leóman to leóhte land bú[en]dum; leomum and leáfum : cy [n]na ge-hwylcum (Beowulf, v. 178.) luminaries to light the inhabitants of the land; the districts of the earth with boughs and leaves: life also he created that go about alive. 3. These minstrel-poets had, by degrees, composed a large mass of national poetry, which formed collectively one grand mythic cycle. Their education consisted chiefly in committing this poetry to memory, and it was thus preserved from age to age. They rehearsed such portions of it as might be asked for by the hearers, or as the circumstances of the moment might require, for it seems certain that they were in the habit of singing detached scenes even of particular poems, just as we are told was done with the works of Homer in the earlier times of Greece. Thus in Beowulf, on one occasion, the subject selected by the Bard as most appropriate, is Offa's expedition against Finn, a romance of which, singularly enough, we have still a fragment left,*— The circumstance of our having a part of the very romance which the bard is introduced singing, gives a singular air of verity to the pictures of early manners in this interesting poem. The fragment first printed by Hickes, and reprinted in Kemble's Beowulf under the title of "The Battle In their passage from one minstrel to another, these poems underwent successive changes; and, since, like the religion taught by the priests, the poetry belonged to the whole class, without being known severally as the work of this or that individual, it happens that all the Anglo-Saxon national poetry is anonymous. In like manner, the question as to the authors of most of the poetry of the early Grecian cycles was among the Greeks themselves a matter of great uncertainty. The practice of singing detached. pieces also accounts for the fragments of larger poems which are still found in manuscripts; the famous Exeter manuscript is chiefly made up of such pieces. Beowulf bears internal evidence of having passed through many hands in its way from the age of paganism in which it was certainly moulded, up to that when among minstrels who held a better religion, it received the various adventitious traits of Christianity which we now find in it. The "Traveller's Song" seems to have been preserved as a kind of nomenclature of geography; and, as might be expected, it is full of interpolations, by the addition of the names of countries, of which the knowledge was brought in by the Christian writers. 4. The poetry of the Anglo-Saxons was neither modulated according to foot-measure, like that of the Greeks and Romans, nor written with rhymes, like that of many modern languages. Its chief and universal characteristic was a very regular alliteration, so arranged that, in every couplet, there should be two principal words in the first of Finnesburh," was found by the former, as he says, in a MS. of semi-Saxon Homilies in the Archiepiscopal Library at Lambeth. It has since been sought there more than once, but without success. Perhaps it was the leaf pasted down in the binding of some MS. which belonged to a very different subject; and, if this be the case, it is certainly very desirable that it should be found, as, by separating it from the cover, more might possibly be discovered than Hickes was aware of. line beginning with the same letter, which letter must also be the initial of the first word on which the stress of the voice falls in the second line. The only approach to a metrical system yet discovered is that two risings and two fallings of the voice seem necessary to each perfect line. Two distinct measures are met with, a shorter and a longer, both commonly mixed together in the same poem, the former being used for the ordinary narrative, and the latter adopted when the poet sought after greater dignity. In the manuscripts, the Saxon poetry is always written continuously like prose, perhaps for the sake of convenience, but the division of the lines is generally marked by a point. Some Anglo-Saxon scholars, and the Germans more particularly, have advocated the printing of the alliterative couplet in one line, while others are equally zealous for its separation into two. This is, perhaps, more a matter of taste than of great importance, though the mode, now generally adopted, of dividing the alliterations into couplets, seems to be countenanced both by the pointing of the manuscripts, and by the circumstance that, if the longer metres be arranged according to the other method, the length of the lines becomes rather inconvenient and unseemly. The harmony and alliteration of the lines, as well as the dividing points, are often lost in the manuscripts by the inaccuracy of the scribes. 5. The Anglo-Saxon poetry has come down to us in its own native dress. In unskilful hands it sometimes became little more than alliterative prose; but, as far as it is yet known to us, it never admitted any adventitious ornaments. Having been formed in a simple state of society, it admits, by its character, no great variety of style, but generally marches on in one continued strain of pomp and grandeur, to which the Anglo-Saxon language itself was in its perfect state peculiarly suited. The principal charac teristic of this poetry is an endless variety of epithet and metaphor, which are in general very expressive, although their beauty sometimes depends so much on the feelings and manners of the people for whom they were made, that they appear to us rather fanciful. As, however, these poets drew their pictures from nature, the manner in which they apply their epithets, like the rich colouring of the painter, produces a brilliant and powerful impression on the mind. They are, moreover, exceedingly valuable to the modern reader, for they make him acquainted with the form, colour, material, and every other attribute of the things which are mentioned. Thus, when the hero shows himself, a long description could not give a more exact idea of his apparel than is here conveyed in a few words Beowulf madelode; sea [ro]-net seówed (Beowulf, v. 804.) Beowulf spake ; on him the coat of mail shone, by the skill of the armourer. When the poet describes Beowulf's approach, with his attendants, to the Danish capital, we see even the path they are treading, and the clank of their armour seems to ring in our ears— Stræ't wæs stán-fáh, gumum æt-gædere. song in searwum, þá híe tó sele furðum in hyra gry're-geatwum The street was variegated with stones, the path directed the men together. The war-mail shone, hard hand-locked; the bright ring-iron sang in their trappings, when they forward to the hall in their terrible armour proceeded on their way. (v. 637.) So, likewise, in Beowulf's desperate encounter with the unearthly Grendel, whom no weapons could injure, when he tears the monster's arm from the shoulder, the poet dwells on the momentary act of separation till we seem to feel the crash : :-- hím on eaxle weard seonowe on-sprungon, (Beowulf, v. 1626.) On his shoulder became a mighty gash evident, the sinews sprang asunder, the juncture of the bones burst. The metaphors also often possess much original beauty. Thus, an enemy is not slain-he is put to sleep with the sword. So it was with the nicors whom Beowulf had destroyed in the sea; and they were found not on the shore-but near the leavings of the waves: When a hero died in peace, he went on his way. Beowulf's father ge-bád wintra worn, he abode for many a year, So (v. 525.) Men's passions and feelings are sometimes depicted with great beauty. What can be more simple and elegant, and at the same time more natural and pathetic, than Hrothgar's lamentation over his old and faithful counseller, whom unexpectedly the Grendel's mother had slain? Hróð-gár mabelode, helm Scyldinga : ne frin þú æfter sæ'lum,— sorh is ge-niwod Denigea leódum; Hrothgar spake, the protector of the Scyldings: to the Danish people; dead is schere |