ARTHUR W. E. O’SHAUGHNESSY.
Was born in 1844, and at the age of twenty obtained a position in the Natural History Department of the British Museum. In 1873 he married Miss Eleanor Marston, who assisted her husband in some of his early works, especially in a volume entitled “Toyland,” published in 1875.
But Mrs. O’Shaughnessy and her two children all died in 1879, and the unfortunate young poet did not long survive them, he dying in London early in 1881.
His early books—“An Epic of Women” (1870); and “Lays of France” (1872), were successful, but “Music and Moonlight” (1874), was coldly received.
Blue Moonshine.
By O’pshawnessy.
Mingled aye with fragrant yearnings,
Throbbing in the mellow glow,
Glint the silvery spirit burnings,
Pearly blandishments of woe.
Ay! for ever and for ever,
Whilst the love-lorn censers sweep,
Whilst the jasper winds dissever,
Amber-like, the crystal deep;
Shall the soul’s delirious slumber,
Sea-green vengeance of a kiss,
Teach despairing crags to number
Blue infinities of bliss.
Francis G. Stokes.
This parody originally appeared in The Shotover Papers, Oxford, May 1874.
“Frangipanni.”
By O’Sh******sy.
Untwine those ringlets! Ev’ry dainty clasp
That shines like twisted sunlight in my eye
Is but the coiling of the jewelled asp
That smiles to see men die.
Oh, cobra-curlèd! Fierce-fanged fair one! Draw
Night’s curtain o’er the landscape of thy hair!
I yield! I kneel! I own, I bless thy law
That dooms me to despair.
I mark the crimson ruby of thy lips,
I feel the witching weirdness of thy breath!
I droop! I sink into my soul’s eclipse,—
I fall in love with death!
And yet, vouchsafe a moment! I would gaze
Once more into those sweetly-murderous eyes,
Soft glimmering athwart the pearly haze
That smites to dusk the skies!
Hast thou no pity? Must I darkly tread
The unknown paths that lead me wide from thee?
Hast though no garland for this aching head
That soon so low must be?
No sound? No sigh? No smile? Is all forgot?
Then spin my shroud out of that golden skein
Thou call’st thy tresses! I shall stay thee not—
My struggles were but vain!
But shall I see thee far beyond the sun,
When the new dawn lights empyrean scenes?
What matters now? I know the poem’s done,
And wonder what the dickens it all means!
Judy. July 21, 1880.
Here is another parody of Mr. C. S. Calverley’s style:—
On the River.
It is sweet to sip the breezes
In September; and it pleases
Folks like me, whose work decreases
When its hot,
To depart from one’s landlady,
Very shortly after pay-day,
And to settle in some shady
Kind of spot.
In September I am lazy,
And my thoughts are rather mazy,
So I love the aspect hazy
Of some glade,
When the autumn moon uprises
O’er the hill, and me surprises,
Talking trash that full of sighs is,
To that maid.
She has eyes that seem to twinkle,
Like the pin-impaled winkle,
When the fish-wife dares to sprinkle
It with spice;
And her chestnut-tinted tresses,
That provoke a man’s caresses,
Haunt her swain till he confesses
She is nice.
Sometimes, when the day has faded,
And the moonbeams have invaded
Every nook that is unshaded
From their gleam,
Chloe, who is very knowing
In the noble art of rowing,
Vaguely drops a hint of going
Down the stream.
’Neath the branches of a willow,
With the drifted sedge for pillow,
Cradled on the silver billow
Lies a boat,
Which I speedily untether,
And we drift away together,
Like two beetles on a feather
That’s afloat.
Couched in shadow that so still is,
Dreamy, large-eyed waterlilies
Stare astonished at us sillies
Up above:
Doubtless, with a timid flutter
Of propriety, they mutter
Sentiments I dare not utter,
About love.
Wretched things! with no affections,
And with very bad complexions;
We can suffer your objections
And your snubs;
By your taunts we won’t be maddened,
And shall be surprised and gladdened,
If our true love be not saddened
By worse rubs.
Anonymous.
“Georgy.”
(After J. Ashby-Sterry.)
I know you, little winsome sweet,
You heroine of childish orgy;
What dance would ever be complete
Without our rosy, romping Georgy?
