English Verse Part 15

(COWPER: _My Mary._ 1793.)

Duncan Gray cam' here to woo-- Ha, ha, the wooing o't!

On blithe Yule night, when we were fou-- Ha, ha, the wooing o't!

Maggie coost her head fu' heigh, Looked asklent and unco skeigh, Gart poor Duncan stand abeigh; Ha, ha, the wooing o't!

(BURNS: _Duncan Gray._ ab. 1790.)

My heart is wasted with my woe, Oriana.

There is no rest for me below, Oriana.

When the long dun wolds are ribb'd with snow, And loud the Norland whirlwinds blow, Oriana, Alone I wander to and fro, Oriana.

(TENNYSON: _Ballad of Oriana._ ab. 1830.)

Oh, the little birds sang east, and the little birds sang west, (Toll slowly) And I smiled to think G.o.d's greatness flowed around our incompleteness-- Round our restlessness His rest.

(ELIZABETH B. BROWNING: _Rhyme of the d.u.c.h.ess May._ ab. 1845.)

"Ah! what white thing at the door has cross'd, Sister Helen?

Ah! what is this that sighs in the frost?"

"A soul that's lost as mine is lost, Little brother!"

(O Mother, Mary Mother, Lost, lost, all lost, between h.e.l.l and Heaven!)

(ROSSETTI: _Sister Helen._ 1870.)

Laetabundus Exultet fidelis chorus, Alleluia!

Egidio psallat coetus Iste laetus, Alleluia!

(ST. BERNARD: _De Nativitate Domini._)

Sermone Marcus Tullius, Fortuna Cesar Julius Tibi non equantur.

Tibi summa prudentia, Prefulgens et potentia Celesti dono dantur.

(From a 12th c. MS.: _Regulae de Rhythmis._ In Schipper's _Englische Metrik_, vol. i. p. 354.)

Quant li solleiz conviset en leon En icel tens qu'est ortus pliadon Perunt matin, Une pulcellet odit molt gent plorer Et son ami dolcement regreter, Ex si lli dis.

(Early French version of the _Song of Songs_, quoted in LEWIS's _Foreign Sources of Modern English Versification_, p. 89.)

The special form of refrain stanza appearing in the first of these foreign specimens (the Alleluia hymn form) is generally thought to have been the source of the "tail-rime stanza" ill.u.s.trated in the other two specimens, and in the several pages which follow. The characteristic feature of this stanza is the presence of two short lines riming together and serving as "tails" to the first and second parts of the body of the stanza. The same name appears in all the languages: "versus caudati" in the mediaeval Latin, "rime couee" in the French, and "Schweifreim" in modern German. It is easy to see, what the following specimens ill.u.s.trate, how stanzas constructed on this fundamental principle might be varied greatly in particular forms, according to the number, length, and rime-arrangement of the longer lines.

Men may merci have, traytour not to save, for luf ne for awe, Atteynt of traytorie, suld haf no mercie, wi no maner lawe.

(ROBERT MANNING of Brunne: _Chronicle._ ab. 1330.)

For Edward G.o.de dede e Baliol did him mede a wikked bounte.

Turne we ageyn to rede and on our geste to spede a Maddok er left we. (_Ibid._)

Manning's chronicle was a translation of the French chronicle of Pierre de Langtoft. Although the translator designed to avoid the various complicated measures used in the original, and kept pretty closely to alexandrines (see p. 254, below), in the pa.s.sages here represented he followed the tail-rime of the original. In the first case the stanza form is not represented in the ma.n.u.script, though of course implicit in the rimes. The name of the stanza, "rime couee," appears very early in Manning's Prologue, in the famous pa.s.sage in which he expressed his preference for metrical simplicity:

Als ai haf wrytenn and sayd Haf I alle in myn Inglis layd, In symple speche as I couthe, That is lightest in mannes mouthe.

I mad noght for no disours, Ne for no seggers no harpours, Bot for e luf of symple menn That strange Inglis cann not kenn.

For many it ere that strange Inglis In ryme wate never what it is, And bot ai wist what it mente Ellis me thoght it were alle shente.

I made it not for to be praysed, Bot at e lewed menn were aysed.

If it were made in ryme couwee, Or in strangere or entrelace, at rede Inglis it ere inowe at couthe not haf coppled a kowe, at outhere in couwee or in baston Som suld haf ben fordon, So at fele men at it herde Suld not witte howe at it ferde.

... And forsoth I couth noght So strange Inglis as ai wroght, And menn besoght me many a tyme To turne it bot in light ryme.

ai sayd, if I in strange it turne, To here it manyon suld skurne.

For it ere names fulle selcouthe, at ere not used now in mouthe.

And therfore for the comonalte, at blythely wild listen to me, On light lange I it begann, For luf of the lewed mann.

(Hearne ed., vol. i. pp. xcix, c.)

Lines 15-22 may be paraphrased thus: "If it were made in _rime couee_, in _rime strangere_, or _rime entrelacee_, there are plenty of those who read English who could not have put the tail-verses together; so that either in the tail-verse or the _baston_ some would have been confused, and many men that heard it would not know how it went." The "interlaced"

(alternate) rime was a familiar form. _Baston_ seems usually to be an equivalent for "stanza" or "stave." It seems uncertain whether by _rime strangere_ Manning had in mind any particular form of stanza or rime-arrangement.

Stand wel, moder, under rode, Byholt y sone wi glade mode; Blye, moder, myht ou be!

Sone, hou shulde y blye stonde?

Y se in fet, y se in honde Nayled to e harde tre.

(Song from Harleian MS. 3253; Boddeker's _Altenglische Dichtungen_, p.

206.)

Listeth, lordes, in good entent, And I wol telle verrayment Of mirthe and of solas; Al of a knyght was fair and gent In bataille and in tourneyment, His name was sir Thopas ...

An elf-queen wol I love, y-wis, For in this world no womman is Worthy to be my make In toune; Alle othere wommen I forsake, And to an elf-queen I me take By dale and eek by doune!

(CHAUCER: _Sir Thopas_, from _Canterbury Tales_. ab. 1385.)

The tail-rime stanza had become a favorite for the metrical romances of the fourteenth century; but Chaucer evidently saw its inappropriateness for long narrative poems, and ridiculed it--with certain other elements of the romances--in this _Rime of Sir Thopas_. The Host is made to interrupt the story:

"'Myn eres aken of thy drasty speche; Now swiche a rym the devel I beteche!

This may wel be rym dogerel', quod he."

My patent pardouns, ye may se, c.u.m fra the Cane of Tartarei, Weill seald with oster sch.e.l.lis; Thocht ye have na contritioun, Ye sall have full remissioun, With help of buiks and bellis.

(SIR DAVID LINDSAY: _Ane Satyre of the Three Estates._ ab. 1540.)

Seinte Marie! levedi briht, Moder thou art of muchel miht, Quene in hevene of feire ble; Gabriel to the he lihte, Tho he brouhte al wid rihte Then holi gost to lihten in the.

G.o.des word ful wel thou cnewe; Ful mildeliche thereto thou bewe, And saidest, "So it mote be!"

Thi thone was studevast ant trewe; For the joye that to was newe, Levedi, thou have merci of me!

(_Quinque Gaudia._ In Matzner's _Altenglische Sprachproben_, vol. i. p.

51.)

Here the principle of the tail-rime is extended to four tail-verses. See also the specimen on p. 111, below.

All, dear Nature's children sweet, Lie 'fore bride and bridegroom's feet, Blessing their sense!

Not an angel of the air, Bird melodious or bird fair, Be absent hence.