  BY CHARLES OLLIER. All hail to the octo-syllabic measure! the most cheerful, buoyant, and terse of all metres; at once familiar and refined, and fitted more than any other to the narration of a gay and laughing tale. Lord Byron, who indulged in it not a little, was pleased nevertheless to condemn it for what he called its "fatal facility;" but we believe that is facility is more a matter for the enjoyment of the reader than for the execution of the writer; since, in the latter respect, it seems to demand so much of polish, point, and neatness, as to require, in its very absence of all apparent effort, no little labour in him who would do its claims full justice. Cowper, who was ambitious to excel in this pleasant verse, declared that the "easy jingle" of Mat. Prior was inimitable; but Prior, delightful as his octo-syllabic poetry undoubtedly is, has many rivals,—not indeed among his contemporaries, but in poets who preceded and followed him. Shakespeare, for example, in whose boundless riches is found almost every variety of the Muse, has given us abundant specimens of this verse in the prologues to each act of "Pericles, Prince of Tyre," as spoken by the Ghost of old Gower, who, having, in his Confessio Amantis, told the story afterwards dramatised by Shakespeare, is evoked from his "ashes" to explain to the spectators the progress of the incidents of the play. The following notturno could hardly have been as pleasantly conveyed in any other measure:— "Now sleep yslaked hath the rout; No din but snores, the house about, Made louder by the o'er-fed breast Of this most pompous marriage feast. The cat, with eyne of burning coal, Now couches 'fore the mouse's hole; And crickets sing at th' oven's mouth, As the blither for their drouth. Hymen hath brought the bride to bed." Ben Johnson, too, has revelled in this metre: its sweet cheerfulness appears, for the time, to have drawn from his mind its austere and sarcastic qualities, and to have lulled the violence of his wit. Old Ben is, in short, never seen in so happy and amiable a light as when he writes in the octo-syllabic. Here in a specimen:— "Some act of Love bound to rehearse, I thought to bind him in my verse; Which, when he felt, 'Away!' quoth he, 'Can poets hope to fetter me? It is enough they once did get Mars and my mother in their net; I wear not these my wings in vain. With which he fled me; and again Into my rhymes could ne'er be got By any art. Then wonder not That, since, my numbers are so cold, when Love is fled, and I grow old." But what shall we say of Herrick, the English Anacreon, who fondled this measure with such graceful dalliance? We cannot resist the temptation of making an extract, and of italicising a line or two, that we may enjoy them with the reader:— "A sweet disorder in the dresse Kindles in cloathes a wantonnesse; A lawne about the shoulders thrown Into a fine distraction; An erring lace, which here and there Enthralls the crimson stomacher; A cuffe neglectfull, and thereby Ribbands to flow confusedly; A winning wave, deserving note, In the tempestuous petticote; A carelesse shooe-string, in whose tye I see a wild civility; Doe more bewitch me, than when art Is too precise in every part." Mark the ease, the play, the curiosa felicitas, of this exquisite little poem. Could it have been as happy in any other measure? The stern and unflinching patriot, Andrew Marvell, evidently takes delight in the piquant grace of the octo-syllabic. Here is a passage from his poem addressed to the Lord Fairfax, descriptive of the grounds about that nobleman's house, in Yorkshire, called Nun-Appleton. Speaking of the meadows, Marvell says:— "No scene, that turns with engines strange, Does oftener than these meadows change; For when the sun the grass hath vex'd, The tawny mowers enter next; Who seem like Israelites to be, Walking on foot through a green sea. To them the grassy deeps divide, And crowd a lane to either side. With whistling scythe, and elbow strong, These massacre the grass along. The mower now commands the field; In whose new traverse seemeth wrought A camp of battle newly fought; Where, as the meads with hay, the plain Lies quilted o'er with bodies slain: The women that with forks it fling, Do represent the pillaging. And now the careless victors play, Dancing the triumphs of the hay. When, after this, 'tis piled in cocks, Like a calm sea it shews the rocks." The poems of Thomas