ENGLISH BALLAD POETRY

New Zealand Times, Volume LII, Issue 12211, 8 August 1925, Page 12

ENGLISH BALLAD POETRY

FIRESIDE SONGS OF THE PEASANTS

Writted for the “N.Z. Times”

It’s, Uot everyone that likes poetry. It’s hard for them then to have to listen to it. One is reminded of Janet HoGillavorich in “Nancy Stair.” Quot-

ing from memory • . . •- “I was never one that oould stand poetry. Thank God, Shakespeare sickened me of that. This chopping up of one line to make it-shorter and padding out'of another to make it longer . . . .” A great many people will agree with that straight- old fire-eater. Yet there are men, like Robert'Lynd, who would tell you that poetry is a primal instinct, native, not acquired. The child,, he. says, beats rhythmically on toe -taible with its spoon, and some of those dauoing nursery chants are pure poetry. “I 'had a little nut-tree,’’ is- certainly poetry. The coming of the King of Spain’s daughter leads us out of the land of the real into the land of to B fairy. If one were asked what forms of poetry were the best loved, not by the few hut by the many,'one. would say nursery rhymes, lujlabies, hymns, and ballads. Ballads are toe earliest form of folk poetry, and folk poetry is our subject.! Nowadays so much poetry is written that it may be necessary to state what folk poetry is. It is the songs of a people, the songs that are sung by the fireside when Winter sparks race pp the wide chimneys, be they fire of turf Or of logs. ' They are simple; all great things are simple. They arb enduring; all great things,endure. ' They, deal with great human passion—’love of a land, love of a woman, love of , a child. Sometimes they are in dialeot, but dialeot is not essential. Simplicity is. The writers of folk poetry are merely peasant ruediums—happy mediums—-for their poems go to more /hearts than the poems, of- the great; Shelley they he “gold-dusty from tumbling among the stars,’/ hut Shelley’s poems are for the few. They are not sung'by the fire. They never cause a tear. When one says that one does _ not decry them. They are gold-dusty in very (truth, but human beings are like children. ■ Its' is . the homely doll /that is cherished. /-English balladry comes.of a long line. 1 was reading the other day ’Henryson’s “Robin and Makyne.” Students Of old English would be interested in the s word-fOrmß. The atory is simple. At first it is Makyne who pipes for Robin, and is mocked. Then .by the perversity of life it is Robin who “mumit and Makyne leuohe.” One is glad it was Makyne who -laughed in toe end.- Most of the early poems are ahonymous. Many of them show a sweet faith. Thus May in the Greenwood: — “This is a mery moryning,’’ said Little Johns, "Be Hym that dyed on tre, , A more mery man than I am o&e Lyves not in Cbristiante.” “The Nut-Brown Maid’.’ is too. well known ;to need repeating here, And so is "Robin Hood.”: 7‘Sir Lancelot Du Lake” is another of an ancient theme, but one can only take stray examples, because space must be toft for' toe moderns, , . .Sweetest of ;all-are songs like ‘‘Barbara Allen,” which appears in noth English and Scotch collections; “Deep in toe Valley”:— * "In Scarlet" Town whore I was born There wis a fair maid dwellin’, ' Made every youth cry Well-a-wayi Her name was Barbara Allen." And so on to' the sad climax: — "O mother, mother, make my. bed; O make it saft ahd narrow; My love has (lied for me to-day, -I’ll die for him to-morrow.” Site might have/saved toe -both of. them by/knowing- her own mind; but common sense and‘poetry , are only distant kinsmen. . ' % Jfean Ingelow’s ‘‘Enderby” is better, Since it dealß,, pot with a jade’s wilfulness. but with an act of God. “The Brides of. Enderby” 'la the warning tun® for the little sea-town' that danger is on it. Jean' Ingelow has written trulv and as a folk poet should' write. The old woman ' in “Enderby”. tells, her tale in an old woman’s words, ih an old woman’s way, with an old woman’s breaks and pauses. iiinniiiiiniiiniMifiiiininiiiiiniiiiiaiiiiiiiiiiiiauiiiiiiiiiitiiiiiiiiiinim

poem,-, hut it would bd ungrateful to cavil when it is so beautiful.

Coming down the years, Barnep has some; lovely rhymes in toe dialect, but curiously enough they are: little sung. One small fragment, though not in the dialect, has ail the simplicity of a folk song. A mother has a dream of heaven, and sees there a train of shining, children, and each child beam alighted lamp—r • /‘Then a little,sad, Came my child in turn. But the lamp. he had, . O it did not burn! He, to clear my doubt, > Said', half-turned about, - , ‘Your tears put it out. Mother, never mourn.'" Among the actual modern*, folk poetry is being written. This is Huefrer’a 6trange song for the Wealden Trio who are out a Christmlassing—. “'E was a man’s poor as us, very near, An' *E 'ad 'is trials and danger, An’ I think El’ll think of me when : '£ sees us singing 'eret For 'ls mother was poor, like us, poor dear, Anf she bore 'lm in a mutiger.” One would expect a great folk-song from, too creator of “Teas of the D.’Vrbervilles,” "but Hardy writes of a peasant,, rather, than* a* _ one. The simplest (if llis is “At ‘Ghristmss.” He is mourning, that folk no longer believe that toe oxen kneel at midnight in 'honour of, toe birth. ; , /‘So fair a fancy few: would weave . In these years! Yet l/'.fcel. If someone Baid on Christmas Eve, 'Come; see the oxen kmeel In the lonely barton by yonder'coomb Qur .childhood used to know.’ I should go with him in' the gloom, .Hoping it might be so." 1 Non* of Chesterton’s poems are simple enough to be; termed folk*poesryBetlod comes near- to ft in “The South Country,” and / “When’ Jesus Christ was Four Years .Old,’’ hut he is,not ,a folk-poet. Charielte Mew-lias some fine countryside poems. It’s a wild elf that sings through Charlotte Mew. “The Farmer’s Bride” is one of it* twists. "She does the work about too house, . As well as most but ljkp a mouse, I Happy enough to chnt and play With birds and rabbits and auoK as, they. So long as meh-folk keep away, ‘Not. near, not fiear,'-her eyes beseech. When one of Us comes Within reach... The women say that’boasts ih st*ll " Look routad lik*.«hlldreh.at her,, call, I’ve hardly heard Kef. speak at all. But the modern who is truly a folkpoet of to* English is A. E. Housmhn. He is not dead: yet,’ and he is sung already the world ovter. /The delicacy of the country idiom, without an excess of dialect is offered by Housman. Dialect is sometimes a barrier. It is etrafige that great learning such ,as his could 'have produced perfect folk-poems. The short, strong Saxon words make his songs as simple' as a child’s. , ■ This might have been sung by a squire or by a shepherd—- " The half-moon westers low, my love, And to B wind brings up toe rain/ And wide' apart lie we, my love,' And seas between the twain. I know not if it rains, my love. In the land where you do lie; Arid oh, so sound, you sleep, my love. You know no mote than I. • There is something wild in the'metre and "toe thought of “The Lancer,” "I ’listed at home for a lancer, Oh, who would not Bleep with the brave? I 'listed at home for a lancer, To ride on a horse to my grave. He lies sleeping on a mattress of' . loam when the others are being'' 'wel-' corned back—- " The wind with the plumes'will be ploying, » The girls will stand watching them wave,' And eyeing my comrades'-and saying, ' Oh, who would not sleep with the tuare? They ask and there is not an answer; Says you, I will 'Hat for a lancer,. . ■'' Ob, who would not sleep with the brave f It is imjiossiblo to ■ say ■ those words, iiiiiiiiiic3iiiiiiiiniic]iiiiiiiiiiiiniiiniuiinniiiiiiiiiiiiaiiiiiimiiiniiii(