The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1912-03-05

lows:
Beauty like hers IS genius. Not the
call
Or ONE or Of Dante's hear
sublime
Not Alichae!'s hand furrowing the
zones of time
Is more with comprised mysteries
musical:
Nay, not in Springs or summers
sweet football
More gathered gifts eSuberant
Life beuueatheS
Than doth this sovereign face,
whose lOvo-spcll brcathes
Even from it's Swallowed contour on
the wall.
AS many men are poets in their youth.
But for one sweet-s1rung SOU the
wires prOlong
Even through all change the in
Gomitable n
SO in likewise the enEenomed years,
whose tooth
Eends shallower grace with ruin void
Of ruth.
Upon this beluty's power shall
Wreak no wrong.
Obviously. each Of the four technical
divisions Of the piece voices q dis
tinct thought. Thus. quatrain n
says that no call OF genius is more
musical with comprised mysteries
tina is the girls beauty: q%uatrain two
ayers that not even in the approach.
OF Spring n Summer does exuber-
ant Life bedueath more gathered
gifts than does this girls face; teTcet
one likens the enduring quality Of the
poets love to the ~prO4Ongation Of
on irdomitable song: and tercet two
pictures the girls beauty as a power
which the envcnomed years, whose
tooth reHds ShallOWer grace, cannot
destroy. But as an evidence that this
Italian rule regarding Quatrains and
tercets is not always followed by the
best Victorian son1letccrs. any more
than it is followed by Milton in his
famous sonnet. "On His Blindness"
let us ook at the first OF Mrs. Brown
ing's 'Sonnets from the Portuguese"
which is quite as fine q piece Of work
as Rossetti's Genius in Beauty"
Mrs. ErowEing's sonnet is as follows:
I thought once how Theocritus had
Sung
OF the sweet years, the dear and
WiShed-for years.
Who each one in a gracious hand
To bear a gift for mortals. old or
young:
And as unused It in his antique
tongue.
I saw. In gradual vision through
my tears
The sweet. sad years. the lnelan-
choly years.
Those of my own life, who by turns
had flung
a shadow across me-. Straightway
was ware.
So weeping. how a mystic shape die
move
Behind me. and draw me backward
by the hair:
And q voice said in mastery, while
Guess now who holds thee -
Death" I said. But. there
The silver answer rang,-"Not death
but Love"
In the above poem, the word:
Young" flung" and hair should
each. theoretically. mark the clos.
Of a distinct thought: although, q:
; we observe. the word flung which
falls at the end Of the octave ant
should therefore be Immediately fol
lowed by the most pronounced breal
in the poem. comes. as a matter O
fact. in the middle OF a sentence. an,
is followed by no pause whatsoever
And a similar condition is to be fount
:, in sonnets 2, 8, 6. 10, II. IS. II. IS
I 20. p. %. 90, 81, Is. %. 81, 81, "a
So. 81. 80. Al. IA Of "Sonnets from
. the Portuguese" Hence. we must con
| ciude that the success Of the Vic
= torian sonnet is due quit as niue;
to discriminating and judicious de
8 parture from the old rules OF tech
nioue as to rigid observance of thes
= rules.
Even in the rost superficial con
8 sideration Of the Victorian sonnet, on
fact which must never be lost sigh
3 OF is that the Victorian poets almos
G invariably went to Milton and tn,
Italians. rather thar to Shakspere
for their sonnet forms. Neither Mrs
Browning Tor Rossetti Used tn
ShaksperiaH form. and indeed if "
G wish to find it in Victorian literatur
at all. we shall be almost oblige,
to go to the sonnets OF Aubrey d
a Ill., Cl>4-IA n---a.-e- 49,