Chapter VIII: Part I: Studies in Vocal Interpretation (5)

"Yes, very, very good. I _do_ love you, Tom."

Tom had put the line back in his pocket, and was looking at the
hooks one by one, before he spoke again.

"And the fellows fought me because I wouldn't give in about the
toffee."

"Oh, dear! I wish they wouldn't fight at your school, Tom. Didn't
it hurt you?"

"Hurt me? no," said Tom, putting up the hooks again, taking out a
large pocket-knife, and slowly opening the largest blade, which he
looked at meditatively as he rubbed his finger along it. Then he
added:

"I gave Spouncer a black eye, I know--that's what he got by wanting
to leather _me_; I wasn't going to go halves because anybody
leathered me."

"Oh, how brave you are, Tom! I think you're like Samson. If there
came a lion roaring at me, I think you'd fight him--wouldn't you,
Tom?"

"How can a lion come roaring at you, you silly thing? There's no
lions only in the shows."

"No; but if we were in the lion countries--I mean, in Africa, where
it's very hot--the lions eat people there. I can show it to you in
the book where I read it."

"Well, I should get a gun and shoot him."

"But if you hadn't got a gun--we might have gone out, you know, not
thinking, just as we go fishing; and then a great lion might run
toward us roaring, and we couldn't get away from him. What should
you do, Tom?"

Tom paused, and at last turned away contemptuously, saying: "But
the lion _isn't_ coming. What's the use of talking?"

"But I like to fancy how it would be," said Maggie, following him.
"Just think what you would do, Tom?"

"Oh, don't bother, Maggie! you're such a silly--I shall go and see
my rabbits."

Maggie's heart began to flutter with fear. She dared not tell the
sad truth at once, but she walked after Tom in trembling silence as
he went out, thinking how she could tell him the news so as to
soften at once his sorrow and anger; for Maggie dreaded Tom's anger
of all things--it was quite a different anger from her own.

"Tom," she said, timidly, when they were out-of-doors, "how much
money did you give for your rabbits?"

"Two half-crowns and a sixpence," said Tom, promptly.

"I think I've got a great deal more than that in my steel purse
up-stairs. I'll ask mother to give it you."

"What for?" said Tom. "I don't want _your_ money, you silly thing.
I've got a great deal more money than you, because I'm a boy. I
always have half-sovereigns and sovereigns for my Christmas boxes,
because I shall be a man, and you only have five-shilling pieces,
because you're only a girl."

"Well, but, Tom--if mother would let me give you two half-crowns
and a sixpence out of my purse to put into your pocket to spend,
you know, and buy some more rabbits with it?"

"More rabbits? I don't want any more."

"Oh, but, Tom, they're all dead."

Tom stopped immediately in his walk and turned round toward Maggie.
"You forgot to feed 'em, then, and Harry forgot?" he said, his
color heightening for a moment, but soon subsiding. "I'll pitch
into Harry--I'll have him turned away. And I don't love you,
Maggie. You sha'n't go fishing with me to-morrow. I told you to go
and see the rabbits every day." He walked on again.

"Yes. But I forgot--and I couldn't help it, indeed, Tom. I'm so
very sorry," said Maggie, while the tears rushed fast.

"You're a naughty girl," said Tom, severely, "and I'm sorry I
bought you the fish-line. I don't love you."

"Oh, Tom, it's very cruel," sobbed Maggie. "I'd forgive you if
_you_ forgot anything--I wouldn't mind what you did--I'd forgive
you and love you."

"Yes, you're a silly; but I never _do_ forget things--_I_ don't."

"Oh, please forgive me, Tom; my heart will break," said Maggie,
shaking with sobs, clinging to Tom's arm, and laying her wet cheek
on his shoulder.

Tom shook her off, and stopped again, saying in a peremptory tone:
"Now, Maggie, you just listen. Aren't I a good brother to you?"

"Ye-ye-es," sobbed Maggie, her chin rising and falling
convulsively.

"Didn't I think about your fish-line all this quarter, and mean to
buy it, and saved my money o' purpose, and wouldn't go halves in
the toffee, and Spouncer fought me because I wouldn't?"

"Ye-ye-es ... and I ... lo-lo-love you so, Tom."

"But you're a naughty girl. Last holidays you licked the paint off
my lozenge-box, and the holidays before that you let the boat drag
my fish-line down when I set you to watch it, and you pushed your
head through my kite, all for nothing."

"But I didn't mean," said Maggie; "I couldn't help it."

"Yes, you could," said Tom, "if you'd minded what you were doing.
And you're a naughty girl, and you sha'n't go fishing with me
to-morrow."

With this terrible conclusion, Tom ran away from Maggie toward the
mill, meaning to greet Luke there, and complain to him of Harry.

Maggie stood motionless, except from her sobs, for a minute or two;
then she turned round and ran into the house, and up to her attic,
where she sat on the floor, and laid her head against the
worm-eaten shelf, with a crushing sense of misery. Tom was come
home, and she had thought how happy she should be--and now he was
cruel to her. What use was anything, if Tom didn't love her? Oh, he
was very cruel! Hadn't she wanted to give him the money, and said
how very sorry she was? She knew she was naughty to her mother, but
she had never been naughty to Tom--had never _meant_ to be naughty
to him.

"Oh, he is cruel!" Maggie sobbed aloud, finding a wretched pleasure
in the hollow resonance that came through the long empty space of
the attic. She never thought of beating or grinding her Fetish; she
was too miserable to be angry.

