> ■ 1 il m TUl'ifTiTgli,: 1 i^m J^H M ^H ■liSiiil 'itm 9 ^^H iillip .^TVy^^ 1 lilliHl' Hi; ; 1 r ■' .^i-',....i!i!i!i!i!!ll!iit!i!ii!iii ,il!llllllii|itilillt!;t!i!!!:'ii!!l!!!ll!'::!!!!!!!!|l! ! ij^^^^^^^^^^^^^l /•^* //j Y LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. G)i|;tp (^ti{up0]^t IJo. Shelf -P.R_A.\'i!S' UNITED STATES OF AME^IQA. I. iM 3' #i| .-■■•^ *v • 'r i^^ 't^- !!r((>AAA^ '^fV.o^-^(^eCt<^ FESTIVAL OF ART, POETRY AND SONG; SELECTIONS FRO-M |l|e litaicst |odfi of ik fn^Mx Im^micj. BY / ■ FREDERICK SAUNDERS, AUTHOR OF "salad FOR THE SOLITARY AND THE SOCIAL," "evenings with the sacked PCErS,'' EIC. ILLUSTRATED WITH Sr.VE\-TY.THREE ORIGINAL PICTURES BY MEMBERS OF THE NATIONAL ACADTMY OF DESIGN, AND NUMEROUS PORTRAITS AND AUTOGRAPH STANZAS IN FACSIMILE. SAINT LOUIS: SCAMMELL & COMPANY, Publish-.''.:. boston: -NV. H TM(»MPS0X & CO. FOXD BIT LnC, WIS.: G. L. UENJAMIN. CINCINNATI: DOUCLA£S BSOS. SAN F^c -^i^// ■ / ^ I fP- A^/ ^i^ ,^^ Z;.,^ ~Mlc^(/i^ ^/^T,^w^'4 / PRESENTATION. "D IGHT welcome, gentle dames, and ye, worthy gal- lants, to this our festive banqueting. And sith, as "rare Ben" saith, " 'Tis the fair acceptance that creates The entertainment perfect, not the cates," come to it joyously, with hearts elate, and all a-glow with sweet expedancies and kindly thoughts. The feast itself, seled and choice, and enriched with multitudinous dainties to tempt the taste and please the fancy, now but awaits the generous gusto of the guests. There is, for- sooth, a rare and prodigal diversitie of delicacies outspread — a most Epicurean and pleasurable repast : I pray ye, my masters, of your courtesy, look — there is wherewith to regale both soul and sense ; to wit, delicious Melodies to charm the listening ear, and glowing Pidures to fasci- nate the kindling eye withal. In fine, you shall share much joyaunce and delegation from the costly spoils here garnered from our own and divers other times. Moreover, trusty friends, note well the noble folk who grace this festival. Among them are the " kings of thought," ay, "heirs of more than royal race," — a rare companie of most renowned wits and worthies, with whom it is our privilege to hold quiet colloquy, or listen, de- lighted, to their nigh discourse. Meanwhile, from their ardcufici verbu^ we may, perchance, catch somewhat of their inspiration; since, in order thereto (if I trow aright), it needeth that our ear be but attent to the unfolding of " Whate'er in rhapsody, or strain most holy, The hoary minstrels sang in times of old," as well as to the sweet melodies of bards of later days. Nay, of your clemency, look not askance at the mention of ancient minstrels and sages, nor urge that their mouldy tomes are rife with quaint conceits and rugged rhymes. Go to; certes, they are as delightsome as odoriferous herbs, and as voiceful of rich melody as their own loved lyre. Rather let us render rightful homage to these *' magnates of the mind," forasmuch as, by their sweet sentiment and song, the tedium of life's prosaic routine ha^l- oft-times been beguiled ; whilst their concentrated wit hath, not seldom, unwittingly seduced us into the pleasant places of wisdom and virtue. I beseech ye then, my singular good friends, let us forget the turbulent world awhile, and surrender ourselves to the high enjoyment that now awaits us. FREDERICK SAUNDERS. p o E r s P--1GI FIRST Ef^ENING.—CHAVCER, Surrey, Sidney, Raleigh, Spenser, Shak- SPEARE, JoNsoN, Beaumont, Shirley, Carew, Lovelace, Lyly, TiTCHBOURNE, Marlowe, Daniel, Lodge, Herrick, King, Wot- TON, Suckling ^ SECOND EVENING. — Drummond, Habington, Qi-'arles, Waller, Ayton, Cowley, Milton, Byrd, Chamberlayne, Herbert, Den- uam, Marvell, Dryden, Addison, Pope, Parnell, Thomson, Collins, Shenstone, Young 55 THIRD EFENING.—Gkay, Akenside, Jones, Berkeley, Irving, All- STON, Dana, Percival, Sigourney, Pierpont, Drake, Sprague, Brooks, Payne, Burgoyne, Darwin, Woodworth, Goldsmith, CowPER, Burns, Darley, Sheridan, Logan, Leyden, Beattie, Chatterton, Wolff, Wilde, Halleck io9 FOURTH EFENING.—BRAiviARD, Pinkney, Read, Cutter, Prentice, Cist, Gallagher, Perkins, Byron, Crabbe, Scott, Hogg, Lamb, White, Montgomery, Coleridge, Poe, Hemans, Southey, Moore, Bryant, Hunt, Welby, Nichols, Botta 163 PAGB. FIFTH E I-IENIN'G. —?ohhOK., MjRRrs, Rogers. Boies, Campbell, Osgood, Hood, Maclean, Eastman, Elliott, Blanchard, Moir, Spencer, ^Aordswortii "hflley, Keats. Whittier, Keble, Bur- BiDGE, Eliza Cook, Milman, Swain, Mrs. Norton, Hervey, TUCKERMAN, BoWLES, PrAED, LiNEN, MoTHERWELL, MrS, BROWN- ING, Mrs. Barbauld, Lover, Peabody, Sterling, Jones, Wilson, Mackay, Vedder, Cooke, Willis, Clarke, Smith 237 SIXTH EVENING. — Longfellow, Chadwick, Fields, Massey, Bul- WER Lytton, Holmes, Emerson, R. Brown, E. Arnold, C. Young, .Street, IL Coleridge, Frances Brown, Proctor, R. Browning, A. Proctor, Bailey, A. Smith, Saxe Hinxman, Kingsley. B. Tay- lor, Robert Lowell, Thackeray, Macaulay, Westwood. J. R. Lowell. R B. Lytton, A. C. Coxe, Aldrich, Tennysov, Stod- dard, .Stedman, Cranch, Dickens, F. Tennyson, Allingham, Winter, Boker, Ingelow, Alice Cary, Phcebe Cary, George Eliot, Holland, Swinburne, Harte, Miller 315 PAINTERS. Page ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Initial— " First Evening" i " " Interior of the Tabard 3 JAMES HART, N. A Deer— Spring 8 WILLIAM HART, N. A Spring— Landscape 13 " « Summer — Landscape. 14 « « Autumn — Landscape 14 « " Winter — Landscape 15 J. F. CROPSEY, N. a Anne Hathaway's Cottage 18 ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Juliet taking the Opiate 13 " " Ariel and Ferdinand 28 " " Love's Challenge 33 J. F. KENSETT, N. A Summer Sea 37 A. D. SHATTUCK, N. A Primroses 43 S. COLMAN, N. A Starlight ; 50 ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Initial— " Second Evening" 53 JAMES HART, N. A Landscape— Spring 55 J. A. SUVUAM, N. A guiET Seas 59 Eastman johnson, n. a pensive Nun 65 C. parsons, a Evening 69 A F. BELLOWS, N. A Summer Morn 73 v. NEHLiG, N. A Alexander's Feast 77 J. McENTEE, N. A Twilight 8a W. WHITTREDGE, N. A The Western Wild 86 V. NEHLIG, N. A The Hermit 90 G. H. SMILLIE, A Early D.'^wn 94 W. J. HENNESSY. N. A Thl Schoolmistress loi ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Initial — "Third Evening" lo^' V. NEHLIG, N. A.... The Welsh Bard 109 S. COLMAN, N. A Norman Tower 116 J. A. HOWS, A Language of Flowers 121 ALFRED FREDERICKS, A. The Culprit Fay 126 A. D. SHATTUCK, N. a The Old Oaken Bucket 130 W. WHITTREDGE, N. A Rural Pastimes 134 J. McENTEE, N. A Winter Scene 139 WILLIAM HART, N. A Scottish Cottage 143 W. HOMER, N. A Boyhood's Sports 149 G. H. SMILLIE, A Nature — Morning 154 J. A. HOWS, A The Mocking-Bird 158 ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Initial— " Fourth Evening" 161 Page F. E. CHURCH, N. A Niagara— Table-Rock 163 C. T. DIX, A Iceberg 169 M. F. H. DE HAAS, A Ocean— Storm I74 S. COLMAN, N. A Spanish Bull-fight 180 ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Allen-a-Dale 186 M. WATERMAN, A Harvest Moon 193 V. NEHLIG, N. A Arnold i>e Winkelried 199 D. HUNTINGTON. P. N. A Girl's Head 207 R. GIGNOUX, N. A The Dismal Swamp ai6 C. PARSONS, A The Waterfowl 223 A. BIERSTADT, N. A The Prairik Hunter 228 ALFRED FREDERICKS. A Initial — "Fifth Evening" 235 J. A. HOWS, A Primeval Nature 237 H. P. GRAY, V. P. N. A Joyousness 251 ALFRED FREDERICKS, A The Haunted Chamber 257 A. B. DURAND, N. A Nutting 266 S. COLMAN, N. A Moonlight 273 ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Nature 281 W. J. HENNESSY, N. A Mother and Child 285 R. S. GIFFORD, N. A The Adirondack Mountains 292 W. J. HENNESSY, N. A Child Sleeping 297 JAMES HART, N. A Moonrise 303 J. D. SMILLIE, A MoRfJiNG Breeze 309 xiii Page ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Initial— " Sixth Evening" ; 313 F. O. C. DARLEY, N. A The Village Blacksmith 315 «« " Weariness 318 J. D. SMILLIE, A The Ploughman 325 S. R. GIFFORD, N. A The Woodpath 333 E. BENSON, A Among the Rocks 339 A. F. BELLOWS, N. A The Church-Gate 350 J. D. SMILLIE, A The Fountain 357 ALFRED FREDERICKS, A Annie's Dream 362 J. R. BREVOORT, N. A November 366 M. WATERMAN, A , ... CAttle in Stream 373 OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS. Statue of " Poetry" on the Grand Opera House at Paris Title Page. PORTRAITS. '^LONGFELLOW Prontispiece. SHAKESPEARE Facing Page i8 MILTON GOLDSMITH BURNS BYRON SCOTT MOORE BRYANT WHITTIER TENNYSON (( It 62 t( (( 132 • ( (. 146 " " 176 ( (( 184 ( (( 216 ' " 224 i k( 28) I i. 362 FAC-SIMILES. INGELOW Following Title Page. MILTON Facing Page 68 PAYNE SCOTT POE BRYANT HOOD WHITTIER LONGFELLOW HOLMES SAXE TAYLOR LOWELL TENNYSON .... STEDMAN .... HOLLAND 128 190 208 228 252 284 316 322 342 348 354 364 368 378 " Now^ sHr the Jire, and close the sliiitters fasty Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round.— ^ So let us welcome peaceful Evening in" Chaucer, Surrey, Sidney, Raleigh, Spenser, Shakspeare, Jonson, Beaumont, Shirley, Carew, Lovelace, Lyiy, Titchbourno. Marlow, Dani«' "^.odge, Herrick, King. Wotton. buckling. EOFFREY CHAUCER, that worthy minstrel-monk, first in the order ot Anglican poets, thus prefaces his Canterbury Tales : — Betelle, that, in that seson on a day, In Southwerk at the Tabard as I lay, Redy to wenden on jny pilgrimage To Canterbury with devoute corage, At nighte was come into that hostelrie Wei nine and twenty in a compagnie Of sondry folk, by aventure yfalle In felawship, and pilgrimes were they aile. That toward Canterbury wolden ride. The chambres and the stables weren wide, And wel we weren esed atte beste. Although written nearly five centuries ago, this work, notwith- standing its obsoleteness of style, has never been more popular among scholars than it is at this time. There is, indeed, to us of the present day, a charm in its very antiquity, as Campbell remarks, — " something picturesque in it, — like the moss and ivy on some majestic ruin." This noble production of the early English muse, which was probably suggested by the Decameron of Boccaccio^ supposes a com- pany to have convened at the Tabard,' Southwark, where they are entertained by the host, on the evening prior to their commencing pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Thomas ii Becket, at Canterbury Cathedral ; and that these " nine and twenty sondry tolk," by way of beguiling time, agree amongst themselves to contribute each a tale for the entertainment of the company. The old "hostelrie," or rather part of it, is yet extant, under the name of " The Talbot ;" where may be seen a sign-post bearing the inscription, — " This is the Inne where Sir Geoffrey Chaucer and the twenty-nine pilgrims lodged in their journey to Canterbury^ anno 1383." Chaucer was given to the world in the year 1328 ; and he wrote his Canterbury Tales in the full maturity of his genius, when he had passed his sixtieth year. He was undoubtedly a laborious student, for, according to his own confession, he preferred reading to every other amusement, with the exception of " a morning walke in Maytide." He was fond of retirement, temperate in diet, " rose with the larke and lay * Tabard, a slseveiess coat, WGrn nv nobles in early times, now by heralds only. 4 down with the lambe." He seems to have surrendered himself to the inspiring influences of nature, and to have revelled, as at a festival, amid birds and flowers : hence the rich arabesque character of his poetry, and the marvellous freshness and bloom of his pas- toral pictures.: witness the following: — The busy larlce, the messenger of day, Saluteth in her song, the morwe gray ; And fiery Phoebus riseth up so bright. That all the Orient laugheth at the sight ! And with his streames drveth in the greves. The silver droppes hanginge on the leves. Chaucer is said to have been one of the handsomest personages attached to the gallant court of the Plantagenets. As a court ecclesiastic he became involved in the controversies of his times, having espoused the doctrines of Wicliff; and he was, for a season, obliged to leave his native land. He afterwards returned, married Philippa, sister of the renowned John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, and closed his career in the year 1400. His tomb is one of the earliest of the illustrious dead in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey. Now let us bear him company in one of his morning rambles in " Maytide," and mark how observant he is of all that is delicious to soul and sense : — I rose anone, and thought I woulde gone Into the woode to hear the birdes sing, Whan that the misty vapour was agone. And cleare and faire was the morrowing ; The dewe also, like silver in shining Upon the le\'es, as any baume swete, Till fiery Titan with his persant hete Had dried up the lusty licour newe, Upon the herbes in the grene mede, 5 And that the floures of many divers hewe, Upon hir stalkes gon tor to sprede^ And for to splaye out hir leves in brede Againe the sunne, gold-burned in his spere, That doune to hem cast his beames clere. Here is that most charming of descriptions and pictures, Emelie in the Garden : — Thus passeth yere by yere, and day by day, Till it felle ones in a morwe of May, That Emelie, that fayrer was to sene Than is the lilie upon his stalke grene, And fresher tVian the May with floures newe, For vrA\ tfi.; rose-colour strof hir hewe : I n'ot which was the finer of hem two. Kre it was day, as she was wont to do, 'i>he was arisen, and alle redv dight, Tor May will have no sluggardv a-nigi:.*' . T^'^ seson pricketh every gentle herfe And maketh him out of his sleeoe to start, And sayth. Arise ! and do thine observance. The great charm of Chaucer consists in his simplicity of detail, combined with dramatic effect, and his love of rural sights and sounds. We find the following estimate of his genius in the British Quarterly Review : — " He is, perhaps, the most picturesque poet we possess : his paintings are fresh, glittering and off-hand, done to the life. His love of nature resembles an intoxication of spirit : his sketches are bright with perpetual sunshine, — his flowers are always in bloom, fragrant with odoriferous perfumes, and gemmeo with sparkling dew-drops. From mere narrative and playful humor, up to the heights of imaginative and impassioned song, his genius has exer- cised itself in nearly all styles of poetry, and won imperishable laurels in all." Need we wonder, then, that Coleridge, like many others in the line of the Muses' priesthood, took such especial delight in poring over his beautiful living pictures and vivid sketches of character ? We might, indeed, rather marvel, with another noted poet, that the bard should have seen so distinctly in that gray, misty morning of literature, and that his landscapes should still look green in the very dews of Spring. Tennyson beautifully styles him — The first warbler, whose sweet breath Preluded those melodious bursts, that fill The spacious times of great Elizabeth With sounds that echo still. Campbell, with all a poet's appreciation, has thus beautifully ex- pressed our obligations to the great pioneer poet : — Chaucer ! our Helicon's first fountain-stream. Our morning Star of song, that led the way To welcome the long-after coming beam Of Spenser's lights and Shakspeare's perfect day. Old England's fathers live in Chaucer's lay. As if they ne'er had died : he grouped and drew Their likeness with a spirit of life so gay. That still they live and breathe in fancy's view. Fresh beings fraught with truth's imperishable hue The evils of the protracted civil war in England, prevented not only the progress of literature, but even prostrated its very existence for upwards of a centurv after the death of Chaucer. With the exceptions of Gower, Wyatt, Raleigh, and Surrev, we meet with no great poet till the age of Spenser. The brilliant character of the Earl of Surrey, — both as to his military career and scholastic attainments, as well as his sad end, — alike endear him to memory. His celebrated poem, written during his unjust imprisonment at Windsor, is universally admired ; atid some of his sonnets are no less beautiful. Here is one : — 7 The soote seson, that bud and bloom forth brings, With green hath clad the hill, ..nd eke the vale ; The nightingale with feathers new she sings ; The turtle to her make hath told her tale. Summer is come, for every sprav now springs ; The hart hath hung his old head on the pale ; The buck in brake his winter coat he flings ; The fishes flete, with new repaired scale ; The adder all her slough away she flings ; The swift swallow pursueth the flies smale ; The busy bee her honey now she mings ; Winter is worn that was the flowers' bale. And thus I see among these pleasant things Each care decays, and yet my sorrow springs. Of Sir Philip Sidney, it has been said, that his literary renown rests more upon his prose than his verse •, Cowper indeed refers to him as " warbler of poetic prose ;" — yet he has his eminent place among the poets, and here is an effusion of his muse : it is styled Wooing Stuff e : — Faint amorist, — what, dost thou think To taste love's honey, and not drink One drachm of gall -, — or to devour A world of swete, and taste no sour ? Dost thou e'er think to enter Th' Elysian fields, that durst not venture In Charon's barge ? A lover's mind Must use to sail with every wind. He that loves, and fears to try. Learns his mistress to deny. Doth she chide thee ? 'Tis to show it, That thy coldness makes her doe it : Is she silent — is she mute ? Silence fully grants thy suit : Doth she pout, and leave the room t Then she goes to bid thee come : Is she sicke ? Why, then, be sure She invites thee to the cure : Doth she cross thy sute with no ? Tush — she loves to hear thee woo : Doth she call the faith of man Into question ? Nay, forsooth, she loves thee than : He that after ten denials. Dares attempt no further tryals, Hath no warrant to acquire The dainties of his chast desire. Sidney's Defence of Poesie has long been a favorite with scholars. Professor Marsh characterizes it as " the best secular specimen of prose yet written in England •-" and adds, that " if is destined to maintain its high place in aes='-etical literature." The Arcadia B 9 is the other prose production bv which he is most known, although it is now but seldom read. Recently was exhibited before the Archaeological Society at Salisbury, a copy of this production, be- tween the leaves of which was found wrapped up a lock of Oueen Elizabeth's hair, and some complimentary lines addressed by Sidney, when very young, to the maiden queen. The hair was soft and bright, of a light-brown color, inclining to red, and on the paper enclosing it was written : — " This lock of Oueen Elizabeth's own hair was presented to Sir Philip Sidney by her majesty's owne faire hands, on which he made these verses, and give them to the queen on his bended knee, A. D. 1573." ^"<^ pinned to this was another paper on which was written, in a different hand — said to be Sidney's own — these lines : — Her inward worth all outward show transcends. Envy her merits with regret commends ; Like sparkling gems her virtues draw the sight. And in her conduce she is alwaies bright. When she imparts her thoughts, her words have force. And sense and wisdom flow in sweet discourse. The gentle Sidney was one of the especial favorites of the queen^ whonj she styled " her Jewel of the times," for the noble virtues he illustrated by his heroic life. Every one remembers his brave words, when, fallen on the battle-field, and suffering from thirst caused by loss of blood, as he ordered the cup presented to him to be given to the wounded soldier, saying, " Thy necessity is yet greater than mine." All England mourned his loss, for every one revered and loved him. Hear Shakspeare's tribute to his memory : — His honour stuck upon him as the sun In the gray vault ot heaven, — and by his light Did all the chivalry of England mo^e To do brave acts ! • A scarcely less interesting character is that of the gallant Sir Walter Raleigh, who, after having brought a new world to light, wrote the history of the old in a prison. In his wonderful versatility of genius, and in all departments of his remarkable life, it may truly be said, he was equally illustrious. " He was honored by England's greatest queen, and was sacrificed to the caprice of the meanest of her kings." Probably the last words ever traced by his pen were the following, written in his Bible on the evening pre- ceding his execution : — E'en such is time, that takes on trust Our youth, our joys, our all we have, And pays us but with earth and dust ; Who in the dark and silent grave — When we have wandered all our ways — Shuts up the story of our days : But from this earth, this grave, this dust. My God shall raise me up, I trust ! That " bold and spirited poem," as Campbell styles the " Soul's Errand^'" is now generally admitted to be from the pen of Raleigh, since it has been traced in manuscript to the year 1593 ' ^^'^ ^^^ answers to it, written in his lifetime, ascribe its authorship to Sir Walter. It was originally designated thus : — " Sir Walter Raleigh^ his Lie." Campbell tells us that its perusal always deeply affected him ; and he adds, — " It places the last and inexpressibly awful hour of existence before my view, and sounds like a sentence of vanity on the things of this world, pronounced by a dying man, whose eye glares on eternity, and whose voice is raised by strength from another world." Listen to a few of the strong- stanzas : — ■ Goe, soule, the bodies guest, upon a thanklesse arrant ; Feare not to touch the best ; — the truth shall be thy warrant : Goe, since I needs must dye. And give the world the lye. Say to the, Court, it glowes, and shines like rotten wood ; Say to the Church, it shewes what's good, and doth no good ; If Church and Court reply, Then give them both the lye. Tell Zeale it wants devotion ; tell Love it is but lust ; Tell Time it is but motion ; tell Flesh it is but dust ; And wish them not reply. For thou must give the lye. Tell Age it daily wasteth ; tell Honour how it alters ; Tell Beauty how she blasteth ; tell Fauour how it falters And as they shall reply. Give every one the lye. Tell Fortune of her blindnesse ; tell Nature of decay ; Tell Friendship of unkindnesse ; tell Justice of delay ; And if they will reply. Then give .them all the lie. * * * * So when thou hast, as I commanded thee, done blabbing ; Although to give the lie deserves no less than stabbing ; Yet stabb at thee who will, No stabb the soul can kill. The author of one of the most romantic poems in the English language, Edmund Spenser, was born near the Tower of London, in 1553. To affirm that his Faerie ^eene is replete with brilliant and luxurious imagery, enriched with wondrous sweetness of ver- sification, is but to echo the universal verdict of critics. Camp- bell styles Spenser the " Rubens of English poetry," while Charles Lamb refers to him as " the Poets' poet ;" and such, indeed, he is : for not only was he the special favourite of Milton, Dryden, Pope, and Gray, but there has scarcely been any eminent poet since his day who has not delighted to peruse, if not to pilfer from, his prolific productions. Leigh Hunt considers him, in the imaginative faculty, superior even to Milton ; his grand characteristic is poetic luxury. Another of our noted bards speaks of him as " steeped in romance ;" and as "the prince of magicians." Glance at his group of the Seasons ; how daintily his allegorical impersonations are decked with flowers, and redolent with perfume : — So forth issew'd the seasons of the yeare : First, lusty Spring all dight in leaves of flowres Xhat freshly budded and new bloosmes did beare. In which a thousand birds had built their bowres That sweetly sung to call forth paramours ; And in his hand a iavelin he did beare. And on his head (as fit for warlike stoures) A guilt engraven morion he did weare ; That as some did him love, so others did him feare. 13 Then came the iolly Sommer, being dight In a thin silken cassock colored greene, That was unlyned all, to be more light : And on his head a girlond well beseene He wore, from which as he had chauffed been The sweat did drop ; and in his hand he bore A bowe and shaftes, as he in forrest greene Had hunted late the libbard or the bore, And now would bathe his limbes with labor heated sore. Then came the Autumne all in yellow clad, As though he ioyed in his plentious store, 14 Laden with fruits that made him laugh, full glad That he had banisht hunger, which to-fore Had by the belly oft him pinched sore : Upon his head a wreath, that was enrold With eares of corne of every sort, he bore ; And in his hand a sickle he did holde, To reape the ripened fruits the which the earth had yold. Lastly came Winter cloathed all in frize, Chattering his teeth for cold that did him chill ; Whilst on his hoary beard his breath did freese. And the dull drops, that from his purpled bill As from a limbeck did adown distil : In his right hand a tipped stafFe he held. With which his feeble steps he stayed still ; For he was faint with cold, and weak with eld, That scarce his loosed limbes he able was to weld. In these glowing lines, Spenser pays beautiful tribute to the floral month of May : — Then came faire May, the fairest maid on ground, Deck'd all with dainties of her season's pride, And throwing flowres out of her lap around ; Upon two brethren's shoulders she did ride. The twins of Leda ; which, on either side, Supported her like to their sovereign queene. Lord ! how all creatures laugh'd when her they spied. And leap'd and danced as they had ravisht been ; And Cupid's self about her flutter'd all in greene. Here is another choice stanza from the Faerie ^ueene^ descrip- tive of Una (the impersonation of Faith) — " radiant with beauty beaming through her tears :" — One day, nigh wearie of the yrkesome waye, From her unhastie beaste she did alight : And on the grasse her daintie limbes did laye In secrete shadow, far from all mens sight : From her fayre head her fillet she undight And layd her stole aside : her angels-face, As the great eye of heaven, shyned bright. And made a sunshine in the shady place : Did ever mortall eye behold such heavenly grace ? The original plan of this work contemplated twelve books, " fash- ioning twelve moral virtues ;" of these, however, we have only six ; the others, if ever written, were probably destroyed with the rest of his property, and, it is said, his child, in the burning of his castle in Ireland during the rebellion. There is a story on record, but generally discredited, to the effect that when Spenser took his manuscript of the Faerie ^eene to the Earl of Southampton, — the great patron of the poets of his day, — that after reading a few pages, his lordship ordered his servant to carry to the author twenty pounds. Reading further, he cried out in a rapture, " Give him twenty more :" proceeding still with the perusal, he soon again stopped, and added another twenty pounds : but at length, checking his enthusiasm, he told his servant to " put him out of his house i6 or he should be ruined." Sad to state, the close of our gentle poet's career was full of sorrow. He died at an inn in London, it is said, in poverty, and of a broken heart for his loss. Ben Jonson affirms that he died " for lack of bread," and that when Lord Essex sent him (too late) twenty guineas, Spenser refused the gift, saying, " He was sorry he had no time to spend them." He was the friend of Sidney, at whose estate, Penshurst, these gifted sons of genius consecrated many happv hours to friendship and the muse. In 1580 the poets separated, one to the service of the camp, the other to his estate in Ireland, where he became acquainted with another master-spirit, Sir Walter Raleigh, by whom he was introduced to Oueen Elizabeth. " When we conceive," says Campbell, " Spenser reciting his compositions to Raleigh, in a scene so beautifully ap- propriate, the mind casts a pleasing retrospect over that influence which the enterprise of the discoverer of Virginia, and the genius of the author of the '•Faerie ^ueene^ have respectively produced on the fortune and language of England. The fancy might even be pardoned for a momentary superstition, that the genius of their countrv hovered unseen over their meeting, casting her first look of regard on the poet that was destined to inspire her future Milton, and the other on the maritime hero who paved the way for colo- nizing distant regions of the earth, where the language of England was to be spoken, and the poetry of Spenser to be admired." Shakspeare, whom Bunsen styles " the great prophet of human destinies on the awakening of a new world," was, in his fifteenth year, withdrawn from the " free school," where, in the words of Ben Jonson, " he had acquired small Latin and less Greek," for the purpose of aiding his father's business, which, according to Aubrey, was then that of a butcher ; and that " when he killed a calf, he would do it in a high style, and make a speeche." A pursuit so uncongenial naturally tended to pervert his taste, and we soon find him among the roystering fraternities, known as "the topers and sippers" of Stratford, " so renowned for the excellence of its beer c 17 and the unquenchable thirst of its inhabitants." The lady of his love, as all the world knows, was Anne Hathaway^ the dark-eyed maiden of the adjacent hamlet of Shottery ; at whose picturesque cottage, worthy Master William was, doubtless, not an unfrequent visitor. The traditionary charge of deer-stealing preferred against our embryo bard, and the indignities he suffered in consequence thereof, are supposed to have caused him to leave his native town, and seek his fortune in the British metropolis, where, after being seventeen years a player, he at length became proprietor of the "Globe" and other theatres, from which he derived an ample in- come. In 1 612 he returned to Stratford, after having written most of his dramas. It was not till seven years after his death that the first collective edition of his plays appeared ; and it is no less re- markable that it should have omitted Pericles^ and included seven cramas since rejected as apocryphal. We all regret our ignorance of the " sayings and doings," and personal history of the great poet, who himself seemed to be so well acquainted with our common humanity. Even the walls of that rendezvous of rollicking wits. WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. the " Boar's-Head Inn," Eastcheap, or the " Mermaid," Blackfriars, no longer echo with the jubilant mirth and pleasantries once fabled of Jack Falstaff and his merry men ; or with the " wise saws" of the illustrious author of those creations. Let us, then, leave the ficti- tious and turn to the real — let us accompany the genial author of The Sketch-Book^ and seek the grave of Shakspeare : — " The place is solemn and sepulchral : tall elms wave before the pointed windows, and the Avon, which runs at a short distance from the walls, keeps up a low, perpetual murmur. A flat stone marks the spot where the bard is buried, upon which are inscribed the following lines : — GOOD FREND, FOR lESVS SAKE FORBEARE, TO DIGG "HE DVST ENCLOASED lEARE; BLESE BE Y MAN Y SPARES THES STONES, AND CVRST BE HE Y MOVES MY BONES. Just over the grave, in a niche of the wall, is a bust of Shakspeare, put up shortly after his death, and considered as a resemblance. The aspect is pleasant and serene, with a finely arched forehead." The bust is said to be life-size, and was originally painted over, ii\ imitation of nature : the eyes were light hazel ; the hair and beard, auburn ; the doublet or coat, scarlet ; the loose gown or tabard, black. Malone, however, caused the bust to be painted over white, in 1793. " The inscription on the tombstone has not been without its effect : it has prevented the removal of his remains from the bosom of his native place to Westminster Abbey, which was at one time contem- plated. A few years since, also, as some laborers were digging to make an adjoining vault, the earth caved in, so as to leave a vacant space almost like an arch, through which one might have reached into his grave. No one, however, presumed to meddle with his remains, so awfully guarded by a malediction ; and lest any of the idle or curious, or any collector of relics, should be tempted to com- 19 mit depredations, the old sexton kept watcn over the place for two days, until the vault was finished and the aperture closed again. He told me that he had made bold to look in at the hole, but could see neither coffin nor bones — nothing but dust. It was something, I thought, to have seen the dust of Shakspeare !" But, leaving to its silent repose all that is mortal of the great poet, let us seek communion with the spirit that Hves immortal in his pages — pages all aglow with clustered brilliants and gems of thought. Dr. Johnson, referring to the difficulty of exhibiting the genius of Shakspeare by quotation, says : " He that attempts it will succeed like the pedant in Hierocles, who, when he offered his house to sale, carried a brick in his pocket as a specimen." Nevertheless, as we are not restricted to a single specimen, we will make the most of our privilege. Had the great bard given us but these four dramas — Hamlet^ Macbeth^ Lear^ and Othello^ he would have yet been decked with the laurel-crown as Prince of Poets. What an affluence of imagery and splendor of diction signalize the first act of Hamlet ! Familiar though it may be to us, yet it never can become trite, — that matchless soHloquy of the royal Dane : — To be, or not to be, that is the question : Whether 'tis nobler in the mind, to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. Or to take arms against a sea of troubles. And, by opposing, end them ? To die, — to sleep, — No more ; and by a sleep to say we end The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to, — 'tis a consummation Devoutly to be wish'd. To die ; — to sleep ; — To sleep ! perchance to dream ; — ^ay, there's the rub ; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come. When we have shuffled off this mortal coil. Must give us pause : — there's the respect That makes calamity of so long life : For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The pangs of dispriz'd love, the law's delay. The insolence of office, and the spurns That patient merit of the unworthy takes. When he himself might his quietus make With a bare bodkin ? who would these' fardels bear. To grunt and sweat under a weary life ; But that the dread of something after death. The undiscovered country, from whose bourn No traveller returns, puzzles the will ; And makes us rather bear those ills we have. Than fly to others that we know not of? Thus conscience does make cowards of us all ; And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought ; And enterprizes of great pith and moment. With this regard, their currents turn away," And lose the name of action. From this noble reach of philosophy, turn we to the line impas- sioned burst of Romeo in the garden : — But, soft ! what light through yonder window breaks ! It is the east, and Juliet is the sun ! Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon. Who is already sick and pale with grief. That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she ; Be not her maid, since she is envious ; Her vestal livery is but sick and green. And none but fools do wear it ; cast it off. — It is my lady ; O ! it is my love. > These, in first folio, but not in quartos. ' A-way, in folio ; in quartos, atvry. The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars, As daylight doth a lamp : her eye in heaven Would through the airy region stream so bright, That birds would sing, and think it were not night. What other poet has so felicitously portrayed all that is pictur- esque and lovely in a summer's dawn ■, — pouring on our souls all the freshness and cheerfulness of the returning sunlight ? Look, love ! what envious streaks Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east : Night's candles are burnt out, — and jocund day Stands tiptoe on the misty mountains' tops ! Among the masterly passages of the great dramatist may be classed the soliloquy of Juliet, on drinking the opiate : — Farewell ! God knows when we shall meet again. I have a faint cold fear thrills through my veins, That almost freezes up the heat of life : I'll call them back again to comfort me. — Nurse ! — What should she do here ? My dismal scene I needs must act alone. — Come, phial. — What if this mixture do not work at all ? Shall I be married, then, to-morrow morning ? No, no -, — this shall forbid it : lie thou there. — \_Laying down the dagger. What if it be a poison, which the friar Subtly hath ministered to have me dead ; Lest in this marriage he should be dishonoured. Because he married me before to Romeo ? I fear, it is : and yet, methinks, it should not, For he hath still been tried a holy man : I will not entertain so baa a thought. — How if, when I am laid into the tomb, I wake before the time that Romeo Come to redeem me ? there's a fearful point ! Shall I not, then, be stifled in the vault, »3 To whose foul mouth no heahhsome air breathes in. And there die strangled ere my Romeo comes ? Or, if I live, is it not very like, The horrible conceit of death and night, Together with the terror of the place, — As in a vault, an ancient receptacle. Where, for these many hundred years, the bones Of all my buried ancestors are pack'd ; Where bloody Tybalt, yet but green in earth, Lies festering in his shroud ; where, as they say, At some hours in the night spirits resort : — Alack, alack ! is it not like, that I, So early waking, — what with loathsome smells ; And shrieks like mandrakes torn out of the earth, That living mortals, hearing them, run mad ; — O ! if I wake, shall I not be distraught. Environed with all these hideous fears, And madly play with my forefathers' joints. And pluck the mangled Tybalt from his shroud ? And, in this rage, with some great kinsman's bone. As with a club, dash out my desperate brains ? O, look ! methinks I see my cousin's ghost Seeking out Romeo, that did spit his body Upon a rapier's point — Stay, Tybalt, stay ! Romeo, I come ! this do I drink to thee. \_She throivs herself on the bed. In Othello we have many gems of thought : here is one : — Good name in man and woman, dear my lord. Is the immediate jewel of their souls : Who steals my purse steals trash ; 'tis something, nothing ; 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands : But he that filches from me my good name, 24 Robs me of that which not enriches him. And makes me poor indeed. We all remember these admirable lines : — The quality of mercy is not strained 5 It droppeth, as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath : it is twice bless'd ; It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes ; 'Tis mightiest in the mightiest ; it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown. What a sublime passage is that on the end of all earthly glo- ries : — The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself. Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve ; And, like this insubstantial pageant faded. Leave not a rack behind ! What can be finer in structure of words than the speech of Mark Antony over the body of Caesar ? Or, take another variety — Othello's relation of his courtship, to the Senate 5 or, still another familiar, yet exquisite passage, from Romeo and 'Juliet^ on Dreams, commencing : — O then, I see Queen Mab hath been with you. For wonderful condensation and vigor, it has been thought that the passage in As Tou Like It^ on the world being compared to a stage, is one of the greatest gems of Shakspeare : but we have the authority of Bunsen for assigning the highest merit to the de- scription of a moonlight night with music, in The Merchant of Venice : — as How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank ! Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music Creep into our ears : soft stillness, and the night. Become the touches of sweet harmony. Sit, Jessica : look how the floor of heaven Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold ; There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st. But in his motion like an angel sings, Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins : Such harmony is in immortal souls -, But, whilst this muddy vesture of decay Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it. Now for a cluster of little brilHants, rich and rare : — From Two Gentlemen of Verona : — Who is Silvia ? what is she. That all our swains commend her ? Holy, fair, and wise is she : The heavens such grace did lend her. That she might admired be. Is she kind, as she is fair ? For beauty lives with kindness : Love doth to her eyes repair. To help him of his blindness ; And being help'd, inhabits there. Then to Silvia let us sing. That Silvia is excelling : She excels each mortal thing Upon the dull earth dwelling : To her let us garlands bring. 26 From Measure for Measure : — Take, oh take those lips away. That so sweetly are forsworn ; And those eyes, the break of day. Lights that do mislead the morn: But my kisses bring again, Bring again. Seals of love, but seal'd in vain, Seal'd in vain ! From The Merchant of Venice : — Tell me, where is Fancy' bred. Or in the heart, or in the head ? How begot, how nourished ? Reply, reply. It & engenaer'a m the eyes. With gazing fed ; and Fancy dies In the cradle where it lies : Let us all ring Fancy's knell ; I'll begin it, — Ding, dong, bell. Ding, dong, bell. From Js Tou Like It : — Blow, blow, thou winter wind, Thou art not so unkind As man's ingratitude : Thy tooth is not so keen, Because thou art not seen, Although thy breath be rude. Heigh, ho ! sing heigh, ho ! unto the green holly ; Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly. ^ Frequently used by this poet in the sense of Love. 27 From The Tempest : — Come unto these yellow sands. And then take hands ; Court'sied when you have, and kissed, (The wild waves whist !) 28 Foot it featly here and there ; And, sweet sprites, the burden bear. The watch-dogs bark — bowgh, bowgh. Hark ! hark ! I hear The strain of strutting chanticlere Cry cock-a-doodle do. Where the bee sucks, there suck I ; In a cowsUp's bell I lie ; There I couch, when owls do cry. On the bat's back do I fly. After summer, merrily : Merrily, merrily, shall I live now, Under the blossom that hangs on the bough. From Cymbeline : — Hark ! hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings^ And Pnoebus 'gins arise. His steeds to water at those springs On chahced flowers that lies ; And winking mary-buds begin To ope their golden eyes : With every thing that pretty bin ; My lady sweet, arise ; Arise, arise ! From Midsummer Night's Bream. The fine song of Oberon : — I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows. Where ox-lips and the nodding violet grows ; Quite over-canopied with lush woodbine. With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine : There sleeps Titania, some time of the night. Lulled in these flowers with dances and delight ; *9 And there the snake throws her enamelled skin, Weed-wide enough to wrap a fairy in : And with the juice of this I'll streak her eyes, And make her full of hateful fantasies. Here is a magnificent apostrophe to Sleep ; — O sleep ! O gentle sleep ! Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee. That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down, And steep my senses in forgetfulness ? Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs. Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee. And hush'd with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber ; Than in the perfum'd chambers of the great. Under the canopies of costly state. And lull'd with sounds of sweetest melody? O thou dull god ! why liest thou with the vile. In loathsome beds ; and leav'st the kingly couch, A watch-case, or a common 'larum-bell ? Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains In cradle of the rude imperious surge, And in the visitation of the winds. Who take the ruffian billows by the top. Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them With deaPning clamours in the slippery clouds, That, with the hurly, death itself awakes ? Canst thou, O partial sleep ! give thy repose To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude ; And in the calmest and most stillest night. With all appliances and means to boot, Deny it to a king ? Then, happy low, lie down \ Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. 30 In Timon of Athens^ is this humorous passage on stealing: — I'll example you with thievery; The sun's a thief, and with his great attraction Robs the vast sea ; the moon's an arrant thief, For her pale fire she snatches from the sun ; The sea's a thief, whose liquid surge resolves The moon into salt tears ; the earth's a thief. That feeds and breeds by a composture stolen From general excrement ; each thing's a thief; The law, your curb and whip, in their rough power Have unchecked theft. We have but space for one of Shakspeare's fine sonnets ; but wv :hink this one of the best : — Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments : love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds. Or bends with the remover to remove : no ! it is an ever-fixed mark That looks on tempests, and is never shaken ; It is the star to every wandering bark Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle's compass come ; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom ; — If this be error, and upon me proved, 1 never writ, nor no man ever loved. In Othello^ Desdemona says : " My mother had a maid called Barbara ; she was in love ; and he she loved proved mad, and did forsake her : she had a song of willow, an old thing 'twas, but it expressed her fortune, and she died singing it : that song to-night will not go from my mind ; I have much to do, but to go hang my head all at one side, and sing it like poor Barbara : — The poor soul sat sighing by a sycamore tree, Sing all a green willow ; Her hand on her bosom, her head on her knee, Sing willow, willow, willow : The fresh streams ran by her, and murmured her moans ; Sing willow, willow, willow. Her salt tears fell from her, and softened the stones, Sing willow, willow, willow — Sing all a green willow must be my garland," Reluctantly as we leave the almost unexplored wealth of thought and imagery which cluster the pages of this magician of the pen, we yet must pass on to some of his contemporaries : — " Those shining stars that run • Their glorious course round Shakspeare's golden sun." Among these were Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, and others. Glancing over the life-records of these gifted, but, for the most part, erratic sons of genius, who can trace their checkered career without tender sympathy for their misfortunes, while cherish- ing reverence and admiration of their exalted endowments ! Ben Jonson's proud fame was allied with suffering and sorrow, for we find at his closing days the poet thanking his patron, the Earl of Newcastle, for bounties which, he says, had " fallen like the dew of heaven on his necessities." The classic beauty of the following lyric of Jonson has ever been the admiration of all critics : — Drink to me only with thine eyes, and I will pledge with mine ; Or leave a kiss but in the cup, and I'll not look for wine. The thirst that from the soul doth rise doth ask a drink divine ; But might I of Jove's nectar sup, I would not change for thine. 3- I sent thee late a rosy wreath, not so much honouring thee, As giving it a hope that there it could not wither'd be ; But thou thereon didst only breathe, and sent'st it back to me ; Since when it grows, and smells, I swear, not of itself, but thee. His song, entitled 7 he Grace of Simplicity^ is one of the most characteristic of its author : — Still to be neat, still to be drest. As you were going to a feast ; Still to be powder'd, still perfum'd ; Lady, it is to be presum'd. Though art's hid causes are not found, All is not sweet, all is not sound. Give me a look, give me a face. That makes simplicity a grace ; Robes loosely flowing, hair as free ; Such sweet neglect more taketh me. Than all the adulteries of art : They strike mine eyes, but not my heart. Another of his exquisite songs is the well-known Hymn to Diana^ ' Diana is here addressed as the moon, rather than the goddess of hunting. 33 in which the spirit of the classic lyre is beautifully illustrated. It is supposed to be derived from Philostratus : — Queen and huntress, chaste and fair, Now the sun is laid to sleep, Seated in thy silver chair, State in wonted manner keep : Hesperus entreats thy light, Goddess, excellently bright ! Earth, let not thy envious shade Dare itself to interpose ; Cynthia's shining orb was made Heaven to clear, when day did close i Bless us then with wished sight. Goddess excellently bright ! Lay thy bow of pearl apart, And thy crystal shining quiver ; Give unto the flying hart Space to breathe, how short soever ; Thou that mak'st a day of night, Goddess excellently bright ! There is such a fulness of inspiration about the old poets, such prodigality of fancy and imagery, that their chief difficulty appears to have been to find place for their thick-coming fancies. For in- stance, take Beaumont's fine Ode to Melancholy : — Hence, all you vain delights. As short as are the nights Wherein you spend your folly ! There's naught in this life sweet. If man were wise to see't, But only melancholy ; Oh, sweetest melancholy ! 34 Welcome, folded arms and fixed eyes, A sight that piercing mortifies, A look that's fastened to the ground, A tongue chained up without a sound ; Fountain heads, and pathless groves. Places which pale passion loves, — Moonlight walks, when all the fowls Are warmly housed, save bats and owls ; A midnight bell, a passing groan. These are the sounds we feed upon : Then stretch our bones in a still gloomy valley. Nothing's so dainty sweet as lovely melancholy. Here is a delicious lyric from the same source : — Look out, bright eyes, and bless the air ! Even in shadows you are fair. Shut-up beauty is like fire. That breaks out clearer still and higher. Though your beauty be confin'd. And soft Love a prisoner bound. Yet the beauty of your mind Neither check nor chain hath found ; Look out nobly, then, and dare E'en the fetters that you wear ! What a fine figure has Beaumont employed in the foUowmg lines to illustrate the influence of woman : — The bleakest rock upon the loneliest heath. Feels in its barrenness some touch of Spring ; And in the April dew, or beam of May, Its moss and lichen freshen and revive ; And thus the heart, most sear'd to human pleasure. Melts at the tear, — joys in the smile of woman. Shirley, the latest of the Elizabethan dramatists, wrote the fol- lowing : — Woodmen, shepherds, come away, This is Pan's great holiday ; Throw off cares, with your heaven-aspiring airs — Help us to sing, While valleys with your echoes ring. Nymphs that dwell within these groves, Leave your arbours, bring your loves. Gather posies, crown your golden hair with roses : As you pass. Foot like Fairies on the grass. What stateliness and vigor of expression characterize his cele- brated Dirge : — The glories of our blood and state. Are shadows, not substantial things ; There is no armour against fate : Death lays his icy hand on kings ; Sceptre and crown must tumble down. And in the dust be equal made With the poor crooked scythe and spade ! Some men with swords may reap the field, And plant fresh laurels where they kill ; But their strong nerves at last must vield. They tame but one another still : Early or late, they stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath. When they, pale captives, creep to death ! The garlands wither on your brow. Then boast no more your mighty deeds ; Upon death's purple altar, now. See, where the victor-victim bleeds : 36 All lieatls must come to the cold tomb ; Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, and blossom in the dust. Listen to the sweet music and melancholy flow of this fine old song : — Go sit by the summer sea, thou whom scorn wasteth. And let thy musing be where the flood hasteth ; Mark, how o'er ocean's breast rolls the hoar billow's crest, — Such is his heart's unrest who of love tasteth. Griev'st thou that hearts should change ? Lo, where life reigneth. Or the free sight doth range, what long remaineth ? Spring, with her flowers, doth die, fast fades the gilded sky. And the full moon on high ceaselessly waneth ! 37 Smile, then, ye sage and wise, and if love sever Bards which thy soul doth prize, such does it ever. Deep as the rolling seas, soft as the twilight breeze, But of more than these — boast could it never ! ;;c ^c * * Carew, the " sprightly, polished, and perspicuous," wrote sundry love-ditties : one of his most popular begins — Ask me no more where Jove bestows, When June is past, the fading rose ; For, in your beauties, orient deep. Those flowers, as in their causes, sleep. * * * * His other noted song commences thus : — He that loves a rosy cheeic, or a coral lip admires, Or from star-like eyes doth seek fuel to maintain his fires ; As old Time makes these decay. So his flames must waste away. But a smooth and steadfast mind, gentle thoughts and calm desires ; Hearts with equal love combined, kindle never-dying fires. Where these are not, I despise Lovely cheeks, or lips, or eyes. * :|; :!: * Here, also, we have some terse lines of his, touching things terrene : — Fame's but a hollow echo — gold, pure clay, — Honour, the darling but of one short day ; Beauty, the eye's idol — but a damask skin ; State, but a golden prison to live in And torture free-born minds, — embroidered trains, • Merely but pageants for proud swelling veins : 38 And blood allied to greatness, is alone Inherited — not purchased, nor our own. Fame, honour, beauty, state, train, blood, and birth, Are but the fading blossoms of the earth. The "gallant and accompHshed" Lovelace wrote this beautiful song to his mistress, on joining the army of the King : — Tell me not, sweet, I am unkind, that from the nunnery Of thy chaste breast and quiet mind to war and arms I fly. True, a new mistress now I chase, the first foe in the field ; And with a stronger faith embrace a sword, a horse, a shield. Yet this inconstancy is such as you, too, shall adore ; I could not love thee, dear, so much, loved I not honour more. His fine lines written during his incarceration. To Althea^ com- mence : — When Love, with unconfined wings, hovers within my gates, And my divine Althea brings to whisper at my grates : When I lie tangled in her hair, and fettered to her eye. The birds that wanton in the air know no such liberty. {iis last is the finest stanza : — Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage ; Minds innocent and quiet, take that for an hermitage : If I have freedom in my love, and in my soul am free. Angels alone, that soar above, enjoy such liberty. Love, the great theme of the poets, has been in these pages presented in most of its Protean aspects ; but as it is classed among the noblest virtues, we can hardly have too much of it from the poets. Dr. Johnson once remarked, that " we need not ridicule a passion, which he who never felt, never was happy ; and he who 39 laughs at, never deserves to feel — a passion w^hich has caused the change of empires and the loss of u^orlds — a passion which has inspired heroism and subdued avarice." Here is an airy, bird-like lyric, by Heywood : — Pack, clouds, away, and welcome day ; With night we banish sorrow ; Sweet air, blow soft ; mount, lark, aloft. To give my love good-morrow ! Wings from the wind to please her mind, Notes from the lark I'll borrow ; Bird, prune thy wing, nightingale, sing. To give my love good-morrow. To give my love good-morrow. Notes from them both I'll borrow. Wake from thy nest, robin redbreast : Sing, birds, in every furrow ; And from each bill let music shrill Give my fair love good-morrow. Blackbird and thrush, in every bush — Stare, linnet, and cock-sparrow — You pretty elves, amongst yourselves, Sing my fair love good-morrow. To give my love good-morrow. Sing, birds, in every furrow O fly, make haste ! See, see, she falls Into a pretty slumber ; Sing round about her rosy bed, That, waking, she may wonder. Say to her, 'tis her lover true That sendeth love to you ; to you ! And when you hear her kind reply. Return with pleasant warblings. 40 Lyly's genius for lyric verse is seen in the following little Song of the Fairies : — : By the moon we sport and play, With the night begins our day : As we dance, the dew doth fall, Trip it, little urchins all. Lightly as the little bee. Two by two, and three by three, And about go we, and about go we. The following exquisitely sportive lines are also by this noted dramatist : — Cupid and my Campaspe play'd At cards for kisses : Cupid paid. He stakes his quiver, bow, and arrows ; His mother's doves and team of sparrows ; Loses them too, then down he throws The coral of his lip — the rose Growing on's cheek, but none knows how. With these the crystal on his brow, And then the dimple of his chin ; All these did my Campaspe win : At last he set her both his eyes -, She won, and Cupid blind did rise. O Love, hath she done this to thee ? What shall, alas ! become of me ? TiTCHBOURNE, who was one of the victims of political despotism in 1568, wrote these quaint and touching lines the night preceding his execution : — My prime of youth is but a frost of cares ; My feast of joy is but a dish of pain ; 41 My crop of corn is but a field of tares, And all my goods are but vain hopes of gain. The day is fled, and yet I saw no sun. And now I live, and now my life is done ! My Spring is past, and yet it hath not sprung ; My fruit is dead, and yet the leaves are green ; My youth is past, and yet I am but young ; I saw the world, and yet I was not seen ; My thread is cut, and yet it is not spun. And now I live, and now my life is done ! Herrick's lyrics are among the most sprightly and picturesque that we possess ; they are fragrant with the aroma of Spring flowers. Listen to his lines addressed to " Primroses filled with morning dewV'— Why do ye weep, sweet babes ? Can tears Speak grief in you, Who were but born Just as the modest morn Teem'd her refreshing dew ? Alas ! you have not known that shower That mars a flower, Nor felt the unkind Breath of a blasting wind ; Nor are ye worn with years, Or warp'd, as we. Who think it strange to see Such pretty flowers, like to orphans young, Speaking by tears before ye have a tongue. Speak, whimp'ring younglings, and make known The reason why Ye droop and weep : 42 Is it for want of sleep, Or childish lullaby ? Or, that ye have not seen as yet The violet ? Or brought a kiss From that sweetheart to this ? No, no ; this sorrow, shown By your tears shed. Would have this lecture read, — ** That things of greatest, so of meanest worth, Conceived with grief are, and with tears brought forth." 43 Here are two more of Herrick's sweet songs : — Fair daffodils ! we weep to see You haste away so soon ; As yet the early-rising sun Has not attained his noon : Stay, stay, Until the hastening day Has run But to the even-song ; And having prayed together, we Will go with you along. We have short time to stay as you, We have as short a Spring ; As quick a growth to meet decay, As you, or any thing : We die. As your hours do ; and dry Away Like to the summer's rain. Or as the pearls of morning dew, Ne'er to be found again. To Blossoms : — Fair pledges of a fruitful tree. Why do ye fall so fast ? Your date is not so past. But you may stay yet here awhile To blush and gently smile. And go at last. 44 What, were ye born to be An hour or half's delight, And so to bid good-night ? 'Tis pity nature brought ye forth, Merely to show your worth, And lose you quite. But you are lovely leaves, where wc May read how soon things have Their end, though ne'er so brave ; And after they have shown their pride, Like you, awhile, they glide Into the grave. Now let us rehearse that famous old song of Marlowe, the favorite of that honest philosopher, angler, and right worthy gentle* man, Izaac Walton : — Come live with me and be my love. And we will all the pleasures prove, That hill and valley, dale and field. And all the craggy mountains yield. There will we sit upon the rocks. And see the shepherds feed their flocks, By shallow rivers, to whose falls Melodious birds sing madrigals. There I will make thee beds of roses. And a thousand fragrant posies ; A cap of flowers, and a kirtle, Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle; A gown made of the finest wool. Which from our prettv lambs we pull ; Fair lined slippers for the cold, With buckles of the purest gold, A belt of straw and ivy buds. With coral clasps and amber s*" ads : And if these pleasures may ihce move, Come live with me, and be my love. * * * Here is the openmg passage of a poem by Daniel, who, for the vigor of his verse, was stvled the Atticus of his day : — He that of such a height hath built his mind. And rear'd the dwelling of his thoughts so strong. As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame Of his resolved powers ; nor all the wind Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong His settled peace, or to disturb the same ; What a fair seat hath he, from whence he may The boundless wastes and wilds of man survey ! He also wrote the following sprightly song : — Love is a sickness full of woes. All remedies refusing ; A plant that most with cutting, grows ; Most barren, with best using : Why so ? More we enjoy it, more it dies ; If not enjoyed, it sighing cries — Heigh-ho ! Love is a torment of the mind, A tempest everlasting ; And Jove hath made it of a kind Not well, nor full, nor fasting : Why so ? 46 More we enjoy it, more it dies ; If not enjoyed, it sighing cries — Heigh-ho ! Among favorite love-lyrics of the olden time, is that entitled Rosalind's Madrigal^ by Lodge. Here it is : — Love in my bosom, like a bee. Doth suck his sweet ; Now with his wings he plays with me, Now with his feet. Within mine eves he makes his nest. His bed amidst my tender breast ; My kisses are his daily feast, And yet he robs me of my rest : Ah, wanton, will ye ? And if I sleep, there percheth he With pretty flight. And makes his pillow of my knee. The livelong night. Strike I my lute, he turns the string ; He muSiC plays if so I sing ; He lends me every lovelv thing. Yet cruel he my heart doth sting : * Whist, wanton, still ye, Else I, with roses, every day Will whip you hence. And bind you, when you long to play. For your offence : I'll shut mine eyes to keep you in ; I'll make you fast it for your sin ; I'll count your power not worth a pin j Alas ! what hereby shall I win, If he gainsay me ? 47 What if I beat the wanton boy With many a rod ? He will repay me with annoy, Because a god. Then sit thou safely on my knee, And let thy bower my bosom be ; Lurk in mine eyes, I like of thee, O Cupid ! so thou pity me. Spare not, but play thee. The following impassioned and beautiful lines are the commence- ment of a poem, entitled The Exequy^ written by Dr. King : — Accept, thou shrine of my dead saint. Instead of dirges, this complaint ; And for sweet flowers to crown thy hearse. Receive a strew of weeping verse. From thy grieved friend, whom thou might'st see Quite melted into tears for thee ! Dear loss ! since thy untimely fate. My task hath been to meditate On thee, on thee ; thou art the book. The library whereon I look. Though almost blind \ for thee (loved clay) I languish out, not live, the day, Using no other exercise But what I practise with mine eyes : By which wet glasses I find out How lazily Time creeps about To one that mourns : this, only this, My exercise and business is : So I compute the weary hours With sighs dissolved into showers. II His terse lines on Life are more familiar : — Like to the falling of a star, Or as the flights of eagles are ; Or like the fresh Spring's gaudy hue. Or silver drops of morning dew : Or like a wind that chafes the flood. Or bubbles which on water stood — E'en such is man, whose borrowed light Is straight called in and paid to-night : The wind blows out, the bubble dies, The Spring entombed in Autumn lies ; The dew dries up, the star is shot. The flight is past — and man forgot ! Sir H. Wotton's admired lines, entitled The Happy Life^ are well worthy of a place among the most perfect passages of our English poetry : — How happy is he born and taught That serveth not another's wni ; ' Whose armour is his honest thought, And simple truth his utmost skill ! Whose passions not his masters are, Whose soul is still prepared for death — Untied unto the worldly care Of public fame or orivate breath ! * * * * Who God doth late and early pray More of His grace than gifts to lend ; And entertains the harmless day With a religious book or friend : This man is freed from servile bands Of hope to rise or fear to fall ; Lord of himself — though not of lands , And having nothing, yet hath all. o 49 WoTTON is also justly celebrated for his brilliant stanzas ad- dressed to the Princess Elizabeth, daughter of James I. : — You meaner beauties of the night, That poorly satisfy our eyes More by your numbers than your light, — You common people of the skies. What are vou when the moon shall rise ? Ye violets, that first appear. By your pure, purple mantles known, — Like the proud virgins of the year. As if the Spring were all your own, — What are you when the rose is blown ? Ye curious chanters of the wood, That warble forth dame Nature's lays. Thinking your passions understood By your weak accents ; what's vour praise When Philomel her voice shall raise ? 