Love's Meinie: Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds

In modern music the meaning is, I believe, by the reputed masters omitted.

39. To Spin, or unravel. Synthesis and analysis, in the vulgar Greek slang.

46. Mad. Compare Byron of the English in his day. "A parcel of staring boobies who go about gaping and wishing to be at once cheap and magnificent. A man is a fool now, who travels in France or Italy, till that tribe of wretches be swept home again. In two or three years, the first rush will be over, and the Continent will be roomy and agreeable." (Life, vol. ii., p. 319.) For sketches of the English of seventeen years later, at the same spots (Wengern Alp and Interlachen), see, if you can see, in any library, public or private, at Geneva, Topffer's 'Excursions dans les Alpes, 1832.' Douzième, Treizième, and Quatorzième Journée.

48. The Tail. Mr. Courthope does not condescend to italicize his pun; but a swallow-tailed and adder-tongued pun like this must be paused upon. Compare Mr. Murray's Tale of the Town of Lucca, to be seen between the arrival of one train and the departure of the next,—nothing there but twelve churches and a cathedral,—mostly of the tenth to thirteenth century.

60. Afar. I did not know of this weather sign; nor, I suppose, did the Duke of Hamilton's keeper, who shot the last pair of Choughs on Arran in 1863. ('Birds of the West of Scotland,' p. 165.) I trust the climate has wept for them; certainly our Coniston clouds grow heavier, in these last years.

63. Social. Rightly sung by the Birds in three syllables; but the lagging of the previous line (probably intentional, but not pleasant,) makes the lightness of this one a little dangerous for a clumsy reader. The 'i-al' of 'social' does not fill the line as two full short syllables, else the preceding word should have been written 'on,' not 'upon.' The five syllables, rightly given, just take the time of two iambs; but there are readers rude enough to accent the 'on' of upon, and take 'social' for two short syllables.

64. Hold. Short for 'to hold'—but it is a licentious construction, so also, in next line, 'themselves' for 'they themselves.' The stanza is on the whole the worst in the poem, its irony and essential force being much dimmed by obscure expression, and even slightly staggering continuity of thought. The Rooks may be properly supposed to have taught men to dispute, but not to write. The Swallow teaches building, literally, and the Owl moping, literally; but the Rook does not teach pamphleteering literally. And the 'of old' is redundant, for rhyme's sake, since Rooks hold parliaments now as much as ever they did.

76. Each Year. I doubt the fact; and too sadly suspect that birds take different mates. What a question to have to ask at this time of day and year!

82. Rivers. Read slowly. The 'customs' are rivers that 'go on forever' flowing from the fount of the soul. The Heart drinks of them, as of waterbrooks.

92. Philosophy. The author should at least have given a note or two to explain the sense in which he uses words so wide as this. The philosophy which begins in pride, and concludes in malice, is indeed a fountain—though not the fountain—of woes, to mankind. But true philosophy such as Fénelon's or Sir Thomas More's, is a well of peace.

98. Worth. Again, it is not clearly told us what the author means by the worth of a bird's soul, nor how the birds learned it. The reader is left to discern, and collect for himself—with patience such as not one in a thousand now-a-days possesses, the opposition between the "fount of our soul" (line 83) and fountain of philosophy.

124. I could willingly enlarge on these last two stanzas, but think my duty will be better done to the poet if I quote, for conclusion, two lighter pieces of his verse, which will require no comment, and are closer to our present purpose. The first,—the lament of the French Cook in purgatory,—has, for once, a note by the author, giving M. Soyer's authority for the items of the great dish,—"symbol of philanthropy, served at York during the great commemorative banquet after the first exhibition." The commemorative soul of the tormented Chef—always making a dish like it, of which nobody ever eats—sings thus:—

"Do you veesh
To hear before you taste, of de hundred-guinea deesh?
Has it not been sung by every knife and fork,
'L'extravagance culinaire à l'Alderman,' at York?
Vy, ven I came here, eighteen Octobers seence,
I dis deesh was making for your Royal Preence,
Ven half de leeving world, cooking all de others,
Swore an oath hereafter, to be men and brothers.
All de leetle Songsters in de voods dat build,
Hopped into the kitchen asking to be kill'd;
All who in de open furrows find de seeds,
Or de mountain berries, all de farmyard breeds,—
Ha—I see de knife, vile de deesh it shapens,
Vith les petits noix, of four-and-twenty capons,
Dere vere dindons, fatted poulets, fowls in plenty,
Five times nine of partridges, and of pheasants twenty;
Ten grouse, that should have had as many covers,
All in dis one deesh, with six preety plovers,
Forty woodcocks, plump, and heavy in the scales,
Pigeons dree good dozens, six-and-dirty quails,
Ortulans, ma foi, and a century of snipes,
But de preetiest of dem all was twice tree dozen pipes
Of de melodious larks, vich each did clap the ving,
And veeshed de pie vas open, dat dey all might sing!"

125. There are stiff bits of prosody in these verses,—one or two, indeed, quite unmanageable,—but we must remember that French meter will not read into ours. The last piece I will give flows very differently. It is in express imitation of Scott—but no nobler model could be chosen; and how much better for minor poets sometimes to write in another's manner, than always to imitate their own.

This chant is sung by the soul of the Francesca of the Bird-ordained purgatory; whose torment is to be dressed only in falling snow, each flake striking cold to her heart as it falls,—but such lace investiture costing, not a cruel price per yard in souls of women, nor a mortal price in souls of birds.

Her 'snow-mantled shadow' sings:

"Alas, my heart! No grief so great
As thinking on a happy state
In misery. Ah, dear is power
To female hearts! Oh, blissful hour
When Blanche and Flavia, joined with me,
Tri-feminine Directory,
Dispensed in latitudes below
The laws of flounce and furbelow;
And held on bird and beast debate,
What lives should die to serve our state!
We changed our statutes with the moon,
And oft in January or June,
At deep midnight, we would prescribe
Some furry kind, or feathered tribe.
At morn, we sent the mandate forth;
Then rose the hunters of the North:
And all the trappers of the West
Bowed at our feminine behest.
Died every seal that dared to rise
To his round air-hole in the ice;
Died each Siberian fox and hare
And ermine trapt in snow-built snare.
For us the English fowler set
The ambush of his whirling net;
And by green Rother's reedy side
The blue kingfisher flashed and died.
His life for us the seamew gave
High upon Orkney's lonely wave;
Nor was our queenly power unknown
In Iceland or by Amazon;
For where the brown duck stripped her breast
For her dear eggs and windy nest,
Three times her bitter spoil was won
For woman; and when all was done,
She called her snow-white piteous drake,
Who plucked his bosom for our sake."

126. "See 'Hartwig's Polar World' for the manner of taking Eiderdown."—Once more, we have thus much of author's note, but edition and page not specified, which, however, I am fortunately able to supply. Mr. Hartwig's miscellany being a favorite—what can I call it, sand-hill?—of my own, out of which every now and then, in a rasorial manner, I can scratch some savory or useful contents;—one or two, it may be remembered, I collected for the behoof of the Bishop of Manchester, on this very subject, (Contemporary Review, Feb. 1880); and some of Mr. Hartwig's half-sandy, half-soppy, political opinions, are offered to the consideration of the British workman in the last extant number of 'Fors.' Touching eider ducks, I find in his fifth chapter—on Iceland—he quotes the following account, by Mr. Shepherd, of the shore of the island of 'Isafjardarjup'—a word which seems to contain in itself an introduction to Icelandic literature:—

127. "The ducks and their nests were everywhere, in a manner that was quite alarming. Great brown ducks sat upon their nests in masses, and at every step started up from under our feet. It was with difficulty that we avoided treading on some of the nests. The island being but three-quarters of a mile in width, the opposite shore was soon reached. On the coast was a wall built of large stones, just above the high-water level, about three feet in height, and of considerable thickness. At the bottom, on both sides of it, alternate stones had been left out, so as to form a series of square compartments for the ducks to make their nests in. Almost every compartment was occupied; and, as we walked along the shore, a long line of ducks flew out one after another. The surface of the water also was perfectly white with drakes, who welcomed their brown wives with loud and clamorous cooing. When we arrived at the farmhouse, we were cordially welcomed by its mistress. The house itself was a great marvel. The earthen wall that surrounded it and the window embrasures were occupied by ducks. On the ground, the house was fringed with ducks. On the turf-slopes of the roof we could see ducks; and a duck sat in the scraper.

"A grassy bank close by had been cut into square patches like a chess-board, (a square of turf of about eighteen inches being removed, and a hollow made,) and all were filled with ducks. A windmill was infested, and so were all the out-houses, mounds, rocks, and crevices. The ducks were everywhere. Many of them were so tame that we could stroke them on their nests; and the good lady told us that there was scarcely a duck on the island which would not allow her to take its eggs without flight or fear."

128. But upon the back of the canvas, as it were, of this pleasant picture—on the back of the leaf, in his book, p. 65,—this description being given in p. 66,—Doctor Hartwig tells us, in his own peculiar soppy and sandy way—half tearful, half Dryasdusty, (or may not we say—it sounds more Icelandic—'Dry-as-sawdusty,') these less cheerful facts. "The eiderdown is easily collected, as the birds are quite tame. The female having laid five or six pale greenish-olive eggs, in a nest thickly lined with her beautiful down, the collectors, after carefully removing the bird, rob the nest of its contents; after which they replace her. She then begins to lay afresh—though this time only three or four eggs,—and again has recourse to the down on her body. But her greedy persecutors once more rifle her nest, and oblige her to line it for the third time. Now, however, her own stock of down is exhausted, and with a plaintive voice she calls her mate to her assistance, who willingly plucks the soft feathers from his breast to supply the deficiency. If the cruel robbery be again repeated, which in former times was frequently the case, the poor eider-duck abandons the spot, never to return, and seeks for a new home where she may indulge her maternal instinct undisturbed by the avarice of man."