once a high wind which shall carry him hereafter across dull levels and
intervals. I believe that it lay--though whether consciously or not he
scarcely tells us--at the bottom of Matthew Arnold's mind when, selecting
certain qualities for which to praise Homer, he chose, for the very
first, Homer's _rapidity_. 'First,' he says, 'Homer is eminently rapid;
and,' he adds justly, 'to this rapidity the elaborate movement of
Miltonic blank verse is alien.'

Now until one studies writing as an art, trying to discover what this or
that form of it accomplishes with ease and what with difficulty, and why
verse can do one thing and prose another, Arnold's choice of _rapidity_
to put in the forefront of Homer's merits may seem merely capricious.
'Homer (we say) has other great qualities. Arnold himself indicates
Homer's simplicity, directness, nobility. Surely either one of these
should be mentioned before rapidity, in itself not comparable as a virtue
with either?'

But when we see that the difficulty of verse-narrative lies just _here_;
that the epic poet who is rapid has met, and has overcome, the capital
difficulty of his form, then we begin to do justice not only to Arnold as
a critic but (which is of far higher moment) to Homer as a craftsman.

The genius of Homer in this matter is in fact something daemonic. He
seems to shirk nothing: and the effect of this upon critics is
bewildering. The acutest of them are left wondering how on earth an
ordinary tale--say of how some mariners beached ship, stowed sail, walked
ashore and cooked their dinner--can be made so poetical. They are
inclined to divide the credit between the poet and his fortunate age--'a
time' suggests Pater 'in which one could hardly have spoken at all
without ideal effect, or the sailors pulled down their boat without