A LGE R N O N C H A RLE S SWINBURNE

A CRITICAL STUDY

BY E DWARD THOMAS

NEW YO RK MITCH ELL KE NNE R LE Y MCM" II

To WALTE R DE LA MARE

’

ti z r t an i . Ques ons, 0 roy al trave ller, are eas e h auswe s

- THE THREE MULLA M ULGAB S.

N O T E

T I AM very much indebted to Mr . heodore

Watts - D a nton for permission to quote from i ’ t Sw nburne s prose and poe ry in this book ,

f for and to my friend , Mr . Clif ord Bax , many consultations .

E . T .

CONTENTS

CHAPTE R PAGE I T T I C YDO . A ALAN A N AL N

II . PREPARATIONS H III . THE APPRO AC I V PO MS AND B DS . E ALLA

V OPI IO S : PROS -W ORKS . N N E B F U VI . SONGS E ORE S NRISE T R PO MS CH R T RISTI S VII . LA E E A AC E C

VIII . LATER POEMS RE SULTS TRISTR M OFLY NE I" . A O SSE THE PLAYS

ATALANTA I N CALYDO N

’ I T was the age of Browning s Dramatis Persona ’ ’ D of L andor s William Morris s efence Guenevere , ’ T of Heroic Idylls , ennyson s Idylls the King , ’ L ’ Meredith s Modern ove , Robert Buchanan s L P : L A ondon oems ongfellow , lexander Smith and Owen Meredith were great men . The The year 1 8 64 arrived . poetical atmo ” P sphere was exhausted and heavy, says rofessor “ Mackail of , like that a sultry afternoon darken f to . o ing thunder Out that stagnation broke , the ofA ta la nta all in a moment, blaze and crash in a l don . n C y It was somethi g quite new, quite unexampled . It revealed a new language in

as t . English , a new world it seemed in poe ry Two years passed , and , as an Edinburgh reviewer “ n of - says , i to the midst a well regulated and - T self respecting society , much moved by enny ’ t t son s Idylls , and al oge her sympathetic with — the misfortunes o f the blameless King j ustly appreciative of the domestic affe ction so tenderly ’ portrayed by Coventry Patmore s Angel in the 1 1 B U A . . C S W I N R N E — House appreciative also of Ata la nta in Ca ly don Mr . Swinburne charged impetuously with ” m B a lla ds of P oems his P oe s a nd . Some the a nd B a lla ds Fa ustine , including , had appeared four years earlier in the Spectator ; but the poems accumulated made a fresh and astonish ff ing e ect . The P oems a nd B a lla ds were interesting ff A ta la nta enough to o end many people . can hardly have been interesting , though it contains an interesting story which is probably revealed to the majority of readers by the argument A e o f alone . ltha a , Queen Calydon , gave birth to Meleager after dreaming that she had brought Th forth a burning brand . e Fates prophesied t t hat he should be s rong and fortunate , but should die as soon as the brand then in the fire Al ae were consumed . th a plucked out the brand t of t and ook care it . Meleager sailed away wi h

Jason and became a great warrior . But in one o f W ff to A t his ars he gave o ence r emis , who therefore afflicted Calydon with a terrible wild boar . Only after all the chiefs of Greece had it the n t t warred against was boar slai , and ha the A A t by virgin talanta , because r emis loved

. o f A her Meleager, enamoured talanta , gave o f the t the spoil boar to her , hus arousing the ’ o f T j ealousy his mother s two brethren . hese two Meleager slew because they attempted to 1 2 A T A L A N T A I N C A L Y D O N

A so take away the spoil from talanta , which moved Althma to anger and sorrow that she t fire cast the brand at leng h back again into the , and it was consumed and Meleager died ; and his mother also endured not long after for very of sorrow ; and this was his end , and the end that t hun ing . This story is obliterated by the form of a Greek drama , by abundant lyrics put into of the mouth a Greek chorus , by Greek idioms of and cast speech , and by an exuberance and individuality of language which could not always transmit instantaneously a definite meaning . B ut not one of the obscurity is incompetence, the imperfectly intelligible speech is not an imperfection : at least it persuades and insinuates itself so into the mind that perhaps not many the of of pause at end the first sentence, part the ’ Chief Huntsman s address to Artemis :

a and m t th e t a nd ta M iden , is ress of mon hs s rs th e flowe rle ss of a Now folded in fields he ven , all t t a t Goddess whom gods love wi h hreefold he r , i t t h t Be ng reble in y divided dei y, A t a a nd a a t ligh for de d men d rk hours, foo S t th e as a n d a a wif on hills morning, h nd To all things fierce a nd fleet that roar an d range

ta t t a t t a or Mor l, wi h gen ler sh f s h n snow sleep ; He a r now and help a nd lift no violent h a nd But fa vourable and fa ir a s thin e eyes bea m Hidden and shown in hea ven ; for I a ll night ’ Amid the king s hounds and th e hunting men H a ve wrought a nd worsh ipped towa rd thee ; nor sh a ll man 1 3 B U A . C S W I N R N E

See goodlier hounds or deadlier edge o f spe a rs ;

But for th e e nd t a t a a t e t , h lies unre ched y t the a a nd on th e o f th e Be ween h nds knees Gods .

The effect must always be partly that of a translation even to those who are familiar with Greek religion ; the words have a shade of the

quality inseparable from a translation , whether t for it is or is not crea ive , it is to be found in the Authorized Version of the Bible ; the

reader is a little confused and yet not unduly , when he hears of Artemis as a light for dead k - sun men and dar hours , of the fair faced that kills “ the stars and dews and dreams and de t of i sola ions the night , for it is not Engl sh thus to of ff collect four things four di erent classes , each requiring a distinct change in the meaning of P the verb which governs them all . erhaps “ the reader at first accepts hidden and shown , and even the alternative pairs , roar and range, “ ”

or . snow sleep , favourable and fair, etc , as of part the foreignness . It does not decrease . It is not absent from :

' th e of a re on t t a When hounds spring win er s r ces, The mother of months in mea dow or pla in Fills th e sh adows and windy pl a ces With lisp of lea ves and ripple of ra in And th e brown bright nightinga le amorous a a a t Is h lf ssu ged for I ylus, the ra a a nd the a For Th ci n ships foreign f ces,

The tongueless vigil a nd all th e pa in . 1 4 A T A L A N T A I N C A L Y D O N

“ nl O y, here it is apparent that the shadows and windy places may be due to rhyme at least it seems a false limiting or defining of the action of of of on the lisp leaves and ripple rain , as later ” peril o f shallow and firth is a distinction with f d finit ne s f ff insu ficient e e s o di erence . But the metre is powerful enough to overcome this ffi or to k di culty , keep it from rising ; it ma es us feel that we may go astray if we ask why the nightingale is called bright as well as brown . Later on it may be suspected that bright ’ t of is due par ly to Swinburne s need alliteration , “ partly to his love of the i sound and of bright A t ness . nyone inclined o show and expect a stiff exactingness will be shocked at finding ” ” or summer and not spring , autumn , ” i winter , remembrance, w thout — fulness and so ou in the famous lyric

Before th e beginning of yea rs There ca me to the making of man t a t of t a Time, wi h gif e rs ; Grief with a gla ss tha t ran

a t a for a Ple sure, wi h p in le ven ;

S t t at ummer, wi h flowers h fell ; a a a Remembr nce f llen from he ven, a And m dness risen from hell .

T his , however, has that appearance of precision ff e which Swinburne always a ect d , which is Nor nothing but an appearance . would he have 1 5 B U A . C . S W I N R N E

claimed that it was anything more . He was filling his verse with solemn images acceptable to that part of the human brain which is not occupied with the music of the words and the reverberation of earlier images . It may be that Time received the gift of tears instead of the glass that ran solely for the sake o f allitera tion . It would doubtless be better if it were so bu t not , nothing can be perfect from every to point of view , and this deceitful deference the pure intellect I speak of chiefly to show what ’ Swinburne s use o f the sounds and implications of words can overcome . Reverberation of sound and meaning as in Milton ’s

Ch a riot and cha rioteer lay overturned and Coleridge ’s icicles

Quietly shining to th e shining moon

a l n a f are a great part of A t a t . Scores o times words and sounds are repeated as in

Sa w t t a and it t a i wi h s r nge eyes w h s r nge l ps rejoiced, S t own a of and eeing hese mine sl in mine own , me M a de misera ble a bove a ll miseries ma de

“ for of Breath calls the rhyme death , and “ ” “ t light for nigh , with more transparent “ ” purpose than in other writing ; all demands to be repeated with a persistency that is not to

be denied . Some of the repetitions may indicate simply 1 6

A B . U . C S W I N R N E or o f both as in

A itt a nd I wa s a a nd l le since , gl d , now

a a o r sa a a I never sh ll be gl d d g in .

A A ta la nta e lready in , and still more in lat r t work , his unconscious leaning and conscious i t dev ce , some imes became a trick . A s Swinburne loved and used the qualities o f so o f light and fire , he did those other bold A la a f w t n . ta nt o s and splendid thi gs is full if , t flee , violent , splendid , furious , thunderous , t t fierce , ravenous , umul uous , tempestuous , sharp d things , of foam and win , and fire and hate , and love , hounds and horses and warriors . Meleager speaks to his mother of his father ’s “ plough share being drawn through fatal se e dland of a ” to female field and furrowing her body , beget “ ” so t . him , hat he sprang and cleft her womb When the herald describes Atalanta he says

From her white bra ced shoulder th e plumed sha fts

a a nd th e h e r R ng, bow shone from side ; and he compares Meleager to the sun that strikes the branches into leaf and bloom ; he D is a glory among men . eath for Meleager is “ ” the empty weary house which lacks beauty , “ “ ” o f swift eyes , and might hands and feet he says that there is nothing te rrible r than a ’ Th L mother s face . e Chorus sings of ove 1 8 A T A L A N T A I N C A L Y D O N

a h a ir as the n f a Thy wings m ke light in t e wi gs o dove . Thy feet a re a s wings tha t divide th e stre a m of th e se a ; h to th e a t o f a t t t t . E r h is y covering hide hee, g rmen hee Thou art swift a nd subtle an d blind a s a fla me of fire ;

t th e a t t th e t a of . Before hee l ugh er, behind hee e rs desire

“ “ The boar cried no lesser cry than thunder S and the roar ofwintering streams . o does the poet love the extreme that he makes Meleager “ k in hairie st hollow of stri e the boar the his hide . Where they flay the boar violets blossom and burn and there is a fire and light of other

flowers .

Ye t with and , fi all this fury violence and fire 18 t o f the play a delica e thing , full a refined extravagance at play with primitive and simple A t o f experiences and passions . f er a speech three pages about her murdered brothers Althma says

These dead a a t a wa to th e da I I sh ll w n l ys y die .

Perhaps she need have said nothing more but

’ '

A z , az A long with the clear, visible , and tangible things are equally noticeable the abstractions ’ of time, grief, sorrow , the holy spirit man -k home eeping days and household reverences, compassion and pity, gates barred with groan t ings manifold . No hing that moves the eye 1 9 B U A . C . S W I N R N E

or o f fi And the heart men , but nds a place .

yet all is made into music and ends in music . The : poet is the master , not his characters thus he will make Atalanta Speak of the flash of her “ own A ae swift white feet , and lth a describe “ herself and her brother as infants fl owe rwise feeding as the feeding bees at their mother ’s T breast . his comparison , if at all permissible , should have been made by the poet who might not be supposed to have witnessed it , by the woman who could not . So it will be objected . But what would have been a flaw in another one Ata la nta drama is not in , where what was necessary was to do nothing inharmonious with f A a la n a l n o t nta i do . the loveliness the title , C y S T . o too here is nothing inharmonious , , with the style ; alliteration that could have made another ludicrous is in this only a fit portion o f h f t e o . echoing balance the whole Hardly before, or k perhaps , except in lyrics , in narratives li e Th of A o e . s Eve St gnes , had words been self so so contained , much an end in themselves , little fettered to what they could suggest but t The no express . words are everything : all o f that life heroes and passionate women , seas and winds , has been subdued to the colour of the words and the music of their cadence . W here the words cannot be everything , where two characters interchange brief speeches that 20 A T A L A N T A I N C A L Y D O N

no r allow ly ical development , they deserve the parody Of Lowell

CHORUS : Foo who te of n e his a to t . lish bi s os , f ce spi e Oun s : Who f ars his at Fat a l one da e f e, him e sh l y

Spurn.

CHORUS The G ods themse lves are pliable to Fate .

- wa OUTI S : The strong self ruler dreads no other s y . ut CHOR US Sometimes the shorte st way goes most a bo .

OUTI S A d on I ow t at ta ma set. shepher ce, kn h s rs y CHORUS : Wh t a o a a v n tar w t " y fe ch c mp ss , h i g s s i hin ’ m n OUT15 : That thou le d st sheep fits not for leading e . CHORUS : To sleep -sealed eyes the wolf-dog ba rks in vai n.

The play cannot be abridged or divided T without complete destruction . here are few separable phrases or passages in it that are not far more beautiful in their places , because the ke to to y them is only be found in the play , not Th in the human breast . e whole Should or for be read , heard , at a Sitting , the first time P to of at least . ause , let in the light every to w day , and it may seem as it did Bro ning, “ ” z a fuz of words . It is very nicely balanced e one - abov folly . It is sided and makes but ff th i a single appeal . It can su er by e n of of k trusion the world , the sound men tal or For not ing nightingales singing . it does appeal to us as men knowing aught of men or i : to night ngales experience can add nothing it , 2 1 A B U . C . S W I N R N E o r take away anything ; and tod ay it cannot

s fo r as be eriously blamed a chorus which , T o f ennyson said , abused the deity in the style the The Hebrew prophets . words in it have no rich inheritance from old usage of speech or poetry , even when they are poetic or archaic o r T f . o Biblical hey have little variety tone , being for the most part majestically mournful , V and never suddenly changing tone . ariety is ff given chiefly by the metre , and the di erences of The that are almost numberless . blank verse changes and does everything save Speak . A S o f to the lyric verse it is many forms , and each is so clear cut and SO masterful to words without Show o f tyranny that a man might suppose any words would do as well and w f H ould maintain the same joy o metre . ardly do we notice in the sweetness o f it an u n “ English phrase like imminence o f wings or i the innumerable l ly , after the opening

0 t a t too h I now , I were

a a t - floods By deep wells nd w er . Again and again it tempts us to recall the sa Opinion that the words are everything , and y that they are nothing ; certainly it matters little what exactly is meant by “ bodies of things to be in the houses o f death and o f ' It f the birth . is su ficient that words never 22 A T A L A N T A I N C A L Y D O N

impede the music , and often colour it with or or something noble, delicate, pathetic , that “ “ t - the rhy hm , as Burne Jones said , goes on with such a rush that it is enough to carry the ” world away . Swinburne could make even a line o f monosyll ables swift and leaping by using in the unaccented places negligible words , ” “ ” “ of like and , , and the , which are almost T l Silent . ennyson wrote to the poet te ling him that he envied him his wonderful rhythmical ’ T wn invention . ennyson s o had always been carefully experimental and subordinate ; in Ata lanta rhythm paramount, in rule sole and undivided .

2 3 PREPARATI ONS

W I NB URNE - 1 864 S was twenty seven years Old in , yet he had been before the public already Six Th ’ teen years . e reader of Fraser s Magazine in A 1 8 48— T ’ pril , the year after ennyson s The Princess— might have seen some verses entitled The Warning put in to the mouth of a minstrel singing to the nobles and far -descended : gentlemen of England , to this purpose

’ ’ t th e ma n t n and t Then don despise working , he s s ro g hones o to , And he would rather governed be th a n seek to govern you ; But a a at a t ma a ma d l ck of proper guid nce l s y m ke him , ’ ’ the t t a the And when bes don govern him, he ll c ll upon bad

a nd t t From whence will come confusion errible urmoil , all a th e a a the of th e And bec use l wm kers, owners soil, W a of a i a t ta t ill he r no word w rn ng me n , will ke no s ep in t ime,

Before th e groaning millions burst from sorrow into crime .

A . S . These verses , signed . C , were dated ff Of from the Carlton Club . What the e ect the 24

A S \V I N B N E . U R C .

to o o f t u s e He had sung , , Fa e that rules h re with adamantine wand , and of how

a t a t a on t A pe ce h is b sed du y, i a n d th e to t The w ll power hink , Ca n a a t a t c rry , unsc hed in be u y,

The bra ve where th e feeble sink . Little need was there to tell the world that the poet had “ learnt in suffering what he taught in song

H a rk " how th e poet Sings Whom grief is we a ring ; Like a s th e flower springs a Into full be ring .

Where a mid Old deca y Fine Skill h a s l a id it ; ’ Even so th e poet s lay His a a it woes h ve m de .

B ut T A 1 849 . his was said in pril , he had consolations . He published a poem in the same t ’ Y magazine Side by Side wi h Kingsley s east , in A 1 8 48 ’ ugust, , on Chopin s playing, and stanzas “ addressed to a wild floating symphony in 1 8 49 A March , month before had appeared this catch

Ne a r th e moon a pa le sta r clinging

a a t n H rbingers no her mor , Fe e ble spa rk to morta ls bringing a n a i Hopes d c res wi th dayl gh t born . 2 6 P R E P A R A T I O N S

a t t a F re hee well, hou moon of s dness "

Sil t t a a " en nigh , while f rewell Will th e day give grief or gla dness " ’ Who of Ada m s ra ce c an tell "

a t t of a t " F re hee well, hou moon be u y a t n su n " H il, hou glorious risi g Le t th e a t i t we k be s rong n du y, l t i t Ti l heir course, l ke hine, be run .

He could write playfully of love as in Under ” wa for the Rose, but his preference s rather the dignified reflection that marked his last contri bution 1 85 1 A T , in June, , Summer hought

U t a t t a not two a a pon h ree w ve le ves like,

Ye t are t all oak a and a ll hey le ves, derive

th e a the a a t From s me source , by s me me ns, heir

a at its e t th e t E ch h h voice, y when migh y wind ’ S o e r t as a on e t weeps hem lyre, song is heirs,

O a o h a f t t e t o . ne hymn of pr ise, Gre Lord All — When sh all we be like them when understand That if we grow upon th e topmost bough O th e at t -or so a f gre ree, be lowly pl ced a t t t th e a at its t Th we mus ouch d isy foo , O a im ne origin is ours, one , one work, f O to tie o to . ne God bless, one love bind

This poem was sufficient to prove that the “ Th author was not lowly placed . e reader might also have concluded that he was twenty in three, that he had soon afterwards fallen love with a lady sharing his admiration for In 2 7 B U A . C S W I N R N E

Memoriam , and had married and rested content and graceful

Upon the topmost bough O th a t t f e gre ree .

A lgernon Charles Swinburne, in fact , was on A 5th 1 83 born pril , 7 , in Chapel Street , Bel son of A gravia , the only dmiral Charles Henry L Swinburne and his wife ady Jane Henrietta ,

daughter o f the third earl of Ashburnham . What he meant by telling the exiled Hugo “ that he was born of exiles I do not know . From his father he had the blood of a feudal

border family , which as long ago as Edward I I had produced a man of mark in Sir Adam de ” Swinburne , says Mr . Edmund Gosse in the

Contemporary Review ; from his mother , the blood o f a loyal groom of the bedchamber to Th Charles I . e child was not long in Bel

. Sir gravia His grandfather , John Edward i Sw nburne, baronet , had a house at Capheaton , in Northumberland , where the family used to

spend half the year . His father bought East D V ene, in the Isle of Wight , between entnor d and Niton , and this house the gran father

- Shared with him for the other half year . Close D Th e to East ene , at Orchard , lived other rela k tions , whose indness the poet was afterwards The S isters to recall in dedicating to his aunt, 28 P R E P A R A T I O N S

the Lady Mary Gordon . Here and in North umberland he had , as he always remembered and repeated in his poetry ,

to t a nd th e ff to a The sun spor in cli s sc le, se a to a and t t The cl sp wres le wi h .

“ now Such joys , he said , even make child ” T and boy and man seem one . ennyson did not to of W 1 853 come the Isle ight until , but w to n to S inburne preferred think , and certai ly T . of write, about Northumberland hat tale “ two o f Balen and Balan , brethren North u mbe rland for , gave him an excuse recalling ’ his own pleasures in describing B alen s

t a t at a t a nd e The joy h lives he r hom , to t th e o to a The joy res , j y ro m, a a nd a The joy of cr gs sc urs he clomb, The ra pture of th e encountering foam a a nd a t of the Embr ced bre s ed boy, t t t The firs good s eed his knees bes rode, The first wild sound of songs that flowed a t at t and a t t at Through e rs h hrilled he r h glowed, at Fulfilled his de h with joy .

Swinburne thought of himself as a northern Tristram L oness child of earth and se a . In of y e he rej oiced to have Tristram and Iseult at Joyous G ard , because that castle might be supposed Northumbrian and he could mingle the hero with himself and the castle with his own home 29 A W . C . S I N B U R N E

The grea t round girth o f goodly wall tha t Showed ' Where fo r o n e clea r sweet sea son s length should be

a o f t t to t a i a nd Their pl ce s reng h res in , f n free , th e t t a i o f the By u mos m rg n loud lone se a .

’ The t poe shared his heroine , Mary Stuart s “ she : t I longing , when cried O hat were now " to o in saddle He shared with her , , her pre o f ference the moors , where the wind and sun make madder mirth by midsummer, to the r smoother south . Reginald in The S iste s makes the same comparison , saying that even with o ut the streams the north would be sweeter, that even with the northern streams the south “ ” o ur Th could not match borders . e youthful Swinburne bound together the pleasures o f se a riding , the moor and the , in days which he afterwards revived for the dedication of his third series o f P oems a nd B a lla ds

a a nd t a D ys when I rode by moors s re ms , t a t Reining my rhymes in o buoy n order .

He was a fearless rider , a fearless climber . He climbed Culver Cliff in the Isle of W ight at k a great ris , to prove his nerve , and his picture “ in Tristra m o f the birds on some straight ’ ro ckS ledge ,

S till as fa ir sh a pes fixed on some wondrous wa ll Of minster a isle or Cloister-close or b a ll

t migh be a memory gained from such a climb . 30 P R E P A R A T I O N S

Riding and climbing were good , and very of The good , but swimming was best all . north might be better than the south : the se a was

always the se a . In after years he wrote many se a one it poems about the and hardly without . The se a not was and the earth , he said , his

mother . Sometimes he coupled with it the The G ar den C mo wind , hailing them , as in of y

doce :

S e a an d t i a n d a a t air , brigh w nd , he ven of rden , More dea r th a n a ll things ea rth -born O to me ’ t a t a own i se a Mo her more de r h n love s long ng, , ’ M t a a re ai ore h n love s eyes , f r .

“ Sometimes he worshipped the sun , O sun that we see to be God bu t it was in the sea For that he did so . a beautiful or a terrible to comparison he had usually to go the sea, and to having gone there seemed forget, certainly : made others forget, why he had gone as when , ’ “ for example , he says that Blake s verse pauses

and musters , and falls always as a wave does , t of wi h the same patience gathering form, and of rounded glory springing curve , and Sharp , sweet flash of dishevelled and flickering foam as sun t it curls over, Showing the through its sof heaving Side in veins of gold that inscribe and j ewels of green that inlay the quivering and or of sundering Skirt veil thinner water, throw 31 A . C . S W I N B U R N E ing upon the tremulous space o f narrowing sea of t in front , like a reflection lif ed and vibrating h t e of its . hair , windy shadow shaken spray A fanciful critic has put down the faulty ’ “ lengthiness of Swinburne s poems to a sea “ obsession , saying that his major forces and t M a r his high crea ive impulse have , Since y S tua rt , been mainly devoted to the splendidly impossible feat o f providing continual lyrical change for the most monotonous theme in exist T ence . His ristram Shared his delight , leaping ’ “ towards the sea s breast with a cry of love as toward a mother ’s where his head might rest ” his M arina Fa liero at the last hour desired “ ’ “ perchance but a boy s wish -to set sail and ” a A S die at se . a boy the poet earned the name of Seagull , which he seems to recall in the poem To a S ea -mew

W had t hen I wings, my bro her, Such wings were mine a s thine

This was in 1 88 6 yet he ended

e Ah , well w re I for ever, ' t a t Would s thou ch nge lives wi h me .

W hen he was a se a - gull he was writing those ’ serious poems in Fraser s Magazine . Reading became a pleasure to him not unworthy to be t ranked wi h swimming and riding . He had 32

A . C S W I N B U R N E and giving in at the Sight o f the hero was one e n which he never lost , but it may have been ’ c o u ra e d g and defined by Carlyle s Heroes . For D Carlyle he did admire at first . ickens n he admired from first to last , readi g Bleak

House in its serial form while he was at Eton . Except in cases o f physical disobedience pro bably the only curb to his freedom was the tradition of his class . But it is said that his mother asked him not to read Byron till he was - : twenty one if he literally obeyed her, as is said , he gave a fresh proof that the like prohibitions are powerless except as direct incentives to dis The of obey the spirit . religion his family was presumably that o f his class ; it either produced ’ o r l could not prevent an atheism like Shel ey s , but it encouraged a study o f the Bible which afterwards served him in helping Jowett to of make a selection for the reading children , and to draw from his collaborator a cordial compliment on his “ thorough familiarity with ”

of . sundry parts the sacred text It left him , it as helped to make him , such that one who “ knew him all through his life said : I never met with a character more thoroughly loyal , chivalrous and— though some of his utterances it— - may seem to contradict reverent minded .

e His r verence for the aged and for parents , women and little children was unlike any other 34 P R E P A R A T I O N S

’ k For one man s that I ever new . such an “ t bo as Othello , he wro e afterwards , even a y may well think how thankfully and j oyfully he would lay down his life such a boy it seems was Swinburne himself. Until his life is written of his we can know little more home days , except that they left him free to enjoy Nature to in and literature the uttermost, and kept him to the last a happy and passionate memory of his childhood and a fond if independent regard for who those Shared it , father and mother, aunt, A cousin and Sisters . dmiral Swinburne being a sailor, the poet could magnify him and at his — — death speak of him but ambiguously as cross “ ing the last of many an unsailed sea in o A S tudy (y Victor H ug o he records with fil ial ’ vanity or egotism his father s friendship in A to V youth with dmiral Canaris, whom ictor “ w Hugo addressed t o glorious poems . While har lotte B ronte not he was writing C , long before of not the death his father , he could but use as an illustration the landscape by Crome hanging k in the house where he wor ed , which he had known all through the years he could remember . Five years at Eton would appear not to have r interrupted o much aided his development , u nless they helped to make him a scholar . - bo Since he had been until then a home bred y, and was neither an athlete nor an ordinary 35 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

it amusing person , is possible that he enjoyed his schooldays chiefly in retrospect . Whether or was not , he hard pressed for matter when he “ 1 89 1 E ton : An Ode or the came , in , to write f Fou r H u ndred a nd Fiftiet/t A nniversa ry of the Founda tion of tlzc Colleg e he had to drag in the o f Shelley , to remark that reaches the river t still Shine , and to sugges that in another four hundred and fifty years haply here Shall Eton ’s ” record be what England finds it yet . But he f was a good enough Etonian to rejoice , a ter ’ o ut o f copying some mistaken Greek Shelley s , that Shelley was clear of Eton when he com mitt d e this verse . Swinburne himself mastered and obeyed Greek scholarship to admiration .

He delighted in language . Once at Eton he offered for an exercise a set of verses in Galli T ’ ambies , the metre Of ennyson s Boadicea , with tragic consequences , for they were rejected by “ th t The e master as no me re at all . young v e rsifie r and lover o f poetry was not to be dis cou raged by a schoolmaster : he was more likely to be impressed by his first meeting with a poet in his early school days , for though the poet was only Rogers he showed “ gracious and ” cordial kindness to the small Etonian . But he had already met in the spirit “ the Spiritual sovereign o f the nineteenth century “ greater than all other poets of his time to 36 " P R E P A R A T I O N S gether the greatest man since Shakespeare — V ictor Hugo , his lord and master . He was afterwards to speak of himself as one of those who from childhood had fostered and fortified —“ whatever of good was born in them all of capacity spiritual work , all seed of human sympathy, all powers Of hope and faith , all passions and aspirations found loyal to the service Of duty and love —with “ the bread ’ of his deathless word and the wine of Hugo s how t immortal song . H e was to recall of en he had chanted or shouted or otherwise de ’ claimed Hugo s Gastibelz a on horseback or in the se a in holiday time :

’ Ga stibe lz a a la a a , l homme c r bine Ch anta it a insi ’ Que lqu un a -t-il connu dOna S abine " ’ ’ Que lqu un d ici P a z a t z v illa e ois l la t a D nse , ch n e , g nui g gne t a Le mon F lou . Le vent qui vient a travers 1a montagne a Me rendr fou .

“ He recalled how its beauty had reduced his own ambition to a sort of rapturous and adoring ” despair, and gave him a new delight in the V sense that there is always ictor Hugo , living t bow t or o to o . dead , look up and down He had still further to recall the paternal good ” ness of Hugo in vouchsafing to take notice of 37 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

one of his early “ crude and puerile attempts to render some tribute o f thanks for the gifts ” f was f o his genius . He to use first o all as a comparison for Hugo one of the sublimest o f scenes his life , a night scene in the Channel , o f k o f for ed and Sheet lightning , moonlight and phosphoric fire on the waters together “ Artemis watching with a serene Splendour of scorn the battle of Titans and the revel of sum nymphs , from her stainless and Olympian of f T mit divine indif erent light . his was the Cha nnel Passag e of 1 8 55 which gave the title and ’ a subject to Swinburne s last book of poems . The scene was used a third time in A S tu dy (J Sha kes ea re e not p , becaus he could forbear saying that the painter of the storm in Pericles must have Shared the adventure and relished the ” of rapture such an hour . Except that he was kn of sailing from Ostend , I ow nothing the P travel which this crossing concluded . robably it was during the period between Eton and or Oxford , when Swinburne was either abroad under the tutorship o f the distinguished rumi ” o f nant Stubbs , afterwards Bishop Oxford , V O and then icar f Navestock in Essex , where the boy sometimes resided with him . 1 85 In 7 Swinburne entered Balliol College , P Oxford , as a Commoner . ater, at Brasenose,

wa s two who years younger, was thus almost his 38 P R E P A R A T I O N S

exact contemporary . William Morris had just w t t . o e t taken his degree J , nearly twen y years t af er his election to a Fellowship at Balliol , had l P f ately become Regius rofessor o Greek , only to for l pay his religious iberalism , at the sentence of o f the University, with the emoluments his f o f O fice during ten years . He became a friend ’ Swinburne s , travelled in England with him , and ’ was a guest at his father s house . Swinburne apparently did not become quite to friendly the University, though he remained sufficiently Oxonian to enjoy a laugh at certain — wise men of the east of England Cantabrigian ”

. o f Magi In spite his scholarship , he was placed only in the second class in classical

Moderations , earned no classical prizes , and never took a degree but in 1 858 he had the Taylorian f r prize o French and Italian . It is clear that he was a very great reader, especially of poetry ; even twenty years later he could not really feel that prose could be as good as verse , and he “ wrote of the spring o f 1 6 1 6 as the darkest that ever dawned upon England or the world ” All or because it killed Shakespeare . young t bold writers had his heart, whether hey were E sch lu s D lofty like y and ante and Milton , V sweet like Sappho , Catullus , illon , Coleridge , T or t Musset and ennyson , swee and lofty like M A Shelley and arlowe . fter Shakespeare and 39 A . C S W I N B U R N E

e Hugo , he most loved Sh lley and Marlowe , t t L mos venera ed andor . He chose , above all , poetry that was in some way adventurous , aspiring even to giddiness , free and yet ex quisite : whence he could never fully admire A or or W . S Spenser Keats , Byron hitman an on Older man he turned round Musset , but as a youth the poem where the Frenchman whim pered like a whipped hound over the cruel work of men who Shook the Cross and took away the Saviour seemed a genuine product of sincere and tender inspiration , though he could not look back to that period without “ an inward — smile . New English poetry by itself not to speak o f the personalities of the two living r R poets then in Oxford , his f iends ossetti and Will iam Morris— was enough to produce his “ ’ profound inattention to lectures on Aldrich s ” T ’ L ogic . ennyson s finest short poems had : appeared Maud was new and unpopular , but admired by Swinburne . Browning was known P l an Pome ranate s by his auline , Bel s d g , Sordello , the A l and plays ; rnold by his Strayed Reve ler , ’ - De Empedocles , and Scholar Gypsy . Morris s 1 85 8 fence Of Guenevere belonged to . In France ’ V Chatime nts ictor Hugo s , Contemplations , and

’ Lé De s e t Emau x e t é gende Si cles , Gau ier s Cam es , e were new . Musset and B ranger were j ust dead ( 1 857) Catullus and Marlowe and Shelley were 40

A . C S W I N B U R N E o f 1 85 7 and 1 8 58 contain both ve rse and prose t t t by Swinburne . Wri ing on the drama is s \ Ve bste r Marlowe and , he expressed his prefer “ the ence for strong , fresh minds from which stamp of a stem and glorious age was not yet outworn , to those who , like Beaumont and “ o f Fletcher , mix with the very sources poetry that faint false sweetness which enervates the mind and clogs the taste of the reader . He praised the rapid rhythm and gorgeous luxuries “ o f L Hero and eander , and the poet who did j ustice once for all to that much misused and belied thing , the purely sensuous and outward ” L ’ Side of love . He read with delight eander s the V : reply to Hero , sacred nun of enus

The rites ’ I n a t t t which Love s be u eous Empress mos deligh s , a t t Are b nque s, Doric music, midnigh revel , a a a n d a a ll t a t t e t t . Pl ys , m sks, h s ern g coun e h evil a s a i i t t she Thee holy d o do h scorn , For thou in vowing ch a s tity h a st sworn

TO a a nd a nd t rob her n me honour, hereby ’ Co mmit st a S in fa r t a worse h n perjury ,

a a a t t Even s crilege g ins her Dei y, Through regula r a nd forma l purity at Sin a nd a a To expi e which , kiss Sh ke h nds , S a as t V a uch s crifice his enus dem nds .

i “ t He bel eved that wise enjoymen , noble and

all healthy teaching , lies for in the forgotten 42 P R E P A R A T I O N S

of writings the early masters , and concluded with some original verses

Honour them now (ends my a llocution) Not a confer your degree when th e folks le ve college .

ueen Yseu lt His poem , Q , in the same number of P Undergraduate apers , Shows the influence ’ o f Morris s as yet unpublished early poems , both T ’ in style and subj ect . ennyson s Idylls did not 1 859 The appear until . poem Opens with the ’ of T Blanche fl ou r death ristram s mother,

There men found her as they sped V a t and a ery be u iful de d, h n In t e lilies white a d red .

t And beside her lying here, Found a m anchild strong a nd fa ir Lain a mong th e lilies ba re

th e t h a d And for swee look he , W n ot but sad eeping very ,

a Tristram by h is na me they b de .

’ The first and only Canto ends with Tristram s embassage to fetch Yseult

S a th e K so a and p ke ing le n cold, S at a of n he h h n me ho our old,

t th e a . Yseul queen, h ir of gold

are a an d t All her limbs f ir s rong, a is t a t and All her f ce s r igh long,

And her talk is a s a song .

And faint lines of colour stripe (As Spilt wine th a t on e Should wipe) rn r All her golden h air c o ipe . 4 3 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

Drawn like re d gold c a rs tha t s ta nd I n the yellow summer l a nd

— a i t a Arrow s tr gh her perfect h nd .

And her eyes like river- l a kes Where a gloomy glory Sh a kes

Which th e ha ppy sunset ma kes .

H e r a t a to sh ll Tris r m go bring, With a gift of some rich thing K ” Fit to free a prisoned ing .

S a a it w as As ir M rk s id , done ’ se t th e sun And ere morrow s ,

Tristra m the good knight was gone .

t to a a For h Irel nd b de he come, t a th e se a a For h cross grey fo m ,

All to bring Queen Yseul t home .

The next number proved that Swinburne had “ ” not surrendered the merry madness of w ueen Yseu lt for youth to rite Q , it contained ’ a review of the imaginary Monomaniac s Tragedy and Other Poems of Ernest VVhel f “ o : A . drake , author Eve Mystery Eve , ‘ says the reviewer , was anatomized with a bitter and severe delight by all the critics who noticed it with the exception (we believe) of

Mr . Wheldrake himself. He quotes short passages to Show Belial blaspheming and dwell “ ” “ on t ing unbecoming opics , like wine of dishevelled tresses , globed sapphires t liquescent eyes , warmed wi h prenatal influx ” “ of v in rich love, luscious sweetnesses of 4 4 P R E P A R A T I O N S

- The of tage tinctured raiment . hero the ’ T who Monomaniac s ragedy , is engaged in A T ” writing Iscariot ragedy , has broken into his brother ’s house and wrung a nephew ’s neck in order to gain experience of the feelings of thieves and murderers . It cannot be complained out that the fun is long drawn , when the same ’ Short review gives as a Specimen of W heldrake s writing a poem on L ouis Napoleon which Swin burne trusts will atone in imperial circles for ’ Hugo s Chatime nts He stands upon a rock tha t cleaves th e sheath Of blue se a like a sword of upwa rd foa m Along the washing wa ste flows far beneath at f A pa lpit ion o senescent storm . th e t a t of r at He, Le he n pilo g im de h , Utt fits a t t a t ers by very po en bre h .

is th e a of th e a He pex focussed ges , The crown of a ll those labouring powers th at wa rm ’

a t h ot a a . E r h s red core, when scori c sorrow r ges — He is th e breath Titanic th e supreme

Development o f some presol ar dre a m . O t at a t " not wls, dogs , h bellow him is he More strong than ye " H is intermittent love

a f t a k h The me sure o your wre ched h te eeps ot . a re — for a Ye below him he is bove . “ At least this review seems to foretell Swin ’ “ ” own on burne s poems unbecoming topics , the malicious hoaxing irony of his replies to t ’ Rober Buchanan s pseudonymous attack , his much furious and scornful abuse of Napoleon L the ittle . 45 A . N . C S W I N B U R E Swinburne had gone up to Oxford with a very complete Republicanism founded on the words o f P L lutarch and Milton , Shelley, andor, and ’ Mazzini and Orsin i s attempt on Louis Napoleon is said to have moved him to uphold “ the virtue of tyrannicide in public . He has recorded how as a freshman in the fifth or Sixth ’ “ year o f Louis Napoleon s empire of cutpurses and cut -throats he had been smiled on tolerantly by his elders for believing in the principles and teaching of men who ventured to believe in the f The of realization o Italian unity . Society of r the Friends Italy had j ust been econstituted , L one of and Walter Savage andor was them .

England was disturbed , chiefly through the agitation of Mazzini , Garibaldi , and Kossuth , n by a considerable feeli g for Italian unity , against A ’ ustria ; but , like Swinburne s Oxford audience, Carlyle was impatient with Mazzini ’s Republi ” “ P ” “ canism , his rogress , and other Rousseau T fanaticisms . o Swinburne the movement for Italian unity was like the movements celebrated L by Shelley in the Ode to iberty , the Ode to P ’ Naples , and Hellas . hrases like Mazzini s “ P ” “ P God and the eople , God , the eople , L L of sum ove and iberty , the grand style his “ the God mons to a task like tasks of , the of creation of a people , his vision the future “ its and the people rising in maj esty , brothers 4 6 P R E P A R A T I O N S

t one o f one in one fai h , bond equality and love, ideal of citizen Virtue that ever grows in beauty ” “ no and might , his clear cry that there can be moderation between good and evil , truth and — error, progress and reaction these words came ’ ’ to unite in Swinburne s heart with Shelley s :

t t a a t i And hou, los P r dise of h s divine And glorious world thou flowery wilderness Thou isla nd of eternity " thou Shrine ati t it Where Desol on , clo hed w h loveliness W th e t t t 0 ta orships hing hou wer I ly, Gather thy blood into thy he a rt ; repress

The bea sts who ma ke their dens thy s acred p ala ces . Swinburne could spend his fie rie st intellectual emotions on the Italian r isorgimento without throwing them away . Enthusiasm for a genuine social movement never yet failed to be repaid , if only with increase o f enthusiasm ; to S win burne it gave a material that could arouse and A match his swiftest and lordliest measures . fter his Visit to Italy in 1 864 he called her “ my second mother cou ntry . of His first book , published in the year his 1 8 60 t leaving Oxford , , had , however, li tle enough e of liberty and republicanism . It consist d of two — The u een lll other plays one, Q , ending in t the Massacre of Bar holomew , and having for I " its characters Catherine de Medici , Charles of e France, Henry of Navarr , Catholic and

- Of- Huguenot nobles , and certain maids honour ; 47 A . . C S W I N B U R N E the R osa mond o f other, , depicting the last days the love betwe en Henry 11 o f England and fair

Rosamond . Both are distinguished and marred too o f t by a curious Elizabethanism s yle , as where King Charles says in The Queen M other

O r now t t a t a u a , his gold h m kes me p king ,

a i t a nd a o f t This pprehens ve no e m rk ime, ’ i tok e n d t i -t t t Th s kingdom , h s well es ed wor h , Wherein my brows exul t a n d a re begirt

t th e a a n d of i Wi h br ve sum sense kingl ness , To ha ve this melted from a na rrow head O on th e a i a t r broken b re d sfe ured brows,

’ And marr d 1 the very fe a ture and fa i r pla ce — Where it looked nobly were this no Shame to us

co Sometimes the py is admirable , sometimes i obscure . Browning was a better nfluence , lead ing the young poet to lines like those spoken by Rosamond

Who ca lls it Spring " S t t a at an imply his win er pl ys red d green .

C a t t sa " le n whi e no colour for me , did hey y I never loved whi te roses much ; b ut see How th e win d drenches the low lime - bra nches

t a i i th e a t a Wi h Sh ken s lver n r inies le ves .

t t . Mere win er, win er

“ He adopts even the Browningesque suppose o u t y , in a passage where he akes leave to use almost more than the most Elizabethan licence with lines like

t t a a a t a one . Los me my soul wi h m sk , mos ungr cious 48

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

o f white . She tells the lu ng that She could l “ ki l him here between the eyes , rather than lose his face to touch and his hair to twist curls in : She reminds him Of how he bit her above D “ the Shoulder. uring the massacre twenty with sweet laughin g mouths gathered about a “ corpse to abuse it with fl e e rs and gibes that T made the murderer merry . heir blood , says a noble :

Their blood is a pt to heats so muta ble As in thei r softer bodies overgrow t o f t a and The emper swee re son , confound b ut t All order heir blood .

’ “ Y t old olande , wi h an man s brain in her most one supple body , is , thinks Catherine , who will ” not n wry her mouth on tasti g blood . Charles practised as a boy to “ pinch out life by nips in ’ of some Sick beast , likes the smell a man s “ ” D blood : it stings and makes one weep . enise t alone is pitiful , telling her lover tha the body o f the worst man is compounded of love and “ ’ pain , like himself, and was worth God s time to fin ish . The u R osa mon d is far less a play . In Q een fil other Catherine talks about herself and the mouth which “ has been a gracious thing for kisses to fall near in R osa mond the best passages are where Rosamond describes herself, o r where Henry or Eleanor describes Rosamond 5 0 P R E P A R A T I O N S

t . o her face Rosamond , indeed , sees herself already as the legendary beauty ; She speaks of v herself as ha ing been in turn Helen , Cressida , Guenevere before the King comes She says She to of will Sleep , in order have the sweet sleep “ hi Th on her face to touch s senses with . e t of the resul is a languid , luxurious , impression “ ” fair fool with her soft shameful mouth , and “ the reader agrees with Bouchard that being t A o . s fair, a woman is worth pains see the e Rosamond is amorous and gentle , Que n to is amorous and cruel , loving well feel pain to and inflict it on the Shrinking hated mistress . Cruelty and amorousness are mixed also in ’ the A t t boy rthur s s ory , how he thrus himself through the lattice to see a woman with a white, smooth neck and wonderful red mouth , and how the thought of her made him Shake in sleep ; but his master Hugh beat him for it — with a switch like a beehive let loose he could touch separately the twelve prints of “ P m the Sharp , small suckers erhaps Swi burn e had become interested in the birch at Eton : that he was interested is quite clear ’ from the frequent mention of it in L ove s Cr oss u rrents — C , where the boy Reginald afterwards ’ a writer of verse very much like Swinburne s “ relished the subject of fl agellation as few men W ” relish rare ine . 5 1 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

The effect of R osa mond is more like that of The o f S t A such a narrative as Eve . gnes than ff o f a play . It is stu ed with the pleasantness and pitifulness of love among people who seem to have nothing to do but to love , unless it be to hate . But it is love , too , which the lovers sin know as , though Rosamond regards her “ beauty as part o f the perfect witness o f the world , how good it is .

I th at ha ve held a la nd between twin lips And turned l arge Engla nd to a little kiss t not of as t t God hinks me con emp ible .

The poet who made her thought not of her one o f as contemptible, for evidently he was ’ own k love s lovers , loving it for its sa e and because it gives the keenest relish to all things Th in Nature and men and women . e book is rich enough in the luxury of love to stop any t of complain against the form drama , but it can hardly have foretold dramatic success . It is a choice exercise in English , French , and F r L . o atin , for those that can enj oy such the rest , it seldom misses the sweetness of the song o f Constance :

S t ’ I t wee , for God s love bid you kiss righ close O t a nd a ou se e n mou h cheek , bec use y my rose Has died th at got no kisses of th e ra in ; S I to t t t o will sing swee en my swee mou h ,

O a t t a i to t S will I br id my hickes h r smoo h , — And then I need not c all you love a ga in . 5 2 P R E P A R A T I O N S

The blank verse goes on and on with little of purpose but gathering sweets , and the rewards T the gathering are undeniable . hey were extra

in f - - ordinary a man o twenty two or twenty three . The performance might surprise any but the ’ A poet s friends . mong them his reputation as a poet and a brilliant uncontrolled human being was exceptional . He had become so worship ping a disciple of Dante Rossetti that Burne : Now Jones said we were four in company , not three, Morris being the other Courteous , ff a ectionate , and unsuspicious , he was faithful ” beyond most people to those he really loved . Thus was deepened his “ lifelong delight in the of own k forces an art which is not my , quic ened by the intercourse of many years with eminent

. saw artists He continually these men , going even three times a day to Burne -J ones and often taking poems to repeat . He was a noticeable small man with a “ glorious abundance “ “ ” of fiery or reddish yellow or orange hair and blue - grey or clear green eyes softened n by thick brown lashes . While he was repeati g poetry his eyes were lifted in a rapt unconscious ” on gaze , his head hung one side , his body

- Shook , his high pitched voice expressed the “ utmost fervour and excitement , and in the concentrated emphasis of his Slow utterance he D achieved something like a elphic ecstasy , the 53 A W . C . S I N B U R N E transfiguration of the Pythia quivering on her t The o f ripod . halo hair was sometimes “ ” gravely or waggishly waved at the c om “ pany . He might also jump about the room in a manner somewhat embarrassing to the listener . He was always restless , never standing still ; his walk was turned into a t dance ; even Sit ing , he moved his wrists , per i haps his feet also , as if he were keep ng time “ with some inner rhythm o f excitement .

Reciting or not, he was continually subj ect to a “ ” “ o f violent elevation Spirits , yet the extra ordinary spasmodic action accompanying his paroxysms o f excitement seemed to produce no “ fatigue , but changed into a graceful and smiling calm his eyes fixed in a sort o f trance, and only his lips shifting and Shivering a ” little , without a sound .

His conversation , rapid and yet not voluble , was very splendid in quality , always vigorous , t n Of en violent and often biti g , but always sparing an absent friend . It was made the W more remarkable by his memory . hen Rossetti buried his poems with his wife ’ Swinburne s memory kept many of them alive . In an account o f an evening at Fryston with Lord Houghton it has be en recorded how the young poet, the only unknown in the party , made an impression 5 4 P R E P A R A T I O N S

He was t t the of n Silen ill middle din er , when some a d a t a t t S o r body r ise li er ry ques ion , ouching ophocles S a a an and his t s h kespe re . Then he beg ; from firs word his a H t hearers knew they had to do with a m ster . os and u t a d u to and d t g es s pl ye p him , he hel hem spell

ound. W e d n d ta d and b i e , we smoked , he lke , we were ” e t ra a ff t the t r and at t n h lled , s ys , in e ec , wri e ; midnigh I r m r we all a to o eme be dj ourned my r om , where we sat a bout on chairs or on the be d listening while this a maz ing yo ung poet poured o ut page a fter page of the E liz a bethans and pa ge a fte r pa ge of his o wn unpu blished v r t two th e n e se ill in morni g.

To one who was not overwhelmed by him he t t appeared short , wi h shoulders tha sloped ’ more than a woman s , from which rose a long , “ ne ck but not (it is also said) a slender , sur ” mounted by an enormous head with to o small Th ou t of a chin . e cranium was all proportion t f t h o the rest o e structure . His spine was t rigid , and though he of en bowed the heaviness of lasso a a ver a collo his head , p p , he never c onse seemed to bend his back . Except in — qu ence o f a certain physical weakness pre sumably one o f those follies of Bohemianism which are dangerous to health and life “ which probably may, in more philosophical to t days , come be accounted for and pallia ed ff t t except when su ering from his ex ernal cause , he seemed immune from all the maladies that

pursue mankind . He did not know fatigue ; 5 5 A . C . S W I N B U R N E his agility and brightness were almost me cha ni cal . I never heard him complain o f a headache or a toothache . He required very little Sleep , and occasionally when I have parted from him the ft in evening a er saying good night, he has Simply sat back in the deep sofa in his sitting t room , his lit le feet close together , his arms - k against his side , folded in his frock coat li e a

- grasshopper in its wing covers , and fallen asleep , t apparen ly for the night , before I could blow ” o ut the candles and steal forth from the doors . “ Out o f doors he was like something blown ” of before a wind , having the movements a ’ se e somnambulist . I seem to him in Camber s description of his brother Locrine :

My brother is a prince of pa ramours Eyes coloured like th e Springtide se a a nd h a ir Bright a s with fire o f sun dawn In his circle he was already known by many o f the poems afterwards printed in P oems a nd B a lla ds t ; for hese , he said , in the dedication Of

1 865 . , came from seven years of his life

’ t of a t The younges were born boy s p s ime , t a r The eldes e young .

The t 1 862 Several appeared in Specta or in , Fa ustino o f Fa ustine including , forty verses — D temp ora muta ntur down to the last . uring that winter he recited the L a us Veneris on the 5 6

A . C S W I N B U R N E

We a a a and a a h ve gone by m ny l nds, m ny grievous w ys,

e t a no t t a a ll t a And y h ve we found his Ple sure hese d ys . S t a t i a ll a t a ome imes ligh en ng bou her h ve we seen , A gli ttering o f her ga rments a mong the fie lde s green ; S t th e a o f a t at t t ome imes w ving her h ir h is righ swee ,

i t o f i o r a t A l f ing her eyel ds, shining of her fee , O r ei ther in sleeping or in wa king h a ve we hea rd

t o f a t o r a o f a A rus ling r imen whispering word, O a o f a a t a t a a t a r noise ple s n w er running over w s e pl ce, Y e t a not a . h ve I beheld her, nor known her very f ce

was of He thus already a master those means , “ ” “ ” “ ” o f o f such as the frequent use a , the , , ” “ ” or k i , in , and of participial nouns li e l ght e nin g , by which the language submitted itself all o f The is to his love metre . piece purest so Swinburne, nowhere more than in the final triumph of Death :

Ala s " your kingdom and l ands " a la s " your men and their might " Ala s th e strength of your h a nds and the days of your vain delight "

a " th e t a t t on a Al s words h were Spoken , swee words plea sant tongue a " a t a t a re th e a t a t Al s your h rps h broken , h rps h were ca rven a nd s trung

a " th e t th e a " Al s ligh in your eyes, gold in your golden h ir a " a a n d th e t Al s your s yings wise, goodly hings ye were Al as " your glory " a la s " th e sound of your n a mes a mong men

to a a a nd a no t a a it . Behold is come p ss , ye sh ll sleep rise g in

t a a on a a nd t a a a Dus sh ll f ll your f ce, dus sh ll h ng in your h ir ; a t t t a a nd a Ye sh ll sleep wi hou Shif ing of pl ce, sh ll be no more a s ye were 5 8 P R E P A R A T I O N S

Ye shall never Open your mouth ye Sh a ll never lift up your hea d ; Ye sha ll look not to north or to south ; life is done ; a nd behold you are dea d " With your h and ye sha ll not threat ; with your throat ye

shall not sing .

t a t a re e t a a a t . Ye, ye h living y , ye sh ll e ch be grievous hing a a a a t Ye sh ll e ch f re underground, ye sh ll lose bo h speech a nd breath ;

W t t t a se e t t a a a nd i hou sigh ye Sh ll , wi hou sound ye Sh ll he r, a am a sh ll know I De th .

The t repeti ions , the rhetorical and Biblical to stateliness , the splendid farewells what was to splendid , are admirable enough , yet seem reveal that the effort was an exercise and an Th f V i experiment only . e archaic song o a n D : elight, in this form

I am so noble a queen

I a a t tt t h ve righ li le een,

a a t I were goodly s mi e green ,

Fresh flowers a nd red .

NO ma n so sad there is But if I will him kiss t t Wi h my good swee lips, I wis,

a He sh ll well be sped .

Whoso that will me se e a a at of He sh ll h ve gre joy me, And merry man Sha ll he be Till he be dead

this is as good as Swinburne always was at an l o d form or dialect or foreign tongue . The

power to do it is the only originality shown . 5 9 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

He had already begun to write on Blake in “ 1 8 63 ; meanwhile some last word has to be ’ ” w said concerning Blake s life and death , he rites , t s ill with something o f Carlyle in his accent . T o f ie his book , with its necessary accounts p i o f tures , encouraged Sw nburne , if he had need

d . encouragement , in pictorial escription Many of his translations from pictures are as good as in possible a concentrated style, owing a good k deal to Rus in , which did not forbid Swinburne the o f rhythms , the language , or the alliteration Willia m B la ke : his verse, as for example in

Da t and V ta a o f t n e irgil , s nding in niche rif ed rock faced by ano ther cliff u p a nd down which a reptile crowd of t ar a nd on the spiri s sw ms sinks , looking down grovel ling and swine -like flocks o f M alebolge ; lying tumbled a bout the loathsome land in hateful heaps Of leprous fl and t t t t esh dishevelled deformi y , wi h limbs con or ed , a a and ta r o f a and : one cl wing n ils , s ring hor or h ir eyes u t a of the f - fig re hrown down in corner crowded cli f side, her form and fa ce dro wned in a n overflow Of ruined n ra ini g tresses .

One page in this book alone shows into what rhythms his thought ran when phrases like the following are easily to be found

W t t t a a and ta i h limbs con or ed , cl wing n ils , s ring ” o f a and horror h ir eyes . ” A v an a and mid hea ing d gla ring motion of v pour fire . 60 P R E P A R A T I O N S

The dark hard strength and swee p of its sterile d ” ri ges . W a ed a out t ur and rot of t de fire and sh b wi h s f f h i less , ” a n t the u an u of hea vily l de wi h l rid l g or hell .

