DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.62267#0230
220
CLASSICAL TOUR
Dis,
murs choke its closes: it g'lides from the lips
with facility, and it delights the ear with its ful-
as encumbered with circumstances introduced merely for
the purpose of filling up the verse. This penetrating critic
had never, it seems, discovered that the ancient poets ex-
celled in painting, and that to retrench such exquisite
pictures in Horace or Virgil (for we speak only of the Latins)
is as absurd as it would be to expunge the temples, moun-
tains, and streams that throw such glory and freshness over
Claude Lorraines landscapes. Rhyme, he finds delightful,
enchanting, and far preferable to metre. French verse, it is
true, tires sooner than Latin, and now and then lulls the
reader to sleep. But this is the natural effect of its fluency,
clearness and harmony, while Virgil (so happy is this critic
in his instances) is not quite so well understood, nor of
course read with so much ease and avidity. The elisions
in Latin verse are rough and intolerable: in French ©wing
to the E muet all smoothness. The following eulogium on
his own language cannot be perused without a smile at the
simplicity of the writer. The exclamation with which it
commences, is truly comic.—“ Notre langue est si belle,
quand on scait s’en servir! Elie tient plus de I’esprit et
depend moins des organes du corps que toute autre: il ne
faut ni purler de la gorge, ni ouvrir beaucoup la bouche,
frapper de la langue contre les dents, ni “ faire des signes et
des gestesf comme il me semble que font la plupart des
etrangers quand Us parlent la langue de leurs pays!”—The
French r is not a very smooth letter, nor is the u very easily
pronounced by any but Frenchmen*. With regard to the
* Rough and uncouth pronurjnation was imputed to the French sit
CLASSICAL TOUR
Dis,
murs choke its closes: it g'lides from the lips
with facility, and it delights the ear with its ful-
as encumbered with circumstances introduced merely for
the purpose of filling up the verse. This penetrating critic
had never, it seems, discovered that the ancient poets ex-
celled in painting, and that to retrench such exquisite
pictures in Horace or Virgil (for we speak only of the Latins)
is as absurd as it would be to expunge the temples, moun-
tains, and streams that throw such glory and freshness over
Claude Lorraines landscapes. Rhyme, he finds delightful,
enchanting, and far preferable to metre. French verse, it is
true, tires sooner than Latin, and now and then lulls the
reader to sleep. But this is the natural effect of its fluency,
clearness and harmony, while Virgil (so happy is this critic
in his instances) is not quite so well understood, nor of
course read with so much ease and avidity. The elisions
in Latin verse are rough and intolerable: in French ©wing
to the E muet all smoothness. The following eulogium on
his own language cannot be perused without a smile at the
simplicity of the writer. The exclamation with which it
commences, is truly comic.—“ Notre langue est si belle,
quand on scait s’en servir! Elie tient plus de I’esprit et
depend moins des organes du corps que toute autre: il ne
faut ni purler de la gorge, ni ouvrir beaucoup la bouche,
frapper de la langue contre les dents, ni “ faire des signes et
des gestesf comme il me semble que font la plupart des
etrangers quand Us parlent la langue de leurs pays!”—The
French r is not a very smooth letter, nor is the u very easily
pronounced by any but Frenchmen*. With regard to the
* Rough and uncouth pronurjnation was imputed to the French sit