Folio, 1713.
Non injussa cano: te nostræ. Vare, myricæ,
Te nemus omne canet; nec Phœbo gratior ulla est,
Quam sibi quæ Vari præscripsit pagina nomen.—Virg.
London: Printed for Bernard Lintott, at the Cross-keys,
in Fleet Street.
The work appeared before March 9, 1713, on which day Swift writes to Stella, "Mr. Pope has published a fine poem, called Windsor Forest. Read it." In his manuscript Pope says, "It was first printed in folio in ——. Again in folio the same year, and in octavo the next." It was included in the quarto of 1717, in the second edition of Lintot's Miscellany in 1714, and in the four succeeding editions of 1720, 1722, 1727 and 1732.
This poem was written at two different times. The first part of it, which relates to the country, in the year 1704, at the same time with the Pastorals. The latter part was not added till the year 1713, in which it was published.—Pope.
In 1713 Pope published Windsor Forest; of which part was, as he relates, written at sixteen, about the same time as his Pastorals; and the latter part was added afterwards: where the addition begins we are not told.[1] The lines relating to the Peace confess their own date. It is dedicated to Lord Lansdowne, who was then in high reputation and influence among the tories; and it is said, that the conclusion of the poem gave great pain to Addison, both as a poet and a politician. Reports like this are often spread with boldness very disproportionate to their evidence. Why should Addison receive any particular disturbance from the last lines of Windsor Forest? If contrariety of opinion could poison a politician, he would not live a day; and, as a poet, he must have felt Pope's force of genius much more from many other parts of his works. The pain that Addison might feel, it is not likely that he would confess; and it is certain that he so well suppressed his discontent, that Pope now thought himself his favourite.
The design of Windsor Forest is evidently derived from Cooper's Hill, with some attention to Waller's poem on the Park; but Pope cannot be denied to excel his masters in variety and elegance, and the art of interchanging description, narrative, and morality. The objection made by Dennis is the want of plan, of a regular subordination of parts, terminating in the principal and original design. There is this want in most descriptive poems, because as the scenes, which they must exhibit successively, are all subsisting at the same time, the order in which they are shown must, by necessity, be arbitrary, and more is not to be expected from the last part than from the first. The attention, therefore, which cannot be detained by suspense, must be excited by diversity, such as this poem offers to its reader. But the desire of diversity may be too much indulged. The parts of Windsor Forest which deserve least praise are those which were added to enliven the stillness of the scene—the appearance of Father Thames, and the transformation of Lodona. Addison had, in his Campaign, derided the rivers, that "rise from their oozy beds" to tell stories of heroes;[2] and it is therefore strange that Pope should adopt a fiction not only unnatural, but lately censured. The story of Lodona is told with sweetness; but a new metamorphosis is a ready and puerile expedient. Nothing is easier than to tell how a flower was once a blooming virgin, or a rock an obdurate tyrant.—Johnson.
Descriptive poetry was by no means the shining talent of Pope. This assertion may be manifested by the few images introduced in the poem before us which are not equally applicable to any place whatsoever. Rural beauty in general, and not the peculiar beauties of the forest of Windsor, are here described. Nor are the sports of setting, shooting, and fishing, at all more appropriated. The stag-chase, that immediately follows, although some of the lines are incomparably good, is not so full, so animated, and so circumstantial, as that of Somerville.—Warton.
Johnson remarks that this poem was written after the model of Denham's Cooper's Hill, with, perhaps, an eye on Waller's poem of the Park. Marvel has also written a poem on local scenery[3]—upon the hill and grove at Billborow, and another on Appleton House (now Nunappleton), in Yorkshire. Marvel abounds with conceits and false thoughts, but some of the descriptive touches are picturesque and beautiful. He sometimes observes little circumstances of rural nature with the eye and feeling of a true poet: