Sea and Shore | Page 4

'gild refined gold and paint the lily,' as he did in his
so-called 'Sacred Poems.' He can spin a yarn pretty well, and coin a
new word for a make-shift, amusingly, but save me from the foil-glitter
of his poetry."[1]
"This is surprising! You upset all precedent. I really wish you had not
said these things. I now begin to see the truth of what my copy-book
told me long ago, that 'evil association corrupts good manners,' or I will
vary it and substitute 'opinions.' I must eschew your society, in a
literary way, I must indeed, Major Favraud."
"Now comes along this strolling Longfellow minstrel," he continued,
ignoring or not hearing my remark, "with his dreary hurdy-gurdy to cap
the climax. Heavens! what a nasal twang the whole thing has to me.
Not an original or cheerful note! 'Old Hundred' is joyful in
comparison!"
"You shall not say that," I interrupted; "you shall not dare to say that in
my presence. It is sheer slander, that you have caught up from some
malignant British review, and, like all other serpents, you are
venomous in proportion to your blindness! I am vexed with you, that
you will not see with the clear, discerning eyes God gave you
originally."
"But I do see with them, and very discerningly, notwithstanding your
comparison. Now there is that 'Skeleton in Armor,' his last effusion, I
believe, that you are all making such a work over--fine-sounding thing
enough, I grant you, ingenious rhyme, and all that. But I know where
the framework came from! Old Drayton furnished that in his 'Battle of
Agincourt.'" Then in a clear, sonorous voice, he gave some specimens
of each, so as to point the resemblance, real or imaginary.
"You are content with mere externs in finding your similitudes, Major
Favraud! In power of thought, beauty of expression, what comparison
is there? Drayton's verse is poor and vapid, even mean, beside

Longfellow's."
"I grant you that. I have never for one moment disputed the ability of
those Yankees. Their manufacturing talents are above all praise, but
when it comes to the 'God-fire,' as an old German teacher of mine used
to say, our simple Southern poets leave them all behind--'Beat them all
hollow,' would be their own expression. You gee, Miss Harz, that
Cavalier blood of ours, that inspired the old English bards, will tell, in
spite of circumstances."
"But genius is of no rank--no blood--no clime! What court poet of his
day, Major Favraud, compared with Robert Burns for feeling, fire, and
pathos? Who ever sung such siren strains as Moore, a simple Irishman
of low degree? No Cavalier blood there, I fancy! What power, what
beauty in the poems of Walter Scott! Byron was a poet in spite of his
condition, not because of it. Hear Barry Cornwall--how he stirs the
blood I What trumpet like to Campbell I What mortal voice like to
Shelley's? the hybrid angel! What full orchestra surpassed Coleridge
for harmony and brilliancy of effect? Who paints panoramas like
Southey? Who charms like Wordsworth? Yet these were men of
medium condition, all--I hate the conceits of Cowley, Waller, Sir John
Suckling, Carew, and the like. All of your Cavalier type, I believe, a set
of hollow pretenders mostly."
"All this is overwhelming, I grant," bowing deferentially. "But I return
to my first idea, that Puritan blood was not exactly fit to engender
genius; and that in the rich, careless Southern nature there lurks a vein
of undeveloped song that shall yet exonerate America from the charge
of poverty of genius, brought by the haughty Briton! Yes, we will sing
yet a mightier strain than has ever been poured since the time of
Shakespeare! and in that good time coming weave a grander heroic
poem than any since the days of Homer! Then men's souls shall have
been tried in the furnace of affliction, and Greek meets not Greek, but
Yankee. For we Southerners only bide our time!"
And he cut his spirited lead-horse, until it leaped forward suddenly, as
though to vent his excitement, and, setting his email white teeth sternly,
with an eye like a burning coal, looked forward into space, his whole
face contracting.
"The Southern lyre has been but lightly swept so far, Miss Harz," he
continued, a moment later, "and only by the fingers of love; we need

Bellona to give tone to our orchestra."
I could not forbear reciting somewhat derisively the old couplet--
"'Sound the trumpet, teat the drum, Tremble France, we come, we
come!'
"Is that the style Major Favraud?" I asked. "I remember the time when I
thought these two lines the most soul-stirring in the language--they
seem very bombastic now, in my maturity."
He smiled, and said: "The time is not come for our war-poem, and, as