St, 14. _It is even seen_. In a letter May 30, '78, he ex- plains: 'You mistake the sense of this as I feared it would be mistaken. I believed Hare to be a brave and con- scientious man, what I say is that _even_ those who seem unconscientious will act the right part at a great push. . . .

About _mortholes_ I wince a little.'

St. 26. _A starlight-wender_, i.e. The island was so Marian that the folk supposed the Milky Way was a fingerpost to guide pilgrims to the shrine of the Virgin at Walsingham.

_And one_, that is Duns Scotus the champion of the Im- maculate Conception. See Sonnet No. 20.