FROM OVERSEA.
From oversea—
Violets, for memories,
I send to thee.
Let them bear thought of me,
With pleasant memories
To touch the heart of thee,
Far oversea.
A little way it is for love to flee,
Love wing'd with memories,
Hither to thither oversea.
—William Sharp.
In the French example the form is seen to be composed of couplets of five syllable lines, all on the same rhyme, separated by single lines of two syllables, also on one rhyme throughout the stanza, which therefore employs but two rhymes. The number of lines in each verse was not fixed, nor the number of verses in the complete poem. The Lai has preserved a curious old tradition in the form it appears either in writing or print. As in the verse quoted, the first letter of each line begins exactly under the preceding one; not with the short line indented—that is coming under the middle of the larger ones—usual in other poems composed of lines of irregular length. This detail was called Arbre fourchu (a forked tree), from the fanciful resemblance of a trunk with bare branches projecting, found by imaginative persons in its appearance on paper.
In the Lai each fresh stanza of the poem has its own two rhyme sounds, without reference to the preceding ones. By curtailing this liberty, and compelling each succeeding stanza to take the rhyme for its longer lines, from the short line of the preceding verse the Virelai is produced.
The Virelai (ancien) is a lai that preserves a sequence of rhymes throughout. For example, in a twelve-line stanza the rhymes are A. A. b. A. A. b. A. A. b. A. A. b. (the long lines being marked by capital letters, and the shorter by small ones). Therefore, to follow the rules of the virelai, the next verse must have its rhymes B. B. c. B. B. c. B. B. c. B. B. c., and the next C. C. d. C. C. d., and so on until the last verse (taking seven verses for an example) would have G. G. a. G. G. a. G. G. a. G. G. a., its short lines rhyming with the two first lines of the poem. Thus each rhyme appears twice, once in its longer couplets, once in the short single lines. In the English examples this rule is preserved, but the length of the lines are frequently varied.
The Virelai (Rhythme d'Alain Chartier) by Boulmier may be quoted as a form yet unused (I believe) in England.
Triste remembrance!
Hé! Dieu! quand i'y pense
Ce m'est grand penance:
Las! de ma iouuence
A passé la flour.
Sanz doubter meschance,
Bercé d'esperance
Plain de desirance
Auecq Oubliance
Ay faict long seiour.
Nice troubadour
Assoty pastour
Serf ie feus d' Amour
Mais de ma folour
Ie n' ay repentance.
Ouyl, maugré Doulour
Bel Aage engignour
En moy fay retour,
Ne fust-ce qu'vng iour...
Et ie recommence.
The rhymes are a, a, a, a, b; a, a, a, b; b, b, b, b, a; b, b, b, b, a. As but one example has come to notice, so it must speak for itself, for it would be unfair to deduce rules from a single specimen. Before leaving this heading there is another form, the Virelai nouveau, singularly unlike its name. It is curious that both the Rondeau Redoublé and this one, masquerading under the names of well-known forms, should be each unlike their unqualified title, and yet so nearly akin to the other.
The Virelai nouveau is written throughout in two rhymes. Like the rondeau redoublé, its first stanza serves as refrain for the later ones, but its initial verse is but a couplet, and the two lines close each stanza alternately until the last, where they appear both together, but in inverse order. Unfortunately, space forbids an example being quoted in its complete length. The one usually chosen is "Le Rimeur Rebuté;" this commences with the couplet—
Adieu vous dy, triste Lyre,
C'est trop apprêter à rire.
Then follows a five-line stanza, rhyming a, a, b, a, a, with "Adieu vous dy," etc., for its last line; then an eight-lined one rhymed a, b, a, a, b, a, b, a, the last line being "C'est trop," etc.; that is followed by a four-line one closing with first line; then a sixteen-line one, using the second line for its refrain; then a seventeen-line one, with first line ending it; and finally a five-line stanza, its last lines being—
C'est trop apprêter à rire,
Adieu vous dy, triste lyre.
If this description conveys its intended meaning, it will be seen that the verses are singularly irregular in form, and choose both the order of the rhymes and the length of the verses exactly at the will of the poet; but each paragraph must not only use its proper refrain to close with, but must bring it in naturally and easily as an inherent part of the verse. The last two lines in the inverted order must also be worked in with equal skill. Excepting one by Mr. Austin Dobson, that appeared in Evening Hours about 1878, this form has been unused, or at least unpublished, in English verse.
The poems in the following collections have been chosen for several reasons—some for their intrinsic excellence, some as examples of pure form, some for their bold attempts to produce variations from the typical models. There has been no limit to the subjects, since the purpose was to give a representative group of the rhythms, treated in the most diverse ways. Even burlesque and diatribe of the use of the forms, masquerading in guise of the enemy they professed to attack, have been welcomed, as the points of the construction of the verse are often seen more clearly in such examples. For similar reasons the parody of the pioneer Ballade, Mr. Austin Dobson's Prodigals, is quoted, since the doubtful honour of parody is at least a proof of wide popularity, the only others marked in this way being Mr. Swinburne's 'Dreamland' and Mr. Lang's 'Primitive Man.' Here, too, in default of a better place, it may be noted that Mr. Henley's 'Villonism' is not an imitation of the incomprehensible ballades in 'Jargon' or 'Jobelin,' but a paraphrase in thieves' patter of to-day of Villon's Ballade of Good Counsel.
It may be that such a medley of themes handled in so many different ways, was never of set purpose grouped side by side before, but is to be hoped that a method in the madness will be found. While conscious of a few noteworthy examples, Rossetti's Translations from Villon to wit, being not included for reasons beyond my control, so it may be that one or two here inserted would have been replaced by later comers, had they not gone to the printer's eternity of stereotype. Started as a collection, but turned perforce to a selection, from the increasing number available, they yet do not aim so much at being a selection of the best work solely, as of the best and least-accessible examples. This explanation of the progress and purpose of the volume is offered in common fairness both to its readers and to those authors who have permitted their works to be included, also to those who by oversight or too late discovery on my part have no examples of their poetry included herein.
[Note to page [xxxvi].—For Wyatt's Rondeaus, and alteration of the same into Sonnets by Tottel, in his Miscellany, 1557, see Mr. Austin Dobson's Note in the Athenæum.]
[The Ballade, The Double Ballade, and The Chant Royal.]
Ballade en huitains d' octosyllabes.
Chant de May.
En ce beau mois delicieux,
Arbres, fleurs et agriculture,
Qui, durant l' yver soucieux,
Avez esté en sepulture,
Sortez pour servir de pasture
Aux troupeaux du plus grand Pasteur:
Chacun de vous en sa nature,
Louez le nom de Createur.
Les servans d' amour furieux
Parlent de l' amour vaine et dure,
Où vous, vrays amans curieux
Parlez de l' amour sans laidure.
Allez aux champs sur la verdure
Ouir l' oyseau, parfait chanteur;
Mais du plaisir, si peu qu'il dure
Louez le nom de Createur.
Quand vous verrez rire les Cieux
Et la terre en sa floriture,
Quand vous verrez devant vos yeux
Les eaux lui bailler nourriture,
Sur peine de grand forfaiture
Et d' estre larron et menteur,
N' en louez nulle creature,
Louez le nom de Createur.
Envoy.
Prince, pensez, veu la facture,
Combien est puissant le facteur;
Et vous aussi, mon escriture,
Louez le nom de Createur.
—Clement Marot.