A history of English literature - Edward Albert

From Scott the evolution of style can be traced through the mannered, half-humorous ornateness of Lamb to the florid poetic prose of Wilson and the dithyrambic periods of De Quincey. As a final specimen we give an extract from the Noctes Ambrosianæ. The style is fervidly exclamatory, but it lacks the depth of De Quincey’s at its best.

Shepherd. Oh that I had been a sailor! To hae circumnavigated the world! To hae pitched our tents, or built our bowers, on the shores o’ bays sae glittering wi’ league-long wreaths o’ shells, that the billows blushed crimson as they murmured! To hae seen our flags burning meteor-like, high up among the primeval woods, while birds, bright as bunting, sat trimming their plumage amang the cordage, sae tame in that island where ship had haply never touched before, nor ever might touch again, lying in a latitude by itself, and far out of the breath o’ the tradewinds! Or to hae landed with a’ the crew, marines and a’—except a guard on shipboard to keep aff the crowd o’ canoes—on some warlike isle, tossing wi’ the plumes on chieftain’s heads, and sound—sound—sounding wi’ gongs! What’s a man-o’-war’s barge, Mr Tickler, beautiful sight tho’ it be, to the hundred-oared canoe o’ some savage Island-king!

TABLE TO ILLUSTRATE THE DEVELOPMENT OF LITERARY FORMS

Date	Poetry			Drama		Prose
Date	Lyric	Narrative-Descriptive	Satirical and Didactic	Comedy	Tragedy	Novel	Essay	Miscellaneous
	Wordsworth[198]\|	Southey				J. Austen[199]		Coleridge[200]
1800	Coleridge[198]	Landor				M. Edgeworth	Cobbett
		Scott[201]					Jeffrey
	Moore						S. Smith
	Campbell	Wordsworth
1810								Southey
		Byron[202]	J. and H. Smith
	Byron	Hogg
	Hogg	Shelley[203]				Scott[204]
		Moore	Moore		Byron[205]		Lockhart
	Shelley	Keats[206]	Shelley				Hazlitt	Coleridge[207]
1820	Keats		Byron[208]		Shelley[209]
						Galt	DeQuincey[210]	Wilson
							Lamb[211]
						Bulwer-Lytton
1830						Marryat
	Elliott		Elliott			Disraeli		Moore[212]
						Ainsworth
								Lockhart[213]
1840			Hood		Wordsworth[214]	Lever

EXERCISES

1. Below are given two extracts on autumn, one written by Keats and one by Shelley. Compare them carefully with regard to selection of details, style, and meter. How far does each reflect the nature of its author?

(1) Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness!

Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;

Conspiring with him how to load and bless

With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;