New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1882-02-10
NEW PUBLICATIONS.

The OF story ike ONIONhs
20 the beginning of story telling the woria o'e -.
the begin ung Of folklore before 1t mao i"S. is'
human Aspect the beginning of pastoral n''i
whether in prose or verse the beginning Oh 'he
recognition of the sweetness and TENDERNESS VI "
tai life. 1t belongs 10 the Same GLASS
positions as the Book of Ruth, ana 'he hs'oi! u
Ic.ac and Rebecca 1t is related 10 the poetic ioSis
of Thsocri,us and Bion the prose ldyis oi ApuieuN
.h;,,os Totins Heliodorus and Longus, to the
heautiful EPISODE of Cupid and Psyche IN the
Golden ASS. which poor Mrs. Iighe so en1oeoiea
in h,r tliffusive paraphrase eighty or ninety years
acc and 10 the exqu.sitele pathetic little tragedy
NJ Hero and Leander as told by the pseudo NuS&us
and a. glcrousy reinv,goTa;ed by MI hario"e, anu
c,unslv copcluded by old George Chapman 1t re-
minds MS of the country scenes il the comedies OF
Shakespeare oil the best Mosques OF Ben Jonson' Oh
The Faithful ShcphcrdeSs Of Fletcher. OF Wlthers
pbu.rete Of Warmers Argente and Curan
Cba,kmlls Thealma and Clearchus ana
Chambcrlayn's PharonHda. Tie Succession OF
mems 10 which il belongs comes down to us
from the middle of the seventeenth century
through GAYS Shepherds Week, Allan Ramsay
Gentle Shepherd. the episode OF Lavlna III lho9i-
sons Seasons, the episode of Crazy ha'e III ne
Task: through the Incompatible yncS OF burns
WorGsworth's Michael and The Brothers. Coie-
ridges Picture, Soutbey's EclOgues. Tenant $
Anster Fair Leigh Hunts Rimini. heatss kndy-
nion and Isabella The Fee sulan ldyl of landor,
uood's Hero and IeanGer aud Lycus the Centaur.
Tennvson's Mllers Daughter, Dora, Audley Court,
Avlmor's Field Patn0rcs Angel in the House, ana
ends for the present) with Dorothy" We have
given in little the classic and English pedigree OF
this pcem for to he even poor relation OF such
family is no uncomfortable honor. Is Dorothy
q poor relation of Dora Isabella, Maggie, Rosallnd
Hero. and Pysche We think not, bat the world
will decide
&c ba rafar
lave made ought 10 help even casual reader OF
noe1y 10 an understanding of the kind poem that
.',,motby"is 1t will not help him, however, 10
understand the measure in which it is cast, and in
order TO do this for him we must carry him back Tor
n moment TO the latter half Of the sixteenth cen
tury when the poetic minds Of Elzabeth's England
was fermenting with new departure IN measure
II originated Simultaneous, or nearly so, IN the
half added brains of a number of pedantic poet
asters. among whom was Gabriel Harvey, the
friend of Spenser who shook for moment the
fealtv Of that great poet to rhyme, as also the
fealty of Sidney Dyer and the little poetic coterIe
of which they were luminares. 1t did not shake
the fealty of Thomas Nash, the savage satrst, who
Immediately declared war upon the projected new
measure the hexameteT. whom he allowed 10 be
gentleman of an ancient house dating BACK, he
might have added, 10 the ringing plains OF windy
Troyl but lie conceived that lie was not at home IN
HIM TO run his long plough ina judgment IN
which he was anticipated by good old Roger
Ascham who declared On substance that the Just
mentioned long plough trOtted and hobOled, IN
stead of running smoothly in our English tongue
Mr. Abraham FTaunce, however, was OF different
nn,nion for he translated Tassos Amnta into
hevameters as we'll as Yirgi's eclOgue of Alexis
hiding the latter away in "A law book. proceed
ING which brought down upon him csstigaton
from Millions nephew. Edward Phillips. The un-
fortunate hexameter after this
Sunk ike the dsy-stsr n the oceans beo'
for about two and quarter centuries, when he
nopped M his unfortunate head in Southcy's
Vision of Judgment, which brought the blud
ceon of Byron down on the head of poor Southey
Twenty years later the occupant of the char OF
helles.lttre, at Harvard manfully resusctated the
in.used hexameter in a translation from the
Swedish Of Tegner, and followed mp the offence III
1917 with Evangeline The next year Clough
yroe the Bothc Of Tober-na Nuilich, and ten years
after Kingsley wrote his Andromeda. Two
translatons Of the Had by Herschel and Cochrane
followed in this measure in 1o6667, and IN 1870
Bayard TAYLOR published in it his Home Pas
torals dorothy" is not precisely in hexameters
but it is in the nearly related sister measure, the
pentameteT, which has not been much cultivated ID
English since the time of France. The difference
between them is well described by COleridge in q
couple of little transations from Schiller. Here is
the Schiller Coleridge music OF the hexameter;
.strengly bears Us alcns in swelling and hnes bill
Nothing before AMI nothing behid The sky ard the
Ocean"
And here their music of the heXamcter and the
eegiac ode:
"In the he1a1oeter rises the Fountains svery ooinn
IT, the ysntameter aye falling in melody back
In an appendix at the end of his book, where it
,,lovs the part of one of WordEwOrths prefaces or
ESSAYS. the author of Dorothy" has something TO
say about bis measure: We are not ignorant.
brethren. OF what has been said and done concern
ing English HeXametcIs: from the days of Hob
binol and Abraham Fraunce. and Philip Sidney
down TO those OF Whewell. and CIough, and Long
fellow, and Kingsley, and Matthew Arnold, ana
that iun,en purgurcum Mr. 4. &. Swinburne" lie
then ouotes The second of tho Colerdge Schiller
eouplets and adds. " But few have taken kindly to
these measures; their friends feeble ilike my
self; and their enemies are mighty, and rage nor
riblv; and if they rage against the HeNameter. now
much more against the TaTer and more dfhcut ZEN
tameter3 Nevertheless, VIC. having chosen our
measure for no inadequate reasons, have done our
best not to break the rules thereOthat one postu-
late of aoccrt iaseGd Of quantity being granted be-
Ueyng that the metres Of IheOcrltus and Virgil
need not DO degraded though the heroine of our
Idyllum be nothing better than poor Dorothy
Crump."
The story Of Dorothy" which occupies about
Twenty-Five hundred -elegiac lines concerns 1T
SELF with the love of an English farmland
for a game Keeper; who IS OF course, her
superior in the lower strata of English rank 1t is
not necessary TO describe the emotions OF either OF
Itb for one 1nDst be poorly read III modern English
fiction not to divine them before beginning the
uo.m. Neither is it necessary 10 dwell upon the
4 ;frlI ans 4