SOME POETS AND THEIR SCENERY.

BY SIR HENRY NEWBOLT, C.H., M.A., D.Litt., V.-P. R.S.L.

[Read March 25th, 1925.]

How large a volume might be written on types of human error. And how entertaining would be the chapter on poetical fallacies: by which I mean, of course, the fallacies, not of poets, but of critics of poetry, whether professional or private. Perhaps the principal section of this chapter would be devoted to the great archaeological fallacy for it is a fallacy that is twice blessed-it blesseth him that gives it his ingenuous devotion and him that takes it humorously as a spectacle of fatuity. What a joy, for example, it must be for an archaeologist to find in Denmark not only a town called Elsinore, but a spot in the garden of the hotel pointed out to customers as the grave of Hamlet; or to discover, as someone did last week, a letter of 1809 stating that Sir John Moore was buried at Corunna in the afternoon, and therefore not by the struggling moonbeam's misty light and the lanthorn dimly burning. On the other hand, how we chuckle over the modern inn-keeper who indignantly vociferates-"I know nothing about your Mr. Dickens but how can you say that Mr. Pickwick was not a real person, when I tell you he stayed in this very inn?" And how pleasant to hear a learned Dane, Mr. Johannes Jensen, scornfully

hurling Shakespeare the poet at the archaeologists"The realm of imagination, that was to him my Denmark' nor is there any other Denmark in it.” Shall we pause here for a moment to agree with Mr. Jensen upon this: that whatever bits of clay the poet may take from the common earth as raw material, it is always a new world-his own world, his own Denmark-that he makes with them? And then shall we walk for a little way through the scenery of some pastoral poets, where we are sure to find an archaeologist or two digging in the dark for a black fact which isn't there?

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'Tityre, tu patulae recubans sub tegmine fagi Silvestrem tenui musam meditaris avena: Nos patriae fines et dulcia linquimus arva, Nos patriam fugimus: tu Tityre lentus in umbra Formosam resonare doces Amaryllida silvas." ["Tityrus, you lying under the spreading beech-tree's roof, are practising your woodland tunes upon your slender pipe of straw: we cross the border and leave the fields we love we fly our fatherland; you Tityrus stretched in the shade at ease, make the woods resound with the name of beautiful Amaryllis."]

These, as everyone knows, are the opening lines of the first of Virgil's Eclogues; and they deserve the epithet "momentous," for though simple enough in superficial meaning, they have carried as far as almost any that were ever written. The Eclogues made Virgil's fame when he was but thirty—a fame which grew until in the Middle Ages it became a European legend without a parallel. These poems were received in the Roman world with universal delight, and even, it would seem, with some unconscious recognition of

Virgil's true significance in the progress of poetrythey were, as Dr. Mackail has said, the real turningpoint not only between two periods of Latin literature, but between two worlds. In them is first heard that "note of brooding pity," that tone of underlying thought, which among all the beauty and gaiety of the much-loved earth reminds us tenderly of the love and sadness that are in mortal life. So different is this note from any in the older Roman literature that it gave freshness and originality to a set of poems which were in outward form a young poet's "close and careful imitations" of the much older Greek poetry of Theocritus. No doubt the deliberate resemblance combined with the spiritual newness to delight and stir Virgil's audience then as now: for 1900 years he was acclaimed as the greatest of Latin poets. Then came the age of science, unfortunately also the age of applied science, and even of misapplied science. Literary critics began to talk of racial qualities in poetry; one, I remember, gained credit by attributing some of the most attractive lines in the "Ode to a Nightingale" to a Celtic element' in John Keats. At last, after English poetry had been carefully searched for Celtic elements, a consensus of professors, mostly German, turned their attention to Virgil, and offered evidence to prove his Celtic descent. Of this evidence I will only say here that none of it would convince a scientific or judicial mind, while much of it is merely amusing as an example of logical method. Virgil was born at Andes, or Vicus Andicus; Andicus is certainly Celtic, for Caesar mentions a tribe of that name in Gaul. You see the argument: if John Smith was born in

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London, and Londinium was a Roman settlement, then John Smith must be of Roman descent. Again, Virgil's parents were named Vergilius Maro and Magia Polla, his brothers Flaccus and Silo. Silo is a Celtic name; Magia is sometimes found united with a Celtic cognomen. On the other hand Flaccus is Latin; so is Polla; and Magia is found much more often with Latin cognomina. Vergilius itself is almost certainly Latin or Etruscan; and Virgil's pride in the Etruscan origin of Mantua seems to point to a belief in his own Etruscan ancestry. So far the evidence is conflicting. But there is yet a pièce de conviction left: the family surname, Maro. Maro, says Professor Zwicker, is defined in Du Cange's

Glossary' as "Viae praemonstrator "-one who goes before to show the way, an Alpine guide in fact, and therefore of Gaelic descent. Again you see the argument: the word " rider " means a rider of horses, in fact a rider of Arab horses, and Arab horses come from Arabia; therefore a family whose surname is Ryder must be of Arabian origin. We need not trouble further with the name Maro, except perhaps to remark that according to two other German authorities, Schulze and Corssen, it is the Latin form of Maru, as Caspo is of Caspu; and these names in -u are Etruscan, not Celtic. And of the supposed Celtic traits in Virgil's poems I am content to note Dr. Mackail's dictum, that it is quite unnecessary to assume a Celtic origin for any new birth of the romantic element.

The Celtic affinity of Virgil is therefore at present. unproved, and even improbable. If it were proved it would still be irrelevant, for the romantic poetry

of the world is not entirely or mostly the gift of the Celtic race. It may be wondered why I stopped for a moment to examine a theory of so little literary importance. The reason is that this theory was the origin of another, much more interesting. The search for ancient names, the digging for inscriptions in North Italy, incidentally led one of our own Professors, Mr. G. E. K. Braunholtz, to believe that he had found evidence of the true site of Virgil's farm and birthplace. His suggestion has been taken up and illustrated by Professor Seymour Conway with so much learning and enthusiasm that other lovers of Virgil have been led to join the hunt-I may say myself that the sound of his horn brought me from my bed, and that I greatly enjoyed the run, though I came at last to the conclusion that it was a drag and not a live fox that we were chasing.

Let me state the few facts which form our startingpoint. Virgil was born on the 15th of October in the year 70 B.C. His father was a small freeholder who farmed his own land, and practised forestry and beekeeping. The land was in the territory of the town of Mantua in Cisalpine Gaul, which was then thoroughly Romanized and formed a principal recruiting ground for the Roman legions. As for the site of the farm, we are told by Servilius, who wrote about 500 years later, that it was at Andes; and by Dante, who wrote about 900 years after Servilius, that Andes is the same as Pietōla, now Pietōle, nearly three miles to the south-east of Mantua. These statements are, of course, tradition rather than evidence; but they have been accepted by the countrymen of Virgil and Dante all through the