ON MODULATION. (59)
FROM LLOYD.
'T is not enough the voice' be sound and clear',
'T is modulation' that must charm the ear.
When desperate heroes grieve with tedious moan,
And whine their sorrows in a seesaw tone,
The same soft sounds of unimpassioned woes,
Can only make the yawning hearers doze.
The voice all modes of passion can express
That marks the proper word with proper stress:
But none emphatic can that speaker call,
Who lays an equal emphasis on all.
Some o'er the tongue the labored measure roll,
Slow and deliberate as the parting toll;
Point every stop, mark every pause so strong,
Their words like stage processions stalk along.
All affectation but creates disgust;
And e'en in speaking, we may seem too just.
In vain for them' the pleasing measure flows,
Whose recitation runs it all to prose:
Repeating what the poet sets not down,
The verb disjointing from its favorite noun,
While pause, and break, and repetition join
To make it discord in each tuneful line'.
Some' placid natures fill the allotted scene
With lifeless drawls, insipid and serene;
While others' thunder every couplet o'er,
And almost crack your ears with rant and roar;
More nature oft, and finer strokes are shown
In the low whisper than tempestuous tone;
And Hamlet's hollow voice and fixed amaze,
More powerful terror to the mind conveys
Than he, who, swollen with impetuous rage,
Bullies the bulky phantom of the stage.
He who, in earnest studies o'er his part,
Will find true nature cling about his heart.
The modes of grief are not included all
In the white handkerchief and mournful drawl:
A single look' more marks the internal woe,
Than all the windings of the lengthened Oh'!