These bitter sorrows of childhood! when sorrow is all new and
strange, when hope has not yet got wings to fly beyond the days and
weeks, and the space from summer to summer seems measureless.

This text furnishes an easier exercise in interpretation, does it not? It does not require a great stretch of imagination to slip back five, ten, a dozen years to play with these children. But I cannot let you _play_ with them. We want to meet and know them. The task for your imagination is not so simple as you think. It is called upon to engage in character interpretation. You cannot be allowed to merely watch Maggie and Tom play, or even to play with them. You must use your imagination to get inside the minds, hearts, souls of this boy and girl and reveal them to us. You must relive this scene for us, becoming first Maggie and then Tom. This exercise of your imagination belongs in its final and complete stage to the next and last of our studies, and to work on the drama; so we shall not demand too much of you along this line here, and I shall confine my suggestive analysis of the text to the following questions:

Define the relation existing between this brother and sister indicated by this scene.

Is this scene typical of their relation?

Is it a relation likely to obtain throughout their lives? Why?

Define the dispositions of these two children by applying to each three adjectives.

Will Maggie or Tom make the sacrifices inevitable to such a relation?

Characterize as to inflection and tone-color Maggie's voice and Tom's. (If your use of this book has been intelligently directed you have already made a study of these two elements of a vocal vocabulary--_inflection_ and _tone-color_.)

Answer these questions and re-read the scene.

SELECTIONS FOR INTERPRETATION

The following selections were chosen for this study with a double concern in the choice,--concern for the development of imaginative vigor in vocal interpretation; concern for the development of a sense of plot in narrative composition. The demand upon the interpreter of any of these poems, for sensitive progressive play of imagination, in carrying an auditor through a series of events up to a critical issue, cannot fail to develop, with imaginative vigor, a new sensitiveness of creative instinct to the third element in narrative,--action.

Your imagination given free play can no more carry the "good news" from Ghent to Aix on this wild ride, and in the feat fail to outgrow all its former dimensions, than could the heart of Roland's master remain untouched in actually performing the feat itself.

HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS FROM GHENT TO AIX[9]

[9] The "Good News" is that of the "Pacification de Gant,"
concluded in 1576. It was a treaty of union between Holland,
Zealand, and the southern Netherlands, against Spain, under
tyrannical Philip II. The treaty was greeted rapturously by the
frontier cities, because it was expected to free the Netherlands
from Spanish power.

"There is," writes Mr. Browning, "no sort of historical foundation
about 'Good News from Ghent.' I wrote it under the bulwark of a
vessel off the African coast, after I had been at sea long enough
to appreciate even the fancy of a gallop on the back of a certain
good horse 'York,' then in my stable at home. It was written in
pencil on the fly-leaf of Bartoli's _Simboli_, I remember."

While there is, then, no historical foundation for the "gallop,"
the verisimilitude of the situation is perfect. Aix might easily
have resolved to set herself on fire at a given hour, rather than
submit herself and her citizens piecemeal to the torch of the
persecutor. The "horse without peer" might possibly have galloped
the ninety-odd miles between Ghent and Aix, but the feat would be a
marvelous one.

This poem and "Herve Riel," with the accompanying notes, are
reprinted from _Select Poems of Robert Browning_, edited by William
Rolfe, A.M., and Heloise E. Hersey, and published by Harper &
Brothers.

I

I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris, and he;
I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three;
"Good speed!" cried the watch, as the gate-bolts undrew;
"Speed!" echoed the wall to us galloping through;
Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest,
And into the midnight we galloped abreast.

II

Not a word to each other; we kept the great pace
Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our place;
I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight,
Then shortened each stirrup, and set the pique right,
Rebuckled the check-strap, chained slacker the bit,
Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit.

III

'Twas moonset at starting; but while we drew near
Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight dawned clear;
At Boom, a great yellow star came out to see;
At Duffeld, 'twas morning as plain as could be;
And from Mecheln church-steeple we heard the half chime,
So Joris broke silence with, "Yet there is time!"

IV

At Aerschot, up leaped of a sudden the sun,
And against him the cattle stood black every one,
To stare through the mist at us galloping past;
And I saw my stout galloper Roland at last,
With resolute shoulders, each butting away
The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray;

V

And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear bent back
For my voice, and the other pricked out on his track;
And one eye's black intelligence,--ever that glance
O'er its white edge at me, his own master, askance!
And the thick heavy spume-flakes which aye and anon
His fierce lips shook upwards in galloping on.

VI

By Hasselt, Dirck groaned; and cried Joris, "Stay spur!
Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault's not in her,
We'll remember at Aix"--for one heard the quick wheeze
Of her chest, saw the stretched neck and staggering knees,
And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank,
As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank.

VII

So we were left galloping, Joris and I,
Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky;
The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh,
'Neath our feet broke the brittle bright stubble like chaff;
Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang white,
And "Gallop," gasped Joris, "for Aix is in sight!

VIII

How they'll greet us!"--and all in a moment his roan
Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as a stone;
And there was my Roland to bear the whole weight
Of the news which alone could save Aix from her fate,
With his nostrils like pits full of blood to the brim,
And with circles of red for his eye-sockets' rim.

IX

Then I cast loose my buff-coat, each holster let fall,
Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt and all,
Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted his ear,
Called my Roland his pet-name, my horse without peer;
Clapped my hands, laughed and sang, any noise, bad or good,
Till at length into Aix Roland galloped and stood.