’ ’ His descriptions of Rossetti s and Burne -J ones pictures in E ssays a nd S tu dies could not fail to confirm the habit and to impress his mind still ’ more deeply with Rossetti s women , such as Lilith

C ot d in o t te a e t she d a out t ou l he s f whi g rm n s , r ws hr gh a co mb the heav y mass of hair like thick spun gold to u t e t her ad a a a S e u er f lles l ng h ; he le ns b ck h lf le pily, s p b “ ” and satiate with its o wn beauty ; [co mpare Faustin e " the e e are an u t o ut o in t em or at y s l g id , wi h l ve h h e ; the sweet luxurio us mouth ha s the pati ence of pleasu re d and om t the a m e o of a on ure of fulfille c ple e , w r r p se p ssi s t d u of its deligh . The Sleepy splen o r the picture is a fit raim ent for the idea incarnate of faultless fl eshy beauty ” of ea ur unavo a and peril pl s e id ble .

Peril of pleasure unavoidable might have ’ been the last line of a sonnet in Rossetti s

manner . Swinburne must have known well ’ Rossetti s poems on pictures : we kn ow that he knew and admired that Song of the Bower which seems to point us back to Browning and on to Swinburne

S a not one da th h ll I y remember y bower, One day when all days a re on e to me " t not a nd e t h ad th e " Thinking I s irred , y power ea n Ah a a it t Y r ing, God, if g in migh be 6 1 A W . C . S I N B U R N E

a a a a a on t Pe ce , pe ce such sm ll l mp illumes, his high

wa y, S o t t o f t dimly so few s eps in fron my fee ,

a Ye t shows me th a t her wa y is pa rted from my w y. Ou t o f t i t a t a t a ma sigh , beyond l gh , wh go l y we meet "

If he needed incitement to a Biblical accent, ” of The D he found it in the picture Card ealer, and something else which he absorbed and changed :

' W a t " t t lov st hom pl ys she wi h wi h hee , who These gems upon her h and t a t Wi h me, who se rch her secre brows ’ ' i l bl r b a n t a l e ss d o n d . W h men ,

We a t t a nd pl y oge her , She we, Within a va in stra nge land :

a t t a n A l nd wi hou y order, Day even as night (one s a i th) Where who lieth down a riseth not Nor th e sleeper a wak e ne th A l and of d arkness a s da rkness i tself th e a o f at And of Sh dow de h .

Wh at be her c a rds yo u a sk " Even these

a t t a t t b u t a The he r , h do h cr ve a th e a More, h ving fed ; di mond , Skilled to ma ke b ase seem bra ve ;

t th e a The club, for smi ing in d rk ; a to i a a The sp de, d g gr ve .

T r hough Mor is was no painter , the influence of n dre ami his poetry , the mi gled Violence and 6 2 P R E P A R A T I O N S

of of ness life in the land his early poems ,

rather , that arras

Where th e wind se t th e silken kings asway

not of could but second the influence painting . The young poet might be expected to se e living men and women

a sa d and and t - a M de by dew wind, ree b rred moon,

a a In Av lon sleep, th e i and th e Among popp es yellow flowers .

“ ’ If the ladies names bite verily like steel , and massier things weigh more light in “ that

half sleep , half strife (strange Sleep , strange

strife) that men call living , yet sometimes might be heard a voice crying :

W at t th e h e lmit- t hen you c ch his eyes hrough Sli ,

S to th e t t out a t i a werve lef , hen h s he d,

th e God of it And Lord give you joy .

’ ’ of Swinburne s memory Morris s early verses , ’ or A T at least King rthur s omb , enabled him to quote them in reviewing Jason , and he thought it would be safe to swear to his n ot t accuracy ; such verses are forget able, he said ; he found in the figures presented by them “ t the blood and breath , the shape and s ep o f ” 1 8 62 t th life . In he published a s ory in e ’ of D ea d L ove manner Morris s early romances , , 63 A . C . S W I N B U R N E where a woman falls in love with the corpse o f ’ and e her husband s murderer , brings it to lif by t her kissing , but is burnt along wi h it by the cousin who had brought her the corpse to gratify hate , not love . Swinburne ’s training among artists taught him “ to say of a poem of Baudelaire : Nothing can ” beat that as a piece of beautiful drawing . His ’ review o f Baudelaire s Fleurs du Mal is at least as interesting now for its indication of his own t T astes and opinions . aking occasion to remark that French critics seemed to have forgotten “ ’ that a poet s business is presumably to write good verses and by no means to redeem the age ” not and remould society , he did conceal the fact that in the greater part of the book Baude laire has chosen to dwell mainly upon sad and strange things— the weariness of pain and the — bitterness of pleasure the perverse happiness and wayward sorrows of exceptional people . It has the languid lurid beauty o f close and t — a m threatening wea her heavy , heated te pera

- ture, with dangerous hot house scents in it ; k o f thic Shadow cloud about it, and fire of ” P molten light . Which is very much what ater ’ was afterwards to say of Morris s early poems . ” “ on t o f It is Swinburne went , qui e clear all whining and windy lamentation there is nothing o f the blubbering and shrieking style long Since 64

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

Bro a d bracelets divide th e sha pely splendour o f her a rms ; over th e n a kedness o f her firm a nd luminous

a t t w the ne ck t a a a as o f bre s s , j us belo , here is p ssed b nd

ta He e a r u me l . r yes e f ll o f proud a nd passionless lus t a t and a a nd f er gold blood ; her h ir , close curled , seems

a to d nd a nd t a He r re dy shud er in su er divide in o sn kes . t a t a nd and a to the a s hro , full fresh , round h rd eye her

a nd a t and ta t the ea se t on bosom rms , is erec s ely , h d firm it wi thout a ny droop o r lift o f the chin ; her mouth ’ ’ t a a t t a a a and a t crueller h n iger s , colder h n sn ke s , be u iful ’ n a a She the d a a na beyo d wom n s . is e dlier Venus inc r te ;

9 A I W ORN) y er e u 96 0 10 1 KOUK a vwvv/Los‘ I 96 a fo r u pon ea rth a lso m any names might be found for

Lam a re - t a s d t now t a r her ; i r n forme , inves ed wi h fulle

a t but t O all att t not be u y , dives ed f feminine ribu es — native to the sn a ke a Lami a loveless and unassa ilable

the S t a to d a out O by ophis , re dier r in life f her lover than to fa de for his sa ke at his side ; or the Persi an

Ame stris a t the o a t on a t , w ching nly bre s s e r h more ’ bea utiful than her o wn cut Off from her rival s living

or C a t a not d bu t t n t bosom ; leop r , ying urni g serpen ’ u nder the serpent s bi te ; or that queen o f the extreme E a st who with her husband m a rked every day as it ” t o f a and u t wen by some device new wonderful cr el y .

By these fancies he prepared for his own ’ Fa ustine P on La Gio , for ater s meditation f D o . conda , for the metamorphoses orian Gray ’ ’ one or Of head which might be a boy s a girl s , “ h aving in it the delicious doubt o f ungrown so P R E P A R A T I O N S

n of beauty, pausi g at the point where the ways o loveliness divide , he says , thinking perhaps b th ’ — “ of his own and Musset s Fr ag oletta we may give it the typical strawberry flower (Frag oletta ) ” to L and leave it the oves .

This Vl sl t to Italy confirmed his love of her . “ ” Italy, like the sea , became his Mother ; She had made him , he said , before his lips could Sing ” “ - her choral souled boy priest . Siena became f A the lovely city o my love . bove all at

Fiesole , with an introduction from Monckton L on L Milnes ( ord Houghton) , he called andor, - t the Roman hearted gentleman , republican , poe , of of scholar, lover Italy, disliker Byron , who had gain ed a double crown of glory in verse and in ’ ’ prose like Milton s and no other Englishman s since , whom , henceforward , man and poet , Swinburne was to praise and re -praise and over praise continually . He asked and obtained permission to dedicate Ata lanta in Ca lydon to L o f t andor , but by the intervention dea h was to it compelled dedicate , which he did in Greek , ’ to L andor s memory, adding a memorial poem to P oems a nd B a lla ds to S tu dies in S on , and g a Song eight hundred lines long for the Ye t centenary, though five years late further indirect tributes he paid in verse from to de ification of time time, by his tyrannicide , L for andor had written a poem , with a note 67 A . . C S W I N B U R N E

’ “ P “ T from Cicero s hilippics , called yrannicide , saying Most de a r o f all th e virtues to her Sire IS Justice ; a n d mos t dea r To Justice is Tyra nnicide

Other literary influence on Swinburne , except perhaps in confirming his tendency to massive L ness in prose , andor had none ; for he was the t o f calmes , most temperate , and most motionless t ofA ta lanta poe s the author was the least calm , the most intemperate , the fullest of motion . But for many years Swinburne liked to recall L “ A how andor , Republican and theist , who had encouraged and strengthened the young

Spirit of Shelley half a century before , had done the same for another young man who aspired to Show himself a poet .

6 8 THE APPROACH

AFTER A ta lanta Swin , but in the same year, burne published another play, begun , at least , of when he was an undergraduate , in the period R sam nd h u n Bl h r L re o o and T e Q ee at e . ater vision probably made Chastela rd a far more The for is characteristic piece . style , example , marked by ways that were to prevail in it of thenceforward . Such is the repetition the long a ” sound in these lines

They sha ll not say b ut I h ad gra ce to give ’ Wh l a t wa a . e t t t Even for love s s ke y, hem ke heir y ;

’ s in many other place , and throughout Mary s ” of speech beginning, One you maidens there ; of the repetition also the same word, as here

a a at He s ys your gr ce given would sc he yourself, And little grace for such a gra ce as that

“ ” the fondness for an oft- repeated i as in

And then fa ll blind and die with Sight of it ; 69 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

and for chiming like “ lied and died and

H a ve m ade up my he a rt To h a ve no pa rt ;

o f ff repetition an idea under di erent forms , Often w o f : ith a deceptive appearance precision , as in

O t a o f da a t f swee c me sour, y c me nigh , Of long desire ca me brief delight ;

of a triumphant use nothing but monosyllables , for as many as seven lines on end in Mary ’ ” n Beaton s speech beginni g , Nay, let love wait . Throughout the play the variety and fluidity of the lines make the least speeches pleasant to read . The incom subj ect is the love , evasively and le te l Cha telard p y returned , of the poet s for Mary Stuart (whom he had followed o ut o f to his France Scotland) , and execution for the offence o r misfortune o f a second detection at ” Chaste la d b night in her bedchamber . r was e ’ “ ” one Of loved by Mary s four Maries , Mary t who his Bea on , tried to save him , and at death prayed for revenge

’ S o erish the ueen s tra itors ea but so p Q y , Perish the Queen

o f on In the third part the trilogy Mary Stuart , Mary Beaton watched the execution of the 70 T H E A P P R O A C H

of Chaste lard d Queen, the avenging , and hear ’ ’ S o Elizabeth s men cry , perish the Queen s traitors " The play tells a story of aristocratic and poetic courtship delicately, luxuriously , picturesquely , No with perfect sympathy and love of love . one else had made it superfluous by telling the in story the same way and as well . Swinburne himself could probably not at that time have told it in the same way, if as well , in direct narrative like that of Tristra m or B a len : ques tion of the dramatic form is therefore idle A s The ueen M other in Q , there are many striking encounters fitted with appropriate words ; but in R osamond t as , the charac ers talk about them selves and one and another : Mary is quite ” sure I shall die sadly some day ; She knows “ that I am beautiful and describes the battle of Corrichie and how She rode with her good men and took delight as Swinburne would The have described it , but a little more briefly . story is enriched , but even more retarded , by numerous picturesque delays of song or dance or with lyric pathetic comment . Mary takes ’ Chastelard s sword , and seeing her fingers

C a th e a t th e le r in bl de, brigh pink, Shell colour,

t w e arin it becomes dreamy and sugges s g , and Chastelard pretending to be a man , to be a 7 1 A W . C . S I N B U R N E

A woman . very pre tty book might be made o u t o f e t the pr tty , amorous , s ately , melancholy L passages . ike the poet , these men and women of t love the clear , visible world hings under the sun t at o f , wi h a certain fever thought things which are under the earth . When Mary sees her maids talking together She says

Yo u weep a nd whisper with slop ed necks a nd hea ds Like two s ick birds .

In o ne place She describes the device on a breast clasp as closely and well as Swinburne describes a picture ; she describes the dress in which She k so loo s beautiful , and notes , I am too pale to ” Chastelard so . be hot , alone in prison , sees the last sunbeam of his life in the dust as clearly as The if it were a childish memory . Scottish t ci izen , remembering a sermon against Mary and the foreigners , is equally vivid with his pic ture of Pharaoh ’s men “ beautiful with red and with red gold curling their small beards A - gag fashion , and the woman

at ot a t t t a Th g bruised bre s s in Egyp , when s r nge men S a t a t t- t t a w r from gre suns, foo burn wi h ngry soils

t t a a t C a a And s rewn wi h s nd Of g un h lde n miles, a l Poured l their love upon her . (Here Swinburne was experimenting towards the h h m l Chaste lard Aholiha of is P oe s a nd B a la ds . ) ’ will remember , even in the grave , Mary s lips , 72

A W . C . S I N B U R N E

T Chastela rd love and luxury of love . hus is like a lyric multiplied and evolved into a play . Less than in other plays do the lyrics contained o ut k on in it stand clearly , li e single ships a The se a . wide fragment ,

Aloys 1a chatela ine Voit venir de pa r S eine

' a t la a ta Thieb ul c pi ine,

is but a decoration among decorations . But Mary Beaton herself stands o u t against the she decorations almost like a song . It is that Sings the one English song

Between th e sunset a nd th e se a My love l aid h ands and lips on me ;

O t a o f da a t f swee c me sour, y c me nigh , Of long desire ca me brief delight ; a nd at t a o f t Ah love, wh hing c me hee Between th e se a -downs and th e sea " She opens the play with a French song as She Sits with the other three Maries in the T she is sad upper chamber in Holyrood . hen sad with Singing and to hold her peace , but by the end of the play her dainty sadness has grown to a full sorrow coupled with a hate . is D The ueen JVI ot/ier She like enise in Q , and ’ for shows the poet s feeling greys among scarlets , purples and greens .

74 POEMS AND BAL LADS

W HEN the l n Ata lanta k Chorus , spea ing magni ficently in spite of their conclusion that silence of God is most noble till the end , spoke as the supreme evil God and said

are a a t t a a t t O God t All we g ins hee, g ins hee, mos high, readers were confused because it sounded like the Old Testament ; Chastelar d disturbed th em because in it God undoubtedly looked small L not to k o f L P oems a nd beside ust , spea ove ; B a lla d At s made them indignant . least the poet cannot have disappointed them . They must have guessed that

All day long He used to Sit and j angle words in rhyme To suit with shakes of fa int a dulterous sound ’ a Some French lust in men s e rs .

“ In the new volume crueller than God is a for term Of comparison , God being a name the

Supreme Being of Christian or Heathen . But the “ pale Galilean also is accused and his end foretold in spite even of his power when it was 75 B A . C . S W I N U R N E ye t new the worshipper of Proserpina could for a moment cease to lament and say :

t t e t ta a ll a a " b ut t t a t not ta Wil hou y ke , G lile n hese hou sh l ke ,

a th e a a nd the aea th e a t o f the The l urel , p lms p n , bre s nymphs in th e bra ke ; ' a t ft t a a t a t t t t Bre s s more so h n dove s , h remble wi h enderer brea th a ll th e o f th e a nd all th e o And wings Loves , j y before a De th .

I n D olores the poet asks

at a 0 to t ou Wh iled us, Gods, deser y For creeds tha t refuse a nd restra in " and in L a us Veneris the knight of Venus com pares Venus with Christ :

a t art at and a . Al s, Lord, surely hou gre f ir But 10 a " , her wonderfully woven h ir D On the other hand the story Of St . orothy “ The hristmas a rol and C C , suggested by a ’ ”

of D . drawing Mr . G . Rossetti s , are faultlessly devout ; and The M asque of Queen B ersa be is a miracle play including a pageant of fair women but ending et tune dica nt la uda mus ; Aholiha/i is a chapter Of Ezekiel put almost The unchanged into verse . writer might have been a member of the Church of England , or a Catholic , though hardly a dissenter , and almost t no t cer ainly a communicant . He abused God a t L th t he might exal ove and Life . In the 76 P O E M S A N D B A L L A D S same way his lovers talk of death only because they are so much in love with life and love that they are indignant at the shortness thereof. They are protesting against the view o f that other poet 1 am but a stranger here ; Hea ven is my home Ea rth is a desert drea r ;

Heaven is my home .

S o too of to , , they speak often weariness Show the fury of life that has led to it ; and of pallor to prove how they have spent their blood ; and Of sorrow that it may be known they have o to to t tasted j y even the end ; and as sin , hey “ are monks and nuns in a shrine where a Sin is a prayer . At the end the poet could call it all a revel of rhymes . It is even more true of P oems a nd B a lla ds than of Chastelard that there is less love in it o f than love love , more passionateness than Yet passion . in another sense it is all love and all passion , pure and absolute love and passion “ that have found no object worth their con ” so out on stancy , and have poured themselves light loves , dead women , women that never “ of were alive except in books , and daughters of dreams . Few other books are as full the of learning , passing at times into pedantry , love 77 W A . C . S I N B U R N E

r k expe ience , fancy , and books have been ransac ed to store it, nor could anything but a divine a t vit lity have saved it from rancidity , pu rescence , The o f dust . vitality ascends to the height of terror, that panic terror noon which super stition d of truly discerne . In the midst it stands o f the poet , a young man an ancient border

flame ~ c oloure d family with hair, a brilliant human

- being who lived seventy two years , and for the o f z most part flourished , until he died influen a and pneumonia . H e resembles the beautiful tyrant in D olores

t a a ll a a a t When, wi h fl me round him spir n ,

St as a a - a ta ood, flushed h rp pl yer s nds, a a a t t a t The impl c ble be u iful yr n , - a at his a Rose crowned , h ving De h in h nds ; And a sound a s th e sound o f loud w a ter S t fa r t th e t of the mo e hrough fligh fires, And mixed with th e lightning o f slaughter t o f A hunder lyres . Until virtue produces a book fuller of life we ’ can only accept the poet s own label o f sin in of Nor peril blasphemy . is it inapt to recall ff one o f that Richard Je eries , the holiest Of P oems a nd B a lla ds pagans and a lover of , named one of his sweetest heroine after its women , of Felise , and seems to reflect some its ardours h in T e Story of My Heart . ffi Sin Ye t Swinburne did a x this label of . H e in it took it from the world and gloried , coup 78 P O E M S A N D B A L L A D S ling it with L ove and Time ; coupling Desire P P t t with ain , leasure, Satie y , and Ha e ; also D Now lli with Sorrow and eath . he was dwe ng “ ” on loves perverse and the raptures and roses ” “ o f vice in contrast with the lilies and languors ” o f now virtue calling sin Sweet , but brief r beyond reg et, and only a brief bitter bliss acknowledging “ all the sting and all the stain “ of long delight yet again acclaiming the ” strange great sins . Seldom is there any pure so - called pagan delight in what may afterwards t one of be j udged Sin . A time the very name “ ” Sin is given where the world gives it ; at f another the pain and the weariness , the everish o f ness , the bitterness , the faintness it are pub lishe d or , with moans laughter . He consciously of Sin L a exalts the name , as Baudelaire did Débauche et la M ort deuce aima bles filles ; L time uissa nte an crime and ady Macbeth , p and the Night of Michael Angelo

Qui tors paisabl e me nt da ns un pose étrange Tes appas fa conn es aux bouches des Tita ns and the impure woman , that blind and deaf th e o f machine, queen Sins , the bizarre goddess , the demon without pity

t a t tt Elle croi , elle s i , ce e vierge inféconde Et ta t a a la a du por n nécess ire m rche monde, Que la bea uté du corps e st un sublime don ui t t a a a le a Q de ou e inf mie rr che p rdon . 79 S W I N B U N A . C . R E

But Swinburne is more detached than Baude the laire ; his praises are lighter , and being from lips outward are less Sincere as well as more o immoderate and unqualified . In a spirit f gay and amateur perversity he fl atte rs sin with the of appellations virtue , as George Herbert gave o f T his religious poetry the unction love . here is no remorse , no repentance

Until God loosen over se a a nd la nd t and th e t t of th e t The hunder rumpe s nigh .

The lovers are bruised and regretful but unre “ penting so long as they may live and not “ of languish or feign . Even if the keen edge h in sense fore tastet S they cannot relent .

Barrenness , sterility, perversity, monstrosity , n of L cruelty , satiety , are made i to praises ove Omne a nima l ost coitum triste est and Sin . p , as t of a criticism , canno touch the wild drift the rhymes . If evil and misery have this sweetness and tumultuous force , Show me what is good t and j oyous . Civilization and Chris ianity , P England and uritanism , aristocratic breeding k and a classical education , and we now not of what , gave this man a curious knowledge bodily love and a loyal ardour , a wonderful of sweetness and mightiness words , to celebrate it as it was and as it had been . H e brought all o f one the rays life to bear upon this thing , 8 0

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

A tarah ; and it is a Shock , though a pleasant one I nterlude , suddenly to come upon the , l b ithe , bright and actual , recording the happi ness between the Singer and a woman who came when was t the a a t There some hing se son w n ed , th a a n d th e Though e w ys woods smelt sweet. This poem belongs to a class more numerous ’ n r than conspicuous in Swi burne s early poet y , R ococo S ta e L ove including , among others , , g , A M t h B r P a rt n A ima A n s a c o e i n ce . , ef g , and p They vary from the fanciful and playful to the i eleg ac , but are all Of such a kind that they might have been not remotely connected with ’ T the writer s experience . hey have in them something of Brownin g and something of

Rossetti under the influence Of Browning . T oh hey are admirably done, but they are scured by the poems of more astonishing qualities , which were possibly drawn from a o f longer fermentation the same experiences . the Into same class with them , as Showing

Swinburne comparatively pale and mild , go the narratives in the manner o f Rossetti or some t o her obvious model , and the decorative verses o f after the style Morris , and exercises , how A holiba h ever consummate, like , which could be thought pure Swinburne by one ignorant of

Ezekiel . 8 2 P O E M S A N D B A L L A D S

Some o f these lesser poems prove his ability to as idealize quite blamelessly , in the meek D or oth lines of St. y

sat t t Where She working, wi h sof bended brows, at i t a a th e a W ch ng her hre ds, mong school m idens .

to He could be blameless absurdity, as in speak ’ “ ” of . ing the maidens cold , small , quiet beds He preferred to idealize beds that were neither cold nor quiet . He himself has told us some thing Of the origin of Faustine “ Faustine is the reverie o f a man gazing on the bitter and vicious loveliness of a face as common and as cheap as the morality Of re of viewers , and dreaming past lives in which this fair face may have held a nobler or fairer station ; the imperial profile may have been ’ M ’ Faustina s , the thirsty lips a aenad s , when She to or to first learnt drink blood wine, waste the loves and win the lives of men ; through Greece and through Rome She may have passed with the same face which now comes before us dishonoured and discrowned . What ever Of merit . or demerit there may be in the t verses , the idea that gives hem such life as they have is Simple enough ; the transmigration of a Single soul doomed as though by accident to no d from the first all evil and goo , through many ages and forms , but clad always in the of fl hl Th same type e s y beauty . e chance which 8 3 A . C . S W I N B U R N E suggested to me this poem was one which may happen any day to any man—the sudden sight o f a living face which recalled the well -known likeness of another dead for centuries : in this instance the noble and faultless type Of the e lder Faustina as seen in coin and bust . Out o f the casual glimpse and sudden recollection these verses sprang . That Swinburne was ready to take a hint of this kind may be seen from the story of how a lady deceived him by playing “ Three Blind Mice as a very ancient Florentine ritornello ; for he found that “ it reflected to perfection the cruel beauty of the Medicis . He had a nature ma nifica that magnified , and taste directed his g tion towards sin and the sublimity of little known or wholly imagined evil : nor was he incapable o f deliberately flaunting vices before the incurious virtuous . As so his poems are seldom personal , they ’ ’ ’ are not real as Donne s or Byron s or Browning s ” “ t t are , though often realis ic at certain poin s . T hey are magnificent , but more than human . Bliss were indeed bitter and brief if wives and mistresses were so lithe and lascivious and so poisonous , snakes numerous , blood and foam t T so frequen in bower and brake . hey are divine rather than human , like the pictures in the "temple at Sestos 8 4 P O E M S A N D B A L L A D S

t th e in a There migh you see Gods sundry Sh pes, C tt a t t a ommi ing he dy rio s, inces s, r pes

t at at t a a t For know, h underne h his r di n floor ’ Was Da na e s tat a az t s ue in br en ower, ’ t a i t Love slyly s e ling from his s s er s bed, a t a a a To d lly wi h Id li n G nimede, for a And his love Europ bellowing loud,

And tumbling with th e ra inbow in a cloud . Nature and inanimate things are sympa thetic ; not only are the gi rdle and the hair

amorous, but the water round a woman “ A B a lla d bathing is sweet, fierce water . In of L ife the very ballad is human flesh

t a a and ta t a For h , b ll d, ke roses in bo h rms, Even till th e top rose touch thee in th e throat Where th e lea st thorn - prick h a rms ;

th - at And girdled in y golden Singing co , Come thou before my la dy and say this ’ a th a i Borgi , y gold h r s colour burns in me, Thy mouth makes beat my blood in feverish rhymes so a a s t Therefore m ny hese roses be,

Kiss me so ma ny times . it ma t Sh e Then y be, seeing how swee is, That She will stoop herself none otherwise a a a t Th n blown vine br nch do h , t t t a t on t And kiss hee wi h sof l ugh er hine eyes, d n th a l a an o t . B l d, y mou h

“ for Except the vine branch , the verse gives by itself a perfect courtly picture, dainty and joyous , as a man sometimes imagines some m utterly past mode of life to have been . Swi burne could use the same sensuous plenty upon 85 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

the something in ordinary plane of life , as in At P a rtin t t o f g , but not withou a ouch almost meanness in the absence of anything else : I n the Orcha rd ae , a not dissimilar medi val piece P not from the rovencal , is far finer , if it is the t fi . nes of all In his most characteristic work ,

’ L a us e neris The Triu m h ( Time as in V , p J , D olores o f L e D ea th , the ballads if and , he t mul iplies thoughts and images , either very

o r or clear vaguely sublime luxurious , consistent with o ne another and given continuity by the

- t . mood , and s ill more by the lovely stanza form the Only in narrative work is this continuity , logical or emotional , very definite , though the pervading unity of tone usually gives a satis factory first impression . Of confessedly decorative poems in the style of Morris he wrote very few . He preferred forms that all owed a loose combination of the the abstract and concrete , where he could A H mn to P roser multiply melodiously , as in y in H s ria A L a m nta tion e e e e . p , p , Catalogues , the fil as ue u een B ersabe A B a lla d like g of Q , and B urdens t of , and all s anza forms , the more n elaborate the better , permitti g or commanding l A L ita n repetition , ike y and the Rondels , pleased him . Every form made terms with him except blank verse , which naturally did not compel him to the clear definition , the regular 8 6 P O E M S A N D B A L L A D S pauses and slight variations o f theme necessary to produce his best poems and ye t to confine them ; even couplets were not always firm n enough in their hold o his energies . The stanza forms of the book are numerous f ld . o and very dif erent Some are , but he makes it or the old seem new by making leap , making “ it pause with long reluctant amorous delay, so that it hardly moves at all . Some are new of or unfamiliar . Even the stanza Omar , used for L aus eneris V , is transmuted , by rhyming the third lines of each pair Of quatrains , and by greater variety Of movement than Fitzgerald it th e gave . In each poem the rhythm and arrangement of rhymes give the form a richness , a clear tangibility, which must be enj oyed for its own sake if a full half of the poem is not to T be lost . hey might be as fairly indicated by t Swin their metres as their subjects, except hat ’ burne s use of metre is so individual that we “ should have to say a study in the stanza of l ” T D o ores . of , and so on his is true not only the poems of love and lust , and the confessed ex e riments p in sapphics and hendecasyllabics , but o f s poem with a more social Significance, like of L those to Hugo and the memory andor, I n Time o Order I n Time o and the songs f , f R evolution , where the poet reveals intellectual not passions . He does , like another poet, have 8 7 A . C . S W I N B U R N E to think in his metre : his mastery compels the i metre to th nk for him . Swinburne ’s style had now fully manifested itself. Some of its qualities were prominent , — especially the repetition repetition o f Single

o r vowel consonant sounds , of single words , of o f groups words , of ideas . Whether always or t Swin conscious not , hese were essentials in ’ burne s art . Some of them Obviously make for “ ” o f ur pleasantness sound , as in the repeated sound in and pearl and purple and amber on t her fee others more doubtfully , as in the “ ” use frequent of light and night and the like , ’ and the i s of Fr ag oletta

O sole desire of my delight " O sole delight of my desire " Mine eyelids a nd eyesight Feed on thee day and night f Like lips o fire .

