Page:Essays and Studies - Swinburne (1875).pdf/214

 "Therefore ye shall behold How Atheists and Republicans can die."

Such throughout was the process by which the more outspoken verses of a poem outspoken enough throughout were weakened and disfigured. Remembering by what forcible extortion of assent a reluctant admission of these changes was wrung from the poet, we must hope now to have back his own fresher and clearer words in their first fullness and freedom.

The passage cited from "Alastor" is, I believe, corrupt, but I cannot accept the critic's proposed change of punctuation. Here are the words disputed:-—

"On every side now rose Rocks which in unimaginable forms Lifted their black and barren pinnacles In the light of evening, and its precipice Obscuring the ravine disclosed above 'Mid toppling stones, black gulfs, and yawning streams," &c.

Mr. Rossetti in evident desperation would rearrange the last lines thus:—

And—its precipice Obscuring—the ravine disclosed above," &c.

"i.e." (he adds), "the rocks, obscuring the precipice (the precipitous descent) of the ravine, disclosed said ravine overhead."

This I must say is intolerable, and impossible. If the words could be wrenched and racked into such a meaning,