X

And all I remember is, friends flocking round
As I sat with his head 'twixt my knees on the ground;
And no voice but was praising this Roland of mine,
As I poured down his throat our last measure of wine,
Which (the burgesses voted by common consent)
Was no more than his due who brought good news from Ghent.

--BROWNING.

LOCHINVAR

Oh, young Lochinvar is come out of the west,
Through all the wide border his steed was the best;
And save his good broadsword he weapon had none,
He rode all unarmed, and he rode all alone.
So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war,
There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.

He stayed not for brake and he stopped not for stone,
He swam the Esk river where ford there was none;
But, ere he alighted at Netherby gate,
The bride had consented, the gallant came late:
For a laggard in love and a dastard in war
Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.

So boldly he entered the Netherby Hall,
'Mong bride's-men, and kinsmen, and brothers, and all;
Then spoke the bride's father, his hand on his sword,
For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word,--
"Oh, come ye in peace here, or come ye in war,
Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?"

"I long woo'd your daughter, my suit you denied;
Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide;
And now am I come, with this lost love of mine,
To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.
There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far
That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar."

The bride kissed the goblet, the knight took it up;
He quaffed off the wine, and he threw down the cup;
She looked down to blush, and she looked up to sigh,
With a smile on her lip, and a tear in her eye.
He took her soft hand, ere her mother could bar,--
"Now tread we a measure!" said young Lochinvar.

So stately his form, and so lovely her face,
That never a hall such a galliard did grace;
While her mother did fret, and her father did fume,
And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume,
And the bride-maidens whispered, "'Twere better by far
To have matched our fair cousin with young Lochinvar!"

One touch to her hand, and one word in her ear,
When they reached the hall door, where the charger stood near;
So light to the croup the fair lady he swung,
So light to the saddle before her he sprung!
"She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur;
They'll have fleet steeds that follow!" quoth young Lochinvar.

There was mounting 'mong Graemes of the Netherby clan:--
Fosters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran;
There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lea,--
But the lost bride of Netherby ne'er did they see.
So daring in love, and so dauntless in war,
Have ye e'er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar?

--WALTER SCOTT.

KING VOLMER AND ELSIE

_After the Danish of Christian Winter_

Where, over heathen doom-rings and gray stones of the Horg,
In its little Christian city stands the church of Vordingborg,
In merry mood King Volmer sat, forgetful of his power,
As idle as the Goose of Gold that brooded on his tower.

Out spake the king to Henrik, his young and faithful squire:
"Dar'st trust thy little Elsie, the maid of thy desire?"
"Of all the men in Denmark she loveth only me:
As true to me is Elsie as thy Lily is to thee."

Loud laughed the king: "To-morrow shall bring another day,
When I myself will test her; she will not say me nay."
Thereat the lords and gallants, that round about him stood,
Wagged all their heads in concert and smiled as courtiers should.

The gray lark sings o'er Vordingborg, and on the ancient town
From the tall tower of Valdemar the Golden Goose looks down:
The yellow grain is waving in the pleasant wind of morn,
The wood resounds with cry of hounds and blare of hunter's horn.

In the garden of her father little Elsie sits and spins,
And, singing with the early birds, her daily task begins.
Gay tulips bloom and sweet mint curls around her garden-bower,
But she is sweeter than the mint and fairer than the flower.

About her form her kirtle blue clings lovingly, and, white
As snow, her loose sleeves only leave her small, round wrists in sight;
Below the modest petticoat can only half conceal
The motion of the lightest foot that ever turned a wheel.

The cat sits purring at her side, bees hum in sunshine warm;
But, look! she starts, she lifts her face, she shades it with her arm.
And, hark! a train of horsemen, with sound of dog and horn,
Come leaping o'er the ditches, come trampling down the corn!

Merrily rang the bridle-reins, and scarf and plume streamed gay,
As fast beside her father's gate the riders held their way;
And one was brave in scarlet cloak, with golden spur on heel,
And, as he checked his foaming steed, the maiden checked her wheel.

"All hail among thy roses, the fairest rose to me!
For weary months in secret my heart has longed for thee!"
What noble knight was this? What words for modest maiden's ear?
She dropped a lowly courtesy of bashfulness and fear.

She lifted up her spinning-wheel; she fain would seek the door,
Trembling in every limb, her cheek with blushes crimsoned o'er.
"Nay, fear me not," the rider said, "I offer heart and hand,
Bear witness these good Danish knights who round about me stand.

I grant you time to think of this, to answer as you may,
For to-morrow, little Elsie, shall bring another day."
He spake the old phrase slyly as, glancing round his train,
He saw his merry followers seek to hide their smiles in vain.

"The snow of pearls I'll scatter in your curls of golden hair,
I'll line with furs the velvet of the kirtle that you wear;
All precious gems shall twine your neck; and in a chariot gay
You shall ride, my little Elsie, behind four steeds of gray.

And harps shall sound, and flutes shall play, and brazen lamps shall
glow;
On marble floors your feet shall weave the dances to and fro;
At frosty eventide for us the blazing hearth shall shine,
While, at our ease, we play at draughts, and drink the blood-red wine."

Then Elsie raised her head and met her wooer face to face;
A roguish smile shone in her eye and on her lip found place.
Back from her low white forehead the curls of gold she threw,
And lifted up her eyes to his, steady and clear and blue.

"I am a lowly peasant, and you a gallant knight;
I will not trust a love that soon may cool and turn to slight.
If you would wed me henceforth be a peasant, not a lord;
I bid you hang upon the wall your tried and trusty sword."

"To please you, Elsie, I will lay keen Dynadel away,
And in its place will swing the scythe and mow your father's hay."
"Nay, but your gallant scarlet cloak my eyes can never bear;
A Vadmal coat, so plain and gray, is all that you must wear."

"Well, Vadmal will I wear for you," the rider gaily spoke,
"And on the Lord's high altar I'll lay my scarlet cloak."
"But mark," she said, "no stately horse my peasant love must ride,
A yoke of steers before the plow is all that he must guide."

The knight looked down upon his steed: "Well, let him wander free,--
No other man must ride the horse that has been backed by me.
Henceforth I'll tread the furrow and to my oxen talk,
If only little Elsie beside my plow will walk."

"You must take from out your cellar cask of wine and flask and can;
The homely mead I brew you may serve a peasant-man."
"Most willingly, fair Elsie, I'll drink that mead of thine,
And leave my minstrel's thirsty throat to drain my generous wine."

"Now break your shield asunder, and shatter sign and boss,
Unmeet for peasant-wedded arms, your knightly knee across.
And pull me down your castle from top to basement wall,
And let your plow trace furrows in the ruins of your hall!"

Then smiled he with a lofty pride: right well at last he knew
The maiden of the spinning-wheel was to her troth-plight true.
"Ah, roguish little Elsie! you act your part full well:
You know that I must bear my shield and in my castle dwell!

The lions ramping on that shield between the hearts aflame
Keep watch o'er Denmark's honor, and guard her ancient name.
For know that I am Volmer; I dwell in yonder towers,
Who plows them plows up Denmark, this goodly home of ours!

I tempt no more, fair Elsie! your heart I know is true;
Would God that all our maidens were good and pure as you!
Well have you pleased your monarch, and he shall well repay:
God's peace! Farewell! To-morrow will bring another day!"

He lifted up his bridle hand, he spurred his good steed then,
And like a whirl-blast swept away with all his gallant men.
The steel hoofs beat the rocky path; again on winds of morn
The wood resounds with cry of hounds and blare of hunter's horn.

"Thou true and ever faithful!" the listening Henrik cried:
And, leaping o'er the green hedge, he stood by Elsie's side.
None saw the fond embracing, save, shining from afar,
The Golden Goose that watched them from the tower of Valdemar.

O darling girls of Denmark! of all the flowers that throng
Her vales of spring the fairest, I sing for you my song.
No praise as yours so bravely rewards the singer's skill;
Thank God! of maids like Elsie the land has plenty still!

--WHITTIER.

HERVE RIEL[10]

[10] "This spirited poem was sent to the _Cornhill_, because
Browning was asked for a subscription to the fund for sending food
to Paris after the siege by the Germans in 1870-71. Though he
condemned Louis Napoleon's war, he wished to help the French in
their distress, and he sent to the fund the 100 pounds that Mr.
George Smith gave him for 'Herve Riel.' The subject of the poem and
its generous treatment surely manifolded the good-will of the gift.
An English poet restored to France its 'Forgotten Worthy.' An
Englishman sang the praises of a French sailor's balking the
English fleet. One of the nation whose boast it is that her heroes
need no other motive for their noble deeds than 'England expects
every man to do his duty' showed that in France, too--whose
citizens were accused of seeking glory and vainglory as their
dearest gain--was a man who could act out Nelson's words with no
thought of Nelson's end--a 'peerage or Westminster Abbey'--but just
do his duty because it lay before him, and put aside with a smile
the reward offered him for doing it; a real man, an honor to the
nation and the navy of which he was part."

"The facts of the story had been forgotten and were denied at St.
Malo, but the reports to the French Admiralty at the time were
looked up and the facts established. Browning's only alteration is
that Herve Riel's holiday to see his wife, 'La Belle Aurore,' was
to last, not a day only, but his lifetime."

"Herve Riel" was written at Le Croisic, the home of the hero. It is
a small fishing village near the mouth of the Loire.

I

On the sea and at the Hogue, sixteen hundred ninety-two,
Did the English fight the French--woe to France!
And, the thirty-first of May, helter-skelter thro' the blue,
Like a crowd of frightened porpoises a shoal of sharks pursue,
Came crowding ship on ship to St. Malo on the Rance,
With the English fleet in view.

II

'Twas the squadron that escaped, with the victor in full chase;
First and foremost of the drove, in his great ship, Damfreville:
Close on him fled, great and small,
Twenty-two good ships in all;
And they signaled to the place,
'Help the winners of a race!
Get us guidance, give us harbor, take us quick--or, quicker still,
Here's the English can and will!'

III

Then the pilots of the place put out brisk and leapt on board;
'Why, what hope or chance have ships like these to pass?' laughed
they:
'Rocks to starboard, rocks to port, all the passage scarred and scored,
Shall the _Formidable_ here with her twelve and eighty guns
Think to make the river-mouth by the single narrow way,
Trust to enter where 'tis ticklish for a craft of twenty tons,
And with flow at full beside?
Now, 'tis slackest ebb of tide.
Reach the mooring? Rather say,
While rock stands or water runs,
Not a ship will leave the bay!

