Page:Anne Bradstreet and her time.djvu/239

Rh a successful couplet had the same prominence and discussion as a walking match to-day; when one poet thought his two lines a satisfactory morning's work, and another said of him that when such labor ended, straw was laid before the door and the knocker tied up—are over, once for all. Now and then a poet stops to polish, but for the most part spontaneity, fluency, gush, are the qualities demanded, and whatever finish may be given, must be dominated by these more apparent facts. Delicate fancies still abound, and are more and more the portion of the many; but Fancy fills the place once held for Imagination, a statelier and nobler dame, deaf to common voices and disdaining common paths. Every country paper, every petty periodical, holds verse that in the Queen Anne period in literature would have given the author permanent place and name. All can rhyme, and many can rhyme melodiously. The power of words fitly set has made itself known, and a word has come to be judged like a note in music—as a potential element of harmony—a sound that in its own place may mean any emotion of joy or sorrow, hate or love. Whether a thought is behind these alluring rhythms, with their sensuous swing or their rush of sound, is immaterial so long as the ear has satisfaction; thus Swinburne and his school fill the place of Spenser and the elder poets, and many an "idle singer of an empty day" jostles aside the masters, who can wait, knowing that sooner or later, return to them is certain.

Schools have their power for a time, and expression held in their moulds forgets that any other form is possible. But the throng who copied Herrick are forgotten, their involved absurdities and conceits