APPENDIX E. (See page xxix. n.) he curfew tolls the knell of parting day.' rton would read "The curfew tolls!-the knell of day." The curfew-bell is the general expression of poets; the word 'toll' is not the appropriate verb; ot a slow bell tolling for the dead; hence, urfew was ronge-lyghts were set up in haste.' kespeare, 'None since the curfew rung,'-and 'the bell hath rung, 'tis three o'clock.' But there is error; a confusion of time. The curfew tolls, and ghman returns from work. Now the ploughman two or three hours before the curfew rings; and nmering landscape' has long ceased to fade before W. The parting day' is also incorrect; the day ; finished. But if the word curfew' is taken or the evening-bell,' then also is the time incord a knell is not tolled for the parting, but for the 'Molest her ancient solitary reign.' This line would have been better without ancient; but Gray had the antiqua regna' of the Latin poets in his mind, and the deserta regna.' Besides, to molest a reign,' is a very ungraceful and most unusual expression; and only endured for the rhyme's sake. Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap.' This is redundant. For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn.' If the hearth blazes, of course it must burn; but blazing hearth' Gray had from Thomson, and 'burn' was added for the rhyme, return.' No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.' Here the epithet lowly, as applied to bed, occasions an ambiguity, as to whether the poet meant the bed on which they sleep, or the grave in which they are laid, which is in poetry called a low or lowly bed. Of course the former is designed; but Mr. Lloyd, in his Latin translation, mistook it for the latter. There can be no greater fault in composition than a doubtful meaning,—vitanda in primis ambiguitas. 'Or busy housewife ply her evening care.' To ply a care, is an expression that is not proper to our language, and was probably formed for the rhyme-' share.” Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke; Their homely joys and destiny obscure; t knowledge to their eyes her ample page, ich with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll,' &c. essary to go back six stanzas to find the subject to e relative their refers; i. e. e short and simple annals of the POOR.' h with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll,' = expression is taken from Sir Thomas Browne's Medici- Rich with the spoils of Nature.' ill Penury repress'd their noble rage.' of the word 'rage' for desire, if not introduced by s too much used by him just thy skill, so regular thy rage. And, 'Be justly warm'd by your own native rage.' "Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast.' It should be who,' instead of that.' To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land.' This is from Tickell To scatter blessings on the British land.' From insult to protect.' Sculpture deck'd,' is not an allowable rhyme; and what is the force or meaning of the word still erected nigh?' Their lot forbade,- Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin'd— The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide, With incense kindled at the muse's flame." Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne, There should the description close; all after that must be Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife, There is an ambiguity in this couplet, which indeed gives a Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day.' E lascio mesta l'aure suave della vita."' drops' is from Ovid-' piæ lacrymæ ;' Closing from Pope's Elegy; Voice of Nature,' from the gia; and the last line from Chaucer et in our ashes cold is fire yreken.' many different quarries are the stones brought to s elaborate mosaic pavement. From this stanza the composition drops into a lower key; the language is and is not in harmony with the splendid and elaboion of the former part. Mr. Mason says it has a licacy. here at the foot of yonder nodding beech, listless limbs at noontide would he stretch.' perfect rhymes are not allowable in short and finished And so, in the following stanza, we saw him beneath yon aged thorn.' And in the xx and xxi here are four lines in the rhymes of similar sound, sigh,' supply,' ' die.' w drooping woful-wan, like one forlorn.' wan' is not a legitimate compound, and must be nto two separate words, for such they are, when from the handcuffs of the hyphen. Hurd has given lazy-pacing,' and 'barren-spirited,' and hted,' as compound epithets, in his notes on Hot of Poetry !! or up the lawn, nor at the wood was he.' ald, flat, prosaic line. ir Science frown'd not on his humble birth.' sonifications are not in.the taste of our old and best out grow up in modern times. Dodsley's Specifull of them. So little did the printer know about has not even printed science with a capital letter, correct, as well as beautifully poetical: em tu, Melpomene, semel centem placido lumine videris.' |