FROM Bookstall and Study.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17573, 25 June 1925, Page 10

FROM Bookstall and Study.

AMONG MINOR POETS. WILLIAM SHENSTONE. The Oxford Book of English Verse however casually studied, can prove beyond all doubt that the main stream of English poetry has been purely lyrical. The only important deviation was made in the eighteenth century when the Augustans, headed by Pope, broko away from the old tradition. These men did great work, and although they were brilliant phrasemakers, they failed in the main because they forgot that music was one of the essentials of poetry. Their dalliance with the Muses was platonic, and never did they unbend and allow human feeling to enter into, their poetic relationships. That is the reason why Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch gave this brilliant age 3io more than a few pages in Ins anthology. There was no room in the book for philosophical dissertations mnd witty verso exercises. Still the 'age was an interesting one, and in the art chaos of to-day it may be studied with profit, for discipline is one of the qualities which present day writers require most. The Augusta ns were a disciplined band, but to-day each literary man seems to be a unit in himself. If present day writers applied Augustan principles to their work the result would be moro satisfying than it is. Lessons might be Jearut from men whose names arc now scarcely remembered. Take "William Shenstone for example. Few people could tell you much about him now, but the curious who are acquainted with his work are better for their knowledge of the man. He was a minor poet, and hut for indolence he ■might have been a greater one. He was not important, but T think him a more agreeable companion than any of our free-verse writers, so we will speak of him to-night. You must pardon me if I seem oldfashioned, but I feel I have had a surfeit of to-day. Apart from that. Shenstone interests me because recently X saw a hook of his manuscriptin tho Turnbull Library. Perhaps that is why my thoughts are turned to him now. Ho was a good-hearted indolent fellow, and above all. a- gentleman.' The son of Thomas Shenstone and Ann Penn, ho was born at Lcasowes in Hales-Owen in November, 1714. His early education was received from a woman whom he made famous in his poem “The Schoolmistress,” and after being delivered from her hands he went, to Hales-Owen Grammar-school, and passed on from there to Pembroke College, Oxford. From his earliest years lie had a deep affection for books, and as a child lie refused to sleep at nights unless a book was placed in bed with him. He mad 0 no name for himself at the University as a scholar, but at the age of twenty-three ho published a small volume of poems. He then decided to study life and spent most of his time at London and Bath. In 174.1 liq found it necessary for him to take charge of the estate which Jic inherited from his father, so he settled down at Leasowcs, the home where ho was to die. "Writing of this part of the poet’s life Hr Johnson said: “Now was excited his delight in. rural pleasures, and his ambition of rural elegance: he begun from this time to point his prospects, to diversify his surface, to entangle his walks, to wind his waters; which he did with such judgment and such fancy, as made his little domain th© envy of the great, and the admiration of tho skilful ; a place to be visited by travellers, and copied by designers. "Whether to plant a walk in undulating curves, and to place a beuch at every turn where there is on object to catch the view ; to make water run where it will be heard, and to stagnate where it will be seen ; to • leave intervals where the eye will be pleased, and to thicken tho plantation where there is something to be hidden, demands any great powers of mind, I ■will not inquire ; perhaps a sullen and eurly spectator may think such performances the sport rather than the business of the human reason. But it must at least be confessed, that to embellish the form of nature is an. innocent amusement; and some praise must be allowed by the most supercilious observer to him, who does best what such multitudes are contending io do well.” it has been said that Shenstone was a greater landscape gardener than he . was a poet, hut that is merely a picluresqu© exaggeration. Ho spent his fortune on his garden and allowed his house to rot away. In winter he was never sure of having a dry room in ■which to sleep. He spent his time in . spasmodic poetic composition, hut his greatest creative years were over when he went into Leasowes as master. “The Schoolmistress” had been published in 1742 and it. was followed later by the “Pastoral Ballad,” written for a young lady who had captured li\g fancy. Tt is among the most perfect works of_its kind in English, and is really natural urtificialism in its most perfect form. Tho following stanzas are typical. I prized every hour that wont by, Beyond all that had pleas'd me before; But now they are past, and I sigh. And T grieve that I priz'd them no more. TVhen forc'd the fair nymph to forego, What anguish I felt in my heart: Tet I thought—but it might not be so, ’Twas with pain that she saw me depart. She gaz'd as T slowly withdrew: My path I could scarcely discern; So sweetly she bade me adieu, I thought that she bade me return. He captures the spirit of his own peace and indolence in these lines from an ode “To Indolence”: Lov'st thou yon calm and silent flood. That never ebbs and never flows; Protected by the circling wood. From each tempestuous wind that blows. 'Hie last years of his life were clouded by financial trouble, and ShcuBton© became petulant in his attitude towards tho world. He seemed to thing that everything should have been made easy for him. On February 11, I 763, ho died of lever in poverty at Leasowcs. Tn the Turnbull Library, "Wellington, there is a volume of Shenstone manuscript, but it is difficult to say whether the poems in it are parodies of worn dob© bv Shenstone's friends, or whether they are poems by these people collected by Shenstone. The hook was bequeathed to a Reverend Mr Percy, possibly the collector of “ The lteliques of English Pocfry.” who was a friend of the poet's. The book is badly burned,

but an inscription inside tells tlic This precious volume of my poor Friend Shenstone was thus piteously On a fly leaf is the following note:— To the Rev'd Mr Percy At Manduit X'tonshire. Mr Hylton's compliments wait upon Mr Percy, hopes he received his letter of the IQth or 20th Instant and that tile herewith inclosed MS., vol. of Poems will come safe into his hands. Mr Percy will observe that pages 29, 30. 31, 32, S 9, 90, are torn out; probably by design, as containing pieces which Mr S. might think proper to reply t ton had no opportunity of sending the volume last week else It would not have been deferred till this. .Lafall Houee, 26th June, 17C3. Tho book is entitled in Shcnstonc's bandwriting

A COLLECTION POEMS < ’orrected From Original MSS By W. Shenstone. MDCCLIX.

Tho following is a selection from the Poems, which may be parodies, or the original work of the persons to whom they *are ascribed. It may be that •Shenstonc was compiling a miscellany for the publisher, Dodslev, who was one of his dearest friends. Verses on leaving: . ... in a tempestuous night, .March 22. 1750: By Mr Percy. Deep howls ye storm with chilling blast Fast falls ye snow’ and rain Down rush ye floods with headlong haste And deluge all the plain. Yet all‘in vain ye tempest roars And whirls ye drifted snow In vain torrents scorn ye shores To Delia L must g<>. In vain vo shades of evening fall And horrid, dangers, threat " hat can the lover's breast appall Or check his eager feet? The darksome vale he fearless tries And winds the pathless wood High o'er cliffs dread summit flies And rushes through ye flood. Dove Atchieve hardy Deed And fends yo lion-heart.'’ R srocd led by til re, all powerful 'boy T^S^%„ anno v, thy torch, my footsteps light. The cheerful blaze, ye social hour, I he friend—all plead in vain Home calls— I brave each adverse Of peril and of pain. On Ye Death b lortßman° Christopher, a remarkably fat Written by Mr Wigson, of University Coll., Oxon. Tir'd with too long a chase, tlio' stout For who can always hold it oilt? Old < liristonhor —and sure it k'rievcs ua lias slowly taken Nature's road Ami stumbled under his own load. As true an heart—deny't who dare, As drank his glass or carved his hare. Then take ye horn and wind it o'er The man who loved it so before. Then let him sleep—and say no more. Life breeds a throng and Death must To thrust somo out- to make more room. On Mr Pitt's return to Bath after his resignation, 1 TGI. Brita-nnia long her widened fate had By factions rent at home, by Europe To guide her tottering barque, a pilot, fit bhc sought with anxious eyes and fixed on Titf. Pitt left these founts of health and active Reviv'd her credit and subdued her foes. Nay more he bade all civil discord cease. And saw'embittered factions meet in peace. Ttieu quits jc helm—without a title, great; And seeks one© more at Bath a calm retreat. Left his lone 1 assum'd the Imperial Brandish'd the sword; bj r patriot zeal inspir'd Just sav'd his country—triumph'd—and retir'd. By Mr ,-Horace Walpole on L'd Granville. From Ye Chronicle, Jan. 25. 1763. Comraariding beauty smooth'd by cheerful grace Sate on ye open features of his face. Bold was his language, rapid, glowing, And, science flow'd spontaneous from bis And drank his bottle with yo mighty world. The writing in tho book, which had hitherto been bold and legible, could not be deciphered at this stage .and a note explains why. Percy writes: “ The lines in the proceeding page were written a very few days before poor Mr Shenstone's death, and even after lie began to droop; as appears from the traces of tho letters, no so fair or legible as his usual writing, being published in London Shenstone before*’ the 27th, and lie died on 11th February, 17C3.” That was the end of Shenstone, and his life and work is best .summarised by the Scots critic, George Gi Hi I lan; “ After all. Shenstone. although possessed of great accomplishments, much true and a distinct, although narrow vein of poetic genius, has done little. Ho never understood, and therefore never did his work, as a man. He first found, and then forgot and abandoned the sole patli his genius was qualified properly to pursue. Yet sweet singer of two simple strains (“The Schoolmistress ? ’ and “The Pastoral Uallad”). Then there is his gtent- little work —tho Leasowes; l*it. alas! of it. only the ruins remain—and while they preserve the recollection. they also preach the lesson of the weakness of this honest hu( indolent man —this true, but selfstunted poet.” I.M.D. ;

