40 A GOOD WORD FOR WINTER. 



the great storm of two winters ago, the most robustious 

 periwig-pated fellow of late years, I waded and floun- 

 dered a couple of miles through the whispering night, 

 and brought home that feeling of expansion we have 

 after being in good company. " Great things doeth He 

 which we cannot comprehend ; for he saith to the snow, 

 ' Be thou on the earth.' " 



There is admirable snow scenery in Judd's " Marga- 

 ret," but some one has confiscated my copy of that ad- 

 mirable book, and, perhaps, Homer's picture of a snow- 

 storm is the best yet in its large simplicity : — • 



** And as in winter-time, when Jove his cold sharp javelins throws 

 Amongst us mortals, and is moved to white the earth with snows, 

 The winds asleep, he freely pours till highest prominents, 

 Hill-tops, low meadows, and the fields that crown with most contents 

 The toils of men, seaports and shores, are hid, and every place, 

 But floods, that fair snow's tender flakes, as their own brood, em- 

 brace." 



Chapman, after all, though he makes very free with 

 him, comes nearer Homer than anybody else. There is 

 nothing in the original of that fair snow's tender flakes, 

 but neither Pope nor Cowper could get out of their 

 heads the Psalmist's tender phrase, " He giveth his snow 

 like wool," for which also Homer affords no hint. Pope 

 talks of "dissolving fleeces," and Cowper of a "fleecy 

 mantle." But David is nobly simple, while Pope is 

 simply nonsensical, and Cowper pretty. If they must 

 have prettiness, Martial would have supplied them with 

 it in his 



Densum tacitarum vellus aquarum, 



which is too pretty, though I fear it would have pleased 

 Dr. Donne. Eustathius of Thessalonica calls snow v8a>p 

 epiaSes, woolly water, which a poor old French poet, 

 Godeau, has amplified into this : — 



Lorsque la froidure inhumaine 

 De leur verd ornement depouille les for§ts 

 Sous une neige (ipaisse il couvre les guerets, 

 Et la neige a pour eux la chaleur de la laine. 



