_Different Att.i.tudes in which Authors compose.--Bayes, Henry Stevens, Herodotus, etc.--Writing in Bed--in the Fields.--Plato and Sir Richard Blackmore.--Fiddling with Gloves and Twigs.--Madame de Stael.--Rhyming on the Road, in an old Caleche_.
What various att.i.tudes and ways And tricks we authors have in writing!
While some write sitting, some like BAYES Usually stand while they"re inditing, Poets there are who wear the floor out, Measuring a line at every stride; While some like HENRY STEPHENS pour out Rhymes by the dozen while they ride.
HERODOTUS wrote most in bed; And RICHERAND, a French physician, Declares the clock-work of the head Goes best in that reclined position.
If you consult MONTAIGNE and PLINY on The subject, "tis their joint opinion That Thought its richest harvest yields Abroad among the woods and fields, That bards who deal in small retail At home may at their counters stop; But that the grove, the hill, the vale, Are Poesy"s true wholesale shop.
And verily I think they"re right-- For many a time on summer eves, Just at that closing hour of light, When, like an Eastern Prince, who leaves For distant war his Haram bowers, The Sun bids farewell to the flowers, Whose heads are sunk, whose tears are flowing Mid all the glory of his going!-- Even _I_ have felt, beneath those beams, When wandering thro" the fields alone, Thoughts, fancies, intellectual gleams, Which, far too bright to be my own, Seemed lent me by the Sunny Power That was abroad at that still hour.
If thus I"ve felt, how must _they_ feel, The few whom genuine Genius warms, Upon whose soul he stamps his seal, Graven with Beauty"s countless forms;-- The few upon this earth, who seem Born to give truth to PLATO"S dream, Since in their thoughts, as in a gla.s.s, Shadows of heavenly things appear.
Reflections of bright shapes that pa.s.s Thro" other worlds, above our sphere!
But this reminds me I digress;-- For PLATO, too, produced, "tis said, (As one indeed might almost guess), His glorious visions all in bed.[1]
"Twas in his carriage the sublime Sir RICHARD BLACKMORE used to rhyme; And (if the wits don?t do him wrong) Twixt death and epics past his time,[2]
Scribbling and killing all day long-- Like Phoebus in his car, at ease, Now warbling forth a lofty song, Now murdering the young Niobes.
There was a hero "mong the Danes, Who wrote, we"re told, mid all the pains And horrors of exenteration, Nine charming odes, which, if you"ll look, You"ll find preserved with a translation By BARTHOLINOS in his book.
In short "twere endless to recite The various modes in which men write.
Some wits are only in the mind.
When beaus and belles are round them prating; Some when they dress for dinner find Their muse and valet both in waiting And manage at the self-same time To adjust a neckcloth and a rhyme.
Some bards there are who cannot scribble Without a glove to tear or nibble Or a small twig to whisk about-- As if the hidden founts of Fancy, Like wells of old, were thus found out By mystic trick of rhabdomancy.
Such was the little feathery wand,[3]
That, held for ever in the hand Of her who won and wore the crown[4]
Of female genius in this age, Seemed the conductor that drew down Those words of lightning to her page.
As for myself--to come, at last, To the odd way in which _I_ write-- Having employ"d these few months past Chiefly in travelling, day and night, I"ve got into the easy mode Of rhyming thus along the road-- Making a way-bill of my pages, Counting my stanzas by my stages-- "Twixt lays and _re_-lays no time lost-- In short, in two words, _writing post_.
[1] The only authority I know for imputing this practice to Plato and Herodotus, is a Latin poem by M. de Valois on his Bed, in which he says:--
_Lucifer Herodotum vidit Vesperque cubantem, desedit totos heic Plato saepe dies_.
[2] Sir Richard Blackmore was a physician, as well as a bad poet.
[3] Made of paper, twisted up like a fan or feather.
[4] Madame de Stael.
EXTRACT I.
Geneva.
_View of the Lake of Geneva from the Jura.[1]--Anxious to reach it before the Sun went down.--Obliged to proceed on Foot.--Alps.--Mont Blanc.--Effect of the Scene_.
"Twas late--the sun had almost shone His last and best when I ran on Anxious to reach that splendid view Before the daybeams quite withdrew And feeling as all feel on first Approaching scenes where, they are told, Such glories on their eyes will burst As youthful bards in dreams behold.