- JOHNSONIANA. INTERESTING CATALOGUE. Quite the most interesting secondhand booksellers catalogue to appear for some considerable time is that of books bv or relating to Dr Johnson and members of his circle, just issued by Elkin Mathews, Limited, of 4a, Cork Street. \V . with an extremely sympathetic and graceful preface by Mr John Drinkwater (writes "The Times' ) The catalogue is compiled by Mr Evans who is known to be "Penguin” of the "Observer,” with whom literature is a

profession and bookselling a trade. It seems almost incredible that over six hundred books could be got together relating directly or indirectly to a man whose posthumous reputation is almost exclusively due to the fervid and often misplaced hero-worship ol a biographer. But there is hardly a book or a pamphlet here which does not readily and easily fall into Air Evans's classification. Boswell, the man of one book, here stretches over fifty different items, and Dr Johnson himself, who as an author hardly counts at all, extends to over one hundred entries! Mr Evans prices at £65 an exceptionally desirable set of the first edition of Boswell s "Life,” 1791-93, and offers four other copies of the same edition at prices which vary lrom £lO to £SB. A fine copy of the first edition of the Dictionary, 1755, in two folio volumes, is priced at £l6; but the famous "Plan of a Dictionary of the English Language.” 1747, -a quarto pamphlet in the original wrappers, thirty-four pages, is valued at £45. Tt is curious to note that the first edition of “The Prince of Abissinia,” 1759, at £27. and the "Rambler," 1751, in the original 208 numbers, at £2l, have to-day a higher commercial value than the Dictionary itself. To many guests at Mr Evans's sumptuous literary least the minor figures will appeal almost as forcibly as those of "The Great Cham” and his biographer. They all appear more or less conspicuously in Boswell's pages, but here they are set out as separate entities. A good many of them, as the "Edinburgh Review” said of Ruskin in connection with Turner, have obtained a fame by hanging to the skirts of a famous man. One Robert Armitage comes into the Johnson circle through having published in 1851 a little book on "Dr Johnson: His Religious Life and Death.” Of far greater rarity- is Archdeacon Blackburne’s "Remarks on Johnson's Life of Milton,” 17S0, a privately printed book which doubtless Johnson himself saw. Another littleknown book, collected only because Johnson described the author as “ a man of the most companionable talents he had ever known,” Walter Ilartc's "The Amaranth : or. Religious Poems,” 1767, has fallen into Mr Evans's net. Hogarth’s fine print "A Midnight Modern Conversation.” 1734 (not 1770), figures here "because Johnson’s cousin, Cornelius Ford, is the original of the parson” in this picture. Soamc Jenyns’s "Poems,” printed by Dodsley in 1752, is priced at £1 10s; until it became a Johnson item this volume was a very common object in the sixpenny boxes of the London booksellers, and there can be no doubt that the prices of many of the other books in Mr Evans’s catalogue have greatly increased in value since Dr Johnson and his circle became a "cult ” Among these is Miss Cornelia Knight’s “Dinarbas,” 1790. the continuation of "Rassclas." priced at £1 10s. A Johnson "find” of considerable interest is noted in the "St James's Magazine,” 1762-64, edited by Robert Lloyd, one of the many minor poets of the time; in the issue of Febrtfary, 1764, is a poem "by Mr S. Johnson,” which seems to have escaped all Dr Johnson’s editors; among the other contributors arc Christopher Smart, George Colman and Lord Lyttelton. Mr Evans in forming tin’s Johnson collection would seem to have made an especial point to bring in all the Doctor's blue-stocking friends. They are at all events here in overwhelming numbers. Fanny Burney is, of course, particularly prominent, with first and other editions of most of her books. Mrs Elizabeth Carter, Mrs Chaponc, LcCtitia 'Matilda Ilawkins, Charlotte Lennox, Anna Seward, Mrs Macaulay, Mrs Montagu, Mrs Thralc, and Hannah

More all figure more or less conspicuously. Less well known is Mrs Mary Masters, whose "Familiar Letters and Poems on Several Occasions,” 1755, Dr Johnson revised "and illuminated it here and there with a ray of his own genius,” as Boswell tells us: there are in it four poems with the initial "S.” which may be rays of Johnson’s “own genius.” Another lady, Anne Penny, he helped in a practical way by subscribing to her "Poems, with a Dramatic Entertainment,” 1771. which is dedicated to Jonas ITanway, who also comes within the Johnson circle. Although Dr Johnson devoted so much of his time to Shakespeare, Mr Evans has contented himself with three items under this head, two sets of the first edition of Johnson's Shakespeare, printed for tjie Tonsons, 1765, priced at £5 and £6 each set of eight octavo volumes; and a curious little volume with the title "Modern Characters for 1778. By Shakespeare,” and made up with mottoes from Shakespeare, eulogistic, depreciatory, or sarcastic, and applied to eminent people of the day, Johnson- " You must borrow me Gargantua’s mouth, ’Tis a word too great for any mouth of this age's size! ; —Garrick. Burke, Wilkes and Sir Joshua Reynolds.'.Over three hundred characters” are hit off with more or less aptness, and as a candid Who's Who of 1778 this clever littLe pamphlet is not without its value. Among Mr Evans's addenda is a fine copy (if Samuel Madden’s "Boulter's Monument. A Panegyrical Poem,” 1745, which Dr Johnson revised, blotting out “ a great many lines”; a work for which he received a gift of ten guineas, "which was to me at that time a great sum,” as Johnson admitted in after years. Messrs Macmillan announce that publication of a new volume in the "English Men of Letters” series will be resumed next autumn, under the editorship of Mr J. U. Squire. Sixtv-two volumes have been issued in the series since its inauguration under the late Lord Morlcy's editorship in 1878. but. although most of the major figures in English literary history have already been included, some of the older writers are still absent from the list. Donne is to be added to the library in a volume l>v Mr Geoffrey Scott, whose memoir of Madame de < harriere, "The Portrait of /elide,” was recently published. Mr Osbert Burdett, author of "The Beardsley Period." is writing on Blake; Mr Hugh Walpole on Trollope; Mr Harold Xicolson on Swinburne; Mr J. B. Priestley on George Meredith; Mr R. Ellis Roberts on Conrad; Mr Robert Lynd on Stevenson; and Mr J. ('. Squire on Francis Thompson. Three American authors arc also being included in the new series—-Melville, who will be dealt with by Mr John Freeman; Poe, entrusted to Mr Edward Shanks: and Whitman, for whom Mr John Bailey will be responsible.