Page:Poems of Anne Countess of Winchilsea 1903.djvu/131

 INTRODUCTION cxxvii ������flower, she contends, "can have a greater luster than the common white lily." �On the whole, Lady Winchilsea's references to flowers are original, suggestive, and pleasing. The glowing poppy, the bright blue flowers among the standing corn, the bramble-rose on the banks of the stream, the sleepy cowslip in a sheltered nook, the foxgloves that at eventide checker the brakes with pale red, are not flowers indigenous to early eighteenth century poetry. In novelty of choice, in aptness of phrase, and in directness and simplicity of effect, these little flower pictures are of unique value in the poetry of their day. �The use of birds in Lady Winchilsea's poetry is slight, but of real significance. There is one sympathetically drawn picture of a bird by chance imprisoned in a room. In its fright it dashes itself against the ceiling, beats with its wings on the window-panes, or flutters about in "endless circles of dismay," till some kind hand restores it to "ample space, the only heaven of birds." Equally direct and sympathetic is the description of the birds in the great storm. The picture of the "wide free sky," " where none from star to star could call the space his own," the "unentailed estate of birds," renders more effect- ive the accompanying picture of the birds bewildered by the storm, beaten to earth by rough blasts, or tossed about by the whirlwind. �Lady Winchilsea's owl in the fable is by no means a mere reproduction of La Fontaine's. She amplifies his brief generalized description into many homely details. The curiously shaped beak, the high shoulders, the ruff around the neck, the frowsy lids, the waddling steps, the dull eye under its greenish film, are details that in the poetry of the day certainly mark an unusual attempt at minute, realistic portrayal of a bird. She speaks of an "ancient yew" that ��� �