IV

Then was called a council straight.
Brief and bitter the debate:
'Here's the English at our heels; would you have them take in tow
All that's left us of the fleet, linked together stern and bow,
For a prize to Plymouth Sound?
Better run the ships aground!'
(Ended Damfreville his speech).
Not a minute more to wait!
'Let the captains all and each
Shove ashore, then blow up, burn the vessels on the beach!
France must undergo her fate.

V

Give the word!' But no such word
Was ever spoke or heard;
For up stood, for out stepped, for in struck amid all these--
A captain? A lieutenant? A mate--first, second, third?
No such man of mark, and meet
With his betters to compete!
But a simple Breton sailor pressed by Tourville for the fleet,
A poor coasting-pilot he, Herve Riel the Croisickese.

VI

And, 'What mockery or malice have we here?' cries Herve Riel:
'Are you mad, you Malouins? Are you cowards, fools, or rogues?
Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the soundings, tell
On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every swell
'Twixt the offing here and Greve, where the river disembogues?
Are you bought by English gold? Is it love the lying's for?
Morn and eve, night and day,
Have I piloted your bay,
Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of Solidor.
Burn the fleet and ruin France? That were worse than fifty Hogues!
Sirs, they know I speak the truth! Sirs, believe me there's a way!
Only let me lead the line,
Have the biggest ship to steer,
Get this _Formidable_ clear,
Make the others follow mine,
And I lead them, most and least, by a passage I know well,
Right to Solidor past Greve,
And there lay them safe and sound;
And if one ship misbehave,
Keel so much as grate the ground,
Why, I've nothing but my life--here's my head!' cries Herve Riel.

VII

Not a minute more to wait.
'Steer us in, then, small and great!
Take the helm, lead the line, save the squadron!' cried its chief.
Captains, give the sailor place!
He is Admiral in brief.
Still the north wind, by God's grace!
See the noble fellow's face
As the big ship, with a bound,
Clears the entry like a hound,
Keeps the passage as its inch of way were the wide sea's profound!
See, safe thro' shoal and rock,
How they follow in a flock,
Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that grates the ground,
Not a spar that comes to grief!
The peril, see, is past,
All are harbored, to the last,
And just as Herve Riel hollas 'Anchor!'--sure as fate
Up the English come, too late!

VIII

So, the storm subsides to calm:
They see the green trees wave
On the heights o'erlooking Greve.
Hearts that bled are stanched with balm,
'Just our rapture to enhance,
Let the English rake the bay,
Gnash their teeth and glare askance
As they cannonade away!
'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the Rance!'
How hope succeeds despair on each captain's countenance!
Out burst all with one accord,
'This is Paradise for Hell!
Let France, let France's King,
Thank the man that did the thing!'
What a shout, and all one word,
'Herve Riel!'
As he stepped in front once more,
Not a symptom of surprise
In the frank blue Breton eyes,
Just the same man as before.

IX

Then said Damfreville, 'My friend,
I must speak out at the end,
Though I find the speaking hard.
Praise is deeper than the lips;
You have saved the King his ships,
You must name your own reward.
Faith our sun was near eclipse!
Demand whate'er you will,
France remains your debtor still.
Ask to heart's content and have! or my name's not Damfreville.'

X

Then a beam of fun outbroke
On the bearded mouth that spoke,
As the honest heart laughed through
Those frank eyes of Breton blue:
'Since I needs must say my say,
Since on board the duty's done,
And from Malo Roads to Croisic Point, what is it but a run?--
Since 'tis ask and have, I may--
Since the others go ashore--
Come! A good whole holiday!
Leave to go, and see my wife, whom I call the Belle Aurore!'
That he asked and that he got--nothing more.

XI

Name and deed alike are lost:
Not a pillar nor a post
In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell;
Not a head in white and black
On a single fishing smack,
In memory of the man but for whom had gone to wrack
All that France saved from the fight whence England bore the bell.
Go to Paris: rank on rank
Search the heroes flung pell-mell
On the Louvre, face and flank!
You shall look long enough ere you come to Herve Riel.
So, for better and for worse,
Herve Riel, accept my verse!
In my verse, Herve Riel, do thou once more
Save the squadron, honor France, love thy wife the Bell Aurore!

Your imagination can no more follow the flight of the _Formidable_, steered by Herve Riel, with the French fleet close following her guidance and "the English at her heels" past the rocks and shoals of Greve to safe harbor at Solidor, and remain creatively unsensitive to the pulse of progressive action, than could the actual rescue of his country's squadron leave unmoved toward the "man who did the deed" the heart of her Captain Damfreville.

And when your imagination has not only carried you through such adventure, but stimulated _my_ imagination to like activity, there is no limit to be set to the development which may result for us both.

Suggestive analysis can be of little help at this point, the work must be done in the class-room under direction.

To such stimulating exercise in the vocal interpretation of these poems of action, I leave you and your imagination. I shall hope to find difficulty in recognizing either of you at our next meeting. Like Mr. Rhoades's[11] pupil when he emerged from the Ninth book of _Paradise Lost_, you ought to have "outgrown all your present intellectual clothes" in the study of these stories in verse.

[11] Read _The Training of the Imagination_, by James Rhoades; John Lane Publishing Company.

As further material for this study there is no better choice to be made than Tennyson's great quasi-epic, _The Idylls of the King_, from which but for lack of space we should have printed selections. The following suggestions for work in composition at this point are based on the _Idylls_.

Describe in your own words Camelot.

Write an imaginary scene between Gareth and his mother.

Tell the story of Elaine.

Make the Holy Grail into the form of a miracle play.

FIFTH STUDY

TO DEVELOP DRAMATIC INSTINCT

Our final study in interpretation has for its concern the development of dramatic instinct. The work just finished should have left no doubt in your mind as to the nature or value of this final step in the training, since it has anticipated both. Development of imaginative vigor should arouse a latent dramatic instinct and release histrionic power. The choice of place in these studies for this phase of the training was made to insure cumulative evolution resulting in balanced expression. As imagination needs to safeguard her freedom with sympathetic thought and intelligent emotion, so dramatic instinct needs the guidance of a vigorous but trained imagination. Dramatic instinct so directed should achieve skill in interpreting drama and lead to distinction in the art of acting. The immediate evolution should be a clarified vision of life. Your final attainment from this theory should be distinction in the art of living.

With dramatic instinct capable of such achievement, let us proceed to exercise it in the material chosen for this study,--dramatic literature. The natural transition from story to play, from narrative to drama, is by way of the monologue. Some discussion with suggestive analysis of this form is necessary in order to impress upon you the difference between suggestive impersonation and actual impersonation or characterization, leading to a clear understanding of the difference between reading a play and acting in one; but the final evolution of interpretative power must come through acted drama,--through taking part in a play.

The dictionary in defining the monologue authorizes three forms: (1) when the actor tells a continuous story in which he is the chief character, referring to the others as absent; (2) when he assumes the voice or manner of several characters successively; (3) more recently, when he implies that the others are present, leading the audience to imagine what they say by his replies. Browning created this more recent form, which is the most vital of the three. I have chosen for your study of the monologue examples from Browning alone. To interpret effectively any one of the Browning monologues will call into play every element of power in voice and expression which you have gained in your study of previous forms. You must think vividly, feel intelligently, realize and suggest an atmosphere, sustain a situation, and keep the beauty of the poetic form. And you must do all this _in the person of another_. The new demand which the monologue makes is impersonation. Let us see just what we mean by impersonation. It is the art of identifying one's self with the character to be portrayed. It is the art of losing one's self in the character and the situation the dramatist has created. This means that the spirit of the character must take possession of the impersonator, and inform his every thought and feeling, and so his every motion and tone. Remember, it is the _spirit_ of the character that must determine the nature of the tone and gesture. The great danger in entering upon the study of impersonation lies in emphasizing the outward manifestation instead of the inward spirit of the character to be portrayed. If you really sense the soul, mind, heart quality of the character you are to present, and have made your voice and body free agents for the manifestation of those qualities, your impersonation will be convincing. If the spirit of the _Patriot_ or _Andrea del Sarto_ or _Fra Lippo Lippi_ or _Pompilia_ or _Caponsacchi_ or _Guido_ obsesses you, the outward manifestation will take care of itself--always provided your instruments are responsive. Don't begin with the outward manifestation. Don't say I think this man would frown a great deal, or fold his arms over his breast, or use an eyeglass, or strut, or stoop, or do any one of a hundred things which, if repeated a half-dozen times during an impersonation, may become a mannerism and get between the audience and the spirit of the character. When you are studying a character for the purpose of impersonation determine first to what type it belongs. Then study that type, wherever you are. Daily life becomes your teacher and studio. When you enter upon this art there are no longer dull moments in railroad stations or trains, in shops or in the social whirl. Everywhere and always you are the student seeking to know and understand types of people better, that you may use your knowledge in presenting to an audience an individual. When you have caught the spirit of the individual you must realize the situation out of which this particular individual speaks.

Let us make a special study of the _Tale_ (Browning's epilogue to _The Two Poets of Croisic_). It is perhaps the most exquisite of the poet's creations in this field. The situation reveals a young girl recalling to her poet lover an old Greek tale he had once told her. There is a suggestion from some critics that Browning has drawn his wife in this portrait, and through it pays his tribute to her. This immediately affords us a clue to the type of character to which the speaker belongs. We cannot hope (nor do we wish) to impersonate Mrs. Browning, but a knowledge of Mrs. Browning and her relation to her poet lover, gained through a study of her _Letters and Sonnets_, will lead us more quickly to a comprehension of the speaker and situation in the _Tale_.

Obsessed by the spirit of the character and fully realizing the situation, our next step is, _in imagination_, to set the stage. This is an important point in presenting a monologue. The impersonator must have a clear idea of his position on his imaginary stage relative to his imaginary interlocutor. But he must remember that _imaginary_ stage-setting admits of only delicately suggestive use. This is true of the handling of a monologue at every point. It must be suggestive. The actor carries to completion the action which the monologuist suggests. The art of interpreting a monologue depends upon the discrimination of the impersonator in drawing his line between suggestion and actualization in gesture. The business of the monologuist is to make an appeal to the imagination of the audience so vivid that the imagination of the audience can actualize the suggestion. And the illusion is complete. What are the relative positions of the girl and her lover in the _Tale_? There is nothing in the lines to make our choice arbitrary. It is only important that we determine a relation and keep it consistently throughout the reading. Here is a possible "setting." They are in the poet's study; he is working at his desk; she is sitting in a great chair before the fire, a book in her hand, which she does not read; she is gazing into the flames. She begins dreamily, more to herself than to him--"What a pretty tale you told me." At what point does her tone lose its reflective quality and become more personal? Where does she turn to him? How do we know that he leaves his chair and comes over to sit on the arm of her chair? What calls him to her? What two qualities of feeling run through her mood and determine the color of her tone and the character of her movements. If your study of Mrs. Browning has been intelligent, this interplay of the whimsical and serious in her nature cannot have escaped you, and it will illumine now your impersonation of this girl. It is the secret of the peculiar charm of this creation. The story she tells is an old and well-known one. It is the manner of the telling through which we come in touch with an exquisite woman's soul that holds us spellbound. Unless the interpreter catches this secret and reveals it to his audience, he will miss the distinctive feature of the monologue and reduce it to a narrative poem.

