E. C. Harding. — On Voice! Sounds. 419 



In the expression of thought, either in prose or poetry, and 

 particuh\rly in the latter, much depends on the dress. The 

 measure and cadence should be in harmony with the subject. 

 The narrative style of the ballad is altogether unlike the 

 narrative passages of the epic, not only in measure, but in 

 language. Certain artifices of style, alliterative and other- 

 wise, are well known. In a passage so familiar as to be almost 

 hackneyed Pope has shown how, even without changing the 

 measure, the sentiment may be emphasized by the sound of 

 the words : — 



'Tis not enough no harshness gives offence, 



The sound must seetn an echo to the sense : 



Soft is the strain when zephyr gently blows, 



And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows ; 



But when loud surges lash the sounding sliore 



The hoarse rough verse should like the torrent roar; 



When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw, 



The line, too, labours, and the words move slow ; 



Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, 



Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main. 



Essay on Criticism. 



The effect of this passage is chiefly produced by the choice 

 of consonants; the "labouring lines" being burdened with 

 those uncouth chisters of consonantal sounds which are so 

 difficult to the foreigner, and oftentimes by no means easy to 

 the native. But in the works of the modern masters of 

 English verse there are much more subtle devices than this 

 — so refined as almost to defy analysis. In the skilful use of 

 merely imitative words and measures Tennyson is pre- 

 eminent. The ripple and dash of his poem, " The Brook," and 

 the celebrated imitation of the " horse's hoofs as they canter 

 and canter away," in the "Northern Farmer," are cases in 

 point. 



Much has been written on the subject of imitative words, 

 and there is no doubt that (as in the passage just quoted from 

 Pope) they impart a degree of force and vivid expression to 

 both verse and prose. But imitative words are the crudest 

 and most imperfect form of language. It is the child who has 

 not attained the full power of speech who talks of the 

 " moo " and the " bow-wow; " and poetry or oratory which 

 mainly relies on imitative expression for effect is as false in 

 art as " descriptive music " of the " Battle of Prague " order, 

 which gives realistic imitations of cannonading and the 

 " groans of the wounded." 



All will admit that in true music — in such a composition, 

 for example, as Beethoven's " Moonlight Sonata " — there are 

 subtleties appealing to the emotions immeasurably beyond 

 anything of the superficial "descriptive" order. The whole 

 composition was suggested by the moonlight streaming through 

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