Poems on Various Subjects (Coleridge)/Notes

by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

NOTES.

Note 1———Page 37.

Lee Boo, the son of Abba Thule, Prince of the Pelew Islands came over to England with Captain Wilson, died of the small-pox, and is buried in Greenwich Church-yard. See Keate's Account.

Note 2.———Page 37.

And suffering Nature weeps that one should die.

⁠Southey's Retrospect.

Page 46.

Yet never, Burke! thou drank'st Corruption's bowl!

When I composed this line, I had not read the following paragraph in the Cambridge Intelligencer (of Saturday, November 21, 1795.)

"When Mr. Burke first crossed over the House of Commons from the Opposition to the Ministry, he received a pension of 1200l. a-year charged on the King's Privy Purse! When he had completed his labors, it was then a question what recompence his service deserved. Mr. Burke wanting a present supply of money, it was thought that a pension of 2000l. per annum for forty years certain, would sell for eighteen years purchase, and bring him of course 36,000l. But this pension must, by the very unfortunate act, of which Mr. Burke was himself the author, have come before Parliament. Instead of this Mr. Pitt suggested the idea of a pension of 2000l a-year for three lives, to be charged on the King's Revenue of the West India 41/8 per cents. This was tried at the market, but it was found that it would not produce the 36,000l. which were wanted. In consequence of this a pension of 2500l. per annum, for three lives on the 41/2 West India Fund, the lives to be nominated by Mr. Burke, that he may accommodate the purchasers, is finally granted to this disinterested patriot! He has thus retir'd from the trade of politics, with pensions to the amount of 3700l. a-year."

Note 3.———Page 50.

Hymettian Flowrets. Hymettus a mountain near Athens, celebrated for its honey. This alludes to Mr. Sheridan's classical attainments, and the following four lines to the exquisite sweetness and almost Italian delicacy of his Poetry.———In Shakespeare's "Lover's Complaint" there is a fine stanza almost prophetically characteristic of Mr. Sheridan.

So on the tip of his subduing tongue
All kind of argument and question deep,
All replication prompt and reason strong

For his advantage still did wake and sleep,
To make the weeper laugh, the laugher weep:
He had the dialect and different skill,
Catching all passions in his craft of will:
That he did in the general bosom reign
Of young and old.

Note 4.———Page 52.

When Kosciusko was observed to fall, the Polish ranks set up a shriek.

Note 5.———Page 62.

This little Poem was written when the Author was a boy.

Note 6.———Page 65.

One night in Winter, on leaving a College-friend's room, with whom I had supped, I carelessly took away with me "The Robbers" a drama, the very name of which I had never before heard of:—

A Winter midnight—the wind high—and "The Robbers" for the first time!—The readers of Schiller will conceive what I felt. Schiller introduces no supernatural beings; yet his human beings agitate and astonish more than all the goblin rout—even of Shakespeare.

Note 7.——Page

"Effinxit quondam blandum meditata laborem
⁠Basia lascivâ Cypria Diva manâ.
Ambrosiæ succos occulta temperat arte,
⁠Fragransque infuso nectare tingit opus.
Sufficit et partem mellis, quod subdolus olim
⁠Non impune favis surripuisset Amor.
Decussos violæ foliis admiscet odores
⁠Et spolia æstivis plurima rapta rosis,
Addit et illecebras et mille et mille lepores,
⁠Et quot Acidalius guadia Cestus habet."

Ex his composuit Dea basia; et omnia libans
⁠Invenias nitidæ sparsa per ora Cloës.
⁠Carm. Quad. vol. II.

Note 8.——Page 84.

The flower hangs its head waving at times to the gale. Why dost thou awake me, O Gale! it seems to say, I am covered with the drops of Heaven. The time of my fading is near, the blast that shall scatter my leaves. To-morrow shall the traveller come, he that saw me in my beauty shall come. His eyes will search the field, they will not find me. So shall they search in vain for the voice of Cona, after it has failed in the field.————Berrathon, see Ossian's Poems, vol. 2.

Note 9. Page 86.

How long will ye roll around me, blue-tumbling waters of ocean? My dwelling was not always in caves, nor beneath the whistling tree. My feast was spread in Torthoma's Hall. The youths beheld me in my loveliness. They blessed the dark-haired Nina-thomà.————Berrathon.

Note 10.—Page 99.

L'athée n'est point à mes yeux un faux esprit; je puis vivre avec lui aussi bien et mieux qu'avec le dévot, car il raisonne davantage, mais il lui manque un sens, et mon ame ne fe fond point entièrement avec la sienne: il est froid au spectacle le plus ravissant, et il cherche un syllogisme lorsque je rends une action de grace.

"Appel a l'impartiale postérité, par la Citoyenne Roland," troisieme partie, p. 67.

Page 105.

O (have I sigh'd) were mine the Wizard's rod!

I entreat the Public's pardon for having carelesly suffered to be printed such intolerable stuff as this and the thirteen following lines. They have not the merit even of originality: as every thought is to be found in the Greek Epigrams. The lines in this poem from the 27th to the 36th, I have been told are a palpable imitation of the passage from the 355th to the 370th line of the Pleasures of Memory part 3, I do not perceive so striking a similarity between the two passages; at all events, I had written the Effusion several years before I had seen Mr. Rogers' Poem.——It may be proper to remark that the tale of Florio in "The Pleasures of Memory" is to be found in Lochleven a Poem of great merit by Michael Bruce.——In Mr. Rogers' Poem the names are Florio and Julia; in the Lochleven Lomond and Levina—and this is all the difference. We seize the opportunity of transcribing from the Lochleven of Bruce the following exquisite passage, expressing the effects of a fine day on the human heart.

Fat on the plain and mountain's sunny side
Large droves of oxen and the fleecy flocks
Feed undisturbed, and fill the echoing air
With Music grateful to their Master's ear.
The Traveller flops and gazes round and round
O'er all the plains that animate his heart
With Mirth and Music. Even the mendicant
Bow-bent with age, that on the old gray stone
Sole-sitting suns him in the public way,
Feels his heart leap, and to himself he sings.

Note 11.——Page 111.

The expression "green radiance" is borrowed from Mr. Wordsworth, a Poet whose versification is occasionally harsh and his diction too frequently obscure: but whom I deem unrivalled among the writers of the present day in manly sentiment, novel imagery, and vivid colouring.

Note 13.——Page 118.

Light from plants. In Sweden a very curious phenomenon has been observed on certain flowers by M. Haggern, lecturer in natural history. One evening he perceived a faint flash of light repeatedly dart from a marigold. Surprised at such an uncommon appearance, he resolved to examine it with attention; and, to be assured it was no deception of the eye, he placed a man near him, with orders to make a signal at the moment when he observed the light. They both saw it constantly at the same moment.

The light was most brilliant on marigolds of an orange or flame colour; but scarcely visible on pale ones.

The flash was frequently seen on the same flower two or three times in quick succession; but more commonly at intervals of several minutes: and where several flowers in the same place emitted their light together, it could be observed at a considerable distance.

This phenomenon was remarked in the months of July and August at sunset, and for half an hour, when the atmosphere was clear; but after a rainy day, or when the air was loaded with vapours nothing of it was seen.

The following flowers emitted flashes, more or less vivid, in this order:

1. The marigold, galendula officinalis.
2. Monk's-hood, tropœlum majus.
3. The orange-lily, lilium bulbiferum.
4. The Indian pink, tagetes patula & erecta.

From the rapidity of the flash, and other circumstances, it may be conjectured that there is something of electricity in this phenomenon.

 

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FINIS.