243. Uvedale Price to EBB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 1, 274–277.
Foxley
Decber 20th 1826
Dear Ba.
When Luxmoore [1] was with us, a little before he called at Hopend [sic], I shewed him what I had just been writing on the Charter-house mode of pronouncing, chiefly that of their passing over the vowel to the consonant in iambi & pyrrhics but continuing to accent them, as we do, on the first syllable: He read it with more interest than he is apt to feel on such subjects, & wished me to go on with it; having as great a dislike to egʹo πυρ´ι fugʹe, pigʹer [2] &ca as I have; & being convinced by what I shewed him, that the trochaic cadence & the shortened finals (two principal objects of reform) are much the same in μεγ´α δ´ αμ´φι πυλ´αι μυκ´ον as in με´γα δ´ αμ´φι πυ´λαι μυ´κον, but with a much worse sound; & that the dactylic rhythm, & four out of the five dactyls in
βριθσυνη μεγᾰ δ´ αμφι πυλαι .. μυκὂν ουδ αρ οχηες [3]
were for want of the long finals & the true cadence of the pyrrhic, equally destroyed in both modes. He is not acquainted with Dr Russell, but thinks from what is said of him that he is a very liberal man, & one who would like to discuss a subject of this sort; of course, if he thought the remarks worthy of his attention. I have now finished my little dissertation & have had a fair copy made of it: & as it may be conveyed in a few covers I shall venture to send it you & probably in the course of this week: & if on reading it you & your brother should think the statements well founded, & the sheets altogether not unworthy of Dr Russell’s notice, your Brother perhaps, from his charter house connections might know some one sufficiently acquainted with Dr R to mention to him that such a letter (for it is in that form & addressed to you tho’ without your name,) had been written & by whom, & to ask him whether he would like to look at it: if he should you might perhaps contrive to send it to him before the vacation is over. The undisguised freedom of my attack on the change I have just spoken of will be no slight trial of his candour & liberality, tho’ I have given the praises they so well deserve to two other changes; that of stopping on the vowel before a single consonant, as aʹridus, eʹmet, Thʹlyre, oʹmine, & to that of separating two consonants of the same kind, as in terʹruit, irʹritus. These two changes were made,—indeed necessarily, in consequence of the first, but might, & ought to remain, should the first, as I earnestly wish it may, be abandoned. I hope you & your Brother will both of you examine my ms. with a critical eye, & let me know if you should discover any material errors in any of my positions: I heartily wish, on every account, that we were near neighbours, & could talk over the whole viva voce.——
I have a good deal to say to you in reply to your reply; but I have lately had some visits from my arch-enemy that arch-fiend Dyspepsia, & have had hard work to finish the ms. I am going to send you: She acts in various ways sometimes by extreme irritation, at others by stupor & lethargy under the influence of which last, with a little mixture of the first, I am now writing; I will ask you however while I am half awake, whether you have read the Subaltern? It is said, by military men to be a very exact as well as lively account of the D. of Wellington’s campaign in the Pyrenees from the taking of St Sebastian to the surrender of Bayonne: a great part of it is interesting even to so unmilitary a man as myself, but the whole account of the attack & capture of St Sebastian at the beginning of the work, is most striking in all its circumstances & all its detail: the dreadful sublimity of such a scene is likewise enhanced & rendered more awful, by a most impressive description of a thunderstorm that on the very morning when the attack was to be made appeared to be slowly collecting its terrible ammunition: the close oppressive heat of the atmosphere, the lowring sulphureous clouds, the preternatural stillness, the silence, the apparent alarm felt by all animals, seem to be the vivid, but true & unexaggerated images of what he really witnessed. As the day passed on the hour of attack drew near, the clouds gradually collected into one black mass directly over the devoted city & almost at the instant when the troops began to march into the trenches the storm burst forth: still it was comparatively mild in it’s effects. [4] I am very much persuaded from the general style & character of the work that all this singular coincidence did take place just as it is related, & should be very sorry to think otherwise for if I could suppose any thing to have been invented or arranged for the purpose of effect, it would completely defeat it’s purpose. Admitting the exact truth it is a most striking combination, & the grandest contest ever exhibited between the
mortal engines whose hoarse throats
Th’ immortal Joves dread thunders counterfeit [5]
& the thunders themselves: as to Salmoneus, his exhibition was not much better than playhouse thunder & lightning. [6] What makes me inclined to think that the author did not sacrifice truth to effect is that he mentions the first burst of the storm as comparatively mild; then leaves it & goes on with the attack to the end of it & of the chapter; & after such mighty preparation I felt a little disappointed that so little had been produced. In the next chapter, not having chosen to interrupt his narrative of the attack, he returns to the particular movement of his own corps a few days previous to it: they were ordered to advance up in the mountains, but were suddenly recalled to join the besiegers, & were with them when the attack began. He then resumes his account of the thunder-storm where he had left off: “this,” he says “went on increasing every minute, so that at the moment when our leading files emerged from their cover (it was mild when they marched into the trenches) one of the most fearful thunder-storms to which I ever listened had attained its height”: & then after a little interval, & a little suspense to the reader, the full combination & grand chorus is restored. I have been trying to recollect the descriptions of thunder-storms in poetry & the circumstances mentioned: the sulphureous clouds, & any indication of sulphur, I only remember in Homer who in two passages mentions the smell of it with an epithet, which shewed that he thought it terrible, & therefore on the same principle with Burke, sublime.
ως´ δ´ οθ´ υπ´αι ριπης πατρος Διος εξερι´πη δρυς
Προρρι´ ζος δεινη δε θεειου γινεται οδμη [7]
You will certainly have observed the five successive trochees in the first verse, either in the old or the Charter-house mode, & the miserable ending of the line: in fact, there is neither dactyl nor spondee, metre nor rhythm, connection, expression nor harmony till you come to the adonic at the end of the second line. The other instance is where Jupiter darts his thunderbolt at the feet of Diomeds horses
Δεινη δε φλοξ ωρτσ θεειου καιομενοιο [8]
The stillness is noticed, & in the most striking manner by Shakespear; but I cannot recollect an example in poetry, tho’ I dare say you will, of the alarming impression of the storm, while yet collecting, on all animals. I have been writing a great deal in my sleep, & will now return to my armchair. Believe me with our best regards to you all
Most truly yours
U Price
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Armstrong Browning Library.
1. Probably Charles Scott Luxmoore (1794?–1854), Prebendary of Hereford and eldest son of John Luxmoore (1756–1830), who had been Bishop of Hereford 1808–15.
2. See letter 241, note 1.
3. [“The stone fell by its own] weight, and the gates grated loudly around” (Iliad, XII, 460).
4. The Subaltern (1825) by George Robert Gleig (1796–1888). The passage describing the storm occurs in chapter 3.
5. Othello, III, 3, 355–356, slightly misquoted.
6. Salmoneus, son of Æolus, pretended to be a god, making thunder by dragging kettles behind his chariot, and hurling torches to simulate lightning. He was struck dead by Zeus.
7. “As by the stroke of Father Zeus a tree is uprooted, and there comes the terrible smell of sulphur” (Iliad, XIV, 414–415).
8. “And there shot up the terrible fire of burning sulphur” (Iliad, VIII, 135).
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