A TALE

I

What a pretty tale you told me
Once upon a time
--Said you found it somewhere (scold me!)
Was it prose or was it rhyme,
Greek or Latin? Greek, you said,
While your shoulder propped my head.

II

Anyhow there's no forgetting
This much if no more,
That a poet (pray, no petting!)
Yes, a bard, sir, famed of yore,
Went where such like used to go,
Singing for a prize, you know.

III

Well, he had to sing, nor merely
Sing but play the lyre;
Playing was important clearly
Quite as singing: I desire,
Sir, you keep the fact in mind
For a purpose that's behind.

IV

There stood he, while deep attention
Held the judges round,
--Judges able, I should mention,
To detect the slightest sound
Sung or played amiss: such ears
Had old judges, it appears!

V

None the less he sang out boldly,
Played in time and tune,
Till the judges, weighing coldly
Each note's worth, seemed, late or soon,
Sure to smile 'In vain one tries
Picking faults out: take the prize!'

VI

When, a mischief! Were they seven
Strings the lyre possessed?
Oh, and afterward eleven,
Thank you! Well, sir--who had guessed
Such ill luck in store?--it happed
One of those same seven strings snapped.

VII

All was lost, then! No! a cricket
(What 'cicada'? Pooh!)
--Some mad thing that left its thicket
For mere love of music--flew
With its little heart on fire,
Lighted on the crippled lyre.

VIII

So that when (Ah, joy!) our singer
For his truant string
Feels with disconcerted finger,
What does cricket else but fling
Fiery heart forth, sound the note
Wanted by the throbbing throat?

IX

Ay and, ever to the ending,
Cricket chirps at need,
Executes the hands intending,
Promptly, perfectly,--indeed
Saves the singer from defeat
With her chirrup low and sweet.

X

Till, at ending, all the judges
Cry with one assent
'Take the prize--a prize who grudges
Such a voice and instrument?
Why, we took your lyre for harp,
So it shrilled us forth F sharp!'

XI

Did the conqueror spurn the creature,
Once its service done?
That's no such uncommon feature
In the case when Music's son
Finds his Lotte's power too spent
For aiding soul-development.

XII

No! This other, on returning
Homeward, prize in hand,
Satisfied his bosom's yearning:
(Sir, I hope you understand!)
--Said 'Some record there must be
Of this cricket's help to me!'

XIII

So, he made himself a statue:
Marble stood, life-size;
On the lyre, he pointed at you,
Perched his partner in the prize;
Never more apart you found
Her, he throned, from him, she crowned.

XIV

That's the tale: its application?
Somebody I know
Hopes one day for reputation
Thro' his poetry that's--oh,
All so learned and so wise
And deserving of a prize!

XV

If he gains one, will some ticket,
When his statue's built,
Tell the gazer ''Twas a cricket
Helped my crippled lyre, whose lilt
Sweet and low, when strength usurped
Softness' place i' the scale, she chirped?

XVI

For as victory was nighest,
While I sang and played--
With my lyre at lowest, highest,
Right alike,--one string that made
"Love" sound soft was snapt in twain,
Never to be heard again,--

XVII

Had not a kind cricket fluttered,
Perched upon the place
Vacant left, and duly uttered
"Love, Love, Love," whene'er the bass
Asked the treble to atone
For its somewhat somber drone.'

XVIII

But you don't know music! Wherefore
Keep on casting pearls
To a--poet? All I care for
Is--to tell him that a girl's
'Love' comes aptly in when gruff
Grows his singing. (There, enough!)

INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP

I

You know, we French stormed Ratisbon:
A mile or so away,
On a little mound, Napoleon
Stood on our storming-day;
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how,
Legs wide, arms locked behind,
As if to balance the prone brow
Oppressive with its mind.

II

Just as perhaps he mused 'My plans
That soar, to earth may fall,
Let once my army-leader Lannes
Waver at yonder wall,'--
Out 'twixt the battery smokes there flew
A rider, bound on bound
Full-galloping; nor bridle drew
Until he reached the mound.

III

Then off there flung in smiling joy,
And held himself erect
By just his horse's mane, a boy:
You hardly could suspect--
(So tight he kept his lips compressed,
Scarce any blood came through)
You looked twice ere you saw his breast
Was all but shot in two.

IV

'Well,' cried he, 'Emperor, by God's grace
We've got you Ratisbon!
The Marshal's in the market-place,
And you'll be there anon
To see your flag-bird flap his vans
Where I, to heart's desire,
Perched him!' The chief's eye flashed; his plans
Soared up again like fire.

V

The chief's eye flashed; but presently
Softened itself, as sheathes
A film the mother-eagle's eye
When her bruised eaglet breathes;
'You're wounded!' 'Nay,' the soldier's pride
Touched to the quick, he said:
'I'm killed, Sire!' And his chief beside,
Smiling the boy fell dead.

MY LAST DUCHESS

FERRARA

That's my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive. I call
That piece a wonder, now: Fra Pandolf's hands
Worked busily a day, and there she stands.
Will 't please you sit and look at her? I said
'Fra Pandolf' by design; for never read
Strangers like you that pictured countenance,
The depth and passion of its earnest glance,
But to myself they turned (since none puts by
The curtain I have drawn for you, but I)
And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst,
How such a glance came there; so, not the first
Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, t'was not
Her husband's presence only, called that spot
Of joy into the Duchess' cheek: perhaps
Fra Pandolf chanced to say 'Her mantle laps
Over my lady's wrist too much,' or 'Paint
Must never hope to reproduce the faint
Half-flush that dies along her throat': such stuff
Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough
For calling up that spot of joy. She had
A heart--how shall I say?--too soon made glad,
Too easily impressed; she liked whate'er
She looked on, and her looks went everywhere.
Sir, 'twas all one! My favor at her breast,
The dropping of the daylight in the West,
The bough of cherries some officious fool
Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule
She rode with round the terrace--all and each
Would draw from her alike the approving speech,
Or blush, at least. She thanked men,--good! but thanked
Somehow--I know not how--as if she ranked
My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name
With anybody's gift. Who'd stoop to blame
This sort of trifling? Even had you skill
In speech--(which I have not)--to make your will
Quite clear to such an one, and say, 'Just this
Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss,
Or there exceed the mark'--and if she let
Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set
Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse,
--E'en then would be some stooping; and I choose
Never to stoop. Oh sir, she smiled, no doubt,
Whene'er I passed her; but who passed without
Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands;
Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands
As if alive. Will 't please you rise? We'll meet
The company below, then. I repeat,
The Count your master's known munificence
Is ample warrant that no just pretense
Of mine for dowry will be disallowed;
Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowed
At starting, is my object. Nay, we'll go
Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though,
Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,
Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!

--BROWNING.

Our last form for interpretative vocal study is the play. We shall discover that the presentation of the play makes the same demands upon the interpreter as the monologue with the new element of _transition_. We are still studying the monologue, because we are to read, not act, the play. It is still suggestive, not actualized impersonation. But instead of one character to suggestively set forth we have two, three, a dozen to present. The transition from character to character becomes our one new problem. As we have said before, in making the transition from character to character, voice, mind, and body must be so volatile that the action of the play shall not be interrupted. I know of no better way to enter upon the study of a play for reading (or acting) than to treat each character as the speaker in a monologue of the Browning type. The danger in transition from character to character centers in the instant's pause when one speaker yields to another. The unskilful reader loses both characters at this point and becomes conscious of himself; the action of the play stops; and the illusion of scene and situation is lost. The great reader of the play (in that _instant's pause_), as he utters the last word of one character, becomes the interlocutor listening to the words which he as the other character has just uttered. In that instant he must show the effect of the speech he has just uttered upon the character he has just become. Which is the greater art: to read a play, or to act in it?

Use for your study of the play the Shakespearian drama. Begin with scenes from _As You Like It_ and _The Merchant of Venice_; but begin with actualized impersonation of the characters. No discussion more! No analysis more! The play--the "play's the thing" through which to complete this evolution in Vocal Expression.

_A FINAL WORD ON INTERPRETATION_

Looking back over these studies in interpretation, let us review in true scholastic fashion the main points thus far discovered. We say looking back, but as far as the arrangement of our text goes this review involves looking forward too. The division of the book into three parts is purely a matter of a necessary separation in discussing the three activities involved in vocal expression. If your use of this book has been intelligent, each study in interpretation has revealed your need to strengthen your vocal vocabulary or to perfect your vocal technique, and you have turned at once for the required help to the studies in Part II and the exercises in Part III.

Omitting a review of the _preliminary plunge_, which was intended to "show up" all your peculiar powers and all your especial needs at once, and so furnish a basis for the main work, let us see what happened in the five following studies. It will simplify our statement in each case to base the analysis of our discoveries on the form of literature employed in each study.

You found then (or ought to have found) in Study One: that the essay and didactic poem make a fundamental appeal to the mind; that the demand upon the interpreter of this form is for clear, concise thinking; that your need is for a command of unerring emphasis and purposeful inflection. You turned to the studies in _pause_, _change of pitch_, and _inflection_ to meet that need. Returning to the main study, you tested your vocal skill on the essay to find the essay so read might persuade an auditor to some readjustment of his ideas, values, discriminations, or strengthen him in convictions already held.

Study Two revealed that in lyric poetry the primary appeal is to emotion; that its vocal demand upon the interpreter is for a mastery of _tone-color_, a sense of rhythm, and the power to suggest a background of musical sound. Having supplied as far as possible any lack in your vocabulary or technique by supplementary work in Parts II and III, returning you found that a lyric rightly read could release in the auditor pity, forgiveness, forbearance, endurance, understanding, love.

The Third Study should have convinced you that a sense of _good_ humor is a safe and desirable thing to cultivate; that the whimsical tone in interpretation will leaven almost any lump of sheer learning and counteract a serious overdose of sentiment; that fable, fairy tale, and nonsense rhyme depend too for successful interpretation upon this element of whimsicality in the reader; that the secret of the whimsical element in vocal expression lies in a use of _pause_ and _inflection_.

Study Four should have discovered to you that the three elements of the short story can only be realized through imagination; that imaginative vigor dealing with action requires sustained vitality of tone. Such discovery should have resulted in many hours of work on the exercises for _support_ and _freedom_ of _tone_.