Page:Edgar Allan Poe - how to know him.djvu/179

Rh pinged upon the simply ludicrous." But of Hood's Haunted House, Poe writes: "The metre and rhythm are not only, in themselves, admirably adapted to the whole design, but with a true artistic feeling, the poet has preserved a thorough monotone throughout, and renders its effect more impressive by the repetition (gradually increasing in frequency towards the finale) of one of the most pregnant and effective of the stanzas."]

We have already said, however, that mere quaintness within reasonable limit, is not only not to be regarded as affectation, but has its proper artistic uses in aiding a fantastic effect. We quote, from the lines "To my dog Flush," a passage in exemplification:

 Leap! thy broad tail waves a light! Leap! thy slender feet are bright,
 * Canopied in fringes!

Leap! those tasselled ears of thine Flicker strangely, fair and fine,
 * Down their golden inches!

And again—from the song of a tree-spirit, in the "Drama of Exile:"

 The Divine impulsion cleaves In dim movements to the leaves Dropt and lifted, dropt and lifted, In the sun-light greenly sifted— In the sun-light and the moon-light Greenly sifted through the trees. Ever wave the Eden trees, In the night-light and the noon-light, With a ruffling of green branches, Shaded off to resonances, Never stirred by rain or breeze.

The thoughts, here, belong to the highest order of poetry, but they could not have been wrought into ef-