THE BABOO AND THE POETS.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 467, 27 March 1909, Page 9

THE BABOO AND THE POETS.

In an article in the "Contemporary Heriew" on Literature..and the Indian Student,',':,'a';writor who signs himself "Tau'Vgives softie diverting instances,of misquotations and misinterpretations'' by students of English poetry. The writer once heard one of them intoning the first few lines of "Paradise Lost," making- the last three words of- the invocation. "Sing, heavenly mouse," Another made the fallen archangel jay—

• • "And thou, profoundest, Hell, Receive thy new professor." (instead of possessor). The writer says that he once, in a fit of temporary enthusiasm,' quoted four moraorable lines from Shelley's "Adonis," beginning—

"He has outsoared the shadow of our night." He had been emphasising the distinction between the Classical and iiloraantic schools of poetry, and- asked his .class what was the characteristic of Shelley's linos. The students stared at their text-hooks. At last ono of them roso. "Sir, may I?" "Well, what is it?" !"Bombasticity, sir." Another student said gravely, "Humour." "Good heavens!" I gasped, "where?" "In ■'that unrest which men miscall delight.' The humour depends on incongruity." 'Another time Keats's "Ode to a Nightingale" was the subject of the discourse. One student, explaining: the poet's meaning,, said, "The poet calling nightingale 'light-winged Druid (Dryad) of the trees,' says further, T am not sad because of envy a low person might fail with bird for its sweet song.' " A young Brahmin, the secretary of the, Fine Arts Debating Society, explained as follows the last six lines of the "draught of vintage" stanza beginning—

"O-for a beaker full of the warm South." "The poet desired that he might drink the warm wine of South in a peg full of true fountain of Moses. Ho said, 'After intoxicating myself .with abovementioned wine I shall totally forgot everything, and be with you in' the jungle.'" This was a fairly creditable analysis.