5° a So, when my mistress shall be seen, In sweetness of her looks and mind ; By virtue first, then choice, a queen — Tell me, if she was not designed Th' eclipse and glory of her kind ? Another of those courtly minstrels was Sir John Suckling ; and here, with some of his graceful contributions to our poetic an- thology, we conclude the first of our evening studies : — Why so pale and wan, fond lover ? Pr'vthee, why so pale ? Will, when looking well can't move her, Looking ill prevail ? Pr'ythee, why so pale ? Why so pale and mute, young sinner? Pr'ythee, why so mute ? Will, when speaking well can't move her, Saying nothing do't ? Pr'ythee, why so mute ? Quit, quit, for shame ; this will not move, " This cannot take her ; If of herself she will not love. Nothing can make her ; The devil take her ! His most celebrated piece is The Weddings written in honour of the beautiful daughter of the Earl of Suff'olk. Here are a few of the sparkling stanzas : — Her finger was so small, the ring Would not stav on which they did bring, It was too wide a peck : SI And to say truth, for out it must, It looked like the great collar, just, About our young colt's neck. * * * Her feet beneath her petticoat. Like little mice, stole in and out, As if they feared the light. But, oh ! she dances such a way — No sun upon an Easter day Is half so fine a sight. Her cheeks so rare a white was on. No daisy makes comparison (Who sees them is undone) ; For streaks of red were mingled thero, Such as are on a Catharine pear (The side that's next the suny. Her lips were red, and one was thin. Compared to that was next her chin (Some bee had acung it newly) ; But, Dick, her eyes so guard her face, I durst no more upon them gaze Than on the sun in July. * * * Urummond, tlabington, Quarles', /■/aller, jr^yton, Cowley, Milton. iTrd, Chamberla^ne. Herbert, Denham, Marve'u \)rjAen. Addison, Pope, Parnell, Thomson, ».'0'.lins, tnenstone, Voune. J^RUMMOND OF Hawthorn- den, — the singular sweetness and harmony of whose poetry re- minds us of Spenser, — wrote some touching sonnets in memory of his lost love, whose sudden death occurred just prior to their appointed nuptials. The poet was of noble lineage, and lived amidst the most romantic scenery, at his fine castle on the banks of the Esk. The following are his beautiful sonnets on Spring : — 55 Sweet Spring ! thou turn'st with all thy goodly train. Thy head with flames, thy mantle bright with flowers ; The zephyrs curl the green locks of the plain, The clouds, for joy, in pearls weep down their showers Thou turn'st, sweet youth, but, ah ! my pleasant hours And happy days with thee come not again -, The sad memorials only of my pain Do with thee turn, which turn my sweets in sours ! Thou art the same which still thou wast before, Delicious, wanton, amiable, fair ; But she, whose breath embalmed thy wholesome air, Is gone ; nor gold, nor gems her can restore. Neglected virtue, seasons go and come, While thine forgot, lie closed in a tomb ! What doth it serve to see sun's burning face ? And skies enamell'd with both Indies' gold ? Or moon at night in jetty chariot roll'd, And all the glory of that starry place ? What doth it serve earth's beauty to behold, The mountain's pride, the meadow's flowery grace ; The stately comeliness ot forests old. The sport of floods which would themselves embrace ? What doth it serve to hear the sylvan's songs. The wanton merle, the nightingale's sad strains. Which in dark shades seem to deplore my wrongs ? For what doth serve all that this world contains, Sith she, for whom these once to me were dear, No part of them can have now with me here ? Plazlitt thought Drummond's sonnets approached as near almost as any others to the perfection of this kind of writing. Here is his j^ddras to the Nightingale : — 56 Sweet bird ! that sing'st away the early hours, Of winter's past or coming, void of care, Well pleased with delights which present are, Fair seasons, budding sprays, sweet-smelling flowers : To rocks, to springs, to rills, from leafy bowers Thou thy Creator's goodness dost declare. And what dear gifts on thee He did not spare, A stain to human sense in sin that lowers. What soul can be so sick, which by thy songs (Attired in sweetness) sweetly is not driven Quite to forget earth's turmoils, spites, and wrongs, And lift a reverent eye and thought to heaven ? Sweet, artless songster, thou my mind dost raise To airs of spheres, yes, and to angel's lays. Habington's poem on The FlrmatJient opens wit!i these grand lines : — When I survey the bright celestial sphere. So rich with jewels hung, that night Doth like an Ethiop bride appear ; My soul her wings doth spread, And heavenward flies, The Almighty's mysteries to read In the large volumes of the skies. The grave and eccentric Quarles has written some remarkable poems, equally quaint in conceit and curious in structure : for example : — Behold How short a span Was long enough of old To measure out the life of man : In those well-tempered days, his time was then Surveyed, cast-up, and found — but threescore years and ten ! H 57 'i How soon Our new-born light Attains to full-aged noon ! And this — how soon to gray-haired night ! We spring, we bud, we blossom, and we blast : — Ere we can count our days — our days they flee so fast ! And what's a life ? A weary pilgrimage, Whose glory in the day doth fill the stage — With childhood, manhood, and decrepid age. And what's a life ? The flourishing array Of the proud summer-meadow, which to-day — Wears her green plush — and is to-morrow — hay ! False world, thou ly'st : thou canst not lend The least delight : Thy favours cannot gain a friend. They are so slight ! Thy morning's pleasures make an end To please at night : Poor are the wants that thou supply'st. And yet thou vaunt'st, and yet thou vy'st With heaven ! Fond earth, thou boast'st — false world, thou ly'st ! Here are some of his lines, gilded with a little more sunshine : — As when a lady, walking Flora's bower, Picks here a pink, and there a gilly-flower. Now plucks a violet from her purple bed. And then a primrose, — the year's maidenhead ; There nips the brier, here the lover's pansy, Shifting her dainty pleasures with her fancy ; * 58 This on her arm, and that she lists to wear Upon the borders of her curious hair ; At length, a rose-bud (passing all the rest) She plucks, and bosoms in her lily breast. * * * Waller, whose life has been thought to possess more romance than his poetry, is, however, the author of these striking stanzas, among the last he wrote : — The seas are quiet when the winds give o'er ; So calm are we when passions are no more. For then we know how vain it was to boast Of fleeting things so certain to be lost. Clouds of affection from our younger eyes Conceal that emptiness which age descries : 59 The soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed, Lets in new light through chinks that time has made. Stronger by weakness, wiser, men become. As they draw near to their eternal home : Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view. That stand upon the threshold of the new. For harmony anJ elcgi i • of" fancy, these verses, by Ayton, have rarely been surpassed : — I loved thee once, I'll love no more. Thine be the grief, as is the blame ; Thou art not what thou wast before. What reason I should be the same ? He that can love, unloved again, Hath better store of love than brain. God send me love my debts to pay. While unthrifts fool their love away. Nothing could have my love o'erthrown If thou hadst still contmued mine ; Yea, if thou hadst remained thy own, I might, perchance, have yet been thine ; But thou thy freedom didst recall, That if thou might'st elsewhere inthral. And then, how could I but disdain A captive's captive to remain ? The "melancholy Cowley," as that poet styles himself, was yet the writer of this paraphrastic version of one of Anacreon's spark- ling lyrics : — The thirsty earth soaks up the rain, And drinks, and gapes for drink again : The plants suck in the earth, and are. With constant drinking, fresh and fair. The sea itself, which one would think Should have but little need of drink, Drinks ten thousand rivers up. So filled that they o'erflow the cup. The busy sun — and one would guess. By his drunken, fiery face, no less — Drinks up the sea ; and when he's done, The moon and stars drink up the sun : They drink and dance by their own light, — They drink and revel all the night ! Nothing in nature's sober found. But an eternal " health" goes round : Should every creature drink but I — Why — men of morals, tell me why ? Cowley's deep love of rural retirement is exhibited in the sub- joined lines : — Hail, old patrician trees, so great and good ! Hail, ye plebeian underwood ! Where the poetic birds rejoice. And for their quiet nests and plenteous food Pay with their grateful voice. * *• * Here nature does a house for me erect — Nature ! the wisest architect. Who those fond artists does despise. That can the fair and living trees neglect, Yet the dead timber prize If, in the verse of Chaucer, the muse lisped her early numbers with the artless simplicity and grace of infancy, she may be said to have attained to her full-voiced maturity and glory in the august and 6i \ matchless creations of Shakspeare, and the " magnificent sphere- harmonies" of Milton. The latter, indeed, as it has been beauti- fully expressed, like the nightingale, sang his sublime song in the night : for not only was he deprived of the glad light of day, but the dark clouds of sorrow cast their added shadows on his pathway. Yet this noble man stood erect in his integrity and exemplary in his patience, amidst all adverse circumstances. Beautifully has he been likened to the bird of Paradise, which, flying against the wind, best displays the splendour of its golden plumage ; so the bard of Paradise, in his sublime excursions amid the beings of light, bursts upon us with a more supernal grandeur, as he emerges from the darkness with which he was environed. Gray thus refers to him, as one — Who rode sublime Upon the seraph-wings of ecstasy ; The Secret of the abyss to spy Who passed the flaming bounds of space and time, — The living throne, the sapphire's blaze. Where angels tremble while they gaze ! He saw : but, blasted with excess of light. Closed his eyes in endless night. Milton did not commence the composition of his grand epic until he was forty-seven years of age ; although he had matured its plan in his mind several years before. When he visited the Continent, he met Galileo, then a prisoner of the Inquisition : he also became acquainted with Hugo Grotius. It is a curious fact, that Grotius had then written a tragedy of which the leading subject was the Fall of Man ; and Milton's epic was formed out of the first draught of a tragedy to which he had given the title of Adam Unparadised. No evidence has been adduced, however, to prove that Milton bor- rowed his design from Grotius ; or from Du Bartas' Divitie IFeekes^ as has been by some persons supposed. One of his earliest com- positions, the Hy?nn to the Nativity^ was written when he was but 62 JOHN MILTON. twenty-one years old ; yet it has been pronounced by critics as un- surpassed by any production of its class since the age of Pindar. Here is a splendid stanza : — No war, or battle's sound, was heard the world around ; The idle spear and shield were high uphung ; The hooked chariot stood unstain'd with hostile blood ; The trumpet spake not to the armed throng ; And kings sat still with awful eye. As if they surely knew their sovereign Lord was by. How fine is that passage referring to the silencing of the heathen oracles : — The oracles are dumb ; no voice or hideous hum Runs through the arched roof in word: deceiving ; Apollo from his shrine can no more divine, With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving ; No nightly trance, or breathed spell, Inspires the pale-eyed priest from the prophetic cell. The village of Horton is associated with the earlier portion of the poet's life ; it was there that he wrote his Comus^ Lycidas^ and // Penseroso. At Chalfont St. Giles he wrote his great epic. Fuseli thought the second book of Paradise Lost the o-randest eftort ot the human mind we possess. How splendid is his Invocation to Light — - how touchingly it closes ! — Thus with the year Seasons return ; but not to me returns Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn, Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose. Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine : But cloud instead, and ever-during dark 63 Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men « Cut off, and for the book of knowledge fair, f Presented with a universal blank Of nature's works, to me expunged and razed. And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out. * * * According to Sir Egerton Brydges, Milton's sonnet on his loss of sight, is unequalled by any composition of its class in the language : When I consider how my light is spent Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, And that one talent, which is death to hide, Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest He returning, chide : " Doth God exact day-labour, light denied ?" I fondly ask : but Patience, to prevent That murmur, soon replies — " God doth not need Either man's work, or His own gifts ; who best Bear His mild yoke, they serve Him best ; His state Is kingly : thousands at His bidding speed, And post o'er land and ocean without rest : They also serve who only stand and wait !" // Penseroso abounds with striking passages ; such as the following, to Contemplation : — Come, pensive nun, devout and pure. Sober, steadfast, and demure. All in a robe of darkest grain. Flowing with majestic train. And sable state of cypress lawn, On thy decent shoulders drawn ! 6+ Come ! but keep thy wonted state, With even step and musing gait, And looks commercing with the skies, Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes : There, held in holy passion still. Forget thyself to warble, till With a sad, leaden, downward cast. Thou fix them on the earth as fast : And join with thee calm peace and quiet- Spare fast, that oft with gods doth diet. And hears the muses in a ring Aye round about Jove's altar sing : And add to these retired leisure, That in trim gardens takes his pleasure ; 65 But first and chiefest, with thee bring Him that yon soars on golden wing, Guiding the fairy-wheeled throne, The cherub Contemplation. * * * What pen but Milton's could have produced — from so slight an incident as that which occurred at Ludlow Castle when the poet was its guest — a dramatic poem (^Co?fius) so replete with beautiful imagery, and so lustrous with the graces of style ? Here are a few lines : — Can any mortal mixture of earth's mould Breathe such divine, enchanting ravishment ? Sure something holy lodges in that breast. And with these raptures moves the vocal air, To testify his hidden residence : How sweetly did they .float upon the wings Of silence, through the empty vaulted night, At every fall smoothing the raven down Of darkness, till it smiled ! So dear to heaven is saintly chastity. That when a soul is found sincerely so, A thousand liveried angels lacquey her. Driving far oft' each thing of sin and guilt, And, in clear dream and solemn vision, Tell her of things that no gross ear can hear. Till oft converse with lieavenlv habitants % Begin to cast a beam on th' outward shape. The unpolluted temple of the mind. And turns it by degrees to the soul's essence, Till all be made immortal. ^ -.- ^ C6 The Epilogue closes with these beautiful words Mortals, that would follow me, Love Virtue, — she alone is free : She can teach ye how to climb Higher than the sphery chime ; Or if Virtue feeble were, Heaven itself would stoop to her. Here is an example of his famous V Allegro : — Haste thee, nymph, and bring with thee Jest, and youthful Jollity, Quips, and cranks, and wanton wiles. Nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles. Such as hang on Hebe's cheek. And love to live in dimple sleek ; Sport that wrinkled Care derides. And Laughter holding; both his sides. Come, and trip it, as \ ou go. On the light fantastic toe -, And in thy right hand lead with thee The mountain nvmph, sweet Liberty ; And, if I give thee honour due, Mirth, admit me of thy crew. To live with her, and live with thee, In unreproved pleasures free ; To hear the lark begin his flight. And, singing, startle the dull night. From his watch-tower in the skies. Till the dappled dawn doth rise ; Then to come, in spite of sorrow. And at my window bid good-morrow. What a dewy freshness and fragrance breathe from his lines on May Morning : — Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger, Comes dancing from the east, and leads with her The flowery May, who from her green lap throws The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose. Hail, beauteous May ! that dost inspire Mirth, and youth, and warm desire ; Woods and groveS' are of thy dressing. Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing. Thus we salute thee with our earlv song, And welcome thee, and wish thee long. We are all familiar with Milton's majestic Adorning Hymn: how grandly it opens : — These are thy glorious works. Parent of good : Almighty, thine this universal frame, Thus wondrous fair ; Thyself how wondrous then ! Unspeakable, who sitt'st above these heavens To us invisible, or dimly seen In these thy lowest works ; yet these declare Thy goodness beyond thought, and power divine. Speak, ye who best can tell, ye sons of light. Angels ! for ye behold Him, and with songs And choral symphonies, day without night. Circle His throne rejoicing ; ye in heaven. On earth, — join all ye creatures to extol Him first. Him last. Him midst, and without end ! * * ■« 68 CMtt y No less beautiful is his description of Evening in Paradise :- Now came still evening on, and twilight gray Had in her sober livery all things clad ; Silence accompanied ; for beast and bird, They to their grassy couch, these to their nests Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale ; She all night long her amorous descant sung : Silence was pleased : now glowed the firmament With living sapphires ; Hesperus, that led The starry host, rode brightest, till the moon. Rising in clouded majesty, at length Apparent queen, unveiled her peerless light. And o'er the dark her silver mantle threw ! What a rich collection of little gems might be gathere*d from the brilliant pages of this great poet, had we space for the garnering. Here are two or three, caught at random : — 69 From Comus : — How charming is divine philosophy ! Not harsh and crabbed, as dull fools suppose ; But musical as is Apollo's lute, And a perpetual feast of nectared sweets, Where no crude surfeit reigns. From V Allegro : — Lap me in soft Lydian airs. Married to immortal verse, Such as the meeting soul may pierce In notes, with many a winding bout Of linked sweetness long drawn out. From Lycidas : — Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights, and live laborious days ; But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze. Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears, And slits the thin-spun life. How much the world is indebted to the " blind old master of English song," it would be impossible to compute ; for not only has he enriched our literature with the vast resources of a mind pre-eminently endowed, but he was among the foremost of the pioneers of civil and religious liberty. His able and authoritative pen served as efficiently in that noble emprise, as legions of armed soldiers in the field. As the champion of human freedom, he was necessarily obnoxious to the opposing party ; accordingly, on the accession of Charles H., Milton became the object of bitter hos- tility : to such an extent, indeed, that in order to save his valuable life, his very existence had for a time to be kept secret. It is said that his friends spread a report that he was dead, and, assembHng a mournful procession, followed his pretended remains to the grave. The king, some time afterwards discovering the trick, commended his policy " in escaping death by a seasonable show of dying." It is related of the Duke of York, that when, on one occasion, he visited Milton, and he was asked whether he did not regard the loss of his eyesight as a judgment inflicted on him for what he had written against the late king ? he replied, " If your highness thinks that the calamities which befall us here are indications of the wrath of Heaven, in what manner are we to account for the fate of the late king, your father ? the displeasure of Heaven must, upon this supposition, have been much greater upon him than upon me, for I have only lost my eyes, but he has lost his head !" Despised and persecuted as this illustrious man was for his political faith, he stood calmly and grandly forth, in the majesty and integrity of truth, amidst all ; and his posterity has not forgotten his noble service. John Milton's great spirit left the world on Sunday, the eighth of Novem- ber, 1674; and his sacred dust reposes near the chancel of St. Giles's, Cripplegate ; — a shrine, whither tend many pilgrim feet from all parts of the civilized world. It is a note-worthy fact, that while the greatest of English poets (the bard of Avon alone excepted) received only the trifling sum of five pounds for the first edition of his great epic, one of his editors, Newton, received six hundred guineas for his annotations upon it. The following vigorous and impressive stanzas are by Byrd :— My mind to me a kingdom is ; Such perfect joy therein I find, As far exceeds all earthly bliss That God or nature hath assigned. Though much I want, that most would have, Yet still my mind forbids to crave. J Content I live ; this is my stay, I seek no more than may suffice ; I press to bear no haughty sway ; Look, what I lack, my mind supplies. Lo ! thus I triumph like a king, Content with that my mind doth bring. * * * Some have too much, yet still they crave ; I little have, yet seek no more ; They are but poor, though much they have. And I am rich with little store. They poor, I rich ; they beg, I give ; They lack, I lend ; they pine, I live. * * * ■ My wealth is health and perfect ease ; My conscience clear, my chief defence ; I never seek by bribes to please. Nor by desert to give offence. This is my choice ; for why ? I find No wealth is like a quiet mind. Chamberlayne, a poet but little known, but of evident genius, is the author of this beautiful description of a summer morning: — The morning hath not lost her virgin blush. Nor step, but mine, soiled the earth's tinselled robe. How full of heaven this solitude appears. This healthful comfort of the happy swain ; Who from his hard but peaceful bed roused up, In's morning exercise saluted is By a full quire of feathered choristers. Wedding their notes to the enamoured air ! 72 Here Nature, in her unaffected dress, Plaited with valleys, and embossed with hills Enchased with silver streams, and fringed with woods, Sits lovely in her native russet. Who is not charmed with the rich quaintness of worthy George Herbert? Here is his fine piece, entitled Virtue: — Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright, The bridal of the earth and skv ! The dew shall weep thy fall to-night ; For thou must die. Sweet rose, whose hue, angry and brave, Bids the rash gazer wipe his eve ! Thy root is ever in its grave — And thou must di.. Sweet Spring, full of sweet days and roses, A box where sweets compacted lie ! My music shows ye have your closes, And all must die. Only a sweet and virtuous soul. Like seasoned timber, never gives ; But though the whole world turn to coal, Then chiefly lives. These are the opening stanzas of his Mans Medley : — Hark ! how the birds do sing, And woods do ring : All creatures have their joy, and man hath his : Yet if we rightly measure, Man's joy and pleasure Rather hereafter, than in present, is. To this life things of sense Make their pretence ; In th' other angels have a right by birth ; Man ties them both alone. And makes them one. With th' one touching heaven — with th' other, earth. There is a charm about Herbert's poetry, notwithstanding the strange conceits with which it abounds ; as in the following lines, entitled Life : — I made a posie, while the day ran by : Here will I smell my remnant out, and tie My life within this band. But Time did beckon to the flowers, and they By noon most cunningly did steal away. And wither'd in my hand. 74 My hand was next to them, and then my heart ; I took, without more thinking, in good part Time's gentle admonition ; Who did so sweetly death's sad taste convey. Making my minde to smell my fatall day, Yet sugaring the suspicion. Farewell, dear flowers ; sweetly your time ye spent, Fit, while ye liv'd, for smell or ornament, And after death for cures. I follow straight without complaints or grief. Since, if my scent be good, I care not if It be as short as yours. Addison, it may be remembered, thus refers to a brother bard in the following couplet : — " Nor, Denham, must we e'er forget thy strains. While Cooper's Hill commands the neighboring plains." It was this Denham that wrote that celebrated quartette — which seems to have been a poetic inspiration : — Oh ! could I flow like thee, and make thy stream My great example, as it is my theme ! Though deep, yet clear ; though gentle, yet not dull ; Strong without rage ; without o'erflowing, full ! Andrew Marvell, the friend of Milton, wrote these glowing lines On a Drop of Dew : — See how the orient dew. Shed from the bosom of the morn, Into the blowing roses, Yet careless of its mansion new. For the clear region where 'twas, born, 75 Round in itself encloses ; And in its little globe's extent, Frames as it can its native element. How it the purple flower does slight ! Scarce touching where it lies ; But giving back upon the skies, Shines with a mournful light, Like its own tear, because so long divided from the sphere, Restless it rolls and insecure, trembling lest it grow impure. Till the warm sun pities its pain, And to the skies exhales it back again. , So the soul — that drop, that ray Of the clear fountain of eternal day, Could it within the human flower be seen. Remembering still its former height. Shuns the sweet leaves and blossoms green. And recollecting its own light, Does in its pure and circling thoughts express The o-reater heaven in a heaven less. Dryden's magnificent Ode, 0?i the Power of Music^ written in 1697, for the festival of St. Cecilia's day, is by many considered his masterpiece. It is pronounced unequalled by any thing of its kind since classic times ; and is the best illustration of the pliancy of our English extant. He wrote this grand Ode at Burleigh House, where his translation of Virgil was partly executed. One morning Lord Bolingbroke chanced to call on Dryden, whom he found in unusual agitation. On inquiring the cause, " I ha\'e been up all night," replied the bard ; " my musical friends made me promise to write them an Ode for the Feast of St. Cecilia : I have been so struck with the subject which occurred to me, that I could not leave it till I had completed it : here it is, finished at one sitting." 76 The poem is designed to exhibit the different passions excited by Timotheus in the mind of Alexander, feasting a triumphant con- queror in Persepohs. The grandeur of the poem can only be ap- preciated by perusing it entire, and more fully, indeed, on even a second perusal. Here is the opening stanza ; — 'Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won By Philip's warlike son : Aloft in awful state the god-like hero sate On his imperial throne •, His valiant peers were placed around. Their brows with roses and with myrtle bound ; So should desert in arms be crown'd. The lovely l^hais by his side Sat, like a blooming Eastern bride, Jn flower of youth and beauty's pride : 77 Happy, happy, happy pair ! — None but the brave, none but the brave. None but the brave deserves the fair. Timotheus, placed on high Amid the tuneful quire. With flying fingers touched the lyre ; And trembling notes ascend the sky. And heavenly joys inspire ! * * * As instances of Dryden's lighter verse, we present the following : — 1 feed a flame within, which so torments me, : That it both pains my heart, and yet contents me ; 'Tis such a pleasing smart, and so I love it. That I had rather die than once remove it. Yet he for whom I grieve shall never know it ; My tongue does not betray, nor my eyes show it. Not a sigh, nor a tear, my pain discloses, j Biit they fall silently, like dew on roses. Thus, to prevent my love from being cruel, j My heart's the sacrifice, as 'tis the fuel ; j And while I suffer this, to give him quiet, | My faith rewards my love, though he deny it. > On his eyes will I gaze, and there delight me ; I Where I conceal my love, no frown can fright me : . To be more happy, I dare not aspire : J Nor can I fall more low, mounting no higher. . I I O, lull me, lull me, charming air ! My senses rock with wonder sweet ! Like snow on wool thv fallings are ; Soft, like a spirit's, are thy feet. i Griet who need fear That hath an ear ? Down let him He, And slumbering die, And change his soul for harmony Ah, how sweet it is to love ! Ah, how gay is young Desire ! And what pleasing pains we prove When we first approach Love's fire 1 Pains of love be sweeter far Than all other pleasures are. Sighs which are from lovers blown. Do but gently heave the heart ; E'en the tears they shed alone, Cure, like trickling balm, their smart. Lovers, when they lose their breath. Bleed awav in easy death. * :;; H: Dryden happening to pass an evening at the Duke of Bucking- ham's, where were assembled Lord Dorset, the Earl of Rochester, and other distinguished men, the conversation chanced to turn upon literary topics. After some debate, it was agreed that each person present should improvise some lines on anv subject his fancy might suggest, and that the contributions should be placed under the candlestick. Dryden was excepted, but the office of umpire was assigned to him. Some of the company were at more than ordi- nary pains to outrival their competitors ; but Lord Dorset was noticed to write his two or three lines with the most tranquil un- concern. All the wits having contributed their effusions, Dryden proceeded to unfold the leaves of their literary destmy. He dis- covered deep emotion during the process, and at length exclaimed, 79 " I must acknowledge that there are abundance of fine things in my hands, and such as do honour to the personages who penned them ; but I am under the indispensable necessity of giving the preference to L-ord Dorset. I must request you will hear it yourselves, gentle- men, and I believe you will all then approve my judgment : — ' Ifromise to pay to yohn Dry den ^ Esq.^ or order ^ on demand^ the sum of Five hun- dred pounds. — Dorset.' I must confess," continued Drvden, " that I am equally charmed with the style and the subject ; and I flatter myself, gentlemen, that I stand in need of no argument to induce you to acquiesce in opinion, even against yourselves. This style of writing excels any other, ancient or modern : it is not the essence, but the quintessence of language, and is, in fact, reason and argu- ment surpassing every thing in letters." Of course, the company cordially concurred with the bard, and complimented the superior penetration of the noble donor. When Drvden was a boy at Westminster School, he was put, with others, to write a copy of verses on the miracle of the conver- sion of water into wine. Being a great truant, he had not time to compose his verses ; and when brought up, he had only made one line of Latin, and two of English : — " Vidit et erubuit lympha pudica Deuni /" ' " The modest water, awed by power divine. Beheld its God, and blushed itself to wine ;" which so pleased the master, that instead of being angry, he said it was a presage of future greatness, and gave the youth a crown on the occasion. What a contrast this first outburst of poetic power presents with the closing days of his literary career ! when in his seventieth year he complains that, " worn out with study, and oppressed with fortune, he was compelled to contract with his publisher to furnish ten thousand verses at sixpence per line !" Macaulay thus writes of Dryden : — " His command of language was immense. With him died the secret of the old poetic diction This may be a plagiarism from Crashaw's — *^ Nympha pudica Dcum -vidit, et erubuit." 80 of England, — the art of producing rich effects by familiar words. On the other hand, he was the first writer under whose skilful management the scientific vocabulary fell into natural and pleasing verse : — ' The varying verse, the full-resounding line, The long majestic march, and energy divine.' " Warton says, the most splendid and sublime passage that Dryden ever wrote is the following : — So when of old the Almighty Father sate In council, to redeem our ruin'd state, Millions of millions, at a distance round. Silent the sacred consistory crown'd, To hear what mercy, mix'd with justice, could propound : All prompt, with eager pity, to fulfil The full extent of their Creator's will. But when the stern conditions were declared, A mournful whisper through the host was heard, And the whole hierarchy, with heads hung down. Submissively declin'd the ponderous proffer'd crown. Then, not till then, the Eternal Son from high Rose in the strength of all the Deity : Stood forth to accept the terms, and underwent A weight which all the frame of Heaven had bent, Nor He himself could bear, but as Omnipotent ! Addison's poetry is generally considered cold and artificial, al- though his graver productions are harmonious and beautiful ; they are, indeed, accepted as his best compositions. His well-known Hymn^ says Thackeray, " shines like the stars." Here it is : — The spacious firmament on high, With all the blue ethereal sky, gi And spangled heavens, a shining frame, Their great Original proclaim. The unwearied sun, from day to day. Does his Creator's power display, And pubhshes to every land The work of an Almighty hand. Soon as the evening shades prevail. The moon takes up the wondrous tale, And nightly, to the listening earth. Repeats the story of her birth ; While all the stars that round her burn, And all the planets, in their turn, 82 I Confirm the tidings as they roll, And spread the truth from pole to pole. What, though in solemn silence all Move round this dark terrestrial ball ? What, though no real voice, nor sound, Amid their radiant orbs be found ? In Reason's ear they all rejoice, And utter forth a glorious voice ; P'orever singing, as they shine, "The hand that made us is Divine." One of Addison's btst pieces is that written at the tomb of Virgil, in 1741 : he also achieved a dramatic triumph in his cele- brated tragedy of Cato. Let us rehearse his grand soliloquy : — ■ It must be so. Plato, thou reason'st well ! Else, whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire. This longing after immortality ? Or, whence this secret dread, and inward horror, Of falling into naught ? Why shrinks the soul Back on herself, and startles at destruction ? 