Randolph, a writer of the seventeenth century, are not so well known as they deserve to be. A specimen, therefore, of his treatment of our favourite verse, will be some such a novelty as is afforded by the revival of an obsolete fashion. He is addressing his mistress while walking through a grove:— "See Zephyrus through the leaves doth stray, And has free liberty to play, And braid thy locks. And shall I find Less favour than a saucy wind? Now let me sit and fix my eyes On thee that art my paradise. Of Butler it is needless to speak; everybody knows Hudibras. He is, indeed, a glorious champion of the octo-syllabic verse. The glories, too, of Prior,—the witty, the humorous, the riant Prior,—are too well known to require illustration. We say "too well known," for Matthew, alas! had a sovereign contempt for les biensÉances, and only, now-a-days, finds his "way into families" because time and a classic reputation have, in a manner, sanctified his extravagancies. But what must have been the irresistible charm of his octo-syllabic measure, to have seduced the morbid methodist, Cowper, into a warm eulogy of the very metre in which his licentious freaks were perpetuated? As in Prior's case, Gay chose this particular verse to sin in. We do not allude to his "Fables," but to his "Tales," which are dexterous and pleasant enough, but wrong. The reader must not expect specimens. From the next writer, however, to whom we shall allude, namely, Green, author of "The Spleen," we shall be happy to transfer to our pages an extract. Green was a member of the Society of Friends; but, whatever might have been the formality of the outward man, never did a more genial heart beat in the bosom of a human creature than in that of Quaker Green. He was a philosopher, a humanist, a wit, a poet; and we do not like him the less because he took especial delight in the sly humour of the eight-syllable rhyme. He found in this measure a pleasant compromise between a staid cheerfulness and a roystering joke, and he dandled it to his heart's content in the true spirit of Quaker love-making; that is to say, with a certain significance of purpose qualified by sobriety of pretence. The friendly triumph of the flesh over the spirit was never more cordially manifested; but all is done "with conscience and tender heart." The poem called "The Spleen" would have been a luxury from any writer. From Green, in his drab coat, it has a double relish. The fire that burned under the broad-brimmed hat of this wise and gentle lover of humanity, was too strong for the stuff of which his physical man was composed; it "O'er informed his tenement of clay;" and our poetical Quaker died before he had reached his middle age. His principal poem is distinguished by the elastic play of the versification, by manly good sense, and flashing wit. Poor Green! it was especially necessary for him, with his delicate organization, to study how he might best exorcise the spleen, or, as we should now call it, hypochondria,—a task which we, in our Miscellany, have taken under our especial care. The following extract from the exordium to the Quaker's poem will afford a good taste of his quality. We have italicised some lines that appeared to be peculiarly felicitous:— "Hunting I reckon very good To brace the nerves, and stir the blood; But after no field-honours itch, Atchiev'd by leaping hedge and ditch. While Spleen lies soft relax'd in bed, Or o'er coal-fires inclines the head, Hygeia's sons with hound and horn, And jovial cry, awake the Morn: These see her from her dusky plight, Smear'd by th' embraces of the Night, With roral wash redeem her face, And prove herself of Titan's race, And, mounting in loose robes the skies, Shed light and fragrance as she flies. Then horse and hound fierce joy display, Exulting at the 'Hark-away!' And in pursuit o'er tainted ground From lungs robust field-notes resound. Then, as St. George the dragon slew, Spleen pierc'd, trod down, and dying view, While all the spirits are on wing, And woods, and hills, and valleys ring. To cure the mind's wrong bias, Spleen, Some recommend the bowling-green; Some, hilly walks; all, exercise; Fling but a stone, the giant dies; Laugh, and be well. Monkeys have been Extreme good doctors for the Spleen; And kitten, if the humour hit, Has harlequin'd away the fit." We may take an opportunity of resuming this subject. |
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