Gunhild. But they
Will have a longer memory.
. . . . .
... Oh, indestructible
Are the first bonds of living. Fare thee well.
Thou wilt engender thine own ancestry;
Nature will have her permanence.
Canute. And I
Will have my impulse.
Gunhild. Oh, the blue fir-bough,
The bird, the fern, and iris at my feet!
The whole world talks of birth, it is the secret
That shudders through all sap. [Exit.
Act I, Scene 4
In illustrating poetic drama, one chooses inevitably such passages as these, where poetic imagination is concentrated at high power. But they, by their nature, cannot represent the suppler and swifter dramatic qualities of this poetry. And they do no more than hint at what is, in our poet, a very great gift—;psychological insight flashing into expression as vivid and as true as itself. It is well-nigh impossible to illustrate this by quotation, because the effect is cumulative. The phrase which darts into the mind is full of what the mind already holds, but which was dark and inchoate until the flash came. One or two minor examples may be given from this play, as when Edric (conceived by the poet as entirely base) is sounding Canute on the subject of a marriage with Emma:
Canute. I have no doubt
But I shall marry.
Edric. Where’s the wife to match
An eagle of your plumage?
Canute. All the world
Is full of stately women.
Edric. I have seen
But one, the late king’s widow. She is prime
Among all dames.
Canute. You think that you have seen her,
Because you know she has a radiant skin,
And strange, proud eyes!
And again, when Edric asks for some message, a “sugared speech” to take to Emma: