The Modern Scottish Minstrel Volume Iii Part 1

The Modern Scottish Minstrel.

Volume III.

by Various.

SCOTTISH AND h.e.l.lENIC MINSTRELSY:

An Essay.

BY JAMES DONALDSON, A.M.

Men who compare themselves with their nearest neighbours are almost invariably conceited, speak boastingly of themselves, and disrespectfully of others. But if a man extend his survey, if he mingle largely with people whose feelings and opinions have been modified by quite different circ.u.mstances, the result is generally beneficial. The very act of accommodating his mind to foreign modes of thought expands his nature; and he becomes more liberal in his sentiments, more charitable in his construction of deeds, and more capable of perceiving real goodness under whatever shape it may present itself. So when a Scotsman criticises Scotch poetry viewed by itself alone, he is apt to be carried away by his patriotism,--he sees only the delightful side of the subject, and he ventures on a.s.sertions which flatter himself and his country at the expense of all other nations. If, however, we place the productions of our own country side by side with those of another, the excellences and the deficiencies of both are seen in stronger relief; the contrasts strike the mind, and the heart is widened by sympathising with goodness and beauty diversely conceived and diversely portrayed.

For this reason, we shall attempt a brief comparison of h.e.l.lenic and Scottish songs.

Before we enter on our characterisation of these, we must glance at the materials which we have to survey. Greek lyric poetry arose about the beginning of the eighth century before the Christian era, and continued in full bloom down to the time when it pa.s.sed into drama on the Athenian stage. The names of the poets are universally known, and have become, indeed, almost part of our poetic language. Every one speaks of an Anacreon, a Sappho, and a Pindar; and the names of Archilochus, Alcman, Alcaeus, Stesichorus, Simonides, Ibycus, and Bacchylides, if not so often used, are yet familiar to most. Few of these lyrists belonged to Greece proper. They belonged to Greece only in the sense in which the Greeks themselves used the word, as including all the colonies which had gone forth from the motherland. Most of the early Greek song-writers dwelt in Asia Minor--some were born in the islands of the Cyclades, and some in Southern Italy; but all of them were proud of their Greek origin, all of them were thorough Greeks in their hearts. It is only the later bards who were born and brought up on the Greek mainland, and most of these lived to see the day when almost all the lyric poets took their grandest flights in the choral odes of their dramas. These odes, however, do not fall within the province of our comparison. The lyrical efforts both of aeschylus and Sophocles were inwoven with the structure of their plays, the chorus in aeschylus being generally one of the actors; and they have their modern representatives, not in the songs of the people, but in the arias of operas. Setting these aside, we have few genuine efforts of the Greek lyric muse belonging to the dramatic period--the most important being several songs sung by the Greeks at their banquets, which have fortunately been preserved. After this era, we have no lyric poems of the Greeks worth mentioning. The verse-writers took henceforth to epigrams--epigrams on everything on the face of the earth. These have been collected into the "Greek Anthology;" but the greater part of them are contemptible in a poetic point of view. They are interesting as throwing light on the times; but they are weak and vapid as expressions of the beatings of the human heart, and they are full of conceits.

Besides these, there are the Anacreontic odes, known to all Greek scholars and to a great number of English, since they have been frequently translated. With one or two exceptions, they were all written between the third and twelfth centuries of the Christian era, though some scholars have boldly a.s.serted that they were forgeries even of a later date. Most of them seem to be expansions of lines of Anacreon.

They are in general neat, pretty, and gaysome, but tame and insincere.

There is nothing like earnestness in them, nothing like genuine deep feeling; but thus they are all the more suited for a certain cla.s.s of lovers and drinkers, who do not wish to be greatly moved by anything under the sun.

Scotch lyric poetry may be said to commence with the lyrics attributed to James I., or with those of Henryson. There is clear proof, indeed, that long before this time the Scotch were much given to song-making and song-singing; but of these early popular lilts, almost nothing remains.

Henryson's lyrics, however, belonged more to the cla.s.s that were intended to be read than to be sung, and this is true of a considerable number of his successors, such as Dunbar, and Maitland of Lethington, who were learned men, and wrote with a learned air, even when writing for the people. The Reformation, as surely as it threw down every carved stone, shut up the mouth of every profane songster. Wedderburne's "Haly Ballats" may have been spared for a time by the iconoclasts, because they had helped to build up their own temple; but they could not survive long,--they were cast in a profane mould, they were sung to profane tunes, and away they must go into oblivion. Our song-writers, for a long time after, are unknown minstrels, who had no character to lose by making or singing profane songs,--they were of the people, and sang for them. So matters continued, until, at the commencement of the eighteenth century, Scottish songs began to be the rage both in England and Scotland, and an eager desire arose to gather up old s.n.a.t.c.hes and preserve them. Henceforth Scotch poetry held up its head, and a few remarkable poets won their way into the hearts of large ma.s.ses of the people. At last appeared the emanc.i.p.ator of Scottish song in the form of a ploughman, stirring the deepest feelings of all cla.s.ses with songs that may be justly styled the best of all national popular songs, and for ever settling the claims of a song-writer to one of the highest niches in the temple of Fame.

The first thing that strikes us, on dipping into a book of Greek songs, and then a book of Scotch, is the different position of the poets. The Greek poet was regarded as a kind of superior being--an interpreter between G.o.ds and men; and, supposed to be under the special protection of Divinity, he was highly honoured and reverenced wherever he went. The Scotch bard, on the other hand, is a poor wanderer, whose name is unknown, who received little respect, and whose knowledge of G.o.d and the higher purposes of life cannot be reckoned in any way great. There may be a few exceptions. We find n.o.bles sometimes writing popular songs, and occasionally a learned man may have contributed strains; but these are generally not superior either in wit, pathos, or morality, to the verses of the unknown and hard-toiling. This striking contrast arises from a change that had taken place in the history of song. In Greece, all the teeming ideas of the fertile-minded people found expression in harmonious measures, and their songs touched every chord of their varied existence. This was partly owing to their innate love of melody, and partly to the public life which they led. From the earliest ages, they were fond of sweet sounds; and their continual public gatherings gave innumerable opportunities for using their vocal powers unitedly, and turning music to all its best and n.o.blest purposes. They sang sacred songs as they marched in procession to their temples; and on entering, they hymned the praises of the G.o.ds. When they rushed on to battle, they shouted their inspiring war-songs; and if victory crowned the fight, the battle-field rang with their joyous paeans, and their poets tuned their lyres in honour of the brave that had fallen. A victor in the Olympic games would have lost one of his greatest rewards, if no poet had sung his fame. Then, in their banquets, the Greeks amused themselves in stringing together pretty verses, and joined in merry and jovial drinking-songs. If there happened to be a marriage, the young people a.s.sembled round the house, and late in the evening and early in the morning sang the praises of bride and bridegroom, prayed for blessings on the couple, and sometimes discussed the comparative blessedness of single and married life. Or if a notable person happened to die, his dirge was sung, and the poet composed an encomium on him, full of wise reflections on destiny, and the fate that awaits all. There was, in fact, no public occasion which the Greeks did not beautify with song.

It is entirely different with us. Our minister now performs the function of the Greek poet at marriages and funerals. Our funeral sermons and newspaper paragraphs have taken the place of the Greek encomiums. Our fiddles or piano do duty instead of the Greek dithyrambs, hyporchems, and other dancing songs. Our warriors are either left unsung, or celebrated in verse that reads much better than it sings. The members of the "Benevolent Pugilistic a.s.sociation" do not stand so high in the British opinion as the wrestlers of old stood in the Greek; and our jockeys have fallen frightfully from the grand position which the Greek racers occupied in the plains of Olympia. Very few in these days would think the champion of England, or the winner of the Derby, worth a n.o.ble ode full of old traditions and exalted religious aspirations. Through various causes, song has thus come to be very circ.u.mscribed in its limits, and to perform duty within a comparatively small sphere in modern life.

Indeed, song in these days does exactly what the Greeks rarely attempted: it concerns itself with private life, and especially with that most characteristic feature of modern private life--love. Love is, consequently, the main topic of Scottish song. It is a theme of which neither the song-writer nor the song-singer ever wearies. It is the one great pa.s.sion with which the universal modern mind sympathises, and from the expressions of which it quaffs inexhaustible delight. This holds true even of the cynical people who profess a distaste for love and lovers. For love has for them its comic side,--it appears to them exquisitely humorous in the human weakness it causes and brings to light; and if they do not enjoy the song in its praise, they seldom fail to laugh heartily at the description of the plights into which it leads its devotees.

Perhaps no country contains a richer collection of love-songs than Scotland. We have a song for every phase of the motley-faced pa.s.sion,--from its ludicrous aspect to its highest and most rapturous form. Every pulsation of the heart, as moved by love, has had its poetic expression; and we have lovers pouring out the depths of their souls to all kinds of maids, and in all kinds of situations. And maids are represented as bodying forth their feelings, also, under the sway of love. Many of these feminine lyrics are written by women themselves.

Some of them exult in the full return which their love meets; but for the most part, it is a keen sorrow that forces women to poetic composition. They thus contribute our most pathetic songs--wails sometimes over blasted hopes and blighted love, as in "Waly, Waly;" or over the death of a deeply-loved one, as in Miss Blamire's "Waefu'

Heart;" or over the loss of the brave who have fallen in battle, as in Miss Jane Elliot's "Flowers of the Forest."

Peculiarly characteristic of Scotland are the songs that describe the development of love, after the lovers have been married. Here the comical phase is most predominant. For the most part, the Scottish songster delights in describing the quarrels between the goodman and the goodwife--the goodwife in the early poems invariably succeeding in making John yield to her. Sometimes, however, there is a deeper and purer current of feeling, to which Burns especially has given expression. How intensely beautiful is the affection in "John Anderson, my Jo!" And we have in "Are ye sure the news is true?" the whole character of a very loving wife brought out by a simple incident in her life,--the expected return of her husband. Some of these songs also have been written by poetesses, such as Lady Nairn's exquisite "Land of the Leal;" and really there is such delicacy, such minute accuracy in the portrayal of a woman's feelings in "Are ye sure the news is true?" that one cannot help thinking it must have been written by Jean Adams, or some woman, rather than by Mickle:--

"His very foot has music in 't, As he comes up the stair."

What man has an ear so delicate as to hear such music?

The contrast between Greek poetry and Scotch is very marked in this point. There is not one Greek lyric devoted to what we should designate love, with perhaps something like an exception in Alcman. In fact, while moderns rarely make a tragedy or comedy, a poem or novel, without some love-concern which is the pivot of the whole, all the great poems and dramas of the ancients revolve on entirely different pa.s.sions. Love, such as we speak of, was of rather rare occurrence. Women were in such a low position, that it was a condescension to notice them,--there was no chivalrous feeling in regard to them; they were made to feel the dominion of their absolute lords and masters. Besides this, the greater number of them were confined to their private chambers, and seldom saw any man who was not nearly related. Those who were on free terms of intercourse with men, were for the most part strangers, whose morals were low, and who could not be expected to win the respectful esteem of true lovers. The men enjoyed the society of these--their tumbling, dancing, singing, and lively chat; but the distance was too great to permit that deep devotion which characterises modern love. Moreover, when a Greek speaks of love, we have to remember that he fell in love as often with a male companion as with a woman--he admired the beauty of a fair youth, and he felt in his presence very much as a modern lover feels in the presence of his sweetheart. We have, therefore, to examine expressions of love cautiously. Anacreon says, for instance, that love clave him with an axe, like a smith; but it seems far more likely that the reference is to the affection excited by some charming youth.[1] We have a specimen remaining of the nonchalant style in which he addressed a woman, in the ode commencing "O Thracian mare!"--Schneidewin, Poet.

Lyr. Anac. fr. 47.

The great poet of Love was not Anacreon, but Sappho, whose heart and mind were both of the finest. Her life is involved in obscurity, but it is probable that she was a strong advocate of woman's rights in her own land; and as she found men falling in love with other men, so she took special pains to win the affections of the young aeolian ladies, to train them in all the accomplishments suited to woman's nature, and to initiate them into the art of poetry,--that art without which, she says, a woman's memory would be for ever forgotten, and she would go to the house of Hades, to dwell with the shadowy dead, uncared for and unknown.

We have two poems of hers which have come down to us tolerably complete, both, we think, addressed to some of her female friends, and both remarkably sweet, touching, and beautiful.

The Scottish songs devoted to other subjects than love are few, and almost exclusively descriptive. Our sense of the humorous gives us a delight in queer and odd characters, in which the Greeks probably would not have partic.i.p.ated. Though they had an abundance of wit, and a keen perception of the ridiculous, no songs have reached us which are intended to please by their pure absurdity and good-natured foolishness.

Archilochus and Hipponax wrote many a jocular song; but the fun of the thing would have been lost, had the sting which they contained been extracted.

Nor do the Greeks seem to have cared much for descriptive songs. They frequently introduced their heroes into their odes, but these were ever living, ever present to their minds; and several of the songs written on particular occasions were probably sung when the singer had no connexion with the events. But they lived, like boys, too much in the present, to throw themselves back into the past. They wished to give utterance to the feelings of the moment in their own persons, and directly; while we are content to be mere listeners, and are often as much pleased by the occurrences of another's life as by the sentiments of our own hearts.

We are remarkably deficient in what are called cla.s.s-songs. The Greeks had none of these, for there scarcely existed any cla.s.ses but free and slave. The people were all one--had the same interests and the same emotions. There was far less of individuality with them than with us, and there was still less of that feeling which divides society into exclusive circles. A Greek turned his hand to anything that came in his way, while division of labour has reached its utmost limit among us. We can find, therefore, no contrast here between Greek and Scotch songs; but we find a very marked one between Scotch and German. We have no student-songs, very few expressive of the feelings of soldiers (Lockhart's are almost the only), sailors, or of any other cla.s.s.

Indeed, we are deficient not only in cla.s.s-songs, but in social-songs.

The Scotch propensity to indulge in drink is, unfortunately, notorious; and yet our drinking-songs of a really social nature would be comprised in a few pages. One sings of his coggie, as if he were in the custom of gulping his whisky all alone; many describe the boisterous carousals in which they made fools of themselves; not a few extol the power and properties of whisky, and incite to Baccha.n.a.lian pleasures; and we have several good songs suitable for singing at the close of an evening pleasantly spent, but almost none which express the feelings that naturally well-up when one sees his friends around him, becomes exhilarated through pleasant social intercourse, and finds the path of life smoothed and sweetened by the aid of his brothers.

The reason of this peculiar circ.u.mstance is not far to seek. It lies in the distinctive character of the two great cla.s.ses into which the Scotch have been divided since the Reformation, called, at the early period of Scottish song, the Covenanters and the Cavaliers. The one party bowed before religion, most scrupulously abstained from all worldly pleasures, and regarded and denounced as sin, or something akin to it, every approach to levity or frivolity. The other party was a wild rebound from this. Sanctimoniousness was hateful in their eye; and not being able to find a medium, they abjured religion, and rushed into the pleasures of this life with headlong zest. The poets, in accordance with their joy-loving natures, allied themselves to the latter cla.s.s. There was thus in Scotland a deep, dark gulf between the religious and the poetical or beautiful, which has not yet been completely bridged over.

The consequence is, that the elder Scottish songs, of all songs, contain the fewest references to the Divine Being. The name of G.o.d is never mentioned unless in the caricatures of the Covenanters; and a foreigner, taking up a book of Scottish songs written since the Reformation, and judging of the religion of the Scotch from them alone, would be p.r.o.ne to suppose that, if Scotland had any religion at all, it consisted in using the name of the devil occasionally with respect or with dread. The Cavaliers, in their most energetic moods, swore by him and by no other; while the Covenanters had no songs at all, scarcely any poetry of any kind, and doubtless would have regarded as impious the tracing of any but the most spiritual pleasures to G.o.d. The words, for instance, which Allan Cunningham puts into the mouth of a Covenanter, "I hae sworn by my G.o.d, my Jeanie" (p. 17 of this volume), would still be regarded by many people as profane.

The case was the very opposite with the Greeks. Every joy, every sorrow, was traced to the G.o.ds. They almost never opened their lips without an allusion to their divinities. They sang their praises in their processions and in all their public ceremonials. Wine was a gift from a kind and beneficent G.o.d, to cheer their hearts and soothe the sorrows of life. And they delighted in invoking his presence, in celebrating his adventures, and in using moderately and piously the blessings which he bestowed on them. Then, again, when love seized them, it was a G.o.d that had taken possession of their minds. They at once recognised a superior power, and they wors.h.i.+pped him in song with heart and soul. In fact, whatever be the subject of song, the G.o.ds are recognised as the rulers of the destinies of men, and the causes of all their joys and sorrows.

We cannot expect such a strong infusion of the supernatural in modern lays, but still we have enough of it in German songs to form a remarkable contrast to Scotch. Take any German song-book, and you will immediately come upon a recognition of a higher power as the spring of our joys, and upon an expressed desire to use them, so as to bring us nearer one another, and to make us more honest, upright, happy, and contented men. Let this one verse, taken from a song of Schiller's, in singing which a German's heart is sure to glow, suffice:--

"Joy sparkles to us from the bowl!

Behold the juice, whose golden colour To meekness melts the savage soul, And gives despair a hero's valour!

"Up, brothers! Lo, we crown the cup!

Lo, the wine flashes to the brim!

Let the bright foam spring heavenward! 'Up!'

TO THE GOOD SPIRIT--this gla.s.s to HIM!

_Chorus._

"Praised by the ever-whirling ring Of stars and tuneful seraphim-- TO THE GOOD SPIRIT--the Father-king In heaven!--this gla.s.s to Him!"[2]

We meet with the contrast in the Reformers of the respective nations--Knox and Luther. Knox, ever stern, frowning on all the amus.e.m.e.nts of the palace and the people, and indifferent to every species of poetry; Luther, often drinking his mug of ale in a tavern, making and singing his tunes and songs, and though frequently enough tormented by devils, yet still ready to throw aside the cares of life for a while, and enjoy himself in hearty intercourse with the various cla.s.ses of the people. Who would have expected the German Reformer to be the author of the couplet--

"He who loves not women, wine, and song, Will be a fool his whole life long."

And yet he was. And his songs, sacred though most of them be, have a place in German song-books to this day.

Though Scottish songs seldom refer to a Divine Being, yet they are very far from being without their n.o.ble sentiments and inspirations. On the contrary, they have frequently sustained the moral life of a man. "Who dare measure in doubt," says William Thom in his "Recollections," "the restraining influences of these very songs? To us, they were all instead of sermons.... Poets were indeed our priests. But for those, the last relict of our moral existence would have surely pa.s.sed away!"

Yet there is a marked contrast between the very aims of Scottish and Greek song-writers. The Scottish wish merely to please, and consequently never concern themselves with any of the deeper subjects of this life or the life to come. There is seldom an allusion to death, or to any of the great realities that sternly meet the gaze of a contemplative man. There may be a few exceptions in the case of pious song-writers, like Lady Nairn; but even such poets are shy of making songs the vehicle of what is serious or profound. The Greeks, on the other hand, regarding their poets as inspired, expected from them the deepest wisdom, and in fact delighted in any verse which threw light on the great mysteries of life and death. Thus it happens that the remains of the Greek lyric poets, especially the later, such as Simonides and Bacchylides, are princ.i.p.ally of a deeply moral cast. The Greeks do not seem to have had the extravagant rage which now prevails for merely figurative language. They sought for truth itself, and the man became a poet who clothed living truths in the most appropriate and expressive words.

There is a remarkable contrast between the Scotch and Greeks in their historical songs. The lyric muse sings at great epochs, because then the deepest emotions of the human heart are roused. But since, in Greece, the states were small, and every emotion thrilled through all the free citizens, there was more of determined and unanimous feeling than with us, and consequently a greater desire to see the heroic deeds of themselves or their fellows wedded to verse. And then, too, the poet did not live apart; he was one of the people, a soldier and a citizen as well as others, and animated by exactly the same feelings, though with greater rapture. This is the reason why the Greeks abounded in songs in honour of their brave. At the time of the resistance to the Persian invasion, there was no end to the encomiums and paeans. Almost every individual hero was celebrated, and these songs were made by the acknowledged masters of the lyre, such as aeschylus and Simonides. With us, great deeds have to wait their poets. Distance of time must first throw around them a poetic hue; and after the hero has sunk unnoticed into a nameless grave, the bard showers his praises on him, and his worth is universally recognised. Or if his merits are discerned before his death, song is not one of the appointed organs through which our people demand that he should be praised. If a heroic action gets its poet, the people will listen; but if it pa.s.s unsung, none will regret it. Besides, we do not discern the poetry of the present so strongly as the Greeks did. Everything with them seems to have been capable of finding its way into verse. Alcman delights in speaking of his porridge, and Alcaeus of the various implements of war which adorned his hall. The real world in which the Greeks moved had the most powerful attraction for them. This is also, in a great measure, true of the unknown poets, who have contributed so much to Scottish minstrelsy in the days of the later Stuarts. There is no squeamishness about the introduction of realities, whatever they be; and the people took delight in a mere series of names skilfully strung together, or even in an enumeration of household articles or dishes.[3]

This pleasure in the contemplation of the actual things around us, is not nearly so great in modern cultivated minds. We are continually trying to get out of ourselves, to transport ourselves to other times, and to throw ourselves into bygone scenes and characters. Hence it is that almost all our best historical songs, written in these days, have their basis in the past; and the one which moves us most powerfully, "Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled," actually carries us back to the times of Robert the Bruce.

It is rather singular that most of the Scottish songs which refer to our history, are essentially aristocratic, and favourable to the divine right of kings. The Covenanters--our true freemen--disdained the use of the poet's pen. They uttered none of their aspirations for freedom in song, and thus the Royalists had the whole field of song-writing to themselves. Such was the state of matters until Burns rose from amidst the people, and sang in his own grand way of the inherent dignity of man as man, and of the rights of labour. It is one of the frequent contradictions which we see in human nature, that the very same people who sing "A Man's a Man for a' that," and "Scots wha hae," mourn over the unfortunate fate of Bonnie Prince Charlie, and lament his disasters, as if his succession to the throne of Scotland would have been a blessing. Notwithstanding, however, what Burns has done, Scotland is still deficient in songs embodying her ardent love of freedom. Liberty and her blessings are still unsung. It was not so in Greece, especially in Athens. The whole city echoed with hymns in its praise, and the people wiled away their leisure in making little chants on the men who they fancied had given the death-blow to tyranny. The scolia of Callistratus, beginning, "I'll wreathe my sword in myrtle bow," are well known.

Few of the patriotic songs of the Greeks are extant, and it is probable that they were not so numerous as ours. Inst.i.tutions had a more powerful hold on them than localities. They were proud of themselves as Greeks, and of their traditions; but wherever they wandered, they carried Greece with them, for they were part of Greece themselves. Thus we may account for the absence of Greek songs expressive of longing for their native land, and of attachment to their native soil. We, on the other hand, have very many patriotic songs, full of that warm enthusiasm which every Scotsman justly feels for his country, and containing frequently a much higher estimate of ourselves and our position than other nations would reckon true or fair. In these songs, we are exceedingly confined in our sympathies. The nationality is stronger than the humanity. We have no such songs as the German, "Was ist des Deutschen Vaterland?"

Perhaps there is no point in which the Greeks contrast with the Scotch and all moderns more strikingly than in their mode of describing nature.

This contrast holds good only between the cultivated Greek and the cultivated modern; for the cultivated Greek and the uncultivated Scotsman are one in this respect. Perhaps we should state it most correctly, if we say that the Greek never pictures natural scenery with words--the modern often makes the attempt. There is no song like Burns's "Birks o' Aberfeldy," or even like the "Welcome to May"[4] of early Scottish poetry, in the Greek lyric poets. The Greek poet seizes one or two characteristic traits in which he himself finds pleasure; but his descriptions are not nicely shaded, minute, or calculated to bring the landscape before the mind's eye. No doubt, the Greek was led to this course by an instinct. For, first, his interest in inanimate nature was nothing as compared to his strong sympathies with man. He had not discovered that "G.o.d made the country, and man made the town." The G.o.ds, according to his notion, ruled the destinies of man, and every thought and device of man were inspirations from above. He saw infinitely more of deity in his fellow-men--in his and their pleasures, pursuits, and hopes--than in all the insentient things on the face of the earth; and consequently he clung to men. He delighted in representations of them; and in embodying his conceptions of the G.o.ds, he gave them the human form as the n.o.blest and most beautiful of all forms. Nature was merely a background exquisitely beautiful, but not to be enjoyed without the presence of man. And, secondly, though the Greeks may not have enunciated the principle, that poetry is not the art suited for picturing nature, still they probably had an instinctive feeling of its truth. Poetry, as Lessing pointed out in his Laoc.o.o.n, has the element of time in it, and is therefore inapplicable in the description of those things which, while composed of various parts, must be comprehended at one glance before the right impression is produced. Look how our modern poet goes to work! He has a fair scene before his fancy. He paints every part of it, with no reason why one part should be placed before another,--and as you read it, you have to piece each part together, as in a child's dissected map; and after you have constructed the whole out of the fragments, you have to imagine the effect. The Greek told you the effect at once,--he gave up the attempt to picture the scene in words.

But when he had to deal with any part of nature that had life or motion in it--in fact, any element of time--then he was as minute as the most thorough Wordsworthian could wish. How admirably, for instance, does Homer describe the advance of a foam-crested wave, or the rush of a lion, the swoop of an eagle, or the trail of a serpent!

The Greeks were as much gladdened by the sight of flowers as moderns.

Did they not use them continually on all festive occasions, public and private? But minuteness of detail was out of the question in poetry. The poet was not to play the painter or the naturalist. And it had not yet become the fas.h.i.+on to profess a mysterious inexpressible joy in the observation of natural scenery. Nor had men as yet retired from human society in disgust, or in search of freedom from sin, and betaken themselves to the love of pure inanimate objects instead of the love of sin-stained man. It had not yet become unlawful, as it did with the Arabs afterwards, to represent the human form in sculpture. Human nature was not looked on as so contemptible, that it would be appropriate to represent human bodies writhing under gargoyles, as in Gothic churches, or beneath pillars, as in Stirling Palace. The human form was then considered diviner than the forms of lions or flowers.

In bold personification of natural objects, the Greeks could not be easily surpa.s.sed. In reality, it was not personification with them,--it was simply the result of the ideas they had formed regarding causation.