The Casual Ward Part 8

PAGEANTS

My t.i.tyrus! and is't a fact (As wondrous facts there are) That History's scenes thou wouldst enact Beside the banks of Cher?

Wilt thou for pomps like these desert Thy calm and cloistered lair, Not quite so young as once thou wert, Nor (pardon me) so fair?

We saw thee stalk in youthful prime With high Proctorial mien: We saw the majesty sublime Which marked the Junior Dean; O pundit grave! O sage M.A.!

Say in what happy part Thou wilt before the crowd display Thy histrionic art!

With cranium bald, which ne'er again Will need the barber's shear, Wilt thou present in Charles his train Some long-locked Cavalier?

A sober Don for all to see Who once didst walk abroad, Wilt now an Ancient Briton be And painted blue with woad?

Me from such scenes afar remove, And hide my shuddering head Where Nature doth in field and grove Her fairer pageant spread: There will I meditating lie 'Mid summer's calm delights,- But thou wilt walk adown the High My t.i.tyrus,-in Tights. . . .

RULES FOR FICTION

A Novelist, whose magic art, Had plumbed ('twas said) the human heart, Whom for the penetrative ken Wherewith he probed the souls of men The Public and the Public's wife Declared synonymous with Life,- Sat idle, being much perplexed What Att.i.tude to study next, Because he would not wholly tell Which Pose was likeliest to sell.

To him the Muse: "Why seek afar For things that on the threshold are?

Why thus evolve with care and pain From your imaginative brain?

Put Artifice upon the shelf,- Take pen and ink, and draw-Yourself!"

The author heard: he took the hint: He photographed himself in print.

His very inmost self he drew. . . .

The critics said, "_This_ Will Not Do.

No more we recognize the art Which used to plumb the human heart,- This suffers from the patent vice Of being not Art but Artifice.

'Tis deeply with the fault imbued Of Inverisimilitude: He's written out; his skill's forgot: He only writes to Boil the Pot!

It is not true; it will not wash; 'Tis mere imaginative Bosh; And if he can't" (they told him flat) "Get nearer to the Life than that, He will not earn the Public's pelf!"

This happens when you draw Yourself.

Or-I should say-it happens when Such portraits are essayed by Men: For presently a Lady came And did substantially the same.

(Let everyone peruse this sequel Who dreams that Man is Woman's equal),- She with a hand divinely free Drew what she thought herself to be: It did not much resemble Her In moral strength or mental stature- Yet did the critics all aver It simply teemed with Human Nature!

ART AND LETTERS

In that dim and distant aeon Known as Ante-Mycenaean, When the proud Pelasgian still Bounded on his native hill, And the shy Iberian dwelt Undisturbed by conquering Celt, Ere from out their Aryan home Came the Lords of Greece and Rome, Somewhere in those ancient spots Lived a man who painted Pots- Painted with an art defective, Quite devoid of all perspective, Very crude, and causing doubt When you tried to make them out, Men (at least they looked like that), Beasts that might be dog or cat, Pictures blue and pictures red, All that came into his head: Not that any tale he meant On the Pots to represent: Simply 'twas to make them smart, Simply Decorative Art.

So the seasons onward hied, And the Painter-person died- But the Pot whereon he drew Still survived as good as new: Painters come and painters go, Art remains _in statu quo_.

When a thousand years (perhaps) Had proceeded to elapse, Out of Time's primeval mist Came an aetiologist; He by shrewd and subtle guess Wrote Descriptive Letterpress, Setting forth the various causes For the drawings on the vases, All the motives, all the plots Of the painter of the pots, Entertained the nations with Fable, Saga, Solar Myth, Based upon ingenious shots At the Purpose of the Pots, Showing ages subsequent What the painter really meant (Which, of course, the painter hadn't; He'd have been extremely saddened Had he seen his meanings missed By the aetiologist).

Next arrives the p.r.o.ne to Err Very ancient Chronicler, All that mythologic lore Swallowing whole and wanting more, Crediting what wholly lacked All similitude of Fact, Building on this wondrous basis All we know of early races; So the Past as seen by him Furnished from its chambers dim Hypothetical foundations Whence succeeding generations Built, as on a basis sure, Branches three of Literature, Social Systems four (or five), Two Religions Primitive; So that one may truly say (Speaking in a general way) All the facts and all the knowledge Taught in School and taught in College, All the books the printer prints- Everything that's happened since- Feels the influence of what Once was drawn upon that Pot, Plus the curious mental twist Of that aetiologist!

But the Pot that caused the trouble Lay entombed in earth and rubble, Left about in various places, In the way that early races- Hitt.i.tes, Greeks, or Hottentots- Used to leave important Pots; Till at length, to close the list, Came an Archaeologist, Came and dug with care and pain, Came and found the Pot again: Dug and delved with spade and shovel, Made a version wholly novel Of the Potman's old design (Others none were genuine).

