thing, incapable of resuscitation; with all Scott's dramatic faculties he could not write dramas. The one shape in which all the richness of his genius was to be revealed was the Novel. The Novel was for his day and for him what the Drama was for Shakspere and his age. There all his various talents were to find free play-his descriptive and narrative powers, his shrewd observation, his tragic intensity, his lyrical excellence, his infinite humour. Perhaps our own day supplies us with a somewhat parallel instance of failure in the Drama, technically so styled, by one possessed of the highest dramatic spirit in the more general sense of the word. Adam Bede is certainly worth a whole tribe of Spanish Gipsys, great as is the interest of the Spanish Gipsy. It may be remembered that Dickens essayed play writing with but slight success. CADYOW CASTLE. Scott composed this piece the Christmas of 1801 when visiting at Hamilton Palace, Lanarkshire. It has this interest: that it is the first "work in which he grapples with the world of picturesque incident unfolded in the authentic annals of Scotland." It is inserted here from a wish not to omit Scott's name in this collection, and an unwillingness to represent him by any fragment of a poem; certainly it cannot be regarded as of any great intrinsic merit. It is the work of a 'prentice hand; but the works of such 'prentice hands as Scott must not be neglected. Cadyow or Cadzow Castle was the old baronial seat of the Hamiltons. It stood, where its ruins may still be seen, on the banks of the Evan some two miles from the junction of that stream with the Clyde. Close by are some remains of the Caledonian forest that once covered the whole of southern Scotland. For accounts of the assassination of the Regent Murray (Jan. 23, 1569-70), see Robertson's History of Scotland, Book V., Scott's Tales of a Grandfather, chap. xxxii. The ballad follows the facts pretty closely. The murderer escaped to France. In the civil wars of that country an attempt was made to engage him, as a known desperado, in the assassination of the Admiral Coligni; but he resented it as a deadly insult. "He had slain a man in Scotland," he said, "from whom he had sustained a mortal injury; but the world could not engage him to attempt the life of one against whom he had no personal cause of quarrel." 148. 1. [What is the meaning of abode here?] Cadyow was dismantled at the close of the Scotch Civil Wars for its devotion to the cause of Queen Mary. 2. [What is the force of Gothic here? In what other senses is the word used? See Trench's Study of Words.] 4. revel is etymologically but a various form of rebel. 6. [Explain so here.] 10. vaults. See Gray's Elegy, 39. 12. Evan. See Introduction. [What is the force of hoarser here? Is it the same as in Gray's Bard, 26?] 14. [What "part of speech" is minstrel here ?] 15. Scott was at this time busy completing his Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border. 17. thou. He uses thou here, rather than you as in l. 14, because he wishes to be more pointed and emphatic. All this stanza is given to the description of the thou-the Right Hon. Lady Anne Hamilton. 149. 27. As at his own Abbotsford in later years. 31. ashler. Fr. pierre-de-taille, Ital. Pietra riquadrata, Germ. Bunderwerke, Quaterstein. Various forms of the word are achelor, ashlar, aschelere, astler, &c. See Gloss. of Arch., which work quotes, amongst other passages from Hist. Dunelm. Scrip. tres, CLXXX: "et erit [murus] exterius de puro lapide, vocato achiler, plane inscisso, interius vero de fracto lapide, vocato roghwall." Chambers' Etym. Dict. suggests a Celtic derivation, but it looks anything but satisfactory. 32. battled battlemented. 33. keep. Fr. donjon. It may perhaps be doubted whether Castle chapels were ever surmounted with spires. Such ornaments would have made excellent marks for the enemy. But spire here may 43. route. The e belongs to the old Eng. form; see Palsg. apud Wedgwood, and also to the old Fr., which Brachet derives from the Eng. rout. According to Wedgwood, this rout is connected with rout, "to snore, to bellow as oxen," and denotes first, a confusion, tumult, and then a mob. It is certainly of the same house with the Germ. rotte. Rout = a defeat, is of different origin. 50. scud is connected with A.S. scéotan, our modern shoot. The grammatical construction here is noticeable, scud not usually governing an object. case without a preposition to help it. Comp. the boating phrase "to shoot a bridge." Walk is used in a similar way, when people speak colloquially of "walking a country." So "walked the waves," in Milton's Lyc. 173, where see note. 53. See Introduction. 60. the Mountain Bull. "There was long preserved in this forest the breed of the Scottish wild cattle, until their ferocity occasioned their being extirpated about forty years ago. Their appearance was beautiful, being milk-white, with black muzzles, horns, and hoofs. The bulls are described by ancient authors as having white manes; but those of latter days had lost that peculiarity, perhaps by intermixture with the tame breed." (Globe Ed. of Scott.) See Scott's note to Castle Dangerous. This breed survives now only at Chillingham Castle in Northumberland. 