Almost certainly unconscious were repetitions Of w like that of the image a ine press , four times used in L a us Ve neris and several times else : too Of were unconscious , , the extent the u se repeated , not merely in close connection , b u t o f of all through the book , snakes and Sin , t t sad the words li he , pale , curled , sting , s range , , t great , sof , sweet, barren , sterile, etc . , and of collocations like 8 8

A S \ I N B U R N E . V . C

Rather more than nothing perhaps is sacrificed to to e sound , but far more the n ed for a stately , t t L T a delica e , or a sublime se ting to ove , ime The and Sin . love of all lovely and pleasant things deludes to some inexcusably amplified m I t si iles . may do no harm to the praise of a woman to say that

a t a re i t Her bre s s l ke whi e birds , And a ll her gra cious words As wa ter- gra ss to herds In th e June d ays : it certainly does not : but when Demeter in A t E leusis describes herself unswaddling the infant T riptolemus ,

Unwinding cloth from c loth As w ho unhusks a n a lmond to th e white a t th e ta t And p s ures curiously purer s e,

She indulges the sense of taste inopportunely . Other similes are carried so far that the matter o f the Simile is more important in the total than what it appeared to intensify ; others merely the add to quality , not inharmonious and not quite intelligible nor asking to be wholl y under of H es eria stood , the passage , as in p

a t a a ffl a nd a t a And my he r ye rns b ed blind , moved v inly ow rd t a n d hee , moving As th e re flue nt se a weed moves in th e languid exuberant t a s re m , 90 P O E M S A N D B A L L A D S

a a s a a t a s a at F ir rose is on e r h , rose under w er in prison , Tha t stretch e s a nd swings to th e low pa ssionate pulse o f th e s a e , C th e a ir a nd th e s un b ut a i a s a t losed up from , l ve, ghos

a i re r sen,

Pa le a s th e love tha t revives a s a ghost re a risen in me .

no r Here likely reader will inqui e , far enough to t be troubled , what it is hat resembles the or rose, or that stretches and Swings , that is closed up from the air ; or object that finally the subject o f the comparison is virtually used as a comparison for the comparison . Neither perhaps should it be complained that in the same poem Death is both a person and a some thing with “ iron Sides through which hell can be seen ; that in the same poem L ove is a “ ” bloomless bower , and only lives a day ; that ” of sad there are beds full perfume and sound , and doors “ made with music and “ barred round with sighing and laughter and tears , and “ that with the tears strong souls of men are bound nor complained that very different things are frequently spoken of as if belonging to the “ ” “ “ or same class , as lips , foam , and fangs , “ ” ” serpents and cruelties , summer and per ” ” fume and pride , sand and ruin and gold , “ ” “ the treading of wine and the feet of the ” dove , spring and seed and swallow and that exact correspondence is wanting in the lines 91 A W . C . S I N B U R N E

a i a nd For re p ng folk sowing,

a t t a nd For h rves ime mowing . Where metaphor and Simile crowd they have

o f a lower scale values than common , and no attempt need be made to se e Love filling itself t with tears , girdling i self with sighing , letting its ears be filled with rumour of people sorrow ing , wearing sighs (not sighing) for a raiment , decorated with “ pains and “ many a grievous thing , and having sorrows for armlet and for how gorget and for sleeve . I do not know to it t defend , except that in prac ice and in a state o f sobriety that verse of A B a lla d of D ea th can be read with pleasure and without question . But this confusion of categories and indefinite de finitenes s of images is as common in Swin ’ sa burne s poetry , as in bad prose . He will y that a woman is “ clothed like summer with ” sweet hours , but that at the same time her eyelids are shaken and blue and filled with l sa he sorrow . He wil y also that s had a cithern strung with the subtle -coloured hair o f a dead

- lute player , the seven strings being charity , tenderness , pleasure , sorrow , sleep , and Sin , and “ t t ’ loving kindness , tha is pi y s kin and is most pitiless while of the three men with her one the is pity and another is sorrow . Who lady is is A B a llad and who my lady , and what in of L ife his soul meant in saying 9 2 P O E M S A N D B A L L A D S

This is ma rvellous ’ Seeing th e a ir s fa ce is n ot so del icate ’ Nor th e a so a t sun s gr ce gre ,

an d or a If Sin She be kin morous, remains a matter for subtle and perhaps eternal debate . Marvellous it also is that such confusion of what must be and what cannot be visualized

Should yet be harmonized by rhythm , by Sweet of of L ness words , and by the dominant ideas ove ,

. on etc , into something which the whole the mind A accepts and the spirit embraces . t the same time, not all the vagueness is good . Grey old miseries is not good ; nor is hours o f fruitful ” “ breath or lands wherein time grows the wild end of things is an inadequate description ’ of P T the scene of rometheus agony . here are ’ u e of places , too , where the poet s figurative s “ ” “ clothed and clad , from the first page to one e of the last but , is vain , as when the wav the world is said to be clad about with seas “ as with wings and also impelled of invisible ” t The ides . source may , perhaps , be found in ” the t Biblical clo hed in thunder, which is said to be a sublimity Of mistranslation . The Bible gave him the matter and language o f A L ita n of the whole y, and with Malory and Morris gave him something at least of his the of taste for monosyllables , archaism words ” ” like certes , right gladly then , begot , and 93 A . C . S W I N B U R N E o f whole poems like The M a sque of Queen B ersa b o f e . From Rossetti he took the habit rhyming waters with hers and so on ; from Baudelaire something of his Satanism and some o f his snakes ; from Hugo some of his exuberance . But these elements are seldom unduly con s icu u p o s save under a microscope . Elements peculiarly his own are far more conspicuous . L ove o f sound and especially of rhyme per suade d him to a somewhat lighter use of words than is common among great poets . Space would be wasted by examples o f words pro duce d apparently by submission to rhyme , not The one H es eria mastery over it . line in p

Shrill shrieks in o ur fa ces th e blind bla nd a ir th at was mute a s a a m iden ,

’ is enough to illustrate the poet s carelessness o f the fact that alliteration is not a virtue in itself. Since the adjective is most ready when words t are wanted he used a great number, yet withou equally great variety . He kept as it were a of harem words , to which he was constant and absolutely faithful . Some he favoured more

t t . han o hers , but he neglected none He used them more Often o ut of compliment than of ” necessity . Compare his bright fine lips with th e passages quoted by Ruskin from Shake L speare , Shelley , Suckling , and eigh Hunt . They do not belong to the same school of lan 94 P OE M S A N D B A L L A D S

’ or guage as Here hung those lips , Suckling s

r a n d on e wa s t Her lips we e red, hin

C a a a omp red with th t w s next her chin . S h ad t it ( ome bee s ung newly . )

Bright and “ fine could doubtless be applied to not lips with perfect aptness , but they are T applied so here . hey are complimentary and not descriptive . Swinburne admired brightness , and he called a woman ’s lips “ bright ” and in “ one the next stanza but a blackbird bright . “ do not su s I know what fine means , but I peet that it is not much more definite than the ” w “ A vulgar fine and his o n splendid . group “ of his epithets , as in the lost white feverish ” of limbs the drowned Sappho , has sometimes the effect of a Single epithet by a master like t ’ Keats . Many epi hets express the poet s opinions “ Of things as much as their qualities , as in mar ” “ ” “ v ellous chambers , strange weathers , keen ” D ” thin fish , mystic and sombre olores, strong ” “ of broken spirit a wave , hard glad weather , ” “ of purple blood pain , feverish weather ,

shameful scornful lips , Splendid supple ” ” sad t thighs , colour of s rong marigolds , clean ” of great time goodly fight, fair pure sword , “ ’ ” like a snake s love lithe and fierce, heavenly ” ” hair , heavenly hands , mute melancholy lust ” “ ” “ of v of hea en , fine drouth , fierce reluctance 95 A . . C S W I N B U R N E d t “ isastrous s ars , tideless dolorous midland ” ” se a t o r , fresh fetlocks , ferven oars , the four The t teen epithets applied to Dolores . epithe s in the last stanza o f A B a lla d of D ea th are all appropriate to the intention o f the poet “ “ “ “ - t nu rusted , rain ro ten , waste , late — happy and in keeping with the ideas of i fading , sighing , groaning , bow ng down , even — ing and death but are for the most part but ff indi erently fitted for their respective places , and could perhaps safely be transposed in half a t ff dozen ways wi hout a ecting the sense , though T I Shall not prove it . hat transposition would change and probably spoil the total effect there is no denying . But Swinburne has almost no magic felicity of words . He can astonish and melt but seldom t hrill , and when he does it is not by any felicity

- o f as it were God given inevitable words . He has to depend on sound and an atmosphere of words which is now and then concentrated and crystallized into an intensity o f effect which is almost magical , perhaps never quite magical . This atmosphere comes from a vocabulary very rich in words connected with objects and sensa t ions and emotions Of pleasure and beauty, i but used , as I have said , somewhat l ghtly N and even in appearance in discriminately . O poet could be poorer in brief electric phrases , 96

A W . C . S I N B U R N E

at all anything , but nothing is done inconsistent with the opening , nothing which the rashest critic would venture to call unavailing in the ff complete e ect . Single words are used in some poems , verses in others , as contributive rather than essential ; their growth is by Simple addi tion rather than evolution . Some pieces could probably lose a verse or two without mutilation Fa u in D l o r . st e or o ores any loss , for example, Felise could and would not miss many a verse , and several o f those phrases like

The sweetest n ame th at ever love a of Grew we ry ,

in which it is exceptionally rich . Who would miss a couple of queens from the crowd of A A Az u Herodias , holibah , Cleopatra , bihail , A A A bah , holah , hinoam , tarah , Semiramis , Thom ris Hesione, Chrysothemis , y , H arhas , P A Myrrha , asiphae , Sappho , Messalina , mes P Alacicl " tris , Ephrath , asithea , , Erigone Who the of could weep at loss a verse in the poems , IVa lter a va e To Victor H u o or I n .Memor o S g , y f g L a ndor 7 , which not even exaggeration can save And yet at the same time the man who would not miss Azubah or Atarah would not willingly consent to her disappearance . It was not a good thing to use simple addition very often as Shelley had done once in The Sky -Lark ; but Swinburne 9 8 P O E M S A N D B A L L A D S

I n an Orchar d I t lus A nima A nce s also wrote , y , p , The Ga rden o Pr oser ine B ore D a wn f p , and ef , where addition had no part , where English wo rds sang together as before 1 866 they had of con never done . In some the poems , and ummatel A nima A nce s s y in p , the rhyming words of own have a life their , as Of birds singing or faunS dancing .

99 O PINI ONS PROSE - WORKS

E NGLAND is said to have been troubled by the sound of Swinburne praying to Dolores to The forgive us our virtues . average English “ an man , says Edinburgh reviewer , is not easily thrown by the most potent spells into a ” state of amorous delirium ; he is anxious also t The that others should share his salva ion . n book was withdraw from sale by Moxon , but Th e taken over by Hotten . clatter, said

Swinburne at a much later day, gave him the pleasure of comparing the variously inaccurate verdicts o f the scornful or mournful censors who insisted on regarding all the studies of passion or sensation attempted or achieved in it as either confessions of positive fact or excursions of absolute fancy in the Dedicatory Epistle to the Collected P oems ( 1 904 ) he was content to say that there are photographs from life in the book and there are sketches from imagination . ” t T not He withdrew no hing . here is , he said The A ae 1 8 o n e t in then um , 77 , piece , here is not 1 00

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

” a tra ining in Gre e k li tera ture must tend to emas cula te the Studen t s o t ra ined ; a nd well may we congratul a te ourselves tha t no such proc e ss a s robbed o f a ll strength and ma nhood th e intelligence o f Milton ha s had power to ’ f B a a t a nd a impa ir the virili ty o Mr . uch n n s robus m sculine T o t a t t and fi t genius . h S rong severe gure we urn from the sexless a nd nerveless company o f shrill -voiced singers who sha re wi th Milton the curse o f enforced effeminacy ; from the pi tiful soprano notes o f such dubious crea tures a s a C a an a C d S M rlowe , Jonson , h pm , Gr y , oleri ge , helley ,

La cum semic iro comita tu a t o ur a to ndor, , we ver e rs ca tch the higher and m anlier ha rmonies o f a poet with a ll Fo r t a a a t and t . his n tur l p r s powers comple e ruly , if love o r knowledge Of ancient art a nd wisdom be the sure m ark “ of ema sculation a nd the a bsence of any tain t o f such love or any tinc ture of such knowledge ( as then in consistency it must be) the supreme Sign of perfect man

Mr. t B a a a t t hood , Rober uch n n Should be mply compe en to renew the Thirteenth labour of Hercules .

One would not be a young maid in his way t a i to For more h n blush ng come .

N t a t a s Ca a ever heless , in coun ry where ( Mr . rlyle s ys in his essay on Diderot) indecent exposure is a n o ffence

z a at f it t a a s for cogni ble police o fices , migh h ve been well him to uncover with less immodest publicity the gigantic a o n kedness f his ignorance .

For some time after this Swinburne indulged in the pleasure of harassing Buchanan , the “ t polypseudonymous lyrist and libeller , wi h prose and verse of some humour and much is hilarity . In later years he said to have called 1 02 O P I N I O N S : P R O S E -W O R K S

“ or of of . his early poems , some them , sins youth The crude mass o f popular opin ion had perhaps made him feel that he had been too much of a W or . propagandist, Satanic missionary hether or not he felt that he had been guilty of some more or less inappmpriate extravagance of ” “ expression , as in some hasty topical lines long no w afterwards , he had ish to stand at street corners beseeching all that would be saved to

- adopt a wholesale umEnglish immorality . He ’ might not obj ect to Maupassant s picture of himself as perhaps the most extravagantly r of a tistic being then upon the face the earth , a fantastic apparition , dwelling among fantastic ur pict es and incredible books , with an equally surprising friend and a monkey , adorning his dinner table with another monkey roasted . He how himself told , when he was rescued from off of drowning the coast France, he was wrapped in a sail by the fisherman and beguiled the return with declamations from the poetry of V ictor Hugo . In later years he declared at a supper party that if he could indulge his whim w he would build a castle ith seven towers , and in each of the towers daily should be enacted one of the seven deadly sins ; he enjoyed saying “ t that af er Catullus and Ovid , there was pro bably no poet “ with whose influence a pious parent or a j udicious preceptor should be so 1 03 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

anxious to imbue o r may be so confident o f ” o f imbuing the innocent mind ingenuous youth , a M B ut f s usset . he spoke in elde rly tones o the “ decay coming upon Musset which unmistak ably denotes and inevitably chastises a youth t or n or not merely passiona e idle , se sual self ff indulgent , but prurient and indi erent , callous and effeminate at once he condemned with ’ “ impatience Keats early verses as some of the most vulgar and fulsome doggerel ever whim pered by a vapid and effeminate rhymester in the sickly stage of whelphood and pronounced “ that a manful kind o f man or even a manly of - or ff sort boy, in his love making in his su ering , will not howl and snivel after such a lamentable fashion as Keats in his letters to Fanny B w ra ne . Swinburne had in fact something like the standards o f any other Englishman o f his class in most matters excepting art and beauty. Even his view of art was modified to suit these standards in the presence o f so new a phenome “ a s " or . t non ola Whitman Wha , he asked , ’ ’ when " ola s L A ssomm oir was appearing in

’ ' L a Rep u blzgu e des L ettres

W at the na o f o f a a h in me common sense , hum n re son , ’ it to u s t th e a t a t or not is , whe her u hor s priv e life be be a a for t and a t t to t a t comp r ble only , mys ic inf n ile puri y , h F a of A o f as a or St. such men M rcus Aurelius r ncis ssisi , 1 04

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

’ B ut by 1 8 87 \Vhitman s opinions were no longer sufficient to excuse his form o r his c on T scious purpose . herefore Swinburne said that “ Macpherson could at least evoke shadows mu . T ac c u Mr upper and Mr . Whitman can only The his late words . informing principle of work is not so much the negation as the con tradiction of the creative principle o f poetry . for A So much his art . s for his opinions , ’ V Mr . Whitman s enus is a Hottentot wench under the influence of cantharides and adulter

S tu dies in P r ose a nd P oetr ated rum , and in y Swinburne appealed to public taste in an “ eloquent passage beginning : If nothing that concerns the physical organism of men or o f women is common or unclean or improper for literary manipulation

In brief, Swinburne in his fiftieth year felt that Whitman , his ideas and his methods , were incompatible with fact and fancy at Eton , t P P P r . Caphea on , aphos o utney robably he was already equally admiring and “ adoring both Imogen and Cleopatra , both Blake and of P oems a nd B a lla ds Baudelaire , in the days of and his first love of Whitman , when it seemed to him that the qualities common to Blake and Whitman were so many and grave as “ to afford some ground o f reason to those who preach the transition of souls o r transfusion 1 06 O P I N I O N S : P R O S E - W O R K S of spirits . So , too , when he had had enough of Whitman and abused him with a virulence due perhaps in part to shame at his former his of P admiration , he retained detestation uri tanism from whose inherited and infectious tyranny this nation is as yet ( 1 889 ) but im ” It perfectly delivered . may be surmised also that he continued to be able to enjoy the rich ’ of J strong humour onson s Bartholomew Fair , having refused to leave the table in disgust at the coarseness of the meats and the rankness of not the sauces . He did resent Aristophanes or o f Rabelais . But Coprology or the Science “ Filth he left to Frenchmen , at a time when his patriotism had the upper hand . Moreover , he condemned Wycherley ’s Country Wife as ‘ —“ one of the disgraces of o ur literature the mere conception displays a mind so prurient and leprous , uncovers such an unfathomable of and unimaginable beastliness imagination , that in the present age he would probably have figured as a virtuous journalist and professional k f ” rebu er o poetic Vice or artistic aberration . “ Nor could he stomach the realism and oh ’ sce nit of y Shakespeare s third period , the fetid fun and rancid ribaldry of Pandarus and Thersites though he was ineligible for mem ' b e rship of a Society for the Suppression o f or or the Shakespeare Rabelais , of Homer 1 07 A . . C S W I N B U R N E

e n Bible , he could f el only repulsion on readi g t the prose portions of the four h act o f Pericles . o f t t He was glad to be rid hese hings , the only matter in Shakespeare ’s work which could be unattractive to the perceptions of any healthy ” e Nor mind d and reasonable human creature . should it be forgotten that he thought no man ever did Shakespeare better service than Bowdler , “ who made it possible to put him into the f hands o intelligent and imaginative children . These words were written thirteen years after f m n B a l t the publication o P oe s a d la ds . W i h very short intervals Swinburne probably ad “ mired healthy - minded and reasonable human creatures all the days o f his life . With aberra

t - tions , he was himself a heal hy minded and D reasonable man . He thought Charles ickens “ ” the greatest Englishman of his generation , and though his expre ssions were too easily t excessive , he was at most points in agreemen

or i with general respectable op nion , when he not o f had , as in the case Blake or Fitzgerald , t powerfully helped to crea e it, or far preceded sh it . Never a y solitary singer , he gradually or took a public national , though not a popular, t t t posi ion . He wrote pa rio ic sonnets about the

Armada and about the Boer War . Even when not a patriot he was a passionate lover of Eng o f o f land , her fields and waters , her great men , 1 08

A . C . S W I N B U R N E in the incalculable progress o f humanity since ’ ia Shakespeare s death , and he enj oyed the comparable felicity of sharing the earth with V ictor Hugo . A s to the formal religions current in his time he could seldom speak o f them with much is civility , and there no reason for doubting that he shared the feeling o f the singer of the “ H ymn to P r oserp ine about ghastly glories of f o . A saints , dead limbs gibbeted Gods buse of the deity was one of his chief poetic pleasures . Of priests he always wrote as if inspired to outgo Shelley ’s indignation at “ t o f the t though pries , the slave and the so liberticide His indignation went , in fact , far as partly to disable him from appreciating D for of ante , the ovens and cesspools whose Inferno he expressed careless contempt as being fit only for the dead and malodorous level of mediaeval faith He rej oiced to discover that the author o f Hamlet was a free -thinker “ that loftiest and most righteous title which any j ust and reasoning soul can ever deserve to ” claim . He had discovered also that Shake ae speare , as the author of Julius C sar and King

L . ear , was a republican and a socialist With but Jesus , Swinburne had no real quarrel , only

and its with the Cross worshippers , and he once t flattered Jesus by a comparison wi h Mazzini , 1 1 0 O P I N I O N S : P R O S E -W O R K S

’ and spoke of Emily Bronte s Christ-like long ff ” su ering and compassion . When he had written two sonnets on the death of L ouis The D escent int Napoleon , with the title, o “ H ell do is , and the conclusion , the g dead , his defence was that he could only have offended those to whom the name of Christ and all memories connected with it are hateful , and those to whom the name of Bonaparte and all t t memories connected wi h i are not . I belong “ to neither class he spoke with horror of the blasphemy offered to the name and memory or tradition of Christ by the men who in gratitude for the support given to the Church L by ouis Bonaparte and his empire , bestowed on the most infamous o f all public criminals the for one name , till then reserved whom they to God o f professed worship as , Saviour and ” Messiah . It had hardly been possible for

Swinburne to refuse reverence to Jesus , since one of the few formal elements in his religion

‘ i of was h s exaltation Man in place of God . This became a form to which it was seldom possible to attach a meaning , save a vague , A one . t sublime least , with all his enthusiasm , he never gave it the solemnity o f that passage of from Blake , which he quoted in his study the poet

The of God o His t worship is , hon uring gif s in other 1 1 1 A . C . S W I N B U R N E men a ccording to his genius and loving the grea test men

e t : t who o r a a t a t at God b s hose envy c lumni e gre men h e , for t no t Go d here is o her . Of lesser men or men whom he found him n self hati g he was less respectful . His enemies “ ” “ were vermin . Capital punishment for a or P parricide a poisoner, a hilip the Second ” o r the T a Napoleon hird , seemed delightfully t equitable . H e had evidently no instinc ive or or philosophic regard for human life , a very keen enjoyment of the process o f taking an eye for an eye overcame it ; for it was his opinion that an imaginary “ dealer in pro fe ssional infanticide by starvation might very properly be subj ected to vivisection without ae an sthetics , and that all manly and womanly minds not distorted or distracted by pre possessions or assumptions might rationally and laudably rejoice in the prospect of that legal V and equitable process . Even to ictor Hugo

o f e he would not give up this sense j ustic , though at a later date he preferred to say merely that it was a ' horrible notion that such “ a murderer should be knowingly allowed fo r one unnecessary hour to desecrate creation and to outrage humanity by the survival o f a mon m fi n strous and ale ce t existence . No better proof could be given of his reasonableness and healthy it is mindedness , if remembered that when not 1 1 2

A . C S W I N B U R N E

and with equal fervour . When he found in Ben Jonson the sentence

A t a t ho w a t and t ma yr n , gre migh y soever he y seem to a a nd a b ut one a t one an a cow rds slugg rds , is cre ure , im l , L he pronounced it worthy of andor , and hastened to say that such royalism as is compatible with undisguised approval of regicide or tyrannicide might not irrationally be condoned by the sternest and most rigid of republicans he e n rolled even Collins among the priests of tyran Th nicide . e kindly queens and princes who had adorned his poems with their beauties and their vices he quite forgot . Mazzini was always a bigoted republican in for t n his fight the unity of I aly , and Swi burne would probably have gone as far as Landor in acclaiming an ideal republic and abhorring a real democracy like the American ; he was content to live under a harmless hereditary sovereign and sing of a “ white republic ” that never was ’ a t on se or land . In the poe s mind freedom and republicanism had become inseparable from the so light , much loved by him , to which he had T compared them in his adulation . hey were kept fresh as well as alive by his j oyous hatred ” o f Pope Pius Iscariot and Buonaparte the A was Bastard . s a rule he content that “ a o Freedom should mean what it could , ’ cording to the reader s prejudice or capacity ; 1 1 4 O P I N I O N S : P R O S E - W O R K S

it but Carlyle and Ruskin , proposing , as seemed of - to him, obedience instead self reliance , drill i o f for nstead of devotion , force instead faith , ’ to the world s redemption, roused him a tract in 1 8 66 O L iber t a nd L o a lt f y y y, privately printed 1 909 in , with notes by Mr . Edmund Gosse . He accused Carlyle of a doctrine of utter passivity L of . and absolute dejection oyalty, he said , was a different thing ; wherever there is a grain of loyalty there is a glimpse of freedom if we give up the freedom of choosing between love and hate we give up loyalty . He ended by asking : What virtue can there be in giving what we have no choice but to give " in yielding that which we have neither might nor right to ” “ ” withhold " The law of the love of liberty continued to be for him something beyond all human laws of mere obedience It was with Swinburne chiefly a question of personal re ligion : should he worship the dark goddess or L 7 Obedience, the bright iberty It had the “ advantage of suggesting to him as the only two destinations appropriate for the close of a ’ r rogue s career a gibbet o a throne . It could not seriously interfere with his mainly inherited “ ” notions of what was manly and what was

womanly . Swinburne ’s judgments are less interesting than his tastes , even in the arts . His judgments 1 l 5 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

t t were of en jus , his reasons for them exquisite , but too often he showed how personal a matter t t e t t li erary cri icism was to him , y withou giving up the exc e ssive j udicial pomps ; far too often he could not praise one man without damning t T to o u se ano her . herefore , seldom could he \ the power which enabled him to distinguish the perfection of the execution in The Ancient “ M n not ari er, as the speckless and elaborate finish which shows everywhere the fresh rasp o f file or chisel on its smooth and spruce ex c e lle nc e ; this is faultless after the fashion o f t or the a flower or a ree , complete devotion which led him to write that essay in Jil iscella nies about ’

L . on amb s MS notes Wither , intended for “ those only who would treasure the slightest ’ and hastiest scratch o f [Lamb s" pen which carried with it the evidence of spontaneous en thusiasm or t o f irrita ion , unconsidered emotion ” or un prompted mirth . His one wholly necessary and perhaps um i of fad ng book prose is the study of Blake , i t s nce it gives a vivid account , a sub le but also forcible and well - supported criticism o f a genius then almost new to the world and the critics it t is almost free from truculence, assevera ion and waste digression and no one has superseded any o f it The considerable part . study of Shake speare has enough virtues to make a good book 1 16

A N . C . S W I N B U R E kicked o ut o f his last place with the spoons in his t pocket , may have risen or sunk in o notoriety or obscurity as a gluttonous and liquorish rhyme t o f the ster or novelis , patrician pantry , whose aristocratic meditations alternate between the horsewhip with which he is evidently familiar and the dinner with which he apparently is not

the prose and the poetry , the real and the ideal — o f his life here Swinburne added to the more usual qualities of humour that o f carving in marble what should be writ in water ; he made dignity laugh at itself. When he quoted Macaulay ’s remark that a certain passage in Crabbe ’s Borough has made many a rough and cynical reader cry like a child , and added that he himself was not so rough and cynical as ever to have experienced that particular effect from ” its perusal , he was making the pompous letter “ p do an amusing task . But this dignity was nor not always laughing at itself, when it is can

. on it always be sure of company Sometimes , is the other hand , it is laughable when itself T t gravest . ha laugh , however , is cheerless at o f best , and at the end half a dozen volumes can “ ” be but a hollow mocking at grief. Only a long labour o f most diligent eugenists could breed men to endure such sentences as this , in The A e o S ha kes ea re g f p , concerning a dialogue ’ Dekk r V in e s irgin Martyr . 1 1 8 O P I N I O N S : P R O S E -W O R K S

Its t is so its at so simplici y childlike , inspir ion pure t n t a nd its so t ta t its tt in ins i c expression perfec in s e , u er a and its a t its ff and its are so nce bs inence , e usion reserve , far beyond pra ise or question or a ny comment but thanks t at t t -two and giving, h hese for y lines , homely humble in manner as they are if compared with th e refined rheto ric and the u tur of a to scrupulo s cul e M ssinger, would suffice keep the nam e of Dekker sweet a nd sa fe for ever a mong the most honou ra ble if not a mong th e m ost pre - eminent of his d n kin red a d his age . Sentences of this at present superhuman long windedness seemed to be aimed chiefly at long windedness . It is produced by the double pro fi t cess of repetition and modi cation , bo h useless one except for that purpose, since no gains anything from the addition of “ humble ” to “ homely or from the supposed distinction between “ most honourable and “ most pre A i eminent . simple love of balance and nflation compelled Swinburne to translate into the Swin ian n burn as it did Johnson into the Joh sonian . He would speak of the year of The Alchemist as “ the year which gave to the world for all time a gift so munificent as that of The Al t chemist . He would say, af er mentioning George ’ “ T L fie r Eliot s otty , Eppie and illo , that the y hearted Vestal of Haworth had no room reserved in the palace of her passionate and high -minded imagination as a nursery for inmates of such ” divine and delicious quality ; he forgot that 1 1 9 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

- “ passionate and high minded , divine and

t the delicious , re arded sentence without giving t “ it dep h , and that divine was in any case a of vain vulgarism . But he was a spending and e c remonious nature , and this , coupled with his t t t ar istic delight in balance , repe i ion and opposi At tion , ruined his prose . times he seems to write for the sake o f constructing formally per the feet and sonorous sentences , more often kind o f sentence he prefers is dictated as much by t t t ha preference as by his hought . Now he must find something unqualified to say about everybody ; again he must qualify everything , and institute distinctions founded apparently rather on a love o f repeating phrases than on ’ t as t subtle y, when he says tha Ben Jonson s “ Discoveries would give him a place beside or L a above Rochefoucauld , and beside if not above Chamfort or he will allow himself to be hag ridden by the letter “ t ” and “ d as in the clause

S t or t t ome perversi y obliqui y will be suspec ed , even no t t or t can t t if posi ive infirmi y deformi y be de ec ed , in his intelligence o r his tempera ment

“ or having suggested a curious monotony in “ the variety will a sk if there be not a curious De variety in the monotony . Had Quincey r t t ti L and D . Johnson collabora ed in imi a ng yly they must have produced Swinburnian prose . 1 2 0

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

t so His s yle is meant for public oration . Even , f t it has in it too many o the elements of deba e . I t It is restless in readiness for attack . could not live without comparison , and comparison involved the most truculent disparage ment o f o f fil m someone . Euripides , Byron , Carlyle , or i tes or too too g Hallam , praise , general , and t o f of L much like fla tery, someone else, andor or V ictor Hugo . It never means a jot more it “ than says , and by such a style when all is done that can be done then all is done in vain . It makes no background for itself and no atmo i sphere , being hard and gleam ng and mechanical . n Swi burne had a singular knowledge of books , because it was not mere learning but a violent passion ; he was a voluptuary in books , and had been free to indulge himself in the princely o f L A library his relative , ord shburnham ; and yet all he could do was to flatter or abuse them .

Seldom could he expose their qualities , never t his own feeling for them , withou belabouring them with praise . In criticism he makes laws and pronounces j udgments ; nor has he more t mercy for books han for men , whom he could condemn to “ lifelong seclusion from intercourse “ with the humanity they dishonour as the irreducible minimum o f the penalty demanded ” rather than deserved by their crimes . He is best at loyal flattery in verse : probably no other 1 22 O P I N I O N S : P R O S E - W O R K S poet has written so much poetry about books and writers . The study of Blake and many scattered o f opinions and points textual criticism , must ’ be long connected with Swinburne s name . li for Ob vion , and the first time peace , must be the end for most of his prose , with all its passion u for literature, for what is beautif l and brave and generous in men and women , with all its eloquence and subtlety . When he talked his prose the power of it was undeniable . He talked much as he wrote , but added his own priceless excitement of enthusiasm “ k or . indignation . Mr Gosse thinks his moc irascibility and pleasure in fighting “ deliber ately modelled on the behaviour of W alter L S ’ Savage andor but winburne s size, some ’ a of L andor s thing between third and a half , Mr must have established a new variety . . Gosse recalls part of a typical conversation in i 1 8 5 n which Sw nburne , in 7 , was indulgi g this irascibility towards someone absent and un named

If I am o to ta He had better be ca reful . bliged ke the cudgel in my hand the rafter of the hovel in which he skulks and sniggers shall ring with the loudest wha cks ever administered in discipline or chastise ment to a howl in ur g ch l . After a slow beginning the words were poured 1 23 A . C S W I N B U R N E forth in rapid exultation “ in towering high

’ t t t t to spiri s , wi hou a momen s pause find a ” word . So powerful was his temperament that

B ot/i zoell — he read , a double length chronicle

’ - O Shau ne ss P . . play , aloud to Burne Jones , g y, B t Mars on , and Mr . Gosse , without giving any n recorded cause for complaint . Even Ruski bowed down before the portent o f this most t i the t extravagantly artis ic be ng then upon ear h , remarking of course that he was righter than ” t Swinburne, but not his match . His spiri was At the t extraordinary . age of fif y he would t the A Gladstonite wri e , over signature of , a ’ to the letter St . James s Gazette , saying that he had observed a certain vagueness in the charges o f P L against the boycotters the rimrose eague , and giving this more definite instance : — On the l st of April I will confine myself to the t f a a — u is o f Me da moth o t t n d . O t even s h si gle y Mrs , y, was t a in a a t rn a sho de d her c rri ge , while re u ing from t the a a o f Nus ua m a as visi in dj oining p rish q , by m ked a ssassin wea ring a primrose in his buttonhole . Th e anonymity was unmasked by the editor . Near the end o f his life he wrote to The Times “ protesting against the unsolicited adulation of “ such insult as his inclusion in that u nimagi

A . nable gathering , the British cademy In all e things he is said to have been extreme . Wh n he had left a dull meeting a noise broke in upon 1 2 4

A . W . C S I N B U R N E

L this possession . ike Shelley , he was , as he said , fortunate in his friends , chiefly artists and the tt - poets like Rosse is , Morris , Burne Jones ,

T - D Bell Scott , Mr . heodore Watts unton , Mr.

Edmund Gosse , but ranging in type from the saintly Christina Rossetti to the “ unsaintly ” Sir

Richard Burton , who called him his only beloved son in whom he was well pleased . SONGS OF TIVO NAT I ONS SONGS BEFORE S UNRISE

ALREADY on L by his verses andor and Hugo, and his songs I n Time of Or der and I n Time (f Revolution L , Swinburne had shown that if ove and Sin were a passion with him, they were not an exclusive obsession . In the very year after P oems and B a lla ds S on o I ta l , his g f y, dedicated to Mazzini , proved that he had another passion . Dolores moved him to no such tremorous emotion as he gave to the words of Freedom addressing Italy :

a t a Freedom of t Bec use men wep , s ying , knowing hee, C t at t a t not hild, h hou w s free .

ff no such worship as he o ered Mazzini , then in despair at the unsuccess of Garibaldi and the humiliating generosity o f Napoleon

th t a t a Thy children, even y people hou h s m de, t th a a Thine , wi h y words rr yed, Clothed with thy thoughts a n d girt with thy desires a t a t a s f Ye rn up ow rd hee ires . 1 27 A . C S W I N B U R N E

Art t n ot a t O a t a ll t " hou f her, f her, of hese From th ine own Genoese To where o f nigh ts th e lower extreme la gune its Ve e ti a Feels n n moon ,

’ ' No r suckling s mouth nor mo ther s bre a st se t free

B ut a t t a t a t u t h h h gr ce hro gh hee .

His Obl ation could not but have been mis taken for a love poem to a woman had it o f t appeared in another his books , hough a nation seems a more natural recipient than a o f the o f woman other kind love poem , forty t t s anzas long . Swinburne had never a be ter e xcuse for repetition and for progress by addi t e ion , than in the doxology wh re he bids the one o ne winds and all things , and by the cities o f Italy , praise Mazzini , the fair clear supreme ” spirit without stain . If there be such a thing t as religious poetry , his is religious , ending in “ ” hopes for a bloodless and a bondless world , “ ” Freedom and the fair republic , an earth ” ”

t . kingdomless , hroneless , chainless The theme of A S ong of I ta ly is magnificent ; the poet ’s mood of grave sweetness and a kind o f is o f dark j oyfulness worthy it, and is above i too o f t th nking much pries s and kings , creeds and crimes his words and rhythms have a religious sensuousness . But it is a poem that t t it to ough not to be read , as most of en has be , t t o f dispassiona ely in a study, ins ead being or chanted by some impersonal priest priestess . 1 28

A W . C . S I N B U R N E

whole is not equal to the su m of the admirable t To par s . have been as great as its aim , it I t should have been more than equal . does not its t justify leng h by a pervading , continuous

and accumulating passion , which could absorb until a second o r third reading the pleasure of

O 0 a n d t chosen, pure jus , ’ t fo r a a t i ta t Who coun ed sm ll h ng life s es e,

a n a i at And died d m de t gre .

This is th a t very I taly which was a nd a n ot a And is sh ll p ss . Whether all these clear beauties would count were the song publicly declaimed can hardly be imagined . In private reading they cannot T be missed . hey seem of too fine and delicate f f a kind or a structure o this magnitude . Neither is this delicate quality everywhere

ff The fo r e ectual . opening , example , is defaced ’ by some of Swinburne s characteristic mixture o f as precision and obscurity , when he sees

th e hours

a i a nd th e a a s a As m dens, d ys l bouring men , And th e soft nigh ts a ga in a i to t i own As we r ed women he r souls wed, a a s th e a And ges de d .

In th e doxology he gi ves way to the temptation to to f as appeal such dif erent things winds , 1 30 S O N G S O F T W O N A T I O N S

e light , storm , summer, shore , wave, skies , grav s , u hopes , memories , years , so nds , sorrow , j oy, T human beings dead and alive . herefore , when ” he comes to dews and rains it is hardly possible not to be impatient o f what is so like in its weakness and so unlike in its strength 0 o f the to the great original , all ye Works L L ord , bless ye the ord praise him and magnify ” the t him for ever . Swinburne sacrifices regulari y o f but the original , takes only a licentious and The occasional freedom . obj ects addressed , of ff very di erent classes , are multiplied to excess ; and some are treated with a fancy natural to the poet , and both brilliant and appropriate , as in l of a t Red hi ls fl me, whi e Alps, green Apennines, a of B nners blowing pines,

Sta a o f t a t a nd rds s ormy snows , fl gs of ligh le ves, Three wherewith Freedom wea ves One ensign that once woven and once unfurled

a da all a M kes y of world, a i t not an d t a M kes bl nd heir eyes who knew , ou br ves

a t a The w s e of iron w ves .

It is a fancy that helps to undermine the structure both of the whole and o f the doxo t it to the logical portion , hough adds pleasures th T by e way . hus the poem is the work o f Swinburne partly as an isolated lyrist and partly

or . also as a national , public , social poet His attempt to make the two one was glorious but 1 3 1 A . . C S W I N B U R N E whether any modern poet whatever could have succeeded in it or in any similar one is doubtful . T on If any has done , it is ennyson in his Ode D of D the eath the uke of Wellington , and perhaps Whitman ; but then Whitman is the intimate and equal o f everything and everyone his of in poetry , writing what he has touched and understood , moving freely and cheerfully in o ut and . Swinburne seems to be definitely assuming a part ; he has come from outside to celebrate men and events of which I cannot feel that he was the equal , save in ardour, and this a rdour has a certain thinness and shrillness . When he had to call up city after city to praise i of Mazz ni , only a manly grasp reality could have saved him from the too poetical style in which differentiation was impossible ; so to this ffi he gave way . His task was a more di cult one ’ who Ode to N a les for than Shelley s , , in the p , example , is a solitary man expressing private imaginings which must succeed or fail with very aet al Sw little help from u events and places . in i his burne , surrender ng himself and personality , i appeals to us , as it were , w th an impersonation : i of Freedom , Italy , Rome he was in a publ c to capacity , his poem was addressed a public man , and to the general eye and ear . He per sonifie d Italy and Freedom and gave them words to utter : he used as a model a poem which was 1 32

S \V I N B U N E A . C . R

e e F lis , Swinburne dedicated to Freedom the little time given to men :

A little time tha t we may fill Or wi th suc h good works o r such ill As loose th e bonds or ma ke them strong a l Wherein l manhood su ffers wrong . By rose -hung river a nd light foot- rill There a re who rest n ot ; who think long Till they discern a s from a hill ’ At th e of sun s hour morning song,

K of a nd t nown souls only, hose souls free ,

a a h The s cred Sp ces of t e se a .

But for the more than metaphorical relation ’ ship to light and the sea Swinburne s freedom ou r not might command respect , but certainly ou r attention throughout S ong s B efore S unrise and his later poems . Unless his Freedom gains sublimity or lustre from the associations with eternal things it cannot but be held lightly after To a time save by bigots . those fighting in the “ ” o f n cause Italian u ity the words Freedom , “ L t “ iber y, and Republic , may have had the same value as certain other words at religious T revivals . hese exalted values may or may not be false ; it is certain that they do not give ever n t i lasting life to hymns or poems . It is o d ffi cult to find verses where one of these words is used much as other words are used in hymns , for Tenebrce as , example , in , in the verse 1 34 S O N G S O F T W O N A T I O N S

There a ll ch a ins a re undone ; Da y there seems b ut a s night ; Spirit a nd sense are a s on e In th e light n ot of sta r nor o f sun

Liberty there is th e light .

’ Spirit and sense gives no help . Swinburne s ’ “ t great admiration for Shakespeare s phrase, spiri ” of b e sense, caused him to repeat and vary it

yond all reason both in prose and verse . i uia M ul um a vit re edom s e aks In Q t Am F i p , “ ” of calling itself first , God , the spirit man , “ od and next , Freedom , G and man , which is

very much like popular poetical theology . Free “ dom the is God and also the spirit of earth , “ the God to earth soul, only , in the poem W God hitman . Saluting her, as above all ” “ o s and a G d light bove light , law beyond law, Swinburne declares himse lf to b e her harp and

her clarion , her storm thrush , having heard her and seen her coming before ever her wheels ” The M ar chin S on divide the sky and se a . g g “ speaks of Freedom whence all good things ” — t one in The I n are . She is the mos holy — su rrection in Ca ndia who will cleanse earth ” not the of crime . He does succeed in giving word a high and distinct value by transfe rring to it a value more often connected with Jehovah or one o f t the other deities , hough unconsciously from the context of aspiring and exulting words 1 35 A . . C S W I N B U R N E it acquires a vaguely religious sense correspond ing to that with which it thrills perhaps the t f e or not majori y o men . lovers of Sh lley ; and it may do more than this for men of any sect that responds at once to the sentiment o f A ’ Yea r s B urde n

a There should be no more w rs nor kingdoms won . A man belonging to no sect must feel that here and on almost every page of S ong s B efore S un rise Swinburne is either addressing a sect or i start ng one . Throughout the book Swinburne applies r t Ch is ian terms to his own purposes . Whatever one se e Christians may feel , no else can more than a naive and showy compliment in the end of the H ymn to Ill a n

Glory to Man in th e Highest " for Man is th e master of t hings .

“ T o sa y that all men born are mortal , but not The Pil r ims man , as he does in g , if ingenious , is nothing more , being a matter of words only . To compare men favourably with the gods , ancient and modern , is just , and can be both as amusing and inspiriting , but assertion and severation is not beyond the strength of propa andists not g , though commonly they have the t On solemn ones to pronounce for them , as in 1 36

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

- o f On the light loving spirit , as in the end D owns

the sun t th e a nd And smo e clouds slew, ' the sun th e a a t And from se s bre h blew , And whi te wa ves la ughed a n d turned a nd fle d Th e a i se a fie ld t long green he v ng hrough , And o n them overhe a rd k The s y burnt red .

Possibly this end would gain were “ time ’s deep dawn ” to have a spiritual meaning both clear and powerful : certainly it is too closely allied to the Splendour of the physical sun to fail of the E ve o being poetry . Many poems like f Revolu tion are saved from simple dullness by “ the actual and figurative presence of the four ” winds of the world , and by that metrical energy f P which is not unworthy o wind and su n . oem after poem is worth much or nothing according as the reader can take the first line or verse as t a keynote and hen allow the metre to Sing, with “ t occasional guidance from the words ligh , “ ” “ ” “ ” “ ” “ se a e men , , thundering sleep , we p , “ ” “ ” “ ” “ N . ot sword , grave , time , crown , etc that they are to be regarded as majestic non sense rhymes , for they treat grave matters gravely and grammatically . But the writer trusts more than usual to his metre and his rhymes ; the interspaces are filled more loosely T e with words . his looseness is guid d by rules 1 38 S O N G S O F T W O N A T I O N S of but of T sound , sometimes dignity . hus where Browning sings

a the a t t ta nor su H nds from p s y, nor bi e ke p

Swinburne says in The I nsurrection in Ca ndia

L W f h t e t ine be ar from t e mou h .

In his M a rching S ong the singers have with the n them the morning star, dayspri g even — “ all the fresh daysprings and all th e multi ” t of t ude things , also winds , fountains , moun ains , and not the moon but the mist which lies in the f ” valley, mu fled from the moon , also highlands se a ff and lowlands , and bays , shoals , islands , cli s , not b ut fields , rivers , grass , haze , and the hills “ of the peace at heart hills , also all sights and t t sounds , all ligh s , also the nigh ingale , and the ” e The heart and secret of the worldly tal . point is that Swinburne writes in such a manner that the feebleness of the last phrase does not b ut t tell against him is absorbed , contribu ing to the whole a certain cadence and the rhyme ” ale . It is not absurd for Swinburne to make “ Spain speak o f her sins and sons being dis persed through sinless lands : it is not out of not key , and does prevent us from admiring the how t words that follow , to describe hose sins a of o f God m de the name man accursed , that t hrice accursed . Two pages afterwards Switzerland speaks o f 1 39 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

snows and souls , considerably lowering the “ ” o f the value souls for plodding reader , who o is not blinded by the pomp f the Litany . Even the reader too wise to plod is not content

with a trick , such as that in before any world

had any light, when it is repeated as this is three times within seven verses ( Genesis ) ; but he will recognize too that the parallelism of

Slowlie r t a t at h n life in o bre h , r li r a t t a S u e e th n ime in o de th . in To Wa lt Whitma n in A merica had never so consistent a setting in prose or poetry before ’ At Swinburne s time . its best this style makes o wn of its terms , and often in long series lines , n i or begi n ng perhaps with the same word , By ” Ah one , as like another as wave to wave , the i or verse advances magn ficently , in stateliness , T turbulence , or eager speed . here is no other poetry where the substance is so subdued to the of i not t to musical form verse . It s though set music , but music which has absorbed thou ’ Far less than Shelley s will it permit paraphrase . Ode to L ibert By comparison , the y is massive with thought and history , and the rhyme The S n o seems a fortunate accident . In o g f th ta ndard H ertha Monotones e S , in , in , in " d r Tenebrce A Wa tch c the Messi o , in , in g N i ht g , for example , the metre and rhyme make of each verse a spiritual being that never existed 1 40

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

And language is not even a beautiful disease in the lines :

0 though t illimita ble a nd infinite hea rt Whose blood is life in limbs ind issolu te Tha t still keeps hurtless thy invisible pa rt ti a th And inex rp ble y viewless roo t.

The risks run in this adventure were great ; it is not wonderful that they proved sometimes T too great . hat a volume coming only a few years after P oems a nd B a lla ds Should have been so L L fully consecrated to iberty , using ove “ ” “ only for images o f bride and bridegroom of and the like , is alone a superb proof the ’ n poet s devotion , but it is of small accou t when compared to the positive proofs— the splendour of and variety metre and imagery , the ardour that changes and never abates . In these same years Swinburne wrote other political poems which were printed with A S ong o I ta l S on s o Tw N a tions T in f y in g f o . hey elude a long Ode on the P rocla ma tion of the

Fr ench R e u blic : S e tember th 1 8 70 p p 4 , , and a o f number sonnets concerning , among others , “ The ode the worm Napoleon . shows that already he ran the danger o f becoming poet Th o f . e laureate Freedom , laboriously delirious sonnets made him conscious that perhaps wrath embittered the sweet mouth o f song . He had 1 42 S O N G S O F T W O N A T I O N S not the same regard for himself as he had for Italy when he bade her

Le t not one ton gue of theirs who h ate thee say

a a t Th t thou wert even s hey .

Th e n a t hissing, spitti g , and cursing is the fr n ic of the abuse a partisan , which is worse and not t the better for being done in the name of liber y . is 1 8 0 Swin It a dead relic of 7 , proving that ’ ’ burne was not of Shelley s or Byron s stature . “ “ our our He speaks of blood and tears , but the vomit is his o wn: His spirit is less that of Dante condemning men to Hell than o f L the of Judge ynch . But worst these sonnets is that they will support any doubts of Swinburne ’s right and power to sing what he strove to sing in S ong s B efore S u nrise and S on s o Two N a tions t ia g f , since it is almos credible that the same man should have room for so much love o f liberty as well as so much o f hate Napoleon . Swinburne continued to t k t hate Gods , pries s and ings , hough often with deep respect and love of Christ , even to the of t A days the Sou h frican War, when noble blood and patriotism swamped his love of e Liberty without noticing it . He wrot a poem “ for the feast of Giordano Bruno , philosopher L t and martyr , coupling his name with ucre ius , t e Sidney and Shelley , saying tha sur ly his 1 43 A W . C . S I N B U R N E

“ spirit o f sense had gone up to meet their

Spirits . He abused the Czar . He praised L ines on th M nu m t Kossuth . He wrote e o en Giuse e JlI a z z ini of pp , once more saying that Mazzini was greater than his fellow -townsman f Columbus . When the shadows fallen o years were nine since heaven grew seven times more ” ’ divine at Mazzini s entry , Swinburne again — “ addressed him as very Christ but not “ ” Th e degraded into deity . e Saturday R ’ “ of view s opinion that , as a matter fact , no or — Cmsar man living , who ever lived not or P or A ericles , not Shakespeare Michael ngelo could confer honour more than he took on entering the House of L ords moved him to write Vas D eos L auda mus : The Conserva tive ’ J ou rna list s N a tiona l A nthem , beginning

0 Lords our Gods Because “ What England says her lords unsay . he wrote Clear th e way my lords and lackeys

and was not above reminding the lords , for the o f o f P t sake readers the all Mall Gazette , tha

t and a a ft and t a ffi t a nd Lus f lsehood, cr r c , preceden gold, of t of a t t an d Tongue cour ier, kiss h rlo , promise bough sold , a a f a f l G ve you herit ge o empire over thr lls o o d.

Nell Gwynn had drawn a sonnet from him to Our L a d o L au hter Ou r L a d Pit y f g and y of y, 1 44

A. C . S W I N B U R N E subj ect of the Russian persecution of Jews b e appealed to Christ to know if it had not been his ’ passion “ to foreknow in death s worst hour the The works o f Christian men . suggested Channel tunnel was to him a “ pursy dream “ of k vile vain greed , which could not lin the “ two nations ; nor could anything save union

o f t . or only trust and loving hear King , priest , God made no difference to his love o f England any more than of Eton :

W th e t a o f a th e here foo f ll sounds Engl nd, where smile of

a Engl nd shines,

th e t a and a th e a of a as 0 Rings re d l ughs f ce freedom, f ir h pe divines

a to a t a and lit ta D ys be, more br ve h n ours by lordlier s rs for

signs . ’ All our past a cclaims our future : Sh akespeare s voice and ’ a Nelson s h nd , ’ ’ Milton s fa ith a nd Wordsworth s trust in this our chosen a n d a a ch inless l nd ,

a t : the a a t a e t Be r us wi ness come world g ins her, Engl nd y a ta Sh ll s nd .

The of question Home Rule for Ireland naturally , t Astro he l t herefore, moved him to assert in p tha

b ut one t Three in one, in hree, i t t th e se a God, who g r her wi h

a r a o B de ou Commonwe l t be .

The j ubilee o f 1 88 7 earned from him a loyal poem which bade earth and sea join the “ j ust 1 46 S O N G S O F T W O N A T I O N S

t and sacred j ubilation . When he was thir y England was among the faded nations because t of that was the conven ional View a republican . Patriotism destroyed his dreams as if they had “ never existed : foreign nations became dark ” Muscovy reptile in rancour, base Germany , “ blatant in guile the people became blind ” ranks and bellowing votes ; Ireland was “ murderous Ireland . He was inclined more and more to bestow the title of Cant on any a of thing beyond general love liberty and j ustice . Thus in Astrop hel he sang without a smile

t a th a a re t n Lovelier h n y se s s ro g, a an d Glorious Irel nd, sword song

a n d t ma Gird crown hee none y wrong, S a th a ve y sons lone .

T 1 8 6 A hus with a smile , in 7 , he sang in of B u lg aric

t t S t The gen le knigh , ir John de Brigh , O Brumma e me w a s h e ( f g , ) Forth would he pra nce with lifted la nce

For love of B ulgarie . No l ance in h a nd for other l a nd Sir Bright would ever ta ke ;

For a t of wicked works, s ve hose Turks, No hea d of man would break ;

But t a t a c not h Bulg ri should be free,

a This m de his high hea rt quake .

t 1 88 9 presumably also wi h a smile in , about P A B a lla d o T ruth u l har les arnell, in f f C 1 47 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

Cha rles S tua r t th e crownless king whose h a nd ' S a i t — so t w ys Er n s scep re hey sing ,

The b a rds o f holy Lia rla nd .

t - w t Swinburne was hen fifty t o . Bo h before and after this he gave reason to believe that t L L accident had consecra ed to iberty , ove and P T eace a nature that might have sung yranny, I t . t Hate and War wi h equal bigotry was not , m to however , per itted to him to go farther than say first that the English are a people “ that “ never at heart was not inly free , and are the first of the races o f men who behold unashamed “ the sun and second that none “but we hear in heart the breathless bright watchword ” the se a of , and moreover that never was man born free on the other side of the Channel . Side by Side with this strain ran that other of general hope

See th e light of manhood rise in th e twilight of th e Gods ; and

Not a a ma man ut a a th e of t for g in of he ven y p w y rule ligh .

