Laugh not loudly: watch the treasure
Of the wisdom of the west.
In _a corner_ wisdom whispers. Five and three
(_Let it not be preached abroad_) make an awful mystery.'--p. 102.
This recipe for keeping a secret, by singing it so loud as to be heard
for miles, is almost the only point, in all Mr. Tennyson's poems, in
which we can trace the remotest approach to anything like what other men
have written, but it certainly does remind us of the 'chorus of
conspirators' in the Rovers.
Hanno, however, who understood no language but Punic--(the Hesperides
sang, we presume, either in Greek or in English)--appears to have kept
on his way without taking any notice of the song, for the poem
concludes,--
'The apple of gold hangs over the sea,
Five links, a gold chain, are we,
Hesper, the Dragon, and sisters three;
Daughters three,
Bound about
All around about
The gnarled bole of the charmed tree,
The golden apple, the golden apple, the hallowed fruit,
Guard it well, guard it warily,
Watch it warily,
Singing airily
Standing about the charmed root.
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