62. swarthy is cognate with Germ. schwartz. 150. 68. sound the pryse. The Prise was the note or notes blown at the death of the stag, See Sir Tristrem, Fytte Third, xli. : i.e. three notes or more. "He blew priis as he can Thre mot other mare." Sir Eglamour of Artois, 298-300 (Camd. Soc.): "Then had Syr Egyllamoure don to dedd A grete herte, & tan the hedd, The pryce he blewe fulle schylle." According to some, the pryce consisted of "two longe notes and the rechate." See notes to Syr Gawayne, p. 322. The word, like nearly all other words in English connected with the chase, is Norman-French. It is in fact the same word with the Fr. prise, lit. a capture, and our prize. 72. dight. A. S. dihtan, to arrange, dress, &c. [What is meant by cheer here?] 73. clan is a Keltic word, of the Gadhelic branch. Gael. and Irish clann. 78. [Explain still here.] 81. Claud Lord Claud Hamilton, second son of the Duke of Chatelherault and "Commentator" of the Abbey of Paisley; a firm adherent of Queen Mary, for whom he fought at Langside. 83. buxom. See note to L'Alleg. 24. 85. Woodhouselee was on the bank of the Esk, near Auchendinny. The final syllable is lea a meadow. 87. hearths. Obs. the plural. 89. wan, wane, want, the negative prefix un, Lat. vanus, are all of the same family. 91. sate. Perhaps this e was originally added to shew that the chief vowel was long. The A. S. pret. is sæt. We now pronounce the a short, and have dropped the final e. 94. See Introduction. Bothwellhaugh had been pardoned for his part taken at Langside, but amerced of his property. The lands so forfeited were bestowed upon one of the Regent's favourites. 151. 101. wildered bewildered; but this word is scarcely ever now used in its strict sense 108. Arran brand. 110. resistless. Less (=A. S. los, connected with our loss, lose, not with our less) is not often compounded with verbs. Besides resistless occur ceaseless, and hireless; Gower has haveless. See Stud. Man. Eng. Lang., Lect. vi. 110. headlong. See note to D. Vill. 29. 111. poniard Fr. poignard = It. pugnale = Lat. pugio. 112. jaded. See note to Twa Dogs, 220. steed is akin to stud, A. S. stod. 117. selle, the Fr. selle. See Faerie Q. II. ii. 11, &c. 120. carbine Fr. carabine, old Fr. calabrin, from calabre, an old stone-hurling engine, whose name was afterwards transferred to the musket. So musket originally denoted a sparrow-hawk. 124. drink. So bibere aure in Latin, as Hor. Od. II. xvii. 32: "Sed magis Pugnas et exactos tyrannos Densum humeris bibit aure vulgus." 125. quarry. Fr. curée, Lat. corata, "viscères et poumons d'un animal, de cor cœur; la curée étant proprement les poumons et les entrailles du cerf que l'on donne aux chiens après la chasse." (Brachet). Quarrel, a dispute, is a quite distinct word-from Lat. querela. o'er dale and down. A favourite phrase in the old Metrical Romances. 127. base-born bastard. See apud Wedgwood, who derives from the Gael. baos, lust, fornication, "a bast ibore" (Rob. Gl. 516), "begetin o bast" (Arthur and Merlin), "born in baste" (Hall). 129. [Linlithgow. Where exactly is this town?] [What is meant by side here?] 131. bigot. Derived by some from Visigoth (see Taylor's Words and Places); by others, from Span. bigote moustache (hombre de bigote man of spirit and vigour); by others it is held to be pretty much identical with the Flem. beguin, the common stem being the Ital. bigio = grey, the word referring originally to the dress worn by certain religionists in the 13th century (see Wedgwood's Etym. Dict.). 152. 135. [Explain settled.] 137. hackbut or hagbut="the arquebus with a hooked stock." (Fairholt's Costume in England, Gloss.) "Arquebus is said to be derived from the Italian arca-bouza (corrupted from bocca) signifying a bow with a mouth. Hackbut, or hagbush, is perhaps from the old German hakenbüsche, a hook and gun, or any cylindrical vessel." (Eccleston's Eng. Antiq.) bent = cocked. A word, properly applying to a bow, is here transferred to a gun. Many terms of the old artillery were transferred to the new. See note on carbine, 1. 120. Palace. The carbine with which the Regent was shot is still preserved at Hamilton 140. Scottish pikes and English bows. "In all ages the bow was the English weapon of victory, and though the Scots, and perhaps the French, were superior in the use of the spear, yet this weapon was useless, after the distant bow had decided the combat." (Scott's "Advertisement" to Halidon Hill.) 141. Morton, James Douglas, Earl of Morton, was the chief of Darnley's accomplices in the murder of Rizzio. note.) 1 141, 144. [What part of the sentence is clan ?] Macfarlanes. Lennox Highlanders. 