The Englishman and the universal brother in ff Swinburne were entirely di erent and distinct , like soldier and priest . Hardly a second time did he find the grave mellow note of Two L ea ders where he salutes two prophets of past ” “ kind , high souls that hate us , men whom 1 48

L ATER POEMS : C HARACTERIST ICS

AFTER S ong s B efore S unrise and S ong s of Two N a tions L t , iberty gave Swinburne lit le help the o f towards making poetry . His poems in in future were to be laid before many Gods , L L cluding iberty , ove , and Sin , but Music 1 8 8 of before all . In 7 appeared a second series P oe ms a nd B a lla ds 1 8 80 S on s o the S rin , in g f p g tides S tu dies in S on in 1 8 82 Tristra m o and g , f L onesse in 1 883 A entur o R oundels' 1 884 y , C y f , in A JlI idsummer H olida 1 8 94 A stro hel y, in p , in " 1 896 The Ta le o B a len 1 904 A ha nnel f , in C P a a Tr stra m ss e . i g Except the two narratives , B a len so of and , none of these books was much a piece a s S ong s B efore S unrise or even as P oems a nd B a lla ds : A Century of R oundels comes nearest because all the poems are in similar forms . A o f our ltogether , hardly any poets have t i written more short poems , save hose l ke

Herrick , who wrote many of only a few lines T L apiece . his multitude includes atin , French , de scri and border dialect poems , narratives , p 1 50 L A T E R P O E M S

of of tions, odes , poems reflection and passion of and both , and some translations . But the great variety of forms and subj ects is no obstacle on to e fairly clear but accidental division . On the one hand lie perhaps the only poems which have a distinguishable subject, those confessedly w or connected ith a particular person , place, : event these include the political poems , the to or poems relating men, whether friends great t o men , living and dead ; and with hese g the the translations . On other hand lie those poems which essentially exist in Swinburne ’s books or in the memories of his lovers and no nowhere else, and have important connection with anything outside— poems which at their best could not be paraphrased or abridged or represented by anything but themselves , which could hardly be thought of as better or worse than they are or in any way different . The to second class is superior the first , because as a rule either Swinburne abated his for of k to style the sake things nown the world , or he made an unsuccessful attempt to envelop The of them in it . best example this failure is A ha nnel P assa e the poem entitled C g , which is a t travel sketch in verse , and never does more han remind us that the actual scene was one o f The the uncommon magnificence . poet calls steamer a steam -souled ship and the same 1 5 1 S \V 1 N B U N A . R E C . — translation o f reality into poetry to put it in a crude intelligible way— is the essence and the fatal fault o f the poem . Whenever art allows a in comparison with nature , wherever nature trudes in her own purity and majesty , art fails .

Uniformity o f illusion is a condition of success . In A Cha nnel P assag e there is hardly any l : t n a i lusion it is a man being poe ical o a ste mer, which is no less and no more absurd than being poetical in an omnibus ; but being poetical is not poetry .

St and a t at : a a ern prow plunged under, l ern e glimpse,

a at recoil, bre h , As She Sprang as th e life in a god ma de man would spring at th t at f a t e hro o de h . is a v ersification and rhetorical treatment o f - k or n t o . notes , whether in a pocket boo The prose description of the same scene in E ssays u a nd S t dies is brief and suggestive and humane . The poem is an inhuman perversion of language and metre . The L ake (f G aube in the same volume is t also founded upon an ac ual , perhaps a single, ff experience , with an entirely di erent result . The experience has been digested ; the illusion t the is complete , and no comparison wi h lake itself possible except as a late afterthought to ’ n the those who k ow it ; same world , Swinburne s “ the r The world , is with us from fi st words , 1 5 2

A . . C S W I N B U R N E

The wind spea ks only summer : eye nor e a r S a t at a ll a a a t o f ees ugh of d rk , he rs ugh shrill ,

or a t or a From sound sh dow fel f ncied here .

' S t a as a i the a a t a nd r nge, we pr se de d m n s migh skill ,

S t a t a t a t ts a a r nge h h rsh hough should m ke such he vy cheer, ' t t a a t t While, clo hed wi h pe ce by he ven s mos gen le will, Lo w i h l es t e mere .

“ It is spoilt by the irrelevant as we praise the ’ dead man s might and skill , which introduces to in us a group a picture gallery . Probably the fin est of all the poems where

Swinburne deals with a quite definite , tangible , -k E le 1 8 69—1 891 on well nown subj ect is the gy , the death of Sir Richard Burton , though even “ here some must pause at our demigod of ” “ ” of daring , the sovereign seeker the world , and at other phrases that might seem onl y f exaggerations o rhetoric . In it he seems to be - l fl e shl of half way between a man y y view nature , “ ’ ” of the swordsman s hand , the crested head ,

t tran fi urin P and a spiri ual s g g View . ossibly the “ ” name Burton in the last verse is no gain . A n A O uverg e , uvergne, however, which pens l the poem , is of itself sufficiently unfami iar, per — haps the repetition gives it a Slightly extra natural value— and onwards from the first verse

0 and a Auvergne , Auvergne , wild woeful l nd, O a a nd a i t a s a glorious l nd gr c ous, whi e gle m

ta o f a a as a fla me le ss a The s irs he ven , bl ck br nd ,

St an a s and t a t a a a . r ge even life, s r nger h n dre m 1 5 4 L A T E R P O E M S

to there is , I suppose, scarcely any temptation think of Auvergne apart from these massy z The stan as . poem is in every way a charac “ ” “ ” t ri tic o e s ne . Th e glorious and gracious , indefinite, complimentary , and excited epithets , one duplicating sound and sense, and the clear, “ ” fl amele ss small comparison to a brand , and the three others indefinitely sublime to the “ ” “ of stairs heaven , and life and a dream , could hardly be found in another poet . He begins by asking whether the earth would not remember this man if it could remember men at A all . With him the poet had seen uvergne , the mountain stairs

t t a t a a t More brigh h n vision, more h n f i h sublime ,

Strange a s th e light and d arkness of th e world .

on strange also , as he goes to say , as night and

sun . morning , stars and Somewhat rudely and obscurely, but forcibly , he makes a comparison ff t of on between the e ec death Burton , and on f dawn the mountain , using a crude line o conventional type such as he now and then does affect

at t not a a t Whom f e forge s nor sh ll f me forge .

There follow a number of stanzas where similar comparisons are made in such a way —an that the spiritual exalts the physical abyss , 1 55 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

“ ’ ” “ t now viewless even as ime s , makes him dream how high the freed soul climbs after — death until at length the mountains and the D river are strange in a half antesque , half The Ossianic manner. vague past and mon strous things ” deadlier things unseen —plays

is o . a part . Everything violent r extreme In the mist the two men are blinded as a pilot with “ foam , and shrouded as a corpse , and they go along ledges too narrow for wild goats and sit “ l The . b inded over the abyss . mist is raging “ ” ” The grim black helpless heights scorn the “ u The s n and mock the morning . winds had

The sins for wings . river below suggests the river, soundless and viewless , in which the dead man is being borne according to some super stition which the poet rejected and he turns in t “ thought to the pries s , loud in lies , who will mock his dust with their religion . But the soul o f the man is free, with eyes keener than the

sun . , and wings wider than the world His “ too scorn , , was deep and strong as death and ” “ The t l in life . poet asks in wha i limitable , ” superable , infinite space the soul will use its win gs . He answers immediately that no dream o r faith can tell us . But having said that this ’ soul s flight had always been sunward , his mind turns to Sophocles and the garden of the sun , and the tree of wisdom growing in it which had 1 5 6

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

ff have di ered a great deal from that in the Elegy . Memory and thought had been awakened and t ’ exci ed by Burton s death , and the ordinary o f — values things the tourist value , for ex — e r ample had be n disturbed o destroyed . His o f recollections the mountains ceased to be , if

or they ever had been , more less large dis integrated fragments of the earth and became o f i a region the spiritual world , mingling w th o f other mountains seen , read , or imagined , coloured and changed by a hundred other images assembled at the passionate thought o f t to death and of the pas . H e ceased be a hard Victorian atheist ; he was unveiled as a man who through his ancestors and through his own thought and fancy had entertained a multitude of o f t the forms death . Once his paroxysm of emotional thought had begun to enter the form of

0 a nd a Auvergne, Auvergne, wild woeful l nd . the incalculable suggestions of rhythm began to enter and still further to convert the humorous The and rational atheist . result is , I believe ,

- as accurate and real as a map or a guide book , o f and that in spite what , to another View ,

of . might seem words only , begotten words Rhyme certainly acted u pon Swinburne as a pill to purge ordinary responsibilities . He 1 5 8 L A T E R P O E M S

of became sensible to many the values of words, fi ancient and modern , ordinary and gurative, T etymological and melodic . hus he played with the literal meaning of Gautier ’s Christian ” T e : D name, h ophile ear to God , he said , and went on to speak of the God that gives men T spirit of song . hus he played with the name of Cape Wrath

But t of th e a a a W at th e nor h he dl nd whose n me is r h , by at th e t of th e se a wr h or ru h .

Another form of play is noticeable in

t a th e t a t n e t Enmeshed in oler bly in in oler n , and still more in

And in th e soul within th e sense began a a of a ma n The m nlike p ssion godlike , And in th e sense within th e soul aga in a a f a nd of Thoughts th t m de men o gods gods men .

' This m ay turn out to be very nearly nonsense but certainly it fil ls a place harmoniously in ha la u Th T ssi s not . e , a poem which is nonsense line before it is an example of another kind f “ of play with words . Instead o saying the nightingale he says “ the singing bird whose ” “ song calls night by name ; a thing eight ” hundred years old is one that has seen de ” cline eight hundred waxing and waning years . Speaking of himself and others who read

Tennyson in their teens , he says that it was 1 59 A W . C . S I N B U R N E

“ ere time in the rounding rhyme o f choral seasons had hailed us men , which is more than The n mere periphrasis . next line but o e con tains an example o f a kind o f play which surprises us by making perfect sense

Life more bright th a n th e bre a thless light of soun dless moon a in songless glen .

I ts perfect sense is , I think , not more important than its pattern , which is of a kind that seems instantly to forbid examination save by the A old ear . nother very game played all through ’ Swinburne s books is that with the phrase “ spirit of sense . In one example , just given , the play is with soul and sense : sometimes the two are a line apart , sometimes combined as by “ k of Sha espeare , sometimes in the form spirit ” “ in sense, sometimes as spirit and sense . Mademoiselle de Maupin was “ the golden Th f allite ra book of spirit and sense . e play o one tion needs no example , except which shows “ at the same time another variety of spirit of sense , and how the long line was yet another aid ’ to S winburne s redemption from responsibility

And now th at th e ra ge o f thy rapture is s atiate with revel and

a a nd of th e r vin Spoil snow, the a it t a re an d a tt And br nches brigh ened broken , sh ered t t at th a t la the tree ops h only y wr h could y low , n ot th t a and of How should y lovers rejoice in hee, le der lord

th e a t at t to ye r h exul s be born, 1 60

A W . C . S I N B U R N E

rhymes and this stanza form , must seem long t winded . Rhyme and the s anza excuse him when he pictures England not only with

se a - a t a a t The co s round her like m n le, but with s - a The e a cloud like crown . This would be a grave weakness in a poet who

encouraged reading closely with eye and ear . o f In the next stanza the same poem , “ ommonwea l C , the rhyme deathless leads him to speak of the breathless bright watchword of

sea . T the his is extraordinarily near nonsense, ’ - f almost a bull s eye . He is speaking o English “ men bearing in heart this watchword , “ breathless means perhaps silent or inner , “ and bright is complimentary : but it is a v l near thing . Swinburne is usually pri i eged of sea it when singing the , for can mean the se a se a wild water , or the spirit of the which or V T is freedom , the mother of enus . here u s fore , when Swinburne tells that England for loves light for the sake of light , and truth o f of th e the sake truth , but song for the sake se a ia as well as of song , we acknowledge the f separableness o song and se a . Sometimes the god of rhyme leads him to un- t k English wri ing , as when he spea s of Sep of the 1 8 0 tember, the month proclamation in 7 1 62 L A T E R P O E M S

“ of the French Republic , as Having only the name of honour , only Sign of white Hardly f more English are some o the Biblical phrases , “ like the strengths of the storm o f them but they provided pairs of short syllables where such were wanted . L engthiness through reduplication or multi li p cation needs hardly an example , except per two haps in the class of comparisons . In the first cases one comparison is seen provoking another in almost merry mood

se a was not t a was th e a th e t The lovelier h n here l nd, nor nigh

t a th e da th e da t a th e t . h n y, nor y h n nigh

S o again , light at moonrise is lapped in gloom ,

as t at and a t t an d Even life wi h de h, f me wi h ime, memory with th e tomb Where a dead man h ath for vass als Fame th e serf and Time th e a sl ve .

In this third case comparisons lead out of com parisons in a tangled network which helps to hide from some readers that lizards are the subjects of all the lines but the first

Flowers dense a n d keen a s midnight stars a fla me And living things of light like fla mes in flower Th at glance and fl ash a s though no h and migh t ta me Lightnings whose life outshone their stormlit hour a an d la a t t a ll t And pl yed ughed on e r h , wi h heir power a nd t a ll t of a Gone, wi h heir joy life m de long

a as th e i t i i o f And h rmless l gh n ng l fe song,

Shine sweet like sta rs when da rkness feels them strong . 1 63 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

The z li ards are compared to lightnings , which are then compared to song ; and finally flowers and lizards are compared to stars : the stanza is f thus filled with words o light and movement . Sometimes the comparisons overwhelm the sub e ct of j them , that is , for a reader disobedient to the command of sound and metre and the A n A u tumn suggestiveness which they ordain . Visi on , for example , includes a storm which is thus exalted by a complexity of abstract com parisons which is almost maddening to the soberly in quiring intelligence

As th e da rkness of though t a nd of pa ssion is touched by th e l ight that gives Life deathless as love from th e depth of a spirit th at sees and i l ves,

th e of a and a n as a un From soul seer singer, wherei scroll furled th e t o f i t an d a th e Lies Open scrip ure l gh of d rkness , word o f th e world ,

S a a nd a a s a a nd a a o, sh peless me sureless, lurid nguish h gg rd as i cr me, a as th e t of i a n d a as the a t o f t P le fron obl vion d rk he r ime,

w a n a a t its t w a s a a an d The wild he ven heigh ss iled , subdued a n d ma de More fa ir th a n th e skies th at know not of storm a nd endure

h a not s de .

Comparisons , like these, which either combine or confuse the physical and the spiritual world , are numerous and intensely characteristic in Swinburne : he would not be anything like what 1 64

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

Fa r fli th e i t th e a ckers l gh of sw llows,

Fa r f tt th e t o f th e a lu ers wef gr ss , Spun dense over desol a te hollows More p ale th a n th e clouds a s they pa ss Thick woven a s th e weft o f a witch is Round th e he a rt of a thra ll th a t ha s sinned Where youth a nd th e wrecks o f its riches

Ar a n th e w ifs o e wind .

T the tt the here grass flu ers as swallow flickers , and the earth becomes light and hollow u nder us . Some vagueness and some cheapness exist where words so abound ; where three words o f one have to do the work , there can seldom of n or be any fineness si gle words short phrases , “ ” and at times the se a will be called divine “ so t and deathless , and on , and hings will be ” ” i heavenly , strong as life , subl me as death , and so on . But more noticeable than the vagueness is the violence and extravagance . “ The dawn springs like a panther with fierce and fire -fl e dge d wings upon the lava -black of A A t land uvergne . iger used for comparison in T/i a lassius is

Drunk wi th tra mpling o f th e murderous must Tha t so a ks a n d sta ins th e tortuous close -coiled wood a t it s a - M de mons rous w h it myri d mustering brood .

This is like the drea m tiger o f a child mad with e D : f ar , and as superhuman as olores with the “ L a us eneris hot panther in V , which has a , ” t e sweet throa , it might almost have com 1 66 L A T E R P O E M S from the days when the palm tree languished the e for its mate, and viper and the lampr y Th e Tha lassius most strangely loved . child in feels the thunder and the lightning as atro — ciou sly as he dreamed of the tiger he was half distraught with strong delight ” while the heavens were alive and mad with glory and ” o t angry j y. Of a quieter but equal extremi y is the phrase “ inlaid as with rose which is “ used of a beaker left divine by the lips of D t ione at a feast on Olympus , and the s ate ment that the sun does not light the Channel ’ V or Islands like ictor Hugo s fame , that Tennyson (who died with Cymbeline Open beside him) was led from earthward to sun “ ward , guided by Imogen , which Swinburne ’ S O cannot have believed . Gautier s tomb was “ ” “ k a golden tomb , and Bath was li e a queen ” t enchanted who may no laugh or weep . These things remind us that Swinburne had not only a splendid , vivid , exuberant nature, but a spendthrift and reckless one . He has defended himself in an interesting manner in the Dedicatory Epistle of his collected poems to W -D Mr . atts unton

Not to ou or an ot t nor e to the y , y her poe , inde d very u t and t o r of o t it s ia h mbles simples l ve p e ry, will eem on ruou or t an t O t at c g s s r ge , sugges ive f imperfec symp hy t e or rat o at t a t the v wi h lif inspi i n from n ure , h ery words 1 67 S ‘V I N B . U N E A C . R

Of Sa ppho should be hea rd a nd recogni z ed in the no tes o f the t n a the th e a ts nigh i g les , glory Of presence Of de d poe

a the o f th o f he s k the im gined in presence e glory t y, lus tre Of their adven t and their passage felt visible as in vision o n the live a nd limpid floorwork o f th e cloudless a nd

t- se a Th e a - a to sunse coloured . h lf br ined creature whom books are other tha n living things may se e wi th the e ye ’ o f a ba t a nd dra w with th e fingers o f a mole his dulla rd s distinction be tween books and life : those wh o live the fuller life o f a higher a nima l tha n he know that books are to poets as much pa rt of that life as pictures are to a t or a s to u a d a att t u p in ers , music is m sici ns , e d m er ho gh they may be to th e spiritu a lly stillborn children Of dirt a nd wh o it a nd a t a to dullness , find possible n ur l live while

a a t a nd a a a nd S a ea de d in he r br in . M rlowe h kesp re, [E sch lus and S a do not for us on the y ppho , live only t of a dus y shelves libr ries .

It is excellently said , and necessary ; but perhaps Swinburne was unaware that poets and their poetry entered more directly into his work than ’ L into other poets , that andor , Hugo , Milton , Shelley and Marlowe took a place in it which ’ ’ V D or T irgil did not in ante s ennyson s , which ’ Spenser or Chapman did not in Keats , or Shelley ’ T w . 0 one in Bro ning s give example , he quotes “ from L andor : We are what suns and winds us and water make , and on that text preaches the sonnet beginning

S e a a n d t i t a n d and a t , wind, sun , wi h l gh sound bre h — The spirit of ma n fulfilling these crea te ’ Th a t joy wherewith ma n s life grown passionate

a i a t to a a n d to a and a t G ns he r he r, sense re d f i h 1 68

A S IV I N B U N . R E C .

one own daughter . It is Of his most beautiful ff o f poems , and to have overcome the e ect that abrupt change in the third line

a th e a t a t D wn is dim in d rk sof w er, S t and a i a t a a n d t of p ss on e , d rk swee . ’ ’ own wa s th a a t Love s self e deep se s d ugh er. was a consummate labour Of suggestive music . I will give one more example Of a sacrifice to rhyme , where Swinburne translates Words worth ’s lines

’ I ve heard Of hearts unkin d kind deeds With coldness still retu rn ing ; Al as " the gratitude Of men at H h Oftener left me mourning . into this verse

The poet high a nd hoa ry Of meres th at moun tains bind Felt his great heart more often

a and t t t Ye rn , his proud s reng h sof en t m to t From s e enderer mood, At thought of gra titude Shown tha n Of song or story

a i He he a rd Of he rts unk nd . It was not for this that rhyme and metre were evolved .

1 70 L ATER POEMS RES ULTS

S UCH a lover of words and music could only spend his full powers on poems which essentially exist in his books or in the memories Of his lovers , else hav in and nowhere , g no important connection with anything outside . Sometimes , as in the E l , e on S ir R ichar d B urton g y , he triumphed with a distinguishable subject ; but his best work is where he makes no overt appeal to our interest or sympathy , though the richer we are in the love Of life and Of words the greater will be our The Of all not pleasure . same is true poets , but

' n this degree . For it may be said of most poets that they love men and Nature more than words f o Swinburne that he loved them equally . Other poets tend towards a grace and glory Of words as Of human speech perfected and made divine , Swinburne towards a musical jargon that t is includes human sna ches , but not and never Y t could be speech . e it must never be forgotten that this jargon was no arbitrary novel language , 1 7 1 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

no mere anarchic tumult Of words . It was the medium evolved out Of human speech and liter ature by a man who was lovable and admirable to many Of his finest contemporaries that it was at least as natural as any other medium is shown — by the fact that in a fiv e mile walk he would think out a poem down to the last line and syllable without touching paper and then j oin a luncheon party and be companionable and l o f witty, fu l interest in the newspapers and t topics Of the day . In hese witty moods he was able also to turn round and look upon his own j argon , parodying it and its content com le tel t p y, hus

Surely no spirit or sense Of a soul that was soft to th e spirit and soul of our senses Sweetens th e stress o f suspiring suspicion that sobs in th e semblance a nd sound of a sigh ;

O t a O a t a a nd nly his or cle Opens lympi n , in mys ic l moods tria ngula r tenses Life is th e lust Of a l amp for th e light th at is d a rk till th e a th a d wn of e d y when we die . th e and t Mild is mirk mono onous music Of memory , melodi o usl t as it ma y mu e y be, While th e hope in th e hea rt Of th e hero is bruised by th e ’ a of a to the rod bre ch men s r piers , resigned ; M ade meek as a mother whose bosom -beats bound with th e

i - o f a a - at a bl ss bringing bulk b lm bre hing b by,

t t th e a a As hey grope hrough gr vey rd Of creeds , under skies a a a h growing green t gro n for t e grimness of God ,

a is th e t o f a nd its Bl nk book of his boun y beholden Old, binding is bl acker tha n bluer 1 72

A . . C S W I N B U R N E tombs and feeling the ingratitude of living He begins

S a I t on t o r a h ll s rew hee rose or rue l urel ,

t o n t i t a t wa s th e t " Bro her, h s h veil of hee

O i t se a -flowe r th e se a r qu e moulded by ,

O t t m a - t o r r simples grow h of e dow swee sorrel ,

S a s th e - a a uch summer sleepy Dry ds we ve , Wa ked up by snow -soft sudden ra ins at eve "

O t t at as o n a t r wil hou r her, e r h before,

a - a a t a t H lf f ded fiery blossoms, p le wi h he tt b ut t And full Of bi er summer, more swee TO thee th an gle anings of a northern shore Trod by no tropic feet "

o f It is the simplest the eighteen verses , and , after hesitating over those beautiful Dryads in to the two lines nearest magic in Swinburne , NO sets the tune Of the whole . man , I suppose , “ can be all ear to a poem ; he must stray a to k little now and then thin , apart from the tune . If it were possible never thus to stray in or A ve At u e V ale reading hearing , q would seem ff a perfect poem . Compounded Of di erent n elements arisi g from regret and inquiry , it Of makes out Nature and poetry , fancy , super stition t , my hology , and truth , a perfect tune , n rich , sorrowful , and beautiful . I ca not pretend k to explain it . But I now that the sound and the sense Of the fir st line seem to prepare for it all and to make almost impossible a false curiosity ; “ the se a -fl owe r moulded by the sea lulls a 1 7 4 L A T E R P O E M S : R E S U L T S

“ so of little more , does the rhyme sorrel and “ ” so - laurel ; , far more, do all those long vowelled Of t sea e v e endings hee, , weave , , heat, sweet , “ ” feet , before, and shore . Half faded is ever so too littl—e disturbing if I allow it to combine closely with the blossoms and to produce actually half- faded flowers instead Of fiery ones to which are added the idea and the sound of fading but ’ not the fact . In the second verse Baudelaire s “ flowers of evil ” lead Swinburne to far lands

’ so se a and to the sea , and in particular to the “ ” L to round esbian promontories , and the “ “ ” barren kiss Of piteous wave with wave ” which " is ignorant what “ Leucadian grave “ hides too deep the supreme head of song ’ “ the sea , like Sappho s kisses , salt and sterile , carries her hither and thither and vexes and

. too works her wrong Here , too , I do not ” ” “ closely combine barren and kiss , piteous “ ” ask and wave , nor how waves could know “ W she too here Sappho was lying, nor why lies “ deep . Salt and sterile enter into the c of musi to the extent three syllables and , in n ff the fai test manner, add to the e ect Of the “ ” t S . O bitter in the first s anza , later , in the “ ” “ ff u n rofit phrase e aced unprofitable eyes , p able belongs to the whole and not to the eyes in particular : it is a faintly pervasive sound “ ” “ and feeling, like poisonous , luxurious , 1 75 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

” ” ” m ste ri tumultuous , sleepless , sombre , y ” ” “ o us , sunless , irrevocable , and the recurring “ “ “ strange and bitter and sin . I confess that I pause when Swinburne speaks Of laying “ on - the tomb , Orestes like , a curl Of severed ” NOW hair . and then a thought will rise a little too the is far above surface , as when the dead “ “ t . once a li tle dust , and again wind and air But having reached the last words

Fo r a ll a re t a s th e whom winds quie sun ,

a t a s th e All w ers shore, I feel that there is more Of death and the grave and a living man venturing among them than in any other poem except

a h a Full f thom five t y f ther lies .

of and in some the ballads . The poem is not a the rational meditation , but uncouth experience Of death clothed in the strangest variety Of words and ideas , which results in music rather than P articulate speech . erhaps no single sentence in the poem is unintelligible to the min d any l more than it is ungrammatica . But the com is one bination which the mind cannot judge , f though it may approve , seeing the ef ect , and say that it is beyond her expectation or under standing . Side by side with this may be taken A t a ’ M n h E nd o t s . , in the same book It opens with 1 76

A W . C . S I N B U R N E which we do not quite recognize as reality The Yea r the R ose of , for example, is full Of

A music beginning Of loves

the i t t a t the a In l gh h roses m de,

S i t a s th i uch l gh e mus c loves ,

a The music o f ma n with m id .

The L ast Ora cle tempts by its sober appearance to a more careful reading than it ought to have if it is to succeed in making a grandeur Of dark ness out of which emerges the cry :

0 at of all of us a a f her , P i n , Apollo,

t and a a . Des royer he ler, he r

The The om la int o L isa sestina called C p f , and horia mbics the C , are two poems which give a perfect content to the form of sestina and chori Th a lla o Fra n ois illon ambies . e B d f p V is a perfect ballad almost as saturated with colour A e A t ue Va le and sense and humanity as v q . B efor e S u nset is a melodious arrangement Of words so sweet as to be almost wordless in ff A t P a rtin For or e ect . g fits the idea a day ” to a night love sang to us , played with us of a tune lasting for three verses seven lines . A Forsa ken G a r den is nearly a successful “ attempt to turn the reality o f a steep square ” “ slope , fields that fall southward , and a “ “ dense hard passage , into the music Of all F r S n . ou o s are at one now , roses and lovers g of Four S easons are similar attempts and less 1 78 L A T E R P O E M S : R E S U L T S

of Winter successful . especially in the short lines in N orthu mberla nd , where the frequent rhymes , t of en Of a comic sort , cause deafness to all else . Swinburne was Often in later years to repeat t Of his quality, a kind joyless leaping and danc

’ in of ft of g lifeless words , o en a masque simple o facts r conceits in fancy dress . Rarely could he repeat anything like the quality Of A ve A tque Va le V . His translations from illon make us wish that all the enthusiasm for Love and Sin Of the sixties had left him a substance like V ’ illon s . E rectheus t being af er the same model , A a la n a might have restored the glory of t t . It as may be a better play , Swinburne thought it , too but the style is far gone in the Biblical , the um- too classical and the English , rich in phrases ” - like tongueless water herds , this holiness Of ” “ A nor now thens , thine ear shall my tongue ” ” ke God invo not , a intolerable to seamen , and as a cloud is the face o f his strength not to speak Of the tendency marked in this

a a a s t one a of a Drew se w rd wi h wide w il w ves, Resorbed with relucta tion such a groa n h fluc tuant re flue n c e its a Rose from t e Of r nks . and the confirmed trick shown in this The whole world ’s crowning city crowned with thee ’ As th e sun s eye fulfils and crowns with sight a The circling crown Of he ven . 1 79 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

The blank verse is gracious everywhere and ffe t t b e subtly varied , yet is in e c mono onous cause it is uncontrolled and lacking in con t it tinu ou s form and purpose . Lacking hese the Of cannot , except in charge some rare voice , hold us long either with its speed and mass o r with the fullness Of vowels in lines like these

Hea r then and know why only of all men I

a t as is I a Th bring such news mine , lone Must wa sh good words with weeping ; I a nd thou a t a to a t a Wom n , mus w il he r men sing, mus gro n

TO se e their joy who love us .

It is possible also to be tired Of hearing t t laments over the fact ha a girl is to die a maid . The movement Of the chorus is always lovely or magnificent, but the words have not enough Of any sensuous quality save sound to conceal a

of . thinness substance , a formality Of style On the stage it would have majesty : it Offers per haps the greatest possible opportunity for the extending Of a perfect voice . S tu dies in S ong contains the fine endless poem B the N orth S ea in seven movements , called y , T dedicated to Walter heodore Watts , now T t - D heodore Wat s unton , with whom he had at P just gone to live utney . On examination this proves to mention many things which have t se a sensuous properties , ear h and and men and ft the Women , but though written a er poet had 1 80

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

a to the - My dre ms wind ever living ,

My song to th e se a .

Sun and se a and poet make Of shore another : too complete and satisfactory poem here , , the “ ” sun is his Father God

But t a rt the and th is a and th hou God , y kingdom he ven y n the se a shri e is .

The forty stanzas are in praise of the light and se a Of : the . Nothing is said unworthy them nothing remains in the memory Of the forty a The stanzas save the light and the se . eight hundred -line S ong for the Centena ry of Wa lter S a va e L a ndor re g is not almighty sound , but

fl e ction long drawn out through love of sound . T the hus the sound makes reflection tedious , and the reflection interferes with the sound , and E venin the poem is a monument for patience . g on the B roa ds is another v e rsifie d travel sketch which might seem more but for the intrusion Of the t : fac Northward , lonely for miles , ere ever i a v llage begin , which mars the music , and save in music it is not strong enough to endure the A P a rtin S n t a riend leavin intrusion . g o g ( o f g ’ E ngland for a year s residen ce in Australia ) reveals very clearly that Swinburne could imitate as well as parody himself, and that he could and Th would write beautifully on a broomstick . e 1 8 2 L A T E R P O E M S : R E S U L T S

’ E mp eror s P rog ress is interesting because it shows the poet condemning Nero ’s heavy fair ” faced hateful head , partly no doubt because Was Nero an Emperor, partly because Swinburne had turned forty . S on s o the S rin tides g f p g , three long medita tive lyrics and a longer birthday Ode to Victor S tu dies in Hugo, belonging to the same year as ’ S on is one the g , Of best Of Swinburne s books , and in its original form one of the most pleasant to possess . It is also one Of those in which he Tha la ssius himself plays a conspicuous part . , the first poem , appears to be an autobiographical ’ of poem the same class as Shelley s Epipsychidion , and open to the charge brought by Swinburne against that poem, Of containing riddles as well

The Thala siu s i as mystery . name s s presumably hi k - a variant of s boyish nic name Sea mew, and in the dedication to Trelawny he compares ’ his book seeking favour Of Shelley s friend to a ’ - - The se a mew on a se a king s wrist alighting . ’ A l - on child is found in pri , the poet s birth month ,

se a . the shore By an old warrior poet, a man ’ like the sages in Shelley s P rince A tha na se and L a on and C thna L L y , he is taught iberty, ove,

Hate , Hope , Fear fear to be worthless the dear love Of the wind and se a that bred him and in the end the Old man blesses him 1 83 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

C i Of i t a nd th e s e a t h ld my sunl gh , from bir h A fosterling a nd fugi tive o n ea rth ; S o f as or a o r leepless soul wind w ve fire, ’ A ma n - ch ild with a n ungrown God s desire ; a t a t t ta t a Bec use hou h s loved nough mor l more h n me ,

a t a nd th t - a t se a Thy f her, y mo her he r ed ; Because thou h ast given thy flower a n d fire Of youth ' To a t it t t a t t feed men s he r s w h visions, ruer h n ru h ; Beca use thou h ast kept in those world -wa ndering eyes The light th at ma kes one music o f th e skies ; Bec a use thou h a st he a rd with world -unwe a ried ea rs The music th a t puts light into th e spheres ; H a ve therefore in th ine heart a nd in thy mouth of t at i t a nd t The sound song h m ngles nor h sou h , of a ll th e t a t The song winds h sing Of me,

And in thy soul th e sense of a ll th e se a .

The whole poem is a dimly grandiose and ’ - luxuriant portrait history o f a poet s breeding . The h uman figure in it is not Often more dis ce rn ible t or i han a figure in fire cloud , and l ke is so as such easily lost . But it does not much

Epipsychidion suggest questions and riddles , I t except to irrelevant or inessential curiosity . should be read first of all Swinburne ’s poems f both as showing his o himself, and , h is _w at far more important , how inextricably w mingled with nature and ith words , how

Obsc ui d b e , I S, entangled and je _ y th m he really “ f n A and how they modi y—his conceptig . nalysis proves the framework and the thought very simple ; but the grandiose dimness is due to 1 8 4

A . W . C S I N B U R N E

to im arbitrary , and never ceases be a slight pediment to the reader , while the interspersed fragments o f Sappho are both unintelligible in T n the their places and ineffectual . hough O Cli s not fi would gain by annotation , it does fail to make a powerful , harmonious impression of of by means a musical , passionate use time , se a , night , and solitude , the poet , the poetess , of and the bird , and a tracery words more delicious to the faculties combined in reading L Tha la ssius than to the pure intelligence . ike it is enriched by autobiography , which some times asks ih its turn to be illuminated by As Tha las us k . si intimate personal nowledge in , the poet is dimly glorified . He is like the nightingale

a t h as th a t and My he r been in y he r , my life th a t As y life is, sleepless hidden hing, of the t t and t and Full hirs hunger Of win er spring, Th at seeks its food not in such love or strife ' na t an t As fill men s he a rts with passio e hours d res . For all my days a s all thy days from birth a t as th a t was or t My he r y he r in me hee, Fire ; a nd not a ll th e founta ins Of th e sea a a to it on a t H ve w ves enough quench , nor e r h Is to fuel enough feed ,

a a While d y sows night a nd night sows d y for seed . Child and bird have been “ as brother and sister since first her L esbian word flamed on Th “ him . e harmonious madness which , as 1 86 L A T E R P O E M S : R E S U L T S

not Shelley foresaw and desired , is the result is birdlike more than it is childlike o r manlike . ’ “ own f In the poet s words , light , sound and li e ” are one in it : it is like that song which he se a- his heard while swimming, with the birds , “ ” bright born brethren , skimming overhead , a “ ” song o f earth and heaven and sea molten ft together . It shi s periods and attitudes and moods , and combines them in a manner that needs a book of words if ever music did . The G arden o modoce f Cy , the next poem , is in the same metre , but varied with several ff di erent lyric verses . It begins with a prayer to se a the , to be

A t of t spiri sense more deep Of dei y, A t of ma t ligh love, if love y be, more s rong t a In me h n very song .

The first half makes music Of an unnamed wild

- island , a garden that has snow coloured spray Th . e for its petals , black rocks for its thorns to verse, in spite of references visible things , has ff f only the visual e ects o music . It does not i build sol dly, clearly, and fixedly ; its rhythm and rhyme do not allow it ; nor is it P desirable that they should . hotography has convinced too many people that they see

The a r what the camera shows them . G den of Cymodoce is probably at least as near as a to photograph what a human being sees , that 1 87 A . C . S W I N B U R N E is not , provided the human being has seen a photograph beforehand and known w hat to look B u t V t . " t o n for , alas ictor Hugo sets foo his is t the fair island and he celebra ed , he God and t L I I I Mas er and ord , and Napoleon is abused ,

Whose reeking soul ma de rotten a t a t The lo hed live corpse on e rth once misbego ten .

Only to those who can allow Hugo to become a mythic figure , vast and vague , like the Old Tha lassius warrior poet in , will the whole t poem be satisfactory . Still more is his ability necessary to excuse the B irthday Ode for the A nniversa r Festiva l Victor H u o Feb y of g , ’ r ua r 2 6 1 88 0 - e y , . Being Hugo s ever ready s lf chosen laureate was not much more profitable ’ to poetry than being Edward the Seventh s . These birthday Odes and the like are but t poems in the manner of Swinburne , wi h every Of l thing the original save the i lusion , the transfi uration g , the absolute and unbroken t t sense of music . It is a pi y hat he never said a s o f of this imitator the others , according to D T H . . raill

t t a in They s ru like j ys my lendings, a a n I i They ch tter d screech s ng . a a nd They mimic my phr ses endings, And rum Old Testa ment ring ’ But th e a t it lyric l cry isn in , And th e high gods Spot in a minute ' Th at it isn t th e genu i ne th ing 1 8 8

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

t not poet , hat his fire was one to be kindled at o f will , that the echoing and chiming his words could not be equalled by mechanical regularity

o f e Y t o f h r currence . e some t e roundels are the prettiest saddest things alive ; for if S win k burne did not see all in writing them , he sacrificed nothing ; and he was j ustified without referring to Hugo when he said in the Dedi c atory Epistle to Collected Poems

A writer conscious Of any n atural command over the musica l reso urces of his langu age ca n ha rdly fa il to take such plea sure in the enj oyment o f this gift or instinct as the greatest writer a nd the greatest ve rsifer Of o ur age must ha ve felt a t the highest possi ble degree wh e n com posing a musical exercise Of such incompa rable scope and ” u as L s D n f llness e j in s . It may even be regretted that Swinburne did not or a always use this, a similarly l belled form , when writing occasional or complimentary verses . Nearly all his poems to or about chil f dren are O this kind . Many stories Of his t devotion to children are told , and if any doub o f his love remained it should be dispelled by o f A the last verse Moss Rose , where he says that the best Of all moss -roses is that where the flower is the face o f a baby and the moss a ’ o f bonnet Of plush . Few his children s poems can in fairness be Offered except to other adorers . They abound in the silly tones perhaps 190 L A T E R P O E M S : R E S U L T S

n - ff T inevitable in o e sided a ections . hey are one - excessively sided, and the child is buried ’ t under the man s indiscrimina e compliments . If ’ A hild s the child appears he is delightful , as in C Pit t l t y, where the poet el s how, af er a piteous tale was read of a mother crocodile that was k our illed , hours after, the child blithe small P ” — lord Of aradise, Swinburne calls him was heard crying

was so tt t a a t He sorry, si ing s ill p r ,

th tt a . For e poor li le crocodiles, he s id Then the poet goes on to ask what heavenliest angels Of what heavenly city could match the heavenly heart in children here The croco not diles are delicious , but poetry, any more “ than what heavenliest angels is poetry . A Midsummer H oliday was remarkable for a O series f sketches after nature in ballade form . But even the strict bounds Of the ballade did not give these sketches the unity and complete

to . ness , the independent life necessary poetry

The - ro form itself was wonderfully varied , and p moted to a new rank Of scope and power : the landscape was very Often gracious and some times perfectly felicitous as in the description o f a wasting coast where earth is a fruit rain ” t not rotted o the core . But the form could k ma e poetry Of these incidents , which in their turn were on such a scale and of such a nature 1 9 1 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

as rather to strain the form . Most Of the other poems in this volume grew o u t Of actual scenes

and actual events , like many great poems , but are interesting perhaps only to readers with a particular knowledge o f these scenes and

events . Th e third series of P oems a nd B a lla ds gave an unsurpassable exhibition of metrical e xpe ri

ments . They can only be j udged when rendered “ The A by an excellent voice . rmada , for

“ - example , needs a God gifted organ voice Of : i England to recite it w thout such a voice , the mere creeping intelligence intrudes and i interrupts , mak ng a fatal pause in the tempes tu ou s tide of it . Read silently alone it loses the effect of combining and accumulating sound at most , the words only give occasional transitory ’ impulses to the spirit . In Swinburne s poetry the large groups of sounds and meanings are shor oem what count , and except in a t p the eye and the mind cannot do these j ustice . Ear and

P M a rch : A n mind are necessary . ossibly even Ode would seem to have merit if declaimed as A well as possible . Without that advantage Wor d with the lVind is recogn isable as a charac te ristic of of piece Swinburne , each the roundels R eturn Of fills the mind like a bell stroke , and B a lla d o B a th t l the f is a sta ely flattery , but on y the dialect poems and the lines For S ea men can 1 92

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

’ ’ a fa a a And we ry ye , m riners , ’ And we a ry fa th e se a I t i t ha e ta a n m gh ken hundred men ,

le t a And my e love be .

’ The B a lla d D ea d JPI en s B a In poems like of y, ’ the ballad has merely modified Swinburne s customary style and produced an attractive o f form simplicity . But Kingsley did at least F r as well in Airly Beacon . o dialect and for substance Tennyson ’s Northern Farmer is ’ superior , because it enlarged the poet s range , ’ while Swinburne s was actually narrowed . A strop hel contained more Of these e xperi ments and perhaps an equal metrical variety . Of k Some this , as before , is Of a ind that is three parts wasted if read in silence . Its sound is its chief sensuous element : read in silence the abstract nature Of Swinburne ’s vocabulary k is painfully apparent , and lines li e

a t a t at a e t e and t t F i h, splendour h hope m k s end r, ru h , whose presa ge th e soul divines call for the fundamental brainwork that brings to L the verse nothing but calamity . oud or Gr a ce D a rlin e s silent , pieces like g can hardly stablish a claim to be more than commonplace thought decorated by enthusiasm in fancy dress . — But the E legy on Burton not the lines On the — Dea th of Richard B u rton is one Of his master Of the Threnod pieces richly imaged emotion , y 1 94 L A T E R P O E M S : R E S U L T S

P o on . . ne r B Marston , Of his maste pieces Of abstract contemplation made sensuous only by ’ A S wimm r s D rea m rhythm . e can be seen even ’ by the eye to be the finest of Swinburne s praises of swimming

a a A purer p ssion , lordlier leisure , a a t a on a A pe ce more h ppy h n lives l nd, Fulfils with pulse of diviner pleasure a a and the t a The dre ming he d s eering h nd . a to th e I le n my cheek cold grey pillow, t th e f a The deep sof swell Of ull bro d billow, t a t a And close mine eyes for deligh p s me sure, th e Of th e ta And wish wheel world would s nd .

The ear makes it what the eye cannot make it a dream in music not the music of sweet words w t o f in hich Swinburne is Of en deficient, but rhythms and great images in harmony with A N m h le t . o them y p p is yet finer, but being longer suffers more from the mute and curious for the to eye , it allows mind resent the emphasis and the words which seem periphrastic rather than expressive . But in fact this poem , almost as long as if it were in praise of Hugo and not of Pan ff , has , di used but unbroken throughout two it, the magic unexpectedly revealed in those lines of A ve A tque Va le

S as th e - a a uch summer sleepy dry ds we ve, Wa - t a at ked up by snow sof sudden r ins eve .

All ma nifica the description , the reflection , the g 1 95 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

tion , do not obscure this magic , but orchestrate it for the reader who has ears to hear and some o ne else to fill th e m with

’ i a n h h a Pa n t t e t t . Th ne imm ne presence, pulse Of y he r s life,

Then he will not inquire why the wave should reek Of the light that flickers or o f the spray t to that flies , but will submi himself the spirit — — o f the hour and of the poet that subdues all to Pan

t all a s am b u t a a t And nough is , I , dre m Of hee .

Keats could have put as much magic into one line ; but then he wrote no long poem which sustains that magic until it possesses and enslaves t in the reader . He does no more han put an cantation into our lips which we u se each accord t ’ ing to his capaci y . Swinburne s poem has no

L a D voice as Of Belle ame Sans Merci , but a t blare and blaze Of music which is yrannous , and allows a choice only between absolute to submission and rejection . It is impossible enj oy A Nymp holep t without this absolute submission— impossible to slip quietly into The ff this brassy fairyland and out again . e ect lasts while the sound reverberates in the ears ; for a time the mind is mazed , not altogether t Of at ease . With the res oration silence l t the experience seems unrea , a little thea rical , it not wholly pleasant , and cannot be recovered 1 9 6

A B . C . S W I N U R N E

Nor is opinion . , perhaps , it incompatible with — his retort to one who rebuked him for blas ’ he m t Y p y wi h the words . ou ll die like a dog, sir sa Oh , y a cat for nine lives might well have seemed to such a lover of life equivalent to l “ immorta ity , whether where Orpheus and where ”

or . Homer are, elsewhere I t may fairly be urged that Swinburne ’s phrase about Landor was used ceremoniously Ofone who T stood to him in place of a god . o strip some poets of all such ceremonious traditional phrases t f would leave hem in rags , if not insu ficiently covered for decency . But the words Of poets cannot Off- hand be accused as traditional and condemned as meaningless . N0 one would treat for l in this way , example , the lines Of She ley

am a a a a I borne d rkly, fe rfully, f r ; l t t th e t a Whi s burning hrough inmos veil of He ven ,

Of a a ta The soul Adon is like s r, a th e a th e t a a re Be cons from bode where E ern l .

Here the traditional soul and “ abode where the Eternal are commands more attention than ’ Swinburne s posthumous abode Of Orpheus , L W Homer and andor . e feel that Shelley was not using these grand vague words only because grand vague words are impressive : nor perhaps was Swinburne when he described the swimmer ’s o f rapture , the love his body and soul for the 1 98 L A T E R P O E M S : R E S U L T S

of darkling delight the soundless lake, and exclaimed :

Might life be as this and death be as life that casts Off time a s a robe, The likeness of infinite heaven were a symbol revealed of th e a a l ke of G ube .

This image sent him Off thinking about the ” spirit that is not breath , only to find that deep : silence answers , and to conclude

But well sha ll it be with us ever Who t th e a k drive hrough d r ness here, th e t at If soul h we live by never,

a t t at a a t a . For ugh h lie s i h , fe r The “ lie must be the lie Of the priests about life after death . Swinburne was fond of the variation of that “ O lie which I began by quoting . He spoke f the inexhaustible labour Of Victor Hugo ’s spirit “ ” for O ceasing among us at least , ever, and f “ ” that poet j oining the company Of his equals . ff Sometimes he chose a di erent expression , ’ for quoting, example , when he spoke Of Byron s “ : death He was a great man , good at many now things , and he has attained this also , to be at to k rest . But again and again he preferred thin of a sensible existence in some sort o f Elysian f ” O . fields rather than horizontal peace If, he said , as some thinkers or dreamers might ven to two of ture hope, those great poets the grave , 1 99 W A . C . S I N B U R N E

V now John Webster and ictor Hugo , have met in a world beyond the grave In his poetry he ventured to indulge this hope time after time . “ ” He spoke Of shades of dead lords Of music ; o f T o f T ennyson joining Shakespeare , relawny “ “ ” — — n n surely rejoi i g Shelley , if, that is , hearts of the dead may hear of Barry Corn Ou 4 1 8 4 wall, October , 7 , entering the garden of death , where the singers whose names are deathless one with another make music unknown

o f P . t Of men B . Marston af er death haply i A meeting Milton , who also was bl nd Of urelio Saffi being received by the wider world of men D ’ that is not ours , and standing in ante s ’ presence, by Mazzini s side he bade Shakespeare , “ on 2 1 901 June 7 , , be glad in heaven above all souls ensphered and rej oice that still thy

Stratford bears thy Sign . i On the other hand , salut ng Baudelaire, he t asked the dead if it were well , and were here or flowers fruit where he was , but concluded by bidding him be content

a ll a re t a s th e s un For whom winds quie ,

a t a s th All w er e shore .

L So also James orimer Graham , when he died , t T wen to the dark where all is done . his is not less impressive than the idea o f an Elysian re it union . Consequently is not surprising that 2 00

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

sweet sleep lie hidden , and sleep be sealed not ’ for t fast on dead men s sight ever, hough he believed that the dead knew . Once he asked Death to let the dead send word “ that if they wake their life is sweet as sleep immediately afterwards he expressed the belief that death could not give this grace . He said to the dead , “ ” if ought thou knowest where now thou art, “ — — o r yet haply may not and haply may no ’ ad sense abide Of the dead sun s ray , or (in a n dressing believer , Christi a Rossetti) If death “ do its trust no wrong . He repeated , if the ” “ or dead be alive , if ever a voice may be the “ or same in heaven , if life there be that flies ” not ; and in the dedication of A Channel Passage to the memory of William Morris and “ - not Burne Jones , he said , if love do utterly die, but confessed that of their sleep

We kn ow not indeed if it be not at man at it Wh no h h known if be, Life quickened with light th at we se e not t ma se e If spiri s y .

When his father died in 1 877 he had said simply “ ’ that he knew not if the dead one s life and spirit and work here are done . “ Sometimes while saying that peace , rest, ” and sleep are all we know of death , he would add that “ surely ” the last sleep could not seal “ k i ” up for ever the een swift l ght of the eyes , 2 02 L A T E R P O E MS : R E S U L T S

“ “ or that perchance some lovelier life was k of theirs . Once at least, in thin ing a dead “ ” “ of man, he speaks the roses , music , and of angels round the shrine death , and hears Death answer :

Night h as given what day

Denied him : da rkness hath unsealed his eyes .

At other times he speaks Of death lying dead , and takes refuge in phrases which seem to be derived from the words Of Webster

’ We a to a to t a ce se grieve, ce se be for une s sl ves, Na a to y, ce se die by dying .

for The death Of Sir Richard Burton , example , makes him speak of death delivering from life that dies . Browning, by his death , awakened out f T o life wherein we sleep . heodore de ’ P B . anville s life dies and casts off death . B “ “ of no ff Marston is healed life, longer su ers life Death for him is the healer Of life and “ sets the soul that love could set not free . W of A Saffi riting in memory urelio , he speaks o f the deathless life Of death which earth calls ’ heaven . But Of William Bell Scott s death he “ can only say that Haply not life but ” death may indeed be dead .

In one class of poems he casts off doubt . His love of children led him to pay them the To tribute of feigning certainty . a baby kins 203 A . C . S W I N B U R N E woman he spoke of her dead mother ’s eyes P watching her from aradise , and imagines 0 11 her perchance seeing them shine her , though he afterwards confesses that he can but deem or dream o r guess thee not wholly ” motherless . One child , Olivia Madox Frances “ ” R osse tti was - , new born on earth j ust after Oliver ’ - A B a b s Madox Brown was new born in heaven . y E ita h p p is spoken by the baby , whom angels “ “ have called homeward , forbidding her here ” ’ a b D a th to rest beguiled . Another B y s e caused “ ” him to speak o f the little soul taking wing “ with heaven again for goal but in a third “ sa poem he could only y that perchance , though ” “ ” love knows naught, guiding angels had caught the little hands in a sixth he said that heaven had “ yearned for the child “ till angels hailed one n him there angel by name . When Of twi s t has died , he speaks Of ligh breaking haply

t . into newborn spiri , which is Obscure Even a living child he flatters with talk of angels ; say ing that a baby ’s feet might tempt an angel ’s lips to kiss them : to one he speaks Of the angels as t : 0 your bro hers to another he cries child , what news from heaven " One child makes him a believer to the point Of exclaiming :

o f h e th e of a e If such kingdom he v n ,

I t t a i n d mus be he ven dee .

204

A . C S W I N B U R N E of what was pathetic o r in some other way T conventionally fit for poetry . aken alone , the o f the o n confession ignorance , as in verses his is so father , dignified and suitable , and might any o f the other attitudes have been ; but Swin Of to o burne had assumed the part elegist , and n Often findi g himself with little to say , or little that would go into his verses , he fell into a sort of professionalism in which he did merely better t han other professionals . Swinburne was happier in writing o f death dramatically , and not upon a definite personal occasion . He used an even greater freedom Of O choice among the many states f bliss and pain , rest and annihilation , which have been fancied or ff believed to follow the stilling , sti ening , f l . or chil ing , and silencing of the body It is , ff example , perfectly e ective and natural when Chastelard , in the pride of his life, deliberately “ for asking death , reflects that he is to go where a man lies with all his loves put out and his lips full Of earth . W hatever his religion promised sum him , he knew that as a lover the of his fate ’ The The Trium h was to be that . lover s wish in p of Time is equally to be accepted . He desires to be dead and buried with his false mistress

Clasped and clothed in th e cloven cl ay ' Out of th e wa out of th e t world s y, ligh

but and yet not wholly dead , slumbering 206 L A T E R P O E M S : R E S U L T S

“ dreamily , in a quiet where they would laugh low , live softly , murmur and muse, and even

n . somethi g more Or, he says , he will go down “ ” to se a the , his mother, and find a grave, and ” “ e sl ep and move with the moving ships, and The know of nothing . lust Of a miserable one

t unima in af er an unimaginable tranquillity, an g able annihilation , stirs emotion without surprise ; and the same can be said o f the utterly satisfied ’ K issin H er H a ir lover s feeling in the rondel , g , to that nothing could be added him , save per w haps death , hich I suppose is regarded as in some magnificent way dignifying and sole mniz

. Tristr a m o ing without destroying Iseult, in f L onesse she y , thinks Of a Hell where would be happy if only she knew that her lover was with God on the t ; and , other hand , if he is o j oin her in Hell he will not be disconsolate with At such love as hers . another time she thinks o there would be some j y in death , to be made “ ’ one with Nature, and lost in the sun s light - i and the all girdl ng sea, forgotten and forgetting — she The nay, would not forget all things . for poet himself thinks Of death them otherwise . “ He speaks of Tristram sailing home to sleep

- in home born earth at last, and when the end comes it will deliver them to perpetual rest of se t from bondage and the fear time free . He imagines for them a kind Of happiness and 2 07 A . . C S W I N B U R N E distinction in lying dead at peace so near the “ se a t t o r , roubled by no hing, whatever fear fancy saith Then he allows himself the plea “ sure Of thinking what a sublime sweet sepul sea chre the would be , and forthwith he supposes their grave swallowed up by the waters

B ut a t a t at ma a pe ce hey h ve h none y g in who live, t a t t t a t ca n And res bou hem h no love give , t a t a n d a And over hem, while de h life sh ll be, a The ligh t a nd sound and d rkness Of th e se a .

L The Triu m h o Time i ike the lover in p f , he th nks Of of this as in some sort a noble peace . One E u' his few solely and explicitly personal poems , ’ Voto the t own for , expresses poe s preference such a grave , if he might choose . In his last for t one t hour , he says , he would pray his hing ” the - from birth god Of his day , that he should not o f lie in the earth , but in a bed larger For girth , chaster and colder . , he protests , he ’ ’ was not earth s child , but the sea s , bred by her W ” and the ind , her brother , having in his veins like wine her sharp salt blood and he recalls how once he was near drowned , and how he was “ glad it was the se a that Offered him death to the drink . He compares the earth to sea which The never even seems to be subject and not free . t sea slakes all hirst for ever , and , rising to a t strange ecstasy at his thought , the poet begs 2 08

A N . C . S W I N B U R E

last would now have been as the first . His t e the power had lasted for full hirty y ars , up to

Ta le of B a le n in 1 8 96 . It is even possible that another subject like the story o f Balen would have helped his powers to combine later than 1896 .

