If Mr. Swinburne's examples of the forms in his earlier volumes be not counted (since he then ignored many of the rules that, as his later books show, he can use with such splendid mastery), to Mr. Andrew Lang's Lays and Lyrics of Old France (Longman, 1872) must be assigned the honour of leading the way in the reproduction in English of the old French metrical forms, made in conformance to their ascertained laws. How far that volume led the way to the modern employment of these forms for original poetry in our own tongue, is not so easily proved. One thing, at least, is certain, that Mr. Austin Dobson, Mr. Edmund Gosse, Mr. W. E. Henley, Mr. Payne, and one or two other writers, were each, unknown to the rest, trying the new measures. In the words of one of these, "the study of French literature was in the air;" and naturally, as we now see, the new movement began simultaneously to adapt its rules to English conditions. To Mr. Bridges belongs the honour of printing the first Triolet in modern English; but he expressly disclaims being looked upon as the apostle for the naturalisation of the exotic forms, for which he had no peculiar sympathy, and after his Poems, 1873, ceased to use. So little were his experiments appreciated, that their presence in his volume was considered prejudicial to its success, by competent authorities of the day, who little foresaw the rapid growth that would so soon spring up. To Mr. Austin Dobson is assigned the first ballade, "The Prodigals;" to Mr. Edmund Gosse the first villanelle and chant royal; and to Mr. W. E. Henley the first double ballade, and a few other variations. But it is most likely that the priority of some of these was due to the mere accident of publication, and that it is more near the truth to regard the whole as a contemporaneous movement toward French rhythms, thought out and experimented upon by many writers, ignorant of the fact that they were not alone in the study, and that others were working upon the same lines. One of the first who made trial of these French rhythms has (I believe) never published any; yet examples of their use by the author of A Child's Garden of Verse would have added greatly to the interest of this collection, but the author has willed that they should remain unquoted, so I can only regret their absence.
From 1873 to 1877 a fair number had appeared, but these were produced almost entirely by the writers already named. From 1877, however, the number of those who made them increased rapidly. In that year Mr. Dobson's Proverbs in Porcelain was published, containing a series of these forms, which, as internal evidence of much subsequent work shows, have been accepted as typical models to be followed in their English use. The series in The London noticed elsewhere, during this year and 1878, also increased their popularity, while the later English use may be traced to some extent by the examples here collected. In America about the same time the new fashion in versemaking was taken up very warmly, and to the present day the Americans have shown themselves more cordial towards the Gallic measures than even our own countrymen. In the popular periodicals of the United States there are more specimens than in our English magazines, and the appearance of so many examples in this book shows that the American poets have caught a great deal of the peculiar quality, hard to define but easy to recognise, which the forms demand. Then came Mr. W. Davenport Adams's Latter Day Lyrics, with a section devoted to these forms, and "A Note on Some Foreign Forms of Verse," by Mr. Dobson. Since then the poems written in these styles have been increasing in number, until the idea of collecting them in one volume, long in my mind, was favourably entertained by Mr. William Sharp, the general editor of the series in which this book appears.
The taste for these tours de force in the art of versemaking is no doubt an acquired one; yet to quote the first attempt to produce a lyric with a repeated burden would take one back to the earliest civilisation. The use of the refrain and conventional arrangement of rhyme in these forms differs as widely from the burdens of the old examples, as the purely conventional design of Greek art from the savage patterns of its ancestral stock. Whether the first refrains were used for decorative effect only, or to give the singer time to recollect or to improvise the next verse, it matters little, since the once mere adjunct was made in later French use an integral and vital part of the verse. The charm of these strictly written verses is undoubtedly increased by some knowledge of their technical rules. As a subtle harmony of colours may reveal, to those who can grasp it, a miracle of skill and science, while it is no more nor less than "a pretty picture" to others—or polyphonic harmony, with all the resources of the science of music, may be employed to enrich a clear popular melody, to which the unmusical can yet nod their heads and fancy they understand it all; so a ballade or rondeau may be so deftly wrought, with an infinity of care and grace, that those who read it simply as a dainty poem never suspect the stern laws ordering the apparent spontaneity of the whole. To approach ideal perfection, nothing less than implicit obedience to all the rules is the first element of success; but the task is by no means finished there. Every quality that poetry demands, whether clearness of thought, elegance of expression, harmonious sound, or faultless rhythm, is needed as much in these shapes as in unfettered verse, and not until all those are contributed comes the final test of the poem itself; whether it utters thoughts worth uttering, or suggests ideas worth recalling. It may be said, without fear of exaggeration, that all the qualities required to form a perfect lyric in poetry are equally needful here, plus a great many special ones the forms themselves demand. To the students of any art there is always a peculiar charm when the highest difficulties are surmounted with such ease, that the consummate art is hidden to all who know not the magic password to unveil it. But for those who have no special knowledge of poetry, it is pertinent to inquire what good these ingenious tours de force achieve, and why the poem could not please as well if it was written in ordinary verse? This is hard to answer; but the fact remains that in every phase of art, whether music, picture, or poem, such technical achievements have invariably found admirers in any period of advanced civilisation. It has been said that these forms display no higher aim than the verses printed to resemble an hour-glass or altar, in some of our early poets; but such an accusation is hardly worthy of serious reply. If the sonnet in Italian form has gained world-wide fame, the principle of fixed form is at once shown to be acceptable to the majority of scholars, and it becomes only a question of degree whether these rondeaus and ballades gain so prominent a place. It is hardly fair to expect to find among these forms a lyric that has caught the ear of the public, and won its way to the hearts of everyone; fifteen years of use is all they may claim, and compared with the lyric poetry guileless of bonds, during the same period, they at least hold their own. It must also be remembered that they were adopted by the younger men, who won no small amount of their present fame by these pretty devices.