'Tis the Divinitv that stirs within us : 'Tis Heaven itself that points out an hereafter, And intimates — Eternity to man ! Eternity ! — thou pleasing, dreadful thought ! Through what variety of untried being — Through what new scenes and changes must we pass 1 The wide, th' unbounded prospect lies before me ; But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it. Here will I hold. — If there's a power above us (And that there is, all nature cries aloud Through all her works), He must delight in virtue ; And that which He delights in, must be happy. * t5- -H- 83 The soul, secured in her existence, smiles At the drawn dagger, and dehes its point. The stars shall fade away, the sun himself Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years ; But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth, Unhurt amidst the war of elements. The wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds ! Pope was a precocious genius ; for when only in his thirteenth fear, he wrote these pleasing lines on Solitude : — Happy the man whose wish and care A few paternal acres bound, Content to breathe his native air In his own ground. Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread. Whose flocks supply him with attire. Whose trees in summer yield him shade. In winter fire. Blest, who can unconcern'dly find Hours, days, and years slide soft away. In health of body, peace of mind, Quiet by day, Sound sleep by night ; study and ease, Together mixt ; sweet recreation ; And innocence, which most does please With meditation. Thus let me live unseen, unknown, Thus unlamented let me die. Steal from the world, and not a stone Tell where I lie. 84 He tells us that he sought the solace of poesv to beguile his hours of physical suffering. At the age of sixteen he wrote his Pastorals; and two or three years later, his Messiah^ and Essay on Criticism. Pope's bodily infirmity caused him to be at times very irascible ; and on one occasion his long-tried friend, Bishop Atterbury, in pleasantry, described the poet as Mens curva in corpore curvo.^ His Essay on Man is replete with nervous and picturesque passages ; it is, however, occasionally tinctured with the heresies of his friend Bolingbroke. Subjoined are a few fine passages from his famous Essay on Man : — Hope humbly then — with trembling pinions soar ; Wait the great teacher. Death ; and God adore. What future bliss. He gives not thee to know, But gives that hope to be thy blessing now. Hope springs eternal in the human breast, — Man never is, but always to be blest. The soul, uneasy and confined from home, Rests and expatiates in a life to come. Lo ! the poor Indian ! whose untutor'd mind Sees God in clouds, or hears Him in the wind : His soul, proud science never taught to stray Far as the solar walk or Milky-wav ; Yet simple nature to his hope has given Behind the cloud-topped hill a humbler heaven; Some safer world in depth of woods embraced, Some happier island in the watery waste, Where slaves once more theu" native land behold. Nor fiends torment, nor Christians thirst for gold. To be, contents his natural desire. He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire •, ' In justice to the poet, however, we ought to cite his noble couplet on his friend : — " How pleasing Atterbury 's softer hour ! How sh'nei his S'>ul unconquered in the Tower !" He thinks, admitted to that equal sky. His faithful dog shall bear him company. What a grand concepnon or his is this closing passage : — All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body nature is, and God the soul ; That, changed through all, and yet in all the same ; Great in the earth, as in th' ethereal frame ; Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze. Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees ; Lives through all life, extends through all extent j Spreads undivided, operates unspent ; Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart ; 86 As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns, As the rapt seraph, that adores and burns ; To Him no high, no low, no great, no small ; He fills. He bounds, connects, and equals all. Cease then, nor order imperfection name*. Our proper bliss depends on what we blame. Know thy own point : this kind, this due degree Of blindness, weaicness. Heaven bestows on thee. Submit. — In this, or any other sphere. Secure to be as blest as thou canst bear : Safe in the hand of one disposing Power, Or in the natal, or the mortal hour. All nature is but art, unknown to thee ; All chance, direction, which thou canst not see ; All discord, harmony, not understood ; All partial evil, universal good. The Rape of the Lock^ which Johnson styles "the most airy, in- genious, and delightful of ail Pope's compositions," was occasioned by a fiolic of gallantry. Here are two passages; one portraying the mysteries of the toilet, and the other the heroine of the story: — And now, unveiled, the toilet stands displayed. Each silver vase in mystic order laid. First, robed in white, the nymph intent adores. With head uncovered, the cosmetic powers ; ' A heavenly image in the glass appears. To that she bends, to that her eyes she rears : The inferior priestess, at her altar's side. Trembling begins the sacred rites of pride. Unnumbered treasures ope at once, and here The various offerings of the world appear ; From each she nicely culls with curious toil, And decks the goddess with the glittering spoil. 87 This casket India's glowing gems unlocks, And all Arabia breathes from yonder box. The tortoise here and elephant unite, Transformed to combs, the speckled and the white. Here files of pins extend their shining rows, PufFs, powders, patches, bibles, billet-doux. Now awful beauty puts on all its arms ; The fair each moment rises in her charms, Repairs her smiles, awakens every grace, And calls forth all the wonders of her face ; Sees by degrees a purer blush arise, And keener lightnings quicken in her eyes. The busy Sylphs surround their darling care, These set the head, and those divide the hair, Some fold the sleeve, whilst others plait the gown ; And Betty's praised for labours not her own. Fair nymphs and well-dressed youths around her shone, But every eye was fixed on her alone. On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore, Which Jews might kiss, and infidels adore. Her lively looks a sprightly mind disclose. Quick as her eyes, and as unfixed as those ; Favours to none, to all she smiles extends ; * Ott she rejects, but never once offends. Bright as the sun, her eyes the gazers strike. And, like the sun, they shine on all alike. Yet graceful ease, and sweetness void of pride. Might hide her faults, if belles had faults to hide: If to her share some female errors fall. Look on her face, and you'll forget them all. This nymph, to the destruction of mankind. Nourished two locks, which graceful hung behind In equal curls, and well conspired to deck With shining ringlets the smooth, ivory neck. Love in these labyrinths his slaves detains, And mighty hearts are held in slender chains. * * * Fair tresses man's imperial race insnare, And beauty draws us with a single hair. Th' adventurous baron the bright locks admired ; He saw, he wished, and to the prize aspired. The poetry of Pope has been compared to mosaic work, — full of thoughts familiar to most minds, but draped in elegant metaphor. There is an absence of passion and emotion in his writings ; he seldom excites a smile, and as seldom touches the sympathies by pathos. His " mellifluence," as Johnson expresses it, has the defect of monotony ; but he possessed the faculty of making " sound an echo to the sense" in an eminent degree. Witness these lines : — Soft is the strain when zephyr gently blows, And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows ; But when loud surges lash the soundino- shore. The hoarse rough verse should like the torrent roar. When Ajax strives some rocks' vast weight to throw. The words, too, labor, and the lines move slow : Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain, Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main. A needless Alexandrine ends the song. That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along. Parnell's Hermit^ familiar to most readers, and which Pope pronounced " very good," commences thus : — Far in a wild, unknown to public view, From youth to age a reverend hermit grew ; The moss his bed, the cave his humble cell, His food the fruits, his drink the crystal well ; Remote from men, with God he passed his days. Prayer all his business, all his pleasure, praise. A life so sacred, such serene repose. Seemed heaven itself, till one suggestion rose — That vice should triumph, virtue vice obey ; This sprung some doubt of Providence's sway ; > His hopes no more a certain prospect boast. And all the tenor of his soul is lost. So, when a smooth expanse receives imprest Calm nature's image on its watery breast, Down bend the banks, the trees depending grow. And skies beneath with answering colours glow \ 90 But, if a stone the gentle sea divide, Swift ruffling circles curl on every side. And glimmering fragments of a broken sun. Banks, trees, and skies, in thick disorder run. To clear this doubt, to know the world by sight, To find if books, or swains, report it right — For yet by swains alone the world he knew. Whose feet came wandering o'er the nightly dew — He quits his cell ; the pilgrim staff he bore. And fixed the scallop in his hat before ; Then, with the rising sun, a journey went. Sedate to think, and watching each event. * ^:- * Thomson's Castle of Indolence^ the latest of his productions, seems to have been a labour of love with the poet. The sketch of him- self is interesting, although he tells us, that all except the first line was written by a friend : — A bard here dwelt, more fat than bard beseems. Who, void of envy, guile, and lust of gain. On virtue still, and nature's pleasing themes. Poured forth his unpremeditated strain ; The world forsaking with a calm disdain. Here laughed he careless in his easy seat, — Here quafFd, encircled with the joyous train, Oft moralizing sage, his ditty sweet, — He loathed much to write, he cared to repeat. There is a great charm about this poem ; its numbers seem to lull one into a dreamy sense of pleasure ; note this stanza : — A pleasing land of drowsy herd it was. Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye ; And of gay castles in the clouds that pass, Forever flashing round a summer sky : There eke the soft delights, that witchingly Instil a wanton sweetness through the breast, And the calm pleasures always hovered nigh ; But whate'er smacked of noyance or unrest, Was far, far off expelled from that delicious nest. Here is a beautiful passage : — I care not, Fortune, what you me deny ; You cannot rob me of free Nature's grace, You cannot shut the windows of the sky. Through which Aurora shows her bright'ning face : You cannot bar my constant feet to trace The woods and lawns, by living stream, at eve : Let health my nerves and finer fibres brace, And I their toys to the great children leave ; Of fancy, reason, virtue, naught can me bereave. We should scarcely have expected that this lover of luxurious ease, who used to linger a-bed, sometimes, till two of the afternoon, could have given us such a burst of inspiration on early rising as this : — Falsely luxurious ! will not man, awake, And springing from the bed of sloth, enjoy The cool, the fragrant, and the silent hour To meditation due, and sacred song ? For is there aught in sleep can charm the wise ? To lie in dead oblivion, losing half The fleeting moments of too short a life ? Total extinction of the enlightened soul ; Or else to feverish vanity alive, 92 Wilder'd and tossing through distempered dreams ? Who would in such a gloomy state remain Longer than nature craves ; when every muse, And every blooming pleasure, wait without. To bless the wildly-devious morning walk ? Like others of the illustrious brotherhood, our poet lived for the present, and seldom indulged any anxiety about the future ; the consequence was, that his purse was not unfrequently exhausted. On a certain occasion he was surprised by an unexpected visit from Quin, the comedian, whom he had known only by reputation. Puzzled to think what could have induced such a visit, he pressed the question, when Quin replied, " Why, I will tell you. Soon after I had read your Seasons^ I took it into my head, that as I had something to leave behind me when I died, I would make my will. Among the rest of my legatees, I set down the author of the Seasons for a hundred pounds : and this day, hearing that you were in this house, I thought I might as well have the pleasure of paying the money myself as order my executors to pay it, when perhaps you might have less need of it ; and this, Mr. Thomson, is the object of my visit." The " poet of the Seasons" did much to improve the poetic taste of his day. Campbell justly remarks : " Habits of early admiration teach us all to look back upon this poet as the favourite companion of our solitary walks, and as the author who has first, or chiefly, reflected back to our minds a heightened and refined sensation of the delight which rural scenery affords us." Thomson's sketches are C/aude-WkCj — full of pastoral beauty and sunshine. Here is a beautiful burst of song, descriptive of summer dawn : — The meek-eyed Morn appears, mother of dews. At first faint-gleaming in the dappled east : Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glew ; And, from before the lustre of her face, 93 White break the clouds away. With quicken'd step Brown night retires. Young day pours in apace, And opens all the lawny prospect wide. The dripping rock, the mountain's misty top, Swell on the sight, and brighten with the dawn. Blue, through the dusk, the smoking currents shine ; And from the bladed field the fearful hare Limps, awkward ; while along the forest glade The wild deer trip, and often turning, gaze At early passenger. Music awakes The native voice of undissembled joy ; And thick around the woodland hymns arise. Roused by the cock, the soon-clad shepherd leaves His mossy cottage, where with peace he dwells ; And from the crowded fold, in order, drives His flock, to taste the verdure of the morn. After describing the traveller lost in the snow, the poet thus con- tinues : — In vain for him the officious wife prepares The fire fair blazing, and the vestment warm ; In vain his little children, peeping out Into the mingling storm, demand their sire With tears of artless innocence. Alas ! Nor wife nor children more shall he behold, Nor friends, nor sacred home. On every nerve The deadly winter seizes, shuts up sense, And o'er his inmost vitals creeping cold, \ Lays him along the snows a stiffened corpse, Stretched out, and bleaching on the northern blast I As long as human passions shall animate or disturb the world, CoLLiNs's masterly Ode will doubtless be perused and prized : yet the gifted author suffered from neglect and poverty, and ultimately became the victim of mental disease. Some evil genius seemed to have presided over his destiny, for in early life he fell in love with a fair damsel, who was born a day before himself, and she refused to respond to his appeals. " Your case is a hard one," said a friend. " It is so indeed," replied Collins, " for I came into the world a dav after the fair." When at Magdalen College, Oxford, he was enter- taining a few friends at tea. Hampton, the translator of Polvbius^ unexpectedly entered, and finding no one disposed to dispute with him, deliberately upset the tea-table, scattering its contents across the room. Collins, although constitutionally somewhat choleric, was so utterly confounded at the unexpected demonstration, that he took no notice of the aggressor, but calmly began picking up the broken pieces of china, mildly quoting this line of Horace : — " Invemas etiam disjecti membra poetcc,'''' Now for his masterly Ode : — 95 When Music, heavenly maid, was young, While yet in early Greece she sung. The Passions oft, to hear her shell, Thronged around her magic cell, Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting, Possest beyond the muse's painting ; By turns they felt the glowing mind Disturbed, delighted, raised, refined ; Till once, 'tis said, when all were fired, Filled with fury, rapt, inspired, From the supporting myrtles round. They snatched her instruments of sound ; And, as they oft had heard apart Sweet lessons of her forceful art. Each (for madness ruled the hour) Would prove his own expressive power. First Fear his hand, its skill to try, Amid the chords, bewildered laid, And back recoiled, he knew not why. Even at the sound himself had made. Next Anger rushed, his eyes on fire, In lightnings owned his secret stings ; In one rude clash he struck the lyre. And swept with hurried hand the strings. With woful measures wan Despair, Low, sullen sounds his grief beguiled ; A solemn, strange, and mingled air ; 'Twas sad by fits, by starts 'twas wild. But thou, oh Hope, with eyes so fair. What ,was thy delighted measure ? Still it whispered promised pleasure. And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail ! 