2 1 0 TRI STRAM OF L YONE S SE : THE TALE OF BAL EN

’ S WI NB URNE S two long verse narratives show his powers at a height only excelled in a score Of his best short poems , since whatever the narrative form refused to him which the lyric could not — — have done and that was little the old tales o f T ristram and Balen made up for it, and he inter - t wove with them the richest of his own spirit s uff. Tristr a m of L yonesse followed two years after S on s o the S rin t ides re re g f p g , and with them p sents a brilliant middle period in Swinburne ’s

o f was art , when , in the earlier forties his age, he able to combine the ardour o f S ong s B efore S unrise with the richness of the first P oems a nd “ a lla ki to B ds . In underta ng rehandle the death ” Of T w as less legend ristram , he says , his aim not simply to present that story , diluted and debased as it has been in our own time by other hands , but undefaced by improvement and unde k formed by transformation , as it was nown to the age Of Dante wherever the chronicles Of 2 1 1 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

E rc ildo une to romance found hearing , from Florence ; and no t in the epic o r romantic form o f t t e sustained and con inuous narra iv , but mainly through a succe ssion o f dramatic scenes or pic t o tures wi h descriptive settings r backgrounds . t It is not , in fact . a fresh crea ive work upon the o f t e e o f foundation the Old al , but a s ries lyrical studies from it which do in fact present the main outlines in such a way as to make a e prior knowl dge unnecessary , but yield all their fullest savours to thos e who know and love the t T e n t tale like the poe . hos who do o thus know and love it may think it buried deep under the inessential magnificence of the poet ’s enthusiasm

‘ t e f t and sympa hy with ach stage o he tale . He has given o u t of his life to make their dead

e d o f hi life live som ays s . Swinburne himse lf

t o e e t seems be in lov with Is ul , to give her the amorous adoration which had small outlet in the ha stela r P o ms a n a l books since C d and e d B l a ds. He loves her b e fore Tristram ; he pictures her body when yet her love

Wa tched o ut its virgin Virgil in soft pride And unkissed expecta tion as if he were watching her as L orenzo watched ’ n Th o . e t Madeleine St Agnes Eve . narra ive the core Of poem is sound and good , but the whole is a praise of love that mingles the lofty 2 1 2

A W . C . S I N B U R N E

t “ t bat le , and many a large deligh Of hawk and A t hound . lone ogether at night in summer ,

Only with stress Of soft fierce h a nds she prest Between th e throbbing blossoms Of h e r bre a st a t a a nd t a a t His rden f ce, hrough his h ir her bre h Went quivering as when life is ha rd on dea th And with strong trembling fingers she s tra ined fa st i a t t at a t H s he d in o her bosom ; ill l s , S a tia te with sweetness Of tha t burning bed H is eyes a fire with tea rs he ra ised his head And l aughed into her lips ; and all his he a rt i t a a an d a a t F lled hers ; hen f ce from f ce fell, p r a on a t a t a nd t E ch hung e ch wi h p n ing lips, fel

r Sense into sense and spi it in spirit melt . H ast thou no sword " I would not live till day ; 0 t i t a nd t a a a love, h s nigh we mus p ss w y I t t a nd le t not a t . mus die soon , us die l e

“ Ah God l Ah God l Here echoes , , that day should be so soon from P oems a nd B a lla ds ; yet the poet and Tristram do not deny

Glory a nd gra ce a nd reverence an d deligh t

a t To wedded woma n by her brid l righ . Doubly splendid in contrast with all the soft is Sweetness and bitterness Of love, which in its t turn all the sof er for it, comes

z the th e a nd the The bree e , bloom, Splendour sound , a t t th e t a nd th e Th s ung like fire hun er hound , th e a o f the se a The pulse Of wind, p ssion , The rapture of th e woodla nd

“ This interchange o f the lovely fight Of love and 2 1 4 T R I S T R A M OF L Y O N E S S E sleep with the open air makes up for the lack Of

' drairiaand t continuous narra ive . A s Tristram and Iseult are never anything but passionate so nothing in Nature is loveless or

- . T th e se a : unrapturous hus , hovering gull turns

With eyes wherein the keen heart glittering yea rns Down towa rd th e sweet green se a whereon th e broad moon

burns, - t t t And suddenly, soul s ricken wi h deligh , and th e a a a Drops, gl d w ve gl ddens . Even drowned men are called sleepers in the

t se a of . sof green , as if they had some j oy it ” The wastes Of Wales are wild glad wastes of ” W The t glorious ales . spear hirsts and the “ n The t sword is hu gry . sea akes the sun on her bare bright bosom as a bride The arms of T “ ” ristram swimming are amorous , and the touch Of his lips and the wave is a sharp sweet ’ Th e B roceliande minute s kiss . leaves of are “ O t full Of sweet sound , full f swee wind and sun . T L his alternation Of ove and Nature, except for one t who persis s in wanting a tale , is strong enough almost to hide some of the few points where Swinburne has kept the tale well in view , as where he reminds us that the night when Of God at Iseult Ireland is praying to , and the same time saying

t am Bles I beyond women even herein , at all i sin Th beyond born women s my , 2 15 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

was the night when Iseult Of Brittany married “ T . ristram , a maiden in a marriage bower ’ Nor t are such poin s necessary . Swinburne s t love Of Iseul and her lover , his j oy to be with t t the hem in Northumberland , riding toge her , rapture which he shares with Tristram in swim

at in t ming , his satisfaction when last death heir “ four lips make o ne silent mouth and he can ” give them a “ sublime sweet sepulchre under the se a t t u s t , hese sympa hies make well con ent that he should merely give us the fragments of the story and spend himself in magnifying them and giving them a golden atmosphere . I should have been glad to do without the methodical nightly substitution of B ragwaine for Iseult in the t e bed Of Mark ; above all , withou the lett r ,

e T found after his d ath , in which ristram is alleged t o have e xplained that their love had “ b u t been no choice Of will , chance and sorcer art to Ous and have prayed for pardon , which w as given by Mark with tears . T t hese hings only speck the mighty lyric , which some times swoons with its own extra vagance but never drops u ntil it reaches

n a a The ligh t a d sound nd d a rkness Of the se .

Rightly does Swinburne call Iseult and Tristram “ ” “ T t my lovers , my twain . heir love , heir t t are you h , heir beauty equal in splendour 2 1 6

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

r e b e so . her b east us d to , and everywhere When Iseult has been listening to Tristram ’s story and sighs and sees the sun at that moment ’ the rise up , sun s face burns against hers like a ’ lover s : but also the se a shone and shivered like ’ angels wings ; a wind shook the foam flowers as se a a rainfall Of roses , for the foam was like blossoms ; the moon withered as a face in a swoon ; the air was moved with delight and of passion as love, until air, light and wave seemed full Of beating rest like a new -mated ’ ’ as o f one dove s heart, and had a motion God s beating breast . Everything is done which can make the poem t everywhere grand or sump uous , and inevitably , u it since all comes from Swinb rne , is at times ff S win sti and heavy laden . Every inch is ’ t t burne s . Compare it wi h Romeo and Julie . There the love and beauty is so much beyond the sum of t the details , hat beautiful as they Often are the effect of the whole astonishes and makes the words seem the servants Of greater t NO t spiri s . catalogue Of beau iful things and no cabinet of beautiful words can produce ’ beauty , and Swinburne s poem is far more than a catalogue or a cabinet ; but the total result Of his expenditure is not astonishing or dispropor

tionate . Shakespeare uses the breath Of life ,

Swinburne uses gold , frankincense , and myrrh . 2 1 8 T R I S T R A M O F L Y O N E S S E

But compare it with Laon and Cythna and Endymion and it is at least as re adable and

t . t e , a exuberan “ Few poe s hav more gold fr nk i s and to ff the ncen e, myrrh O er, and having breath o f life strong within himself he use s them successfully to sweeten and to adorn . His t n t dangling sentences , his use Of addi io ins ead o f Of of development , his abuse some his or not favourite habits devices of style , are in excess of what is to be expected in the work of ’ adv en a man s hands . He undertook a lesser ture than Tennyson in the Idylls ; having made no attempt to lift his hero and heroine out o f an “ impossible age of an imaginary world he ’

T . avoids ennyson s failure He creates nothing , but his songs about th e se well - beloved shadows one constitute him of their most perfect lovers , and in English at least th e ir most perfect poet .

The Ta le o B a len t to t f , dedica ed his mo her in fift - t fl his y nin h year , was the fine ower Of ’ t Swinburne s later work . By comparison wi h Tr istra m it is naked narrative , and as near as f L possible to the tale o Malory . From the ady Of Shalott and the lovely fragment of L auncelot and Guinevere he took the metre which made entire nakedness of narrative impossible . Tenny ’ own of son s version Balin and Balan , where th e story is moralized to death with ( I believe) 2 1 9 A . . C S W I N B U R N E

to a t b no gain morality , helped him if all only y ’ T the t provocation . In ennyson s poem dea hs Of ’ the brothers were due to a fit o f B ale n s temper S win which he had earnestly striven to correct . “ ” burne retained the custom o f the castle by e which Balan had to fight with every com r, and at last with Balen who was concealed under t T b u t not u nlife s range armour . his irrational , like and certainly imposing , fate brings an end not less symbolic in its beauty now than it h t e could have seeme d in t e fifteen h c ntury , and ’ we are satisfie d when Merlin writes the brothers names o n the tomb and we eps

For a ll h is he a rt within him ye a rned

Wi th pi ty like a s fire tha t burned . The fa te his fa teful eye d iscerned Fa r Off i it t now d mmed , ere he urned

i a t a Ca t to t H s f ce ow rd melo , ell Arthur Of a ll th e storms tha t woke a and th e t Round B len , dolorous s roke, And h ow th a t l a st blind b attle broke

a t The consumm ed Spell . a K t a t da Al s, ing Ar hur s id, his y I h a ve he a rd th e worst tha t woe might say Fo r in th is world th a t wa nes a wa y

I know n ot tw o such knights a s they . This i s th e ta le th a t memory wri tes O ta a ta f men whos e n a mes like s rs sh ll s nd ,

a a nd a a Of a B len B l n , sure h nd ,

t of t a Two bre hren Nor humberl nd ,

In life a nd de a th good knigh ts .

d t e e t Swinburne himself har ly in erv nes , y Balen 2 20

A . . C S W I N B U R N E

All this brightness is quenched once and for ever

in perfect gloom . The t s ory is clearly and fully told , with only such p raise and dalliance as is necessary to depict the background o f earth loved by knight and

tt . poet , and to fla er the graces Of the stanza ” o r Each Canto begins In hawthorn time , In ’ ” e t or lind n ime , In autumn , In winter, the

t or . like , wi hout confounding obscuring the tale The stanza causes a good deal of length and

b ut . roundaboutness , seldom fails to be gracious t It can be grand also , as where Balen knows tha he shall die :

No r fa te n or fe a r might overc a st

now a its a a t a t The soul ne r pe ce l s . S t a s t a t uddenly, hence for h he p s , A migh ty a nd a de a dly blast a ti a Blown Of hun ng horn he he rd ,

As when th e ch a se h a th nobly sped . a t a t is a i Th bl s blown for me, he s d , ’ i z a m wh o am e t not a The pr e I y de d, i th e And sm led upon word .

Thenceforward there is no delay ; all is knightly Of t t act and speech , a ballad digni y yet wi h no mere simpleness . Those who read the tale here for the first time t will never be in difli c ulty and rarely impatien . Those who kn ow it in Malory and have sought it in Tennyson will go to The Ta le of B a len for the lustrous background and for the con 2 22 T R I S T R A M O F L Y O N E S S E tinuous but not monotonous pleasure Of the for the o f stanza, but also constant nobility temper ; for some tenderness like that where the deadly - wounded Balan crawls on hands and knees towards Balen , as when

’ at t t h a d Bene h heir mo her s eye he, A a t at a t to b be h l ughed wi h joy be, Ma de towa rd him standing by her knee ’ a a o For love s s ke long g . Sometimes the metrical form is allowed its own t way , to form perfect s anzas lovable for their own sakes : as Often the narrative sweeps through the verses without submitting to them , t yet withou shattering them . It becomes too t so Often abstract, even fantas ically , as here

t at a a n d a And seeing h sh me peril , fe r Ba de wrath an d grief a w a ke a n d hea r ’ Wh at shame should say in fa me s wide e a r sh e a a If , by sorrow se led more de r

a t a so . Th n joy migh m ke her, should die but otherwise the style is less mannered and has gained simplicity from its theme and from the The stanza perhaps some sweetness . charac teristic not play Of words is always happy , but is only once as unhappy as in the line about the wave bounding on the land and confounding

The bounding bulk whereon it bounds .

The of success this narrative, the failure Of many 2 2 3 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

of his lyric , descriptive and reflective poems it ft written before , and Of all written a er it , proves that S winburne owed much to the ta n gible substratum of an Old tale and j ustifies a t regret hat he did not more Often trust it .

2 2 4

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

and comprehensive piece Of work ye t for a - t nineteenth century lyric poet , in an age wi hout to a poetic drama , revive a form early discarded e t by Elizab than dramatis s , was an adventure T more grim than serious . hat he read it aloud to his friends without causing any suffering that has yet become famous is a superb testimony to his to hi s . voice , his character , and to friends For B othwell Chastel ard is four times as long as ,

- - and contains four hundred line speeches . It is

t e a mons rous achievement , the most sol mn proof existing of Swinburne ’s power of fundamental The -sacrifice t brainwork . self was little shor Of The crucifixion . style, for example , is allowed to retain hardly more than the tricks Of his characteristic style, some chiming vowels , here and there a phrase like “ clothed and crowned “ or with force and fear, wiles and songs and ” or sins , a passage Of vowels like

But I not a le t t a t would be we ry, h be

I a a nd Pa rt o f my wish . could be gl d good

i so t tt a se t L ving low, wi h li le l bours itt a nd at i t a nd da And l le sleeps w ches, n gh y Fa llin g a nd flowing a s sma ll wa ves in low s e a From Shine to sh a dow a n d b a ck a nd ou t a n d in Among th e firths a nd re a ches Of low life : I would I were a wa y a nd well

But it is a compromise b e twe en his lyric styl e and a kind Of ave rage dramatic blank vers e which does not e schew dullness . Even the lyric 2 2 6 T H E P L A Y S metre Of A nima Aneep s is a little withered by the shadow Lord Love went M a ying wa s a Where Time pl ying, In light ha nds weighin g Light he a rts with sa d C t a a t rowned king wi h pe s n ,

a a t it t P le p s w h presen ,

a it a a t H rsh hours w h ple s n , Good hopes with b a d No r dre a med how fleeter

’ a i t t Th n T me s swif me re , ’ O er all th ings sweeter t t How clo hed wi h power, The murderess ma iden Mistrust wa lks l a den With red fruit ruined a nd white

flower .

’ ’ Mary s spee ch after Rizzio s singing is pretty the speeches so Often are after the songs

’ Wha t does Dea th i th e song " Can they n ot le t love live b ut must needs ma ke His gra ve with sin ging " Tis th e trick Of th e song at Th finds no end else . Rizzio answers

An Old trick ; Your merrier songs a re mournfuller sometimes a t a a r Th n very e rs e .

’ At a hundred points Mary s words Show how

e e fondly and car fully the po t followed her , as when she says 2 2 7 A . C . S W I N B U R N E

A w e a t a i y, were fools , we M ries w n

I a m no t t o f t a t I no t ired h see here ,

a d th a a ir a n th t a t sun n e d e . The l rge , swee e r h

its But the play, with all conscientious study of characters and events , its chaste workmanship , its many flowers , is intolerable when we think what Swinburne could have done with this sub e ct j in narrative , spending himself in rhyme and rhythm and feeling directly upon Mary , instead f o indirectly . fil a r S tu a rt e y , dedicated , like the oth r two o f b e portions the trilogy, to Hugo , appeared tween S ong s of the Sp ring tides and Tristra m L onesse m of y , a favourable time when Swi ’ T burne s genius was ripe and still ardent . here t is some unspoilt wi ness to its period , as when Mary at Chartley cries

0 , Tha t I were now in saddle new -moun ted now I sh all ride right through shine a nd sha de of spring

W t a t a nd a it of a a n d a i h he r h b bride, be r A brow more bright tha n fortune and when a little afterwards she sings

a a a An ye m un br id your yellow h ir, and Mary Beaton remembers singing it after her “ six nurse , and weeping upon it in France at ” years old to think o f Scotland ; o r when the Queen thinks o f the moors in comparison with the midlands 2 28

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

By minds n o t a lwa ys a ll ignobly ma d

No r a ll a i a a i o f a t m de po sonous by f lse gr n f i h , ’ She sha ll be a world s wonder to a ll time is a poor compensation for the loss o f what

e to T/za la ssius On the Ul s giv s life , gf , and Tr istra m o L onesse the f y , and cannot save play from being a conscientious v e rsification o f facts t on e o f and conjec ures , in which only half the t o f poe was employed . Even into the prose ’ the pseudonymous A Yea r s L etters he had put as much o f himself and at least as much o f his knowledge of men and women and old t ffi t women , and hat in a form su cien in itself and never tedious . DI a r ino Fa lier o gave Swin burne an outlet o f for his hate God and king and priest , his of L t T t love Man , iber y , yrannicide , I aly , f t B to e e o he . ut it s Mazzini , and Sea is hard why Swinburne should thus deface Speech with ou t making it poetry Si r, For b ut man a s one wrong done you , being we, a t a t i o f i i If wr h m ke ligh n ng your l fe, n us, For all wrongs done o f a ll our lords a live a ll o ur a of i i t no t Through ye rs l v ng, doub you B ut a t a i a s i t a a a n d a wr h sh ll cl mb h gh ow rd he ven, h ng it o f As h ot w h hope thunder .

not it is It is Swinburne , and not Shakespeare , it is not t it the not speech , and it is poe ry ; is f e product o an att mpt to combine all four. Often he puts noble words into the mouth o f 230 T H E P L A Y S

r0 h etic a noble man , and the last speech has a p p grandeur

I n ot as a a man to a t go b se goes De h, But grea t o f hope : God ca nnot will that here Some day sha ll Spring n ot Freedom nor percha nce Ma a n ot it i of y we, long de d, know , who d ed love

F r a t at a nd t t t at n ot C o dre ms h were ru hs h were . ome Bring me towa rd th e la nding whence my soul

S t a a nd t to se a . e s s il, bid God speed her for h

Ye t he could have signified his admiration of

' M arina Fa lzer o in a briefer or less mutilated T fashion , by enveloping him, like ristram or or o f The Balen , in a great love wrath verse . verse here is by no means negligible ; some o f the variations are original and definitely extend

blank verse . But though written with a View at th e or to being acted the Globe , Red Bull , ” “ the Black Friars before audiences , incredibly intelligent and inconceivably tolerant, which ’ accepted Chapman s eloquence instead of study of of t it to character and interest ac ion , has be read in silence, and therefore with greater need of t intelligence and olerance . It seems to me to old m resurrect of an form simply the archais , to make a tomb for eloquence .

Swinburne took more liberty in his next play . ’ P o f S e limu s erhaps Greene s tragedy , which contains scenes in the verse forms o f D on Juan V A and enus and donis , suggested the far more 231 A . C . S W I N B U R N E cunning and far more various schemes o f rhyme

' in L n ocrz e . t It begins with couple s , but with the t each scene rhyming is changed , hough the i t l nes remain decasyllabic , until the las restores the couplets : in the first scene of the fifth act the scheme is that of a Shakespearean ” The o f w as sonnet . story Sabrina fair a “ l o f T t wan legend ike that ris ram and Balen , and the poet did not think that any life o r life “ likeness possessed by it had suffered from the bondage of rhyme or been sacrificed to the exi f The gence o metre . rhyming in fact helps to confine the “ wan legend ” within strait limits t and to remind the reader o f the fac . Only a consummate artist could have made this choice t and so j ustified it . He tells the ale and he finds abundant good excuse for such indulgence ’ as in her mother E strild s speech to Sabrina

a t th e at se a a t a Thou h s seen gre never, nor c ns dre m ’ How fa irer far th a n e a rth s most Iordly strea m

It its a at a nd t rolls roy l w ers here here,

t all t a Mos glorious born of hings nywhere, Most fa teful a nd most godlike : fit to m ake ’ Men love l ife better for the sweet sigh t s sake And less fe a r death if de ath for them should be Shrined in the s a cred splendours o f the se a ’ od a t As G in he ven s mid mys ery .

’ “ E strild s I t song , Had wist , quo h spring to tt the swallow , calls forth still pre ier speeches from the child Sabrina 2 32

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

B ut if she does — — Love you i fyou c a n w in her a s I th ink — ' (There you re th e h a ppi est fellow ever born .

he tried to prove that his class talked in blank

verse , and sometimes as here

a too a Woodl nds we h ve ,

a not a " o a k a a n d H ve we , M bel beech , , spen pine, ’ Re d ie s old a i i a th e i And g f m l r friend , b rch , Wi th a ll its blithe lithe bounty o f buds a n d sprays

For a to a t a nd h pless boys wince , grow red , And feel a tingling memory prick their sk ins

Sting till their burning blood seems all one blush . to prove that they loved the chime and the birch as as well as he did . What he does prove , in ’ L ove s ross u rrents C C , is that , in the flesh , men

the - -A of Eton and rmy and outdoor type , frank , to simple and chivalrous , and women match , “7 o f appealed to him . hen two them , lovers ,

are dying from poison accidentally taken , they converse in this manner

Regina ld Think we a re going to see — ’ O t a a a nd . ur mo her, M bel Fr nk s ours

Ma be l : I i w ll .

B ut i a a it is to " , Reg n ld , how h rd go

Re ina ld a so a a le t g We h ve been h ppy, d rling, us die

i t a t a nd t a i . Th nking of h , h nk ng God

Ma be l I will .

Die K . s iss me . Ah , Redgie ( )

a " [ a m M bel here .

i a t a They could h ave l ved no h ppier h n they die . 2 34 T H E P L A Y S

This can hardly be taken as a contribution to the t the bu t t na ural history of upper classes , ra her ’ as a testimony to a poet s sentimental e steem of o f e th e them , and the r ligion , tradition and the two t birch that make them , like those bre h “ of t ren Northumberland , in life and dea h good ” The the knights . j ealous woman who causes t e to tragedy is false o the type . She is allow d soliloquize in blank verse that is not common t speech , a concession that emphasizes the ame and literal naturalism o f the greater part . R osa mond u een o the L omba rds t , Q f , writ en t t one when Swinburne was pas six y , is of his The best plays . revenge taken by Rosamond upon the king for being asked to pledge the health of his kingdom in a cup made of the of skull her father, whom he had slain in battle , I t e . s forms a tragic story , simpl and brief brevity and simplicity help Swinburne to his best compromise between his own style and that o f an Elizabethan dramatist . Enjambment like this

Love her . is too often used without any such effect as it gave to Shelley in Is this th e scene Where th e old ea rthqu ake demon taught her young Ruin 235 A W . C . S I N B U R N E

“ the spirit o f sense recurs twice ; God and the priests are despitefully treated ; but the mannerisms are no bar to force and rapidity . ’ The poet s most noticeable intervention is the e i o f the d v ce casting over play , and chiefly over ’ the deceit by which Rosamond turns the king s favourite warrior into her seducer and her ” The t o f . avenger, the mad migh midsummer

Al machilde s t not warrior , , when told tha it was : his mistress who had shared his bed , asks

Art not thou — Or a m not I sunsmitt en throu gh th e bra in By this ma d might o f midsummer

The king himself, in a scene where Rosamond plays with her avenger and her victim tragically and ironically , cries

I would this fierce I ta lia n June were dead and again in the banqueting hall at his last hour

This June m akes b abes of men when th e hea t i a Burns l fe h lf o ut of us .

“ He asks Alma childe s if his memory is burnt o ut b t o f y s ress summer , putting down all that is strange to that ; when he is about to take the cup and drink to the queen he reflects that there are “ but two days more for June to burn and

I . live . Queen , he says , drink to thee 2 36

A . C . S W I N B U R N E

e he r t mistress , t lls son Francesco hat he is over

ae fond , C sar says Na t y, no whi . Our hea venly fa ther on ea rth a dores no le ss Our mother th a n o ur sis ter : a nd I hold

i a t a nd i i t a n d H s he r eye, h s spir his sense ,

a Inf llible .

’ The contrast between C ae sar s licentiousness ’ and shrewdness and his father s heavie r and kindlier worldliness , Francesco going among the assassin s singin g

Love a n d nigh t a re life a nd l igh t Sleep a nd wine a nd song Speed a nd sla y th e h a l ting da y Ere it live too long

Lucrezia being flattered by her father—the ’ t his e the o f father s dread , and hen gri f at news ’ — ’ France sco s murder Cze sar s scornful banter The do not make a play . excessively mannered verses produce an effect something like o ne o f ’ L D o f ucian s ialogues the gods , though the loose and lengthy method obscures the effect and lessens the credit o f it . With good speak e ing , dr sses and scenery , it might prove amusing , b ut so might a thousand other dialogues . It w a s not a brilliant conclusion : it was more in the nature o f a posthumous indiscre tion : but it

o f t the was a sally characteristic the poe , climber ,

e th e swimmer and rid r , lover of women and 2 38 T H E P L A Y S

o f L sunlight , the Sea and iberty , who died a A 1 0 1 9 9 t on 0 . year af erwards , pril , He was at buried in the rocky cemetery Bonchurch , of se a Isle Wight , near the home and the of his o f boyhood , the days when he was chanting Ata la nta in Ca l don y , celebrated often in his poetry and lastly in the dedication of The S isters The t L . to his aun , the ady Mary Gordon o f The Ve garden her house , Orchard , near nt nor to one o f the , had been him sweetest corners o f it t the island , and recalling in that dedica ion h e connected it for the ge nerations of his lovers with himself and the se a :

a t ma a a n d th e sun The springs of e r h y sl cken , Find n o more l a ughing lustre to relume Where once th e sunlight a nd th e Spring seemed on e But n ot on hea rt or soul ma y time o r doom Ca st a ught o f drought or lower with a ught of gloom

a t a n d t a n d If p s fu ure, hope memory, be

i a t t a t and R nged round bou wi h love, f s bound free, a As a ll th e world is girdled with th e se .

T HE E ND

The Co nt m o ar Re v w ne 1907 e p r y ie , J u E m n sse d u d G o . h m s 12 1909 T e A . Ti e , pril , The Conte m ora e w ne 1907 p ry R vie , J u dm s E u nd G os e . The C nt m o a e v w A r 19 10 o . e p r ry R ie , p il The e cta o t m r 6 1862 S t S . p r , ep e be , ans ate d nto Fre nc Le s Ce nc i . Tr l i h by Tola D r an w t I ntrod uct on Swin urn o e . i , i h i by b

Chastela rd.

E rne s The Qu ote d by st Rhy . Ni ne te enth 1909 Ce ntur u . y , J ly The Con e m a e e w ne 1909 t o . p r ry R vi , Ju

S tudies in Prose a nd Poetry . 16 18 The At e nae m ne 77 . h u , Ju , w u 1902 a rte e v e . Qu rly R i , J ly 1 187 The S e c tator Ma 3 3. p , y , 14 1 8 The At enae m A ri 7 7 . h u , p l , ’ r o a s e a e Wo r s I nt odu cti on t Sh ke p r . ( ld

Classi cs . ) 190 The Conte m orar e v e w une 9. p y R i , J 1909 The Conte m orar e v e w ne . p y R i , J u E rne st s in the N nete e nt Ce ntu Rhy i h ry , e 1909 Ju n .