LOVE'S TELEGRAPHY

WE'VE put a girdle round the earth,
And taught the lightning fire
With news of sadness or of mirth
To flash along the wire;
But swifter far than message sped
O'er land or under sea,
Is that by happy maidens read-
Through love's telegraphy.

She binds the kerchief o'er her eyes
To play the children's game,
And making captures, vainly tries
To guess the captive's name.
At last one hand is in her own-
Ah, beating heart, be still!
One name at last is surely known
By love's electric thrill.

Love's telegraphic signal flew

Along her nerves, and came-
To where her brain responsive knew,
And tinged her cheeks with flame.
The tender thoughts transmitted then
All other thoughts eclipse;

His name-ah, happiest of men!-
Comes trembling to her lips.

H. SAVILE CLARKE.

THIRD SERIES, VOL. V. F.S. VOL. XXV.

M M

A MODEL EPIC

SOME months ago a poem entitled Hero and Leander,* from the Greek of Musæus, by Edwin Arnold, M.A., was published, but very unobtrusively. It is a short poem, yet worth serious study in the present day, when most people's notions about poetry are loose or else erroneous.

The story of Hero and Leander is one of the gems of antiquity; yet we have not met with any trace of it in the palmy days of Greek literature. Most likely the incidents themselves occurred between that period and the Christian era; for the Latin poets Virgil and Ovid knew the legend well, but not as a poem. Musæus the ' grammarian,' or as we should say, the man of letters,' is the writer to whom this exquisite tale really owes its hold upon our hearts. We know nothing about him, or when he lived, except from internal evidence; but that is sufficient to date him. His Greek is Alexandrine, and his mind romantic rather than classical; the old Greek mind never dwelt with such art and tenderness on the loves of a virgin and a youth. This epic was certainly written several centuries after the birth of Christ, and might almost be called a mediæval romance with Greek figures and a Greek dress. Undervalued by scholars, it has been tasted by poets; Tasso translated it in Italy, Marot in France, and Marlow in England. There is also an English translation in Anderson's collection; and we have compared Mr. Arnold's version with this, and with the original.

We give the gist of the poem and some of Mr. Arnold's lines. Sestos and Abydos front each other across the Hellespont. Leander was the pride of Abydos, and Hero of Sestos. She was a priestess of Venus, and lived apart at her father's tower by the sea, and never came to the city markets nor to the vintage dances, lest she should encounter rude eyes; and so virginal was her mind that she prayed constantly to Venus and Eros to shield her from love.

'Beseeching that she might unscathed go;

Yet none the more scaped she delicious woe.'

For at the great spring offering to Venus and Adonis, Sestos was thronged with strangers.

'And Hero too went up unto the shrine,

Her face of alabaster all ashine,

Like the pure moon when first it swims the sky;

Nathless her cheek was touch'd with tender dye

* Hero and Leander. From the Greek of Museus. By Edwin Arnold, M.A. (London: Cassell, Petter, & Galpin.)

Such as new rosebuds have-not white nor red,
But sunlit snow; in sooth, you would have said
She was all made of rose-leaves, she did show
So fair and fine beneath her thin gown's flow.'

Her beauty and her grace, which is equally well described, drew all hearts after her. Many a youth sighed for her; but one-Leander-when he looked at her, 'knew he must have or die.' last thought seems modern, but only because it is eternal.

οὐκ ἔθελες ζώειν περικαλλέος ἄμμορος 'Ηρούς.

'What lightning strikes in sooth like a fair face?
What arrow pierces like a woman's grace?

'Tis the eyes slay; thence fly the subtle darts

Which deal swift wounds and hurt unguarded hearts.'

This

Now follows a description of first love in a young man and a young woman, that may challenge all literature, ancient and modern, both for its beauty and its truth; and if our readers will but compare this with the vulgar caricatures of young love, that have lately deluged the libraries, they will perhaps thank God, as we do, for old Musæus and young Arnold. The pair must share the credit; since the Greek drew, but the English hand, we find, has painted, this immortal picture.

'HE.

He trembled, and then blush'd to tremble so;
And vex'd at blushing, straight did venturous grow.
Eros at his heart's ear whispering amain

To lay shame by and speak; so was he fain

To steal a little closer, till he stood

Foot to foot with her; then in daring mood
Sidelong he glanced, and murmur'd half a word
And check'd it to a sigh, itself half heard.

SHE.

And seeming to see nought, she saw and bent
Her sweet head from him, not in discontent.
And seeming not to hear, she heard and sigh'd
A little silver sigh of pleasured pride;
By signs unwitting giving him to know

It was not anger set her cheeks aglow.'

The sun declines; everybody is going home. He sees it is now or never. He implores a word with her, and draws her gently apart by her stole. She remonstrates and comes; comes and remon

strates.

'SHE.

Sir, are you mad? How dare you hold me so?
Leave plucking at my gown; and let me go.

If those who love me saw, 'twould cost you dear.

Besides, I am a holy priestess here,

Vow'd to Queen Venus. Are you not afraid
To stay me so, and I an honest maid?

Thus as the manner of all maidens is,

Her soft lips rated, though her heart was his;

And he by love's quick instinct knew it so,

And let her dear delicious accents flow

In anger musical; for when maids scold

With looks that pardon, lovers may be bold.'

Then he pours out a torrent of love and lovers' arguments, and she stands with her bright eyes bent on the ground and her hot face averted.

'Now with one sandal-tip the grass she beat,

Now drew it back close wrapp'd from head to feet.'

In short, she deliberated. Worse than that, she stole timid glances at him, and saw how fair he was, how bold, how bright. At last she found words and tears; for, being of the same age, and a woman, she is deeper than he is, and has misgivings.

'Friend, were I marble I must answer thee.

Who taught thee such deep eloquence? Ah, me!
Who brought thee hither and procured us pain?
For all these sweet things said are said in vain.

Thou couldst not ask me openly for wife,
My parents would not give me ; and 'twere rife
With untold dangers if you linger'd here
To meet me secretly; for all is ear,

All eye, in Sestos. Things in silence done
Are said next morning at the market stone.'

Then, with a fine touch of womanhood, she breaks off her remonstrances all in a moment, and says he must tell her who he is and where he lives, and his birth and parentage; she is Hero, and she lives in that tall tower, whose foot stands in the foam, and she has no friend nor companion. Then, doubting the discreetness of all this, she hides her face in her gown and is abashed.

'HE.

"Sweet, for thy love," he cried, "the sea I'll cleave,

Though foam were fire, and waves with flame did heave;

I fear not billows if they bear to thee,

Nor tremble at the hissing of the sea.'

All he asks of her is to light her lamp on the tower to guide him. "Sweetheart, do this; my name if thou dost sue,

I am Leander, Hero's lover true."

She was won, and they plighted faith for life.

The poets next describe Leander watching at night for the lamp, its effect on his heart when lighted, his swimming the Hellespont, her loving reception of him as her husband, and their happy time.

By and by came winter, and sailors drew their ships ashore. But no fear kept Leander from facing the bursting waves so often as Hero raised her light. And here poor Hero showed her love inferior in quality to the love of a Northern girl. The poet who limns her feels this, and a cry bursts from his own tender heart, that is both eloquent and simple:

The end is told in verses of power, which we quote at length, partly because there is no other way of dealing with them, and partly to mark how Mr. Arnold can change his style with the subject.

'There came one night, the wildest of the year,
When the wind smote like edge of hissing spear,
And the pale breakers thunder'd on the beach ;
While in mid-sea Leander toil'd to reach
The far-off haven of his Hero's breast.
Sore-toss'd he was from raging crest to crest;
Billow on billow roll'd, the great seas roar'd
Furiously leaping to the clouds, which pour'd
Sleet and brine back, with scream of winds that met
Midway from all the quarters :-Eurus set

His blast against the West Wind; Notus blew
His cheeks to bursting, Boreas to subdue.
Ceaseless the tumult of the tempest was,
And young Leander in its midst, alas!
Battling th' inexorable bitter sea,
Call'd on the gods in his calamity.

To foam-born Venus many a prayer he made,
And oft the name of great Poseidon said;

And oft grim Boreas he did implore

For Orithyia's sake to help him o'er.

Nothing he gain'd; Fate was too strong for Love.
The chill spray-laden storm beat him above;
Below, the monstrous buffets of the sea
Struck the strength from him; till, all helplessly,
His feet droop'd down, relinquishing the strife,
Though his poor hands kept feebly on for life.
O'er lip and nostril now the salt waves clomb;
Gasping for breath, he breathed but choking foam;
Yet gleam'd that light, and still he strove for shore:
Sudden a cruel gust blew !—all was o'er!

The gust extinguish'd Hero's lamp; the sea
Hid young Leander and his agony.

Hero, when that he came not, watch'd all night,
Into the darkness straining hard her sight;
And morning breaking-and no sign of him-
With aching heart she scann'd the sea-face dim,
Fearing to look, because that lamp went out.
He was not there; but, casting still about,
Lo!-at the turret's foot his body lay,

Roll'd on the stones, and soak'd with breaking spray.
She rent her robe upon her, and leap'd down
Headlong, distracted, from the turret's crown.
There on his corpse she breathed her dying breath;
And, link'd in life, those two were one in death.'

Such is this lovely poem; and there is something to be learned from it both as a translation and a poem.

First, as a translation. What, in a general way, is a translation? Champagne rendered flat. 'Your whoreson translator is a sad destroyer of carbonic-acid gas in books.' The worst of it is, people sit quietly down and fancy it must be so. 'The untranslatable' is a current phrase, yet false nine times in ten. We