is not so obvious, and there is danger of its escaping notice. One hears the line with increased pleasure after the imitation of sound is pointed out; but only the trained ear catches it at first.
This correspondence of sound and sense is called onomatopoeia. It may appear in a single word, as buzz, whack, crackle, roar, etc.; or a combination of imitative words, as Tennyson's
The moan of doves in immemorial elms,
And murmuring of innumerable bees;
or a suggestive echo rather than direct imitation, as Shelley's
Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-wingèd thieves;
or a suggestion of motion rather than of sound, as Milton's sea-fish
huge of bulk,
Wallowing unwieldy, enormous in their gait,
and the
Leviathan, which God of all his works
Created hugest that swim the ocean stream;