Gets through our comments and glozes.
R. Browning (Master Hugues of Saxe-Gotha).
Hugues of Saxe-Gotha is an imaginary name, but it probably indicates the great Sebastian Bach, who came from that part of Germany. The “masterpiece, hard number twelve,” referred to in the poem, may be (Dr. E. Harold Davies tells me) the great Organ Fugue in F Minor, which is in “five part” counter-point.
This very interesting poem is written in a half-humorous fashion, but its intention is quite serious. In a wonderfully imitative manner,[8] it describes the wrangling and disputing in a five-voiced fugue (where five persons appear to be taking part):
One is incisive, corrosive;
Two retorts, nettled, curt, crepitant;
Three makes rejoinder, expansive, explosive;
Four overbears them all, strident and strepitant:
Five ... O Danaïdes, O Sieve!