On the Rules of the Various Forms.—There are several general laws governing these fixed metrical forms that must be insisted on at the outset. The rule of the limited number of rhymes holds good of nearly all. One feature prominent in the French rules is impossible in English, as the difference between the rhyme masculine on words that have not the e mute for their final letter, and the rhyme feminine on words that possess the e mute, is unknown to us; but side by side with the release from one binding law in French verse, a new one is imposed. In that language, words of exactly similar sound and spelling may be used to rhyme together, provided the meaning of the words is distinct—such license the most doggerel bard would reject in English—in spite of the precedent Milton offers, having "Ruth" and "ruth" in one of his sonnets. Purists forbid in our tongue the use of words of distinct spelling, but identical sound, as "sail" and "sale," "bear" and "bare;" nor would they allow words closely allied, as "claim," "disclaim," "reclaim," to be employed, the strict rule being, that no syllable once used as a rhyme can be used again for that purpose throughout the poem, not even if it be spelt differently while keeping the same sound; nor if the whole word is altered by a prefix; the syllable that rhymes must always be a new one both in sense and sound. It is this feature of the many rhymes to be found on a limited root-sound that proves the initial difficulty in these shapes.
If the above rule is thought too strict—and it must be owned very few writers acknowledge it to the extent of excluding such words as "claim, acclaim, prove, reprove," etc.—at least such words should be kept as far apart as possible, not used in the same stanza, if it can be avoided, and never to rhyme with one another. Next in order, but of equal, perhaps primary importance, is the use of the refrain. This recurrent phrase is common in many languages; but the way these ballades, rondeaus, and other shapes employ it, differs from all others. In most old ballads and folk-songs the refrain comes as a mere jingle, or, at best, an interlude, not reflecting the idea of the verse it closes, nor varying its sense in spite of retaining its sound, as it does in a perfect example of these forms. An ordinary refrain in other poetry is usually kept to one note resounding through the whole poem, much as the drone-bass in "pifferari" or "musette" music is kept going throughout. In music there is another form of bass always kept continuous—the ground-bass, on which Handel and Bach built some mighty choruses; but in this the repeated sequence of notes in the phrase, although they occur again and again unaltered, have the superstructure welded into them, one splendid harmony—not, as in the other, a melody merely floating over the accompaniment of the one note or chord of the drone bass. It may be a somewhat forced parallel, but in the instance quoted, and the fugue, canon, and other contrapuntal laws of classical music, there is much in common with these laws of strict metrical verse. The enormous use of set forms in the masterpieces of tone-art may be a happy augury to the future that yet awaits them in word-art. It may be said that at present the poems dare claim no such success as the contrapuntal devices in music can show, where the greatest works employ such devices frequently; yet the leap from the simple forms of counterpoint to the works of the mighty John Sebastian took but comparatively few years, although the distance was so great. But fanciful parallels of this sort are rarely satisfactory to any, except their maker, and need not be dwelt on here. The refrain in each case is noticed more especially among the laws of each form, but with regard to all the forms it is necessary to insist on the importance of introducing it unaltered in sound on each recurrence; it is sometimes changed by using, say, "and" for "but," or "then" for "if;" but, without condemning any who take this license, it is better to avoid it. Still, any change of meaning that be obtained by alteration of punctuation, accent, or even of spelling, provided the sound is unchanged, is not merely allowable but desirable, in lighter verse especially. Without recommending the use of the pun pure and simple, where its easy vulgarity would quickly be fatal to the dainty conceits that mark the best humorous verse in these forms, yet any pretty play upon words, or a sentence with new meaning read into it by the context, is more than permissible, being present in the best models of the Voiture rondeau and many triolets and ballades. This applies chiefly to poems of the class called Vers de Société, for want of an English synonym. The comic papers of our own country show no use of the form quite so fine in burlesque treatment as some of the American ones, notably the chant royal, Mrs. Jones, by Mr. H. C. Bunner; in the burlesque examples printed in this book it will be seen that the forms can be made to give added zest to satire or humour, beside imparting a certain scholarly finish, that itself raises them from the terribly dead level of much of our so-called comic poetry. A few shapes yet await presentation in English dress. I have not succeeded in finding specimens of the glose or the virelai (rhythme d'Alain Chartier), while the example of the virelai (nouveau), Mr. Dobson's "July," is the only one brought to light. The lai and the rondelet are also very little used, so that anyone interested in these old measures will yet find plenty of unhackneyed forms for experimenting upon. It is curious that the sonnet, no less exacting in its technical rules, and far more imperious in the treatment it demands, finds so many eager followers, for with its wealth of literature, the chance of attaining to the second rank even, among such splendid poems, requires a high amount of talent, if not absolute genius. In the rondeau, or ballade, many writers who are ignored in the ampler crowd of sonnet-makers might find pleasing forms, not merely to display true poetic thoughts (if they have the power to do so), but verse that has in its shape some air of novelty still, and would sound less like the faint re-echoes of a stronger song, the frequent effect of many a modern sonnet.
These few prefatory lines may well close with De Banville's own words (in Mr. Lang's English)—"This cluster of forms is one of our most precious treasures, for each of them forms a rhythmic whole, complete and perfect, while at the same time they all possess the fresh and unconscious grace which marks the production of primitive times." As the translator adds, "There is some truth in this criticism, for it is a mark of man's early ingenuity in many arts to seek complexity (where you would expect simplicity), and yet to lend to that complexity an infantine naturalness. One can see this phenomenon in early decorative art, and in early law and custom, and even in the complicated structure of primitive languages. Now, just as early and even savage races are our masters in the decorative use of colour and of carving, so the nameless mastersingers of ancient France may be our teachers in decorative poetry—the poetry some call vers de société."
In analysing the structure of these forms, it would be, no doubt, possible for a master to present them in English, as terse and epigrammatic as the French of de Banville or de Gramont. But there would be a danger in so doing. A famous prelate is said to have apologised for a long letter, on the ground that he had not time to write a short one: this anecdote may be paraphrased here, for it often happens that many have time to run through a discursive, gossipy description, when they could not devote the attention needful to read a short one. If every word is carefully chosen, and used in an exact way to convey as much as possible, it requires no less careful reading;—as in some of our Science Primers, where the material for an ordinary chapter is condensed and reduced to the crystal of a single sentence, that demands almost equal exactness in obtaining its solution, if one would absorb all the learning compressed in so small a compass. This excuse may serve in lieu of a better for the somewhat prolix method in which these rules are presented. Let no one imagine that the most perfect knowledge of the laws of these forms is enough to start him in writing poetry; for such rules are but what the fundamental rules of arithmetic are to astronomers—all important as the basis, but powerless, without genius and science, to discover new worlds, or formulate an hypothesis for the existence of known ones. If such books as those the present chapter follows are looked upon as handbooks to making poetry, that one stupendous flight of imagination is probably the only one its author is fated to achieve.
The Ballade.—In the alphabetical sequence adopted in the arrangement of this volume, the Ballade happily comes first. This is as it should be, since no other of these forms has been more frequently used in English, nor, it may be, is any other so capable of variety, since among its successful examples many different treatments will be found. This form adapts itself to its subject, and may be sonorous or stately, playful or easy, at the will of its writer, as, in capable hands, it can strike any note in the gamut of passions, from religious exaltation or fierce grim satire, to actual pathos, or, if needful, pure burlesque. It is possible the Ballade will never be written so strictly to one model as the sonnet, but that many variations—to be noticed presently—will each find admirers; but the existing examples warrant a belief that the shape will continue in our poetry, for it is impossible, in face of many hundred examples, to style it an exotic at the present day.
The construction of the Ballade, although not less stern in insisting on the introduction of a refrain than many of the other shapes, uses it at wider intervals, and so escapes the besetting danger of such forms as the villanelle or triolet, where its constant recurrence may easily become as senseless as the "with a fal, la, la" of the old madrigal writers, unless it be very skilfully brought in. Again, its length, generally of twenty-eight or thirty-five lines, with the refrain in either case appearing but four times, allows room to display the subject, and yet forbids the diffuseness of many ordinary lyrics, where one fancies a happy rhyme-sound is often responsible for the intrusion of an additional couplet or quatrain, that weakens the whole poem. Its length, moreover, strictly within hard and fast limits though it be, is not so cramped as the fourteen lines of the true sonnet, nor has tradition fixed the style of treatment of the central idea. The narrative ballade is perfectly legitimate, provided the writer has sufficient power to overcome the extreme difficulty it presents. It is often urged that the unalterable sequence of rhymes, which must be found after the set of three or five are once chosen, proves a hindrance to the imagination of the poet who uses it. M. Lemâitre has answered this objection very aptly. He says—"The poet who begins a ballade does not know very exactly what he will put into it. The rhyme, and nothing but the rhyme, will whisper things unexpected and charming, things he would never have thought of but for her, things with strange and remote relations to each other, all united in the disorder of a dream. Nothing, indeed, is richer in suggestion than the strict laws of these difficult pieces; they force the fancy to wander afield, hunting high and low; and while she seeks through all the world the foot that can wear Cinderella's slipper, she makes delightful discoveries by the way."[6]