Straight as a dart, of which the sting
Lurks in a pair of pearl-gray eyes;
Slight, but the roundest lissome thing
As o’er the well-chalked floor she flies.
Nor can I say there is concealed
At ev’ry airy pirouette
The frill (not often so revealed!)
Of such a dainty pantalette!
Her little boots with silver heels
Ring on the boards as round she whirls—
I wonder if the darling feels
She cuts out all the other girls?
There is a saucy cock of chin,
A semblance of a conscious power
To stake (with ev’ry chance to win!)
The bud against the fallen flower.
Who knows these little maidens’ dreams?
Unsullied,—but with mischief fraught:
How like a woman Georgy seems,
Yet by what subtle instinct taught?
The question’s vague!—some day, perhaps,
She’ll find the answer, for the rogue is
A match, at twelve, for most young chaps,
And right away beyond us fogies.
For me,—I sit and watch her twirls,
Then wend me home and smoke my pipe,
That whispers “These delightful girls,
Thank goodness are in Sterry-o-type!”
R. Reece.
Judy. June 30, 1880.
It should be mentioned, in connection with Mr. J. Ashby-Sterry, that The Muse in Manacles, quoted on [page 64], was from his pen.
FREDERICK LOCKER-LAMPSON.
It should have been mentioned, in connection with the poems of this gentleman, that illustrated articles concerning his life and works appeared in Once a Week, September 7, 1872, and The Century, February, 1883. Both contained portraits, the one in The Century having been drawn by Mr. George Du Maurier. Mr. Locker’s poem “St. James’s Street,” (see [page 56]) originally appeared in The Times, in 1867.
BALLADES, RONDEAUS, AND VILLANELLES.
Since the last part was published several parodies on these exotics have been sent in by various correspondents, and it would be ungracious not to include them, indeed, the collection would be incomplete without them. The first humorous Ballade, aptly enough, is from the pen of Mr. Gleeson White, whose book on Ballades and Rondeaus has already been alluded to:—
Ballade of a Ballade Monger.
You start ahead in splendid style,
No stint of rhymes appear in view,
With many a happy thought the while—
You dash away as though you knew
Enough to fill the thirty-two.
Those lines, that need such careful filling,
Yet you are lucky if you do—
For ballade-mongering is killing.
Now on your face may dawn a smile,
To think that rhymes both neat and new,
To end your stanzas will beguile
Your pen—till “envoy” you must brew;
But half the poem yet is due.
And though she ready be and willing,
To your shy muse you yet must sue—
For ballade-mongering is killing.
Here’s stanza three, and now they rile,
Those end words that of every hue
And form, all seem so poor and vile,
You, weary of the hackneyed crew
This one suggests the other’s cue.
As fresh as—twelve pence for a shilling,
No, never change can you renew,
For ballade-mongering is killing.
Envoy.
Rhymesters! The Envoy you will rue,
Since it should be supreme and thrilling;
It’s ended, tamely it is true,
For ballade-mongering is killing.
Gleeson White.
Judy. October 5, 1887.
The following well known Ballade originally appeared in Mr. Andrew Lang’s Ballades in Blue China, the first (1880) edition of which is so much prized by collectors.
BALLADE OF PRIMITIVE MAN.
He lived in a cave by the seas,
He lived upon oysters and foes,
But his list of forbidden degrees
An extensive morality shows;
Geological evidence goes
To prove he had never a pan,
But he shaved with a shell when he chose,
’Twas the manner of Primitive Man!
He worshipp’d the rain and the breeze,
He worshipped the river that flows,
And the Dawn, and the Moon, and the trees,
And bogies, and serpents, and crows;
He buried his dead with their toes
Tucked up, an original plan,
Till their knees came right under their nose,
’Twas the manner of Primitive Man!
His communal wives, at his ease,
He would curb with occasional blows;
Or his State had a queen, like the bees
(As another philosopher trows):
When he spoke it was never in prose:
But he sang in a strain that would scan,
For (to doubt it, perchance, were morose)
’Twas the manner of Primitive Man!
(Three verses omitted.)
Envoy.
Max, proudly your Aryans pose,
But their rigs they undoubtedly ran,
For, as every Darwinian knows,
’Twas the manner of Primitive Man!
Andrew Lang.
A Ballade of Primitive Woman.
An American Parody.
She lived in a primitive way,
She lived in a hut made of trees,
With never a moving in May,
Unless when invaded by bees,
Her husband had never night keys,
Lodge nights were not then to deceive;
Nor was he addicted to sprees—
What a life led our relative, Eve!
He hadn’t for bonnets to pay,
Which accounts for his efforts to please;
Nor did he growl round every day,
O’er his trousers that bagged at the knees,
Unheard of were fashion’s decrees
Her dolmans she knew how to weave
From grape-leaves with greatest of ease,
What a life led our relative, Eve!
Her stew-pans she wrought out of clay
Her knives were the shells of the seas,
And she dined on a spicy entrée
Of grapes and some ape-fricassees.
To sleep with the toes to the breeze
Was considered the cheese, I believe,
Which was healthy, no one but agrees—
What a life lead our relative, Eve.
Envoy.
Cast off fashions gay panoplies,
“Sassiety” maiden, retrieve;
Learn, while apeing our “first familees,”
What a life led our relative, Eve!
Anonymous.
The Universal Review, for December, 1888, contained a peculiar article by Mr. H. D. Traill, entitled “The Doom of the Muses,” in which he satirically describes the present position of the Fine Arts. Dealing with Poetry, he thus alludes to the present craze for the Ballade:—
This is the age of glorified jingle,
Honour is only to rhyming pranks;
Deftliest who their assonants mingle,
They shall walk first in Poesy’s ranks:
They shall recline upon Helicon’s banks,
Fountain of bards who have conquered Time;
(Others must do with inferior tanks)
This is the era of run-mad rhyme.
Cold though their verse as the sea-shore shingle,
Common and cheap as the nails in the planks,
Empty as frothiest blather of Fingal,
Pointless as ends of the cats of the Manx,
Still the mere fact that their lines are not “blanks”
Helps them the Mount of Parnassus to climb,
Strengthens their unwinged Pegase’s shanks:
This is the era of run-mad rhyme.
Who shall reign over us sole and single?
He who his rhyme-web’s intricate hanks
Wears like a collar of bells that tingle,
Not like the links of a chain that clanks:
He who his burden of quips and cranks
Bears with the step of a light-foot mime,
Figure erect and unwavering flanks,—
This is the era of run-mad rhyme.
Muse, I presume you object to “spanks,”
Word—I admit it—beneath the sublime.
Pray then excuse me the Envoi. Thanks!
This is the era of run-mad rhyme.
Austin Dobson.—Andrew Lang.
Ah me! how many Fate makes mourn
Unhonoured in our midst to dwell,
Tho’ Epics write they, and—in scorn,
Shun Rondeau, Ballade, Villanelle;
Blank verse they scan—at times, as well,
In jolts and jingles harsh rhymes clang,
But fail to reach the pinnacle
Of Austin Dobson—Andrew Lang,
Dear brothers these, whose names adorn
Their roll, who spread Poesy’s spell,
Their sweetest strains heartward are borne
In Rondeau, Ballade, Villanelle;
Yet did no rival e’er excel
Their efforts in the realms o’ sang;—
The Laureate’s self bears not the bell
From Austin Dobson—Andrew Lang.
Their’s not the heaviness men spurn,
Light as the breeze in fairy dell
The flights of fancy that they turn
To Rondeau, Ballade, Villanelle;
From them we never flee pell mell,
Ne’er close their volumes with a bang;
O! naught our happiness can quell
With Austin Dobson—Andrew Lang.
Envoy.
How soothed our souls—what words can tell?
With Rondeau, Ballade, Villanelle,
How robbed of many a bitter pang
By Austin Dobson—Andrew Lang.
From Ballades of a Country Bookworm. By Thomas Hutchinson. London, Stanesby & Co. 1888.
Some years ago Mr. Austin Dobson wrote a few comical Triolets, which appeared in “Hood’s Comic Annual.” These have not been included in recent English editions of his poems—which is to be regretted.
——:o:——
Rondel.
You bet! you hear me. I tell you
I, Whistler, Sir, has fetched this town
Onto a copper, a renown,
He scratches in, Sir; yes a few!