145. Glencairn = Earl of Glencairn, "a steady adherent of the Regent." (Scott's Parkhead = George Douglas of Parkhead, a natural brother of Morton. Cf. 147. Lindesay Lord Lindsay of the Byres, "the most ferocious and brutal of the Regent's faction, and as such was employed to extort Mary's signature to the deed of resig nation presented to her in Lochleven Castle." So Scott's note. See also Tales of a Grandfather, chap. xxxii. and the Abbot, chap. xxii. 149. pennon'd spears. "Pennon, a small flag at the head of a knight's lance" (Fairholt). Pennant is a various form. 150. [Explain plumage.] 153. vizor="the moveable face-guard of a helmet" (Fairholt). From the Fr. visiere, which is of course ultimately from video. Visard is cognate. 155. truncheon is the Fr. tronçon, from tronc, Lat. truncus. The termination is dim., as in bâton, musketoon, &c. 157. sadden'd made serious. Comp. Rosalind's "sad brow and true maid," As you Like it, III. ii. 228. 161. parts. See Gray's Elegy, l. 1. 166. [What part of the sentence is love here?] 167. As Llewellyn in the Welsh version of one of the oldest tales of the Indo-European It had been recently told in English in a pleasing manner by the Hon. W. R. Spencer : race. "Hell-hound! my child's by thee devoured,' The frantic father cried; And to the hilt his vengeful sword He plunged in Gelert's side." See the whole version in Chambers' Cycl. of Eng. Lit. ii. 380—1. For references to old foreign versions, see Dasent's Popular Tales from the Norse. broaches. Brooch is cognate. 170. [What part of the verb, and what of the sentence, is roll?] 153. 173. This is a strange use of groan for groan out, groan away. felon's is virtually an adj. here. [Quote similar phrases.] 189. [What is the meaning of for here?] WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. (1) 1770-1791. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH was born at Cockermouth, in Cumberland, April 7, 1770, the son of the law agent to Sir James Lowther. He was educated at Hawkshead School, Lancashire; whence, in 1787, he proceeded to St John's College, Cambridge. The University seems to have had few attractions for him; he was in Cambridge, by no means of it; see Books III.-VI. of the Prelude. The better part of his nature was not stirred at all there. Neither the studies of the place nor the society excited interest or admiration. He lived his own life, read the books of his own choice-Spenser, Chaucer, Milton (see Prelude, Bk. III.)—enjoyed much his vacations, feeling always that he "was not for that hour, nor for that place." In the summer of 1790 he made his first continental tour, passing through France, then in the first wild hopes of the Revolution, to Switzerland. Early in 1791 he passed his examination for the degree of B.A., for which ordeal he had prepared himself, it seems, by reading Richardson's novels; with so litttle respect was he inspired for the rites of the University. (2) 1791-1797. Released from Cambridge, he led for some years a somewhat unsettled life, but a life of steady observation, and thought, and development. He travelled in Wales, in France, in South England, in Yorkshire, and the Lake country. His most important sojourn was in France. In the aspirations and hopes of the Revolutionists he was an ardent sharer; he thought that the world's great age was beginning anew; and with all his soul he hailed so splendid an æra; see his lines on the French Revolution as it appeared to enthusiasts at its Commencement, a passage from the Prelude, (printed separately in Coleridge's Friend): "Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, But to be young was heaven." The ultimate degradation of that great movement by wild lawlessness, and then by most selfish ambition, alienated Wordsworth's sympathy from it; in its earlier progress it awoke and aroused him infinitely more than any event of the age; it was the chief external event of his life. He returned to England with reluctance towards the close of 1792. In 1795 a friend, by name Calvert, dying, left him some £900-a very memorable bequest, as it left Wordsworth, a plain liver, and a high thinker (see Sonnet Written in London, Sep. 1802), in a position to obey his lofty nature, free from sordid cares. With help in addition of £1000 from his father's estate, his sister, to whom had come a legacy of £100, and he set up house together at Racedown, Dorsetshire. This sister was to the end a most congenial and inspiring presence; see his poems passim, especially Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey, &c., July 13, 1798. From Race down they removed in 1797 to Alfoxden near Nether-Stowey, Somerset, to be near Coleridge, then residing at the latter village. It must be mentioned that Wordsworth had published in 1793 two little volumes of poetry, entitled Descriptive Sketches and The Evening Walk; but they cannot be called Wordsworthian. The poet's formation was only then beginning. (3) 1797-1814. In the influential sympathetic companionship of his sister, and of his new-found friend Coleridge, Wordsworth's spirit soon began to express its real self. With 1797 begins the prime poetic period of his life, culminating with the publication of the Excursion in 1814. To this period belong His share of the Lyrical Ballads, 1st Ed. 1798, 2nd 1800. |