significance. And the error is a grave one, for in truth nothing is more
marvellous than the magic with which Racine can conjure up out of a few
expressions of the vaguest import a sense of complete and intimate
reality. When Shakespeare wishes to describe a silent night he does so
with a single stroke of detail--'not a mouse stirring'! And Virgil adds
touch upon touch of exquisite minutiae:

Cum tacet omnis ager, pecudes, pictaeque volucres,
Quaeque lacus late liquidos, quaeque aspera dumis
Rura tenent, etc.

Racine's way is different, but is it less masterly?

Mais tout dort, et l'armée, et les vents, et Neptune.

What a flat and feeble set of expressions! is the Englishman's first
thought--with the conventional 'Neptune,' and the vague 'armée,' and the
commonplace 'vents.' And he forgets to notice the total impression which
these words produce--the atmosphere of darkness and emptiness and
vastness and ominous hush.

It is particularly in regard to Racine's treatment of nature that this
generalised style creates misunderstandings. 'Is he so much as aware,'
exclaims Mr. Bailey, 'that the sun rises and sets in a glory of colour,
that the wind plays deliciously on human cheeks, that the human ear will
never have enough of the music of the sea? He might have written every
page of his work without so much as looking out of the window of his
study.' The accusation gains support from the fact that Racine rarely
describes the processes of nature by means of pictorial detail; that, we
know, was not his plan. But he is constantly, with his subtle art,