Your critics they may hop the flue,
Your painting critturs, Sir, may frown,
I, Whistler, Sir! has fetched the town,
You bet you hear me, I tell you.
His bowie, Sir! is bright and new,
He licks ’em up, he licks ’em down
I guess, he gives ’em Fits in Brown,
Yes, Sir! and plays Old Hell in Blue!
You bet! you hear me! I tell you!
Rondel.
We have a most erotic bard,
His style and title Swinburne Charles,
Passion his frame contorts and gnarls,
The gods and women grip him hard.
Observe him bearded like a pard,
Furious and fair as northern jarls;
We have a most erotic bard,
His style and title Swinburne Charles.
He has a dungheap in his yard,
Mixed with the most offensive marls,
No wonder Mrs. Grundy snarls,
Faustine, Dolores, Chastelard,
We have a most erotic bard.
From London. 1877.
That dear old Tune.
(A Rondeau written in a rage.)
That dear old tune I loved of yore!
Indeed I love it still;
But never save by this one Bore
(Who lives upon my basement floor)
Have heard it played so ill.
Alas, what penance for my sins.
I seek my desk, and soon
Once more the tootling Fiend begins
That dear old tune!
All vainly I expostulate;
He tries it morn and noon,
I vow in sheer distress of hate
To learn the ‘loud bassoon’
‘I rage—I burn’—I execrate;
That dear old tune!
Austin Dobson.
Saturday Journal. 1874.
In Re Rondeau.
In corsets laced, in high-heeled shoes,
Too fine a woodland way to choose,
With mincing step and studied strut,
Is this an English Goddess? Tut—
Some masker from the Parley-Voos!
O, Poet! thou of sinewy thews,
Wilt thou free ways and walks refuse,
To mince instead through paths close shut,
In corsets laced?
I cannot—for I’ve old-time views—
Follow the poet who pursues
The Rondeau, with its rabbit scut,
Or Triumphs in a Triolet, but—
There may be those who like the muse,
In corsets laced.
Roundel.
The Cat that sings at dead of night
I pelt with bricks, and boots and things,
Oh, for the luck to kill outright
The Cat that sings!
It is as when at evening rings
Melodeon-music, only slight-
ly worse it tears your bosom-strings.
And if at last you chance to smite
Him over,—as to life he springs,
He simply screeches with delight—
The Cat that sings.
The University News Sheet. St. Andrew’s. March 3, 1886.
——:o:——
The Villanelle.
(For the original Villanelle, by Jean Passerat, see [page 66].)
Jean Passerat, I like thee well—
Thou sang’st a song beyond compare—
But I’ve not lost a tourterelle:
Nor can I write a villanelle—
Thou did’st—and for that Jewel rare,
Jean Passerat, I like thee well.
Now many a twittering hirondelle
The plumes of thy lost dove would wear—
But I’ve not lost a tourterelle.
Could not, indeed, true turtle tell—
If real or mock I could not swear:
Jean Passerat, I like thee well.
True heart that would go “après elle—”
And sure thy sentiment I’d share—
But I’ve not lost a tourterelle.
And am content on earth to dwell—
There are some men they cannot spare:
Jean Passerat, I like thee well,
But I’ve not lost a tourterelle!
Charles Henry Webb.
Villanelle.
“How to compose a Villanelle, which is said to require an elaborate amount of care in production, which those who read only would hardly suspect existed.”
It’s all a trick, quite easy when you know it,
As easy as reciting A. B. C.
You need not be an atom of a poet.
If you’ve a grain of wit and want to show it,
Writing a Villanelle—take this from me—
It’s all a trick, quite easy when you know it.
You start a pair of “rimes” and then you “go it”
With rapid running pen and fancy free,
You need not be an atom of a poet.
Take any thought, write round it or below it,
Above or near it, as it liketh thee;
It’s all a trick, quite easy when you know it.
Pursue your task, till, like a shrub, you grow it,
Up to the standard size it ought to be;
You need not be an atom of a poet.
Clear it of weeds, and water it, and hoe it,
Then watch it blossom with triumphant glee,
It’s all a trick, quite easy when you know it,
You need not be an atom of a poet.
Walter W. Skeat.
The Academy. May 19, 1888.
——:o:——
The Wail of the “Personally Conducted.”
Integral were we, in our old existence;
Separate beings, individually;
Now are our entities blended, fused, and foundered—
We are one Person.
We are not mortals, we are not celestials,
We are not birds, the upper ether clearing,
We are a retrogression toward the Monad:
We are Cook’s Tourists.
All ways we follow him who holds the Guide Book;
All things we look at, with bedazzled optics;
Sad are our hearts, because the vulgar rabble
Call us the Cookies.
Happy the man who, by his cheerful fireside,
Says to the partner of his joys and sorrows:
“Anna Maria, let us go to-morrow
Out for an airing.”
Him to Manhattan, or the beach of Brighton,
Gaily he hieth, or if, fate accurséd,
Lives he in Boston, still he may betake him
Down to Nantasket.
Happy the mortal, free and independent,
Master of the main spring of his own volition,
Look on us with the eye of sweet compassion,
We are Cook’s Tourists.
H. C. Bunner.
Scribner’s Monthly. November, 1879.
——:o:——
AN OLD SONG BY NEW SINGERS.
In the Original.
Mary had a little lamb,
Its fleece was white as snow,
And everywhere that Mary went
The lamb was sure to go.
As Austin Dobson Writes It.
Triolet.
A little lamb had Mary, sweet,
With a fleece that shamed the driven snow.
Not alone Mary went when she moved her feet
(For a little lamb had Mary, sweet)
And it tagged her ’round with a pensive bleat,
And wherever she went it wanted to go—
A little lamb had Mary, sweet,
With a fleece that shamed the driven snow.
As Mr. Browning Has It.
You knew her?—Mary the small,
How of a summer—or, no, was it fall?
The latter, I think—a lamb she received?
You’d never have thought it—never believed,
But the girl owned a lamb last fall.
Its wool was subtly, silky white,
Color of lucent obliteration of night—
Like the shimmering snow or—our Clothild’s arm!—
You’ve seen her arm—her right, I mean—
The other she scalded a-washing, I ween—
How white it is and soft and warm?
Ah, there was soul’s heart-love, deep, true and tender,
Wherever went Mary, the maiden so slender,
There followed, his all-absorbed passion, inciting,
That passionate lambkin—her soul’s heart delighting—
Ay, every place that Mary sought in
That lamb was sure to soon be caught in.
As Longfellow Might have Done It.
Fair the daughter known as Mary,
Fair and full of fun and laughter,
Owned a lamb, a little he-goat,
Owned him all herself and solely.
White the lamb’s wool as the Gotchi—
The great Gotchi, driving snowstorm.
Hither Mary went and thither,
But went with her to all places,
Sure as brook to run to river,
Her pet lambkin following with her.
How Andrew Lang Sings It.
Rondeau.
A wonderful lass was Marie, petite.
And she looked full fair and passing sweet—
And, oh! she owned—but cannot you guess
What pet can a maiden so love and caress
As a tiny lamb with a plaintive bleat
And mud upon his dainty feet,
And a gentle veally odour of meat?
And a fleece to finger and kiss and press—
White as snow?
Wherever she wandered—in lane or street
As she sauntered on, there at her feet
She would find that lambkin—bless
The dear!—treading on her dainty dress,
Her dainty dress, fresh and neat—
White as snow.
Mr. Algernon C. Swinburne’s Idea.
Villanelle.
Dewy-eyed with shimmering hair,
Maiden and lamb were a sight to see,
For her pet was white as she was fair.
And its lovely fleece was beyond compare,
And dearly it loved its Mistress Marie,
Dewy-eyed, with shimmering hair.
Its warped wool was an inwove snare
To tangle her fingers in, where they could be
(For her pet was white as she was fair)
Lost from sight, both so snow-white were,
And the lambkin adored the maiden wee—
Dewy-eyed with shimmering hair.
Th’ impassioned incarnation of rare,
Of limpid-eyed, luscious lipped, loved beauty—
And her pet was white as she was fair.
Wherever she wandered, hither and there,
Wildly that lamblet sought with her to be—
With the dewy-eyed, with shimmering hair,
And a pet as white as its mistress was fair.
A. C. Wilkie.
