REH Word of the Week: hautboy Essay
noun
- oboe: a double-reed woodwind instrument having a conical tube, a brilliant penetrating tone
[origin: ca. 1575; Middle French hautbois, from haut high + bois wood]HOWARD’S USAGE:Grim, grim, grim the elephants were chanting,Chanting in the jungle in the dim, dark dawn;Through the waving branches were the late stars slanting,Beating up the morning ere the night was gone.Lion in the morning, crouching by the river.Red birds flitting with a sing-song shrill.Morning like a topaz, the green fronds a-quiver.Scent of lush a-wafting in the dawn air still.Moses was our leader when we came up out of Egypt—Came up out of Egypt so many years ago—When I think of magic, I always think of Moses,Riding down to glory while the hautboys blow.[from “The Dust Dance (1)”; to read the complete poem see The Collected Poetry of Robert E.
Howard, p. 133; Echoes From an Iron Harp, p. 25; and Robert E. Howard Selected Poems, p. 13 (version 2)]