"Twas distant yet and as I ran Full often was my wistful gaze Turned to the sun who now began To call in all his out-posts rays, And form a denser march of light, Such as beseems a hero"s flight.
Oh, how I wisht for JOSHUA"S power, To stay the brightness of that hour?
But no--the sun still less became, Diminisht to a speck as splendid And small as were those tongues of flame, That on the Apostles" heads descended!
"Twas at this instant--while there glowed This last, intensest gleam of light-- Suddenly thro" the opening road The valley burst upon my sight!
That glorious valley with its Lake And Alps on Alps in cl.u.s.ters swelling, Mighty and pure and fit to make The ramparts of a G.o.dhead"s dwelling.
I stood entranced--as Rabbins say This whole a.s.sembled, gazing world Will stand, upon that awful day, When the Ark"s Light aloft unfurled Among the opening clouds shall shine, Divinity"s own radiant sign!
Mighty MONT BLANC, thou wert to me That minute, with thy brow in heaven, As sure a sign of Deity As e"er to mortal gaze was given.
Nor ever, were I destined yet To live my life twice o"er again, Can I the deep-felt awe forget, The dream, the trance that rapt me then!
"Twas all that consciousness of power And life, beyond this mortal hour;-- Those mountings of the soul within At thoughts of Heaven--as birds begin By instinct in the cage to rise, When near their time for change of skies;-- That proud a.s.surance of our claim To rank among the Sons of Light, Mingled with shame--oh bitter shame!-- At having riskt that splendid right, For aught that earth thro" all its range Of glories offers in exchange!
"Twas all this, at that instant brought Like breaking sunshine o"er my thought-- "Twas all this, kindled to a glow Of sacred zeal which could it shine Thus purely ever man might grow, Even upon earth a thing divine, And be once more the creature made To walk unstained the Elysian shade!
No, never shall I lose the trace Of what I"ve felt in this bright place.
And should my spirit"s hope grow weak, Should I, oh G.o.d! e"er doubt thy power, This mighty scene again I"ll seek, At the same calm and glowing hour, And here at the sublimest shrine That Nature ever reared to Thee Rekindle all that hope divine And _feel_ my immortality!
[1] Between Vattay and Gex.
EXTRACT II.
Geneva.
FATE OF GENEVA IN THE YEAR 1782.
A FRAGMENT.
Yes--if there yet live some of those, Who, when this small Republic rose, Quick as a startled hive of bees, Against her leaguering enemies--[1]
When, as the Royal Satrap shook His well-known fetters at her gates, Even wives and mothers armed and took Their stations by their sons and mates; And on these walls there stood--yet, no, Shame to the traitors--_would_ have stood As firm a band as e"er let flow At Freedom"s base their sacred blood; If those yet live, who on that night When all were watching, girt for fight, Stole like the creeping of a pest From rank to rank, from breast to breast, Filling the weak, the old with fears, Turning the heroine"s zeal to tears,-- Betraying Honor to that brink, Where, one step more, and he must sink-- And quenching hopes which tho" the last, Like meteors on a drowning mast, Would yet have led to death more bright, Than life e"er lookt, in all its light!
Till soon, too soon, distrust, alarms Throughout the embattled thousands ran, And the high spirit, late in arms, The zeal that might have workt such charms, Fell like a broken talisman-- Their gates, that they had sworn should be The gates of Death, that very dawn, Gave pa.s.sage widely, bloodlessly, To the proud foe--nor sword was drawn, Nor even one martyred body cast To stain their footsteps, as they past; But of the many sworn at night To do or die, some fled the sight, Some stood to look with sullen frown, While some in impotent despair Broke their bright armor and lay down, Weeping, upon the fragments there!-- If those, I say, who brought that shame, That blast upon GENEVA"S name Be living still--tho" crime so dark Shall hang up, fixt and unforgiven, In History"s page, the eternal mark For Scorn to pierce--so help me, Heaven, I wish the traitorous slaves no worse, No deeper, deadlier disaster From all earth"s ills no fouler curse Than to have *********** their master!
[1] In the year 1782, when the forces of Berne, Sardinia, and France laid siege to Geneva, and when, after a demonstration of heroism and self-devotion, which promised to rival the feats of their ancestors in 1602 against Savoy, the Genevans, either panic-struck or betrayed, to the surprise of all Europe, opened their gates to the besiegers, and submitted without a struggle to the extinction of their liberties--See an account of this Revolution in c.o.xe"s Switzerland.