Included in DGR's letter is a fair copy of a sonnet he wrote at the time,
The poem was first printed in
, 15 February 1871. WMR has a note to the poem: “
In the last line [DGR] substituted (in MS.) the word ‘” (1911, p. 667); see also Caine.Starveling's’ for ‘tailor's’; and I remember he once told me that his real reason for not publishing the sonnet in either of his volumes [i.e., 1870 or 1881] was to avoid hurting the feelings of some sensitive member or members of the tailoring craft
DGR's mention of “shotten herring” derives from Henry IV, Part 1
if manhood, good manhood, be
not forgot upon the face of the earth, then am I a shotten herring. There live not three
good men unhanged in England; and one of them is fat and grows old
.” DGR likely had
the passage in mind when writing line 6.
Correspondence
I returned here on Friday night after a week's walking in Warwickshire. At the end of said
week I felt a great deal better than I had done for some time, and had enjoyed myself mightily,
especially in the neighbourhood of Stratford. You seem quite to have miscalculated my energies,
as I found two letters of yours on my return, the first of which is dated on the Monday after I
left Newcastle! you seeming to think that I should then be already back in London. I hope you
will henceforward do more justice to the wild enthusiasm of my character. Since I came
I think the "Saint Margaret" is full of beauties. My onlyfancy it might occur to others) the lines seem to me otherwise rather to improve the poem,
especially in the last stanza, which would end rather abruptly & awkwardly without the
burden. But in any case I should take away the expression "loved ones" as that is quite
decidedly "Barrett-Browningian" & I think feminine in the abstract.
There are a few
lines which seem to me inharmonious, & unfinished in rhythm. Such are the 2nd &
3rd (especially 3rd) of stanza 1; the 1st of
When I left Stratford the Avon was flooding the whole country. The crops were under water
& the hay going down the current. It suggested a ballad I have partly written &
mean to finish. However the weather was mostly fine—often lovely & the beauty of the
country inexpressible in many parts. I quite woke to a sense of my Shakespearean awe &
homage. When I got within hail
Is this strong enough for the "shotten herring?
"
I spent a very pleasant day on Sunday in an excursion to Hendon with Brown, who is the only man I have seen yet since my return. Nevertheless one feels again within the accursed circle. The skulls & bones rattle, the goblins keep mumbling, and the owls beat their obscene wings again, round the casting of those bullets among which is the devil's seventh, though it should be hidden till the last. Meanwhile, to step out of the ring is death & damnation.
I notice that the above metaphor is very fine. Something might be done with it—in charcoal. I suppose if I come to
Kindest regards to Mrs. Scott & Mrs. Norquoy.
W. B. Scott Esq.
I hope to get the design for the etching done by the time I see you again, and then to profit by your experience in carrying it out.