THE NEW MRS. MARKHAM.
IV.
CONVERSATION ON CHAPTER LXXI.
Mary. You spoke, Mamma, of CHAUCER being the Father of English poetry. Was there any English poetry before the discoveries of Lord EDWARD MARSH?
Mrs. M. Certainly, my dear. CHAUCER was our first eminent poet, but, as a distinguished American critic has observed, he could not spell. This greatly interfered with his popularity. Then there was SHAKSPEARE, who wrote quaint old-fashioned plays quite unsuitable for filming, but nevertheless enjoyed a certain fame until it was proved that he never existed and that SHAKESPEARE was the name of a syndicate; or that if he did exist he was somebody else; when all interest in his work naturally evaporated. The abolition of rhyme, about the year 1920, gave a fresh impetus to English poetry, and now, as you know, almost anyone can write it fluently, whereas formerly the easiest poems were written with the greatest difficulty. Indeed one reads of some old poets who were not able to produce a mere hundred lines in a day. Under the "free-verse" system, some of the Palustrine (or Marshy) School have been known to produce as many as three thousand lines in a day and to earn in a week as much as MILTON, an old poet of the seventeenth century, received for the whole of his greatest work, on which he was engaged for years.
Richard. You have often talked about people going into sanctuary. What does it mean?
Mrs. M. Originally every church, abbey, or consecrated place was a sanctuary, and all persons who had committed crimes or were otherwise in fear of their lives might secure themselves from danger by getting into them. But in the reign which we have been discussing it came to be used specially of the House of Commons from the number of tiresome and objectionable people who sought refuge there, because of the freedom from legal penalties which they enjoyed. Once safe in the House of Commons they said and even did things which, if they had been said or done in public, or even in private, would have exposed them either to prosecution or personal chastisement. Ultimately the nuisance became so great that the privilege of sanctuary was abolished, and the tone of the House of Commons greatly improved.
Mary. I could not quite understand that story about the King and the public jester.
Mrs. M. In earlier reigns it was customary for kings and nobles to have in their retinue some one whose business it was to play the fool, and who was privileged to say or do anything that was ridiculous for the sake of diverting his master. Although this practice had died out the privilege was usurped by a certain number of writers and speakers, who sought to attain notoriety by making themselves as unpleasant or ridiculous as possible on every occasion. It requires some cleverness to be a great fool, and though some of these public buffoons were clever men the majority had more malice than wit, and in time exhausted the patience of the people. Finally, in order to protect them from the violence of the infuriated populace, the Government were obliged to deport the chief offenders to the Solomon Islands, where cannibalism then prevailed.