"Milk-Woman. What song was it, I pray? Was it 'Come,
shepherds, deck your heads'? or, 'As at noon Dulcina rested'?
or, 'Phillida flouts me'? or, 'Chevy Chase'? or, 'Johnny Arm-
strong'? or, 'Troy Town'?"

ISAAC WALTON, The Complete Angler

WE have already considered, at the beginning
of the previous chapter, the general relation-
ship of the three chief types of poetry. Lyric,
epic and drama, i.e. song, story and play,
have obviously different functions to perform.
They may indeed deal with a common fund of
material. A given event, say the settlement of
Virginia, or the episode of Pocahontas, pro-
vides situations and emotions which may take
either lyric or narrative or dramatic shape.
The mental habits and technical experience
of the poet, or the prevalent literary fashions
of his day, may determine which general type
of poetry he will employ. There were born
lyrists, like Greene in the Elizabethan period,
who wrote plays because the public demanded
drama, and there have been natural drama-
tists who were compelled, in a period when the

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