Pots were in a special sense _Echt-Historisch_ Doc.u.ments: All who Error hope to stem Must begin by studying them; So the Public (which, he said, Had been grievously misled) Must in all things freshly start From his views of Ancient Art.

All (the learned man proceeded) Otherwise who thought than he did, Showed a stupid, base, untrue, Obscurantist point of view; Men like these (the sage would say) Should be wholly swept away; They, and eke the faults prodigious Which beset their creeds religious, Render totally impure All their so-called Literature, Lastly, sap to its foundation All their boasted education,- Just because they've quite forgot What was meant, and what was not, By the Painter of the Pot!

Pots are long and life is fleeting; Artists, when their subjects treating, Should be very, very far Carefuller than now they are.

THE NOVEL

When by efforts literary you might scale the summits airy Which the eminent in fiction are ascending every day, Why obscurely crawl and grovel?-I will write (I said) a Novel!

So I started and I planned it in the ordinary way.

I'd a Heroine-a creature of resplendent form and feature, With a spell in every motion and a charm in every look: I'd a Villain-worse than Nero,-I'd a most superior Hero: And the host of minor persons which is needed in a book:

Each was drawn from observation: yet was each a pure creation Which revealed at once the genius of originating mind: Not a man and not a woman but combined the Broadly Human With a something quite peculiar of an interesting kind:

What a wealth of meaning inner in the things they said at dinner!

How their conversation sparkled (like the ripples on the deep), Half disclosing, half concealing a Profundity of Feeling Which would move the gay to laughter and incite the grave to weep!

There they stood in grace and vigour, each imaginary figure, Each a masterpiece of drawing for the world to wonder at: There was really nothing more I had to find but just the story, Nothing more, but just the story-but I couldn't think of that.

Yet (I cried), in other writers, how the lovers and the fighters Are conducted through the mazes of a complicated plan,- How the incidents are planted just precisely where they're wanted- How the man invites the moment, and the moment finds the man!

How a Barrie or a Kipling guides the maiden and the stripling Till they're ultimately landed in the matrimonial state,- And they die, or else they marry (in a Kipling or a Barrie) Just as if the thing was ordered by unalterable Fate,-

While with me, alas! to balance my innumerable talents, There's a fatal imperfection and a melancholy blot: All the forms of my creating stand continually waiting For a charitable person to provide them with a Plot!

Still I put the endless query why I wander lone and dreary (Barred from Eden like the Peri) minus fame and minus fee, Why the idols of the ma.s.ses have an entree to Parna.s.sus, While a want of mere invention is an obstacle to me!

FRAGMENT OF A JARGONIAD

Arise, my _Muse_, and ply th' extended Wing!

It is of Language that I mean to sing.

Thou mighty Medium, potent to convey The clearest Notions in the darkest Way, Diffus'd by thee, what Depth of verbal Mist Veils now the Realist, now th' Idealist!

Our mental Processes more complex grow Than those our Sires were privileged to know.

In Ages old, ere Time Instruction brought, A Thought or Thing was but a Thing or Thought: Such simple Names are now forever gone- A Concept this, that a Noumenon: As _Cambria's_ Sons their Pride of Race increase By joining _Ap_ to _Evan_, _Jones_, or _Rees_, A prouder Halo decks the Sage's Brow, Perceptive once, he's Apperceptive now!

Here sits Mentality (that erst was Mind), By correlated Ent.i.ties defin'd: Here Monads lone Duality express In bright Immediacy of Consciousness: O who shall say what Obstacles deter The Youth who'd fain commence Philosopher!

The painful Public with bewilder'd Brain For Metaphysic pants, but pants in vain: Too hard the Names, too weighty far the Load: Language forbids, and _Br-dl-y_ blocks the Road.

From Themes like these I willingly depart, And pa.s.s (discursive) to the Realms of Art.

Ye _Muses_ nine! what Phrases ye employ, What wondrous Terms t' express aesthetic Joy!

As once in Years ere _Babel's_ Turrets rose Contented Nations talk'd the self-same Prose: As early _Christians_ in the Days of Yore Took what they wanted from a common Store: So different Arts th' astonished Reader sees Pool all their Terms, then choose whate'er they please.

'Mid critick Crews (where Intellect abounds) Sound sings in Colours, Colours s.h.i.+ne in Sounds: When mimick Groves _Apelles_ decks with green, Or _Zeuxis_ limns the vespertinal Scene, _Staccato Tints_ delight th' auscultant Eye And soft _Andantes_ paint the conscious Sky: Nor less, when Musick holds the list'ning Throng, How crisply lucent glows th' entrancing Song!

Each loud _Sonata_ boasts its lively Hue, And _Fugues_ are red, and _Symphonies_ are blue.