The
following example, a far-off following of a noted contemporary poet,
may be left unsigned -
"Wretches, the bane hath befallen, the night and the blight of your
sin
Sweeps like a shroud o'er the faces and limbs that were gladsome
therein;
And the dirge of the dead breaketh forth, and the faces of all men
are wet,
And the walls are besprinkled with blood, and the ghosts in the
gateway are met,
Ghosts in the court and the gateway are gathered, Hell opens her
lips,
And the sun in his splendour is shrouded, and sickens in spasm of
eclipse."
The next is longer and slower: the poet has a difficulty in telling
his story:
"Wretches," he cried, "what doom is this? what night
Clings like a face-cloth to the face of each, -
Sweeps like a shroud o'er knees and head? for lo!
The windy wail of death is up, and tears
On every cheek are wet; each shining wall
And beauteous interspace of beam and beam
Weeps tears of blood, and shadows in the door
Flicker, and fill the portals and the court -
Shadows of men that hellwards yearn--and now
The sun himself hath perished out of heaven,
And all the land is darkened with a mist."
That could never be mistaken for a version by the Laureate, as
perhaps any contemporary hack's works might have been taken for
Pope's. The difficulty, perhaps, lies here: any one knows where to
have Pope, any one knows that he will evade the mot propre, though
the precise evasion he may select is hard to guess.
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