96 Still would her touch the strain prolong ; And from the rocks, the woods, the vale, She called on Echo still, through all the song ; And, where her sweetest theme she chose, A soft responsive \'oice was heard at everv close. And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden hair. And longer had she sung ; — but, with a frown. Revenge impatient rose ; He threw his blood-stained sword, in thunder, down, And, with a withering look, The war-denouncing trumpet took. And blew a blast so loud and dread. Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe ! And, ever and anon, he beat The double drum with furious heat ; And though sometimes, each dreary pause between, Dejected Pity at his side, Her soul-subduing voice applied. Yet still he kept his wild, unaltered mien, Vhile each strained ball of sight seemed bursting from his head. * * * With eyes upraised, as one inspired, Pale Melancholy sat retired ; And, from her wild, sequestered seat. In notes by distance made more sweet. Poured through the mellow horn her pensive soul ; And, dashing soft from rocks around. Bubbling runnels joined the sound ; Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole, Or o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay. Round an holy calm diffusing. Love of peace and lonely musing. In hollow murmurs died away. N 97 But O ! how altered was its sprightlier tone, When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue, Her bow across her shoulder flung, Her buskins gemmed with morning dew. Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung. The hunter's call, to Faun and Dryad known ! The oak-crowned Sisters, and their chaste-eyed queen, Satyrs and Sylvan Boys, were seen. Peeping from forth their alleys green : Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear ; And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen spear. Last came Joy's ecstatic trial : He, with viny crown advancing. First to the lively pipe his hand addrest ; But soon he saw the brisk, awakening viol. Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best : They would have thought, who heard the strain. They saw, in Tempe's vale, her native maids. Amidst the festal sounding shades, To some unwearied minstrel dancing. While, as his flying fingers kissed the strings. Love framed with Mirth, a gay fantastic round : Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound ; And he, amidst his frolic play. As if he would the charming air repay. Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings. Oh, Music ! sphere-descended maid. Friend of Pleasure, Wisdom's aid ! Why, goddess ! why to us denied, Lay'st thou thy ancient lyre aside ? As in that loved Athenian bower, You learned an all-commanding power j Thy mimic soul, oh, nymph endeared, Can well recall what then it heard. Where is thy native simple heart. Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art ? Arise, as in that elder time, Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime ! Thy wonders in that godlike age Fill thy recording Sister's page. 'Tis said, and I believe the tale. Thy humblest reed could more prevail, N Had more of strength, diviner rage, Than all which charms this laggard age ; Even all at once together found, Cecilia's mingled world of sound. Oh ! bid your vain endeavors cease, Revive the just designs of Greece ; Return in all thy simple state ; Confirm the tales her sons relate ! Collins's grand lines, The Patriofs Grave^ are among the finest of their class : — How sleep the brave, who sink to rest, Bv all tlieir country's wishes blest ! When Spring, with dewy fingers cold. Returns to deck their hallowed mould. She there shall dress a sweeter sod Than Fancy's feet have ever trod. By fairy hands their knell is rung. By forms unseen their dirge is sung ; There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray. To bless the turf that wraps their clay ; And Freedom shall awhile repair. To dwell a weeping hermit there. 99 Shenstone's highest effort was his Schoolmistress. Here is an extract : — In every village marked with little spire, Embowered in trees, and hardly known to fame, There dwells, in lowly shed and mean attire, A matron old, whom we schoolmistress name, Who boasts unruly brats with birch to tame ; They grieven sore, in piteous durance pent. Awed by the power of this relentless dame ; And oft-times, on vagaries idly bent. For unkempt hair, or task unconned, are sorely shent. And all in sight doth rise a birchen tree, Which Learning near her little dome did stowe ; Whilom a twig of small regard to see. Though now so wide its waving branches flow. And work the simple vassals mickle woe : For not a wind might curl the leaves that blew, But their limbs shuddered, and their pulse beat low : And as they looked, they found their horror grew, And shaped it into rods, and tingled at the view. Near to this dome is found a patch so green. On which the tribe their gambols do display; And at the door imprisoning board is seen, Lest weakly wights of smaller size should stray, Eager, perdie, to bask in sunny day ! The noises intermixed, which thence resound, Do learning's little tenement betray ; Where sits the dame, disguised in look profound. And eyes her fairy throng, and turns her wheel around. Her cap, far whiter than the driven snow, Emblem right meet of decency does yield ; Her apron dyed in grain, as blue, 1 trow. As is the hare-bell that adorns the field : And in her hand, for sceptre, she does wield Tway birchen sprays ; with anxious fear entwined, With dark distrust, and sad repentance filled ; And steadfast hate, and sharp affliction joined. And fury uncontrolled, and chastisement unkind. A russet stole was o'er her shoulders thrown ; A russet kirtle fenced the nipping air ; 'Twas simple russet, but it was her own ; 'Twas her own country bred the flock so fair ! 'Twas her own labour did the fleece prepare ; And, sooth to say, her pupils, ranged around. Through pious awe, did term it passing rare ; For they in gaping wonderment abound. And think, no doubt, she been the greatest wight on ground. * * * In elbow-chair (like that of Scottish stem. By the sharp tooth of cankering eld defaced. In which, when he receives his diadem. Our sovereign prince and liefest liege is placed) The matron sat ; and some with rank she graced (The source of children's and of courtiers' pride !), Redressed affronts, for vile affronts there passed ; And warned them not the fretful to deride. But love each other dear, whatever them betide. Unlike most other poets. Young preferred to dilate upon themes connected with the shady side of life, rather than its cheerful aspects. This gloomy proclivity of his pen is the more remarkable from the fact that he was, even to old age, far from being insensible to worldly influences and enjoyments. Schlegel thinks that he was affected in his misanthropy, and unnatural in his pathos. The fol- lowing incident does not seem to conflict with that opinion : — Young was one day walking in his garden at Welwyn, in com- pany with two ladies (one of whom he afterwards married) ; the servant came to acquaint him that a gentleman wished to speak with him. " Tell him," said the doctor, " I am too happily engaged to change my situation." The ladies insisted he should go, as his visitor was a man of rank, his patron and his friend ; but as per- suasion had no effect, one took him by the right arm and the other by the left, and led him to the garden gate ; when, finding resistance vain, he bowed, laid his hand upon his heart, and improvised the following lines : — Thus Adam looked, when from the garden driven. And thus disputed -orders sent from heaven: Like him, I go, but yet to go I'm loath ; Like him, I go, for angels drove us both : Hard was his fate, but mine still more unkind, — His Eve went zuith him^ but mine stays behind ! Notwithstanding the morbid spirit which pervades and oversha- dows most of his poetry, depriving it of much of its potency, yet it abounds with grand imagery, and is sustained by splendor of concep- tion. The genius of Christianity is the patron of all that is joyous ; she gilds the pathway of the present life with Heaven's own bright- ness, and makes even the clouds and darkness which hang over the grave, luminous with the rainbow of Hope. If the poet and moralist had but infused a little starlight into his Night 'Thoughts^ they would have possessed a tenfold charm. It is said that his friend, the Duke of Wharton, sent him a human skull with a candle fixed in it, as the most fitting lamp for him during his nocturnal lucubrations. But we must cull a few passages from our author : and here is an apostrophe to Night : — O majestic night ! Nature's great ancestor ! day's elder-born ! And fated to survive the transient sun ! By mortals and immortals seen with awe ' A starry crown thy raven brow adorns. An azure zone thv waist ; clouds, in heaven's loom Wrought through varieties of shape and shade. In ample folds of draperv divine. Thy flowing mantle form, and, heaven throughout, Voluminously oour thy pompous train : 103 Thy gloomy grandeurs — nature's most august, Inspiring aspect ! — claim a grateful verse ; And, like a sable curtain starred with gold. Drawn o'er my labours past, shall clothe the scene. Here are his impressive lines on Procrastination :— Be wise to-day : 'tis madness to defer ; Next dav the fatal precedent will plead : Thus on, till wisdom is pushed out of life. Procrastination is the thief of time ; Year after year it steals, till all are fled. And to the mercies of a moment leaves The vast concerns of an eternal scene. If not so frequent, would not this be strange ? That 'tis so frequent, this is stranger still ! Of man's miraculous mistakes, this bears The palm, — that all men are about to live — Forever on the brink of being born : All pav themselves the compliment to think They one day shall not drivel, and their pride On this reversion takes up ready praise. * * * There are some noble thoughts in the following passage :— How poor, how rich, how abject, how august. How complicate, how wonderful is man ! How passing wonder He who made him such ! Who centred in our make such strange extremes, From different natures marvellously mixt. Connection exquisite of distant worlds ! Distinguished link in being's endless chain ! Midway from nothing to the Deity ! IO+ A beam ethereal, sullied and absorpt ! Though sullied and dishonoured, still divine ! Dim miniature ot greatness absolute ! An heir of glory — a frail child of dust ! ^ ^ 5^ One more passage, for the sake of its striking metaphor : — Hearts wounded, like the wounded air, Soon close ; where passed the shaft no trace is found. As from the wing no stain the air retains. Our last selection is from his Love of Fame^ which Johnson so highly eulogizes : — What will not men attempt for sacred praise ? The love of praise, howe'er concealed bv art. Reigns more or less, and glows in every heart : The proud, to gain it, toils on toils endure ; The modest shun it but to make it sure. O'er globes and sceptres, now on thrones it swells — Now trims the midnight lamp in college cells. * * -.;: It aids the dancer's heel, the writer's head. And heaps the plain with mountains of the dead : Nor ends with life, but nods in sable plumes. Adorns our hearse, and flatters on our tombs. Thus conclude we our second evening's entertainment with the Minstrels ; and since it has been questioned, from his gravity, whether the author of The Night Thoughts was ever Toung^ we shall regard him as the last of the old poets. With regret we bid adieu, los then, to these great masters of the lyre, whose magnificent melo- dies, quaint imagery, and rich cadences, fall upon the ear like a benediction — " Or like those maiden showers Which, by the peep of day, do strew A baptism o'er the flowers." Justly has it been said, that with them " the imaginative ruled and reigned ; poetry lived much in the upper air, and, like the lark, sang best as it soared to heaven." A high, chivalrous spirit marked the Elizabethan age of song ; its pomp of diction and stateliness of measure often challenging the curious interest of the reader, by the subtle obscurity and inversion of its style, as well as by its rich cadences. What a galaxy of illustrious names then shed lustre upon literature and life ! It was, indeed, the golden age of letters, with its registered glories in philosophy, science, and song. It was the age of contemplation and devotion to study, as ours is of action. Although poets are mortal, poetry is immortal ; the muse's priest- hood still lives in a line of illustrious succession, " to enrich her galleries with glowing and beautiful creations, embodied in deathless and glorified forms :" and the noble inheritance is ours to stimulate us in the highways of wisdom and virtue. We need not, therefore, " Sigh the old heroic ages back ; These worthies were but brave and honest men ; Let us their spirit catch, — pursue their track ; — Striving, not sighing, brings them back again. "'- io6 Gray, Akenside. Jones, Berkeley, Irving, AlletcD. Dans. Percivai, Sigourney, Pierpont, I>.ake, Spragc.o, Brooks, Payne, Burgoyne, Darwin, Vv'oodworth, Gfcldsmith, Cowper, Burns, Darley, Sheridan, Logan, Leyden, Beattie, Chattertoa, WoUc, Wildo . Hallec-k. /^ RAY, who was " sat- urated with the finest essence of the Attic muse," has given us some grand stanzas, in his Ode founded upon the Welsh tradition, that when Edward the First conquered Wales, he ordered the bards to be put to death. These are the opening stanzas : — *' Ruin seize thee, ruthless king ! Confusion on thy banners wait ; ' Though fann'd by Conquest's crimson wing. They mock the air with idle state 109 Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail, Nor e'en thy virtues. Tyrant, shall avail To save thy secret soul from nightly fears, From Cambria's curse, from Cambria's tears !" Such were the sounds that o'er the crested pride Of the first Edward scattered wild dismay. As down the steep of Snowden's shaggy side He wound with toilsome march his long array. Stout Glo'ster stood aghast in speechless trance ; ^To arms !" cried Mortimer, and couch'd his quiv'ring lance. On a rock, whose haughty brow Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood, Robed in the sable garb of woe, With haggard eyes the poet stood ; (Loose his beard, and hoary hair Stream'd like a meteor to the troubled air ;) And with a master's hand, and prophet's fire. Struck the deep sorrows of his lyre. " Hark, how each giant-oak, and desert-cave. Sighs to the torrent's awful voice beneath ! O'er thee, oh King ! their hundred arms they wave, Revenge on thee in hoarser murmurs breathe : Vocal no more, since Cambria's fatal day To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Llewellyn's lay !" * * * Both Campbell and Rogers were much charