Six Centuries of English Poetry Part 6

8. =May.= May, with the poets, is the month of gayety. The older poetry especially is full of May raptures. Chaucer says:

"For May will have no sluggardy a-night: The season p.r.i.c.keth every gentle heart, And maketh him out of his sleep to start."

9. =coronal.= A crown of flowers, a chaplet. As at the Roman banquets. On such occasions it was usual for the host to give chaplets to his guests.

Festoons of flowers were also sometimes hung over their necks and b.r.e.a.s.t.s. The chaplet, or coronal, was regarded as a cheerful ornament and symbol of festivity.

10. =the babe leaps up.= That is for joy. See the poem, "My heart leaps up," on page 46.

11. =there's a tree.= Compare this thought with that contained in the following lines:

"Only, one little sight, one plant, . . . whene'er the leaf grows there Its drop comes from my heart, that's all."

--_Browning's May and Death._

12. =pansy.= The flower of thought. From Fr. _pensee_, thought; _penser_, to think. "It probably derived its name, thought or fancy, from its fanciful appearance."--_Nares._ Another derivation of the word is from _panacea_, meaning _all-heal_, a name given by the Greeks to a plant which was popularly supposed to cure diseases and dispel sorrow. The notion that the pansy is a cure for grief is shown in its common English name, _heart's-ease_.

13. =Our birth is but a sleep.= The idea of pre-existence was a favorite one of the ancient philosophers. The doctrine of metempsychosis, a form of the same idea, was held by the ancient Egyptians and is still maintained by the Buddhists. Tennyson says:

"As old mythologies relate, Some draught of Lethe might await The slipping through from state to state.

"And if I lapsed from n.o.bler place, Some legend of a fallen race Alone might hint of my disgrace."--_Two Voices._

14. =Behold the child.= Pope gives a similar picture:

"Behold the child, by Nature's kindly law, Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw; Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight, A little louder, but as empty quite."--_Essay on Man._

When Wordsworth wrote of

"A six years' darling of a pigmy size,"

he probably had in mind Hartley Coleridge, who was then a child of that age. See his poem "To Hartley Coleridge, Six Years Old."

15. =humorous stage.= See Shakespeare's lines beginning "All the world's a stage," "As You like It," Act ii, sc. 7. The word _humorous_ has here a special sense, such as is used by Ben Jonson in his "Every Man in his Humor."

16. =best philosopher . . . mighty prophet! seer blest!= Stopford Brooke says: "These expressions taken separately have scarcely any recognizable meaning. By taking them all together, we feel rather than see that Wordsworth intended to say that the child, having lately come from a perfect existence, in which he saw truth directly, and was at home with G.o.d, retains, unknown to us, that vision;--and, because he does, is the best philosopher, since he sees at once that which we through philosophy are endeavoring to reach; is the mighty prophet, because in his actions and speech he tells unconsciously the truths he sees, but the sight of which we have lost; is more closely haunted by G.o.d, more near to the immortal life, more purely and brightly free because he half shares in the pre-existent life and glory out of which he has come."--_Theology in the English Poets._

17. =Fallings from us, vanis.h.i.+ngs.= "Fits of utter dreaminess and abstraction, when nothing material seems solid, but everything mere mist and shadow."--_Hales._

18. =Blank misgivings.= Compare Tennyson, "Two Voices":

"Moreover, something is or seems, That touches me with mystic gleams, Like glimpses of forgotten dreams;

"Of something felt, like something here; Of something done, I know not where; Such as no language may declare."

19. =The clouds that gather.= Compare these lines with the following from Wordsworth's "Excursion":

"Ah! why in age Do we revert so fondly to the walks Of childhood, but that there the soul discerns The dear memorial footsteps unimpair'd Of her own native vigor, thence can hear Reverberations and a choral song, Commingling with the incense that ascends Undaunted toward the imperishable heavens, From her own lonely altar?"

FOOTNOTES:

[44:A] The first stanza of We are Seven, said to have been written by Coleridge.

THE TWO APRIL MORNINGS.

We walked along, while bright and red Uprose the morning sun; And Matthew{1} stopped, he looked, and said, 'The will of G.o.d be done!'

A village schoolmaster was he, With hair of glittering gray; As blithe a man as you could see On a spring holiday.

And on that morning, through the gra.s.s, And by the steaming rills, We travelled merrily, to pa.s.s A day among the hills.

'Our work,' said I, 'was well begun: Then, from thy breast what thought, Beneath so beautiful a sun, So sad a sigh has brought?'

A second time did Matthew stop, And fixing still his eye Upon the eastern mountain-top, To me he made reply:

'Yon cloud with that long purple cleft Brings fresh into my mind A day like this which I have left Full thirty years behind.

And just above yon slope of corn Such colors, and no other, Were in the sky, that April morn, Of this the very brother.

With rod and line I sued the sport Which that sweet season gave, And, to the church-yard come, stopped short Beside my daughter's grave.

Nine summers had she scarcely seen, The pride of all the vale: And then she sang;--she would have been A very nightingale.

Six feet in earth my Emma lay; And yet I loved her more, For so it seemed, than till that day I e'er had loved before.

And, turning from her grave, I met, Beside the churchyard yew, A blooming girl, whose hair was wet With points of morning dew.

A basket on her head she bare; Her brow was smooth and white: To see a child so very fair, It was a pure delight!

No fountain from its rocky cave E'er tripped with foot so free; She seemed as happy as a wave That dances on the sea.

There came from me a sigh of pain Which I could ill confine; I looked at her, and looked again: And did not wish her mine!'

Matthew is in his grave, yet now, Methinks, I see him stand, As at that moment, with a bough Of wilding{2} in his hand.

NOTES.

This poem was written in 1799, and published the following year.

1. =Matthew.= This old schoolmaster is described elsewhere by Wordsworth as being "made up of several, both of his cla.s.s and men of other occupations."

2. =wilding.= A twig from a wild apple tree.

"Ten ruddy wildings in the wood I found."--_Dryden._