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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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~~ " Owen Meredith's Poems. Czytemnestra...
and resolutions of _Cvtemnestra , But this is precisely the point on which Owen Meredith has lavished his strength and invention . He sees that the guilty wife , disturbed in her adulterous happiness , is now to be confronted with her husband . She trembles for the future , looks back on the past— On days grown lorelier in the retrospect— , , _„„ - _, i i qj _. i _* i « j . u _* . _/•*!•» and then resolves : « Wherefore look back ? she says , the " path to safety hes forward" ... 1 he sight of her husbands shield recals him , and recals her old dislike of him : — Oh , this man ! Why sticks the thought of him so in my heart ? If f had loved him once—if for one hour— Then were there treason in this falling off . But never did I feel this wretched heart Until it leap'd beneath _^ Eg isthus' eyes . Who could have so forecounted all from first ? . _J rom that flusht moment when his hand in mine - Rested a thought too long , a touch too kind , To leave its P Sse unwarmed ... But I remember I dream'd sweet dreams that night , and slept till dawn , And woke with flutterings of a happy thought , And felt , not worse , but better . . . and now - - . now ? When first a strange and novel tenderness Quiver'd in these salt eyes , had one said then ; " A bead of dew may drag a deluge down : " — Jn that first pensiVe pause , through which I watch'd Unwonted sadness on _JEgisthus' brows , Had some one whispered , " Ay , the summer-cloud Comes first : the tempest follows . "— Well , what ' s past Is past . Perchance the worst ' s to follow yet . This , _wither it be the sophism of guilty passion , or the real utterance of ancient dislike is hnely conceived . _* et she does not undervalue _ Agamemnon : — ' Surely sometimes the unseen Eumenides Do prompt our musing moods with wicked hints , And lash us for our crimes ere we commit them . Here , round this silver boss , he cut my name , . Once—long ago : he cut it as he lay - Tired out with bTawling pastimes—prone—his limbs At length diffused—his head droopt in my lap— His spear flung by : Electra by the hearth Sat with the young Orestes on her knee ; While he , with an old broken sword , hack'd out These crooked characters , and laughed to see ( Sprawl'd from the unused strength of his large hands ) The marks make _Clttemnestba . How he laughed t _. aSgisthus' hand 3 are smaller . Yet I know _. . That matrons envied me my husband ' s strength- And I remember when he strode among The Argive crowd he topp'd them by a head , And tall men stood wide-eyed to look at him , Where his great plumes went tossing up and down The brazen prores drawn out upon the sand , And he approaches •— Herald . Even riow the broad sea-fields Grow white with flocks of sails , and toward the west The sloped horizon teems with rising beaks . Clytemnestra . The people know this ? Herald . Heard you not the noise ? For soon as this _Tving'd news had toucht the gates The whole land shouted in the sun . Clytemnestra . So soon ! The thought ' s outaped by the reality , And halts agape . . . the King— Herald How she is moved I A noble woman ! Clytemnestra . ' Wherefore beat so fast , Thou foolish heart ? 'tis not thy master— Herald . Truly She looks all over Agamemnon ' s mate . Clytemnestra . Destiny , Destiny ! The deed ' s half done . Herald . She will not speak , save by that brooding eye Whose light is language . Some great thought , I see , Mounts up the roval chambers of her blood , As a king mounts his palace ; holds high pomp In her Olympian bosom ; gains her face , Possessea all her noble glowing cheek With sudden state ; and gathera grandly up Its slow majestic meanings in her eyes ! We pass over the choruses ( upon which a word by and by ) and come to the scene between Clytemnestra and her feeble lover _JBgisthus—a scene not dissimilar from that in Macheth , where the Northern Clytemnestra screws her vacillating husband ' s courage to the sticking place . There is nothing of this in _iEschylus ; yet every one sees it is the dramatic pivot of the legend . The scene is too long for extract , but will be read with wonder and _delight by every one who opens the volume . Mere is an ex tractable _passage ; _iEgisthus asks , " If the deed be done dare we hope to be happy ?» — _» > r _ii Clytemnestra . My Belov'd , We are not happy—wo may novor bo , Perchance , again . Yot it is much to think Wo have been bo : and ov ' n tho' wo must weop , We have onjoy _' tl , The rosca and tho thorns We have pluckt together . Wo have proved both . Say , Was it not worth the bleeding hand _» they left us To have won auch flowers ? And if't wore possible To kcop them still—keep oven the withor'd loavoa _, Even tho withor'd leaves aro worth our care .
' _^^ _iX _^ _tl _^ l _^ Z _^ U _^ Be dark ag _j _^^ _fri _^ thunder sits among , Tipt only herean ( i there with a wan gold More bright for rains between?— 'tis much—' tis more , For we shall ever think " the sun ' s behind . The sun must shine before the day goes down I " Anything better than the long , long night , And that perpetual silence of the tomb ! 'Tis not for happier hours , but life itself Which may bring happier hours , we strike at Fate . Why , tho' from all the treasury of the Past 'Tis but one solitary gem we save—One kiss more such as we have kist , one smile , One more embrace , one night more such as thos e Which wo have shared , how costly were the prize , How richlv worth the attempt ! y fi . fa ' h ; terror __ her terror lest she should , b j i _jc- _^ . i i * i * i c • • • . ei 1 Q _eceived ln l » m—and fine the way she catches at a show of spirit m him :-Do * not know the noble steed will start Aside , scared lightly by a straw , a shadow , A thorn-bush in the way , while the dull mule Plods stupidly adown the dizziest paths ? And oft indeed , such trifles will dismay The finest and most eager spirits , which yet Daunt not a duller mind . O love , be sure Whate ' er betide , whether for well or ill , Thy fate and mine are bound up in one skein , Clotho must cut them-both inseparate . You dare not leave me—had you wings for flight ! You shall not leave me ! You are mine , indeed , & S _^^^ _K _^ _IS ? * _*** Life-life with safe and honourable years , And power to do with these that which we would ! —His lip ' s _comprest—his eye dilates—he is saved I O , when strong natures into frailer ones Have struck deep root , if one exalt not both , Both must drag down and perish ! _^ E gisthus . If we should live—Clytemnestra . And we shall _liv « . JEgisthus . Yet . . . yet—Clytemnestra . What ! shrinking still ? I'll do the deed . Do not stand off from me . _^ E gisthus . Terrible Spirit ! Clytemnestra . Nay , not terrible , Not to thee terrible—O say not so ! To thee I never had been anything But a weak , passionate , unhappy woman ( O woe is me !) and now you fear _me—^ g isthus . No , But rather worship . Clytemnestra . O my heart , my heart , It sends up all its anguish in this cry—Love me a little ! T | power , essentially dramatic , which throbs in these lines the reader wi ] 1 perhaps feel even _^/ extract ( although that is a very imperfect way of judging of the effect , since all preparation is lost in extract ) . How fine is this : — Herald . O Honour of the House of Tantalus ! The king ' s wheels echo in the brazen gates . Clytemnestra . Our heart is half-way there , to welcome him , How looks he ? Well ? And all our long-lost friends—Their faces grow before me ! Lead the way Where we may meet them . All our haste seems slow . Indeed the style is affluent and easy in its _strength . The _images are frequently fine and finely expressed : such as this _:-^ J _-,...,., w , n _. For evei T ni _e ht that brought not news from Troy Heaped fear on fear , as waves succeed to waves When northern blasts How white the Cretan main . Yet these images are not dragged in , as if the whole purpose of poetry were to throw off similes . What lias been already quoted will suffice to show the peculiar powers of the writer , . in dramatic expression especially , and we now qliote the description of the sacrifice of _Iphijicnia _, which the reader compare with that of _^ Eschylus ( Ayam . v . 180—237 ) : — J l „ , . _, n „ ,, . \ ,. , , y _£ hc wmds T _™ lu " d in Auhs 5 and the _^ Down-sloped , was loitering to the lazy west . P _™ , _? " ! 8 _, no mot 10 _? of th ? . glaS 8 _y ba _^' _?"' _? " thlnSs by a heavv heht opprest . Windless , cut off upon the destined way—Dar c s » rouds _, distinct against the lurid lull—Dark ropes hung ; useless , loose , from r oast to hull—The black ships lay abreast . Not any cloud would cross the brooding skies . Tho distant sea boom'd fuintly . Nothing more . They walked about upon the yellow _whoro ; _Or _^ _Y ' in & listless , huddled groups supine , With faces turn'd toward the Hat son-spino , They plann'd the Phrygian battle o ' er and o ' ™ Ofl < _r h B r 0 _? _»«» on , and would talk no more , . - _^ llt 8 at > dumb-dreaming . Then would some one rise , And look toward tho hollow hulls , with haggard , hopeless eyes—~\ V \\
Mmpijsip^Gft^'^:^:^ ¦ , ¦ ¦¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ , ¦ -...
_MMpiJsip _^ _gft _^ _' _^ : _^ : _^ ¦ , ¦ ¦¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ , ¦ - .. ¦ _¦ _- . . , v _^ _K _^^^^^ _M _^^^^ ; _^^ i _^ _j _^ : ' ' _^ ' _^ i : ' v ' _^'' - _'¦'' ' _" ' ' ¦ '¦¦ ¦ '' . ' ¦ ¦ # " ¦ 58 Q THE LEADER . [ Saturday ,
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), June 16, 1855, page 4, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/sldr_16061855/page/4/
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