Like Johnson,
however, and Alexander Pope, who, according to Leigh Hunt,
"Spoiled the ears of the town
With his cuckoo-song verses, two up and two down,"
he must have had "time" large; for the music of his rhythm was
absolutely faultless,--cloying indeed, so that he introduced the double
rhymes to roughen it, just as he indulged in alliteration, where the
"lordly lion leaves his lonely lair," that he might not be supposed
incapable of running off upon another track, or into another channel.
But I never heard him sing or try to sing, though he had a deep, manly
voice, read as very few are able to read, and his modulation was rich
and varied, and very agreeable, both to the understanding and the ear.
His pronunciation was a marvel for correctness. In all our intercourse I
never knew him to give a word otherwise than "according to Walker," so
long as Walker was the standard with him,--or never but once, when he
said cli-mac'ter-ic, instead of cli-mac-ter'ic; and when I remonstrated
with him, he lugged out Webster, whom he adhered to forever after. So
exceedingly fastidious and sensitive was he, about the time he left
Baltimore for Cambridge, that in his desire to give the pure sound of
_e_, as in _met_, instead of the sound of _u_, which is so common as to
be almost universal where _e_ is followed by _r_ and another consonant,
so that _person_ is pronounced _purson_, he gave a sound which most
people misunderstood for _pairson_, and went away and laughed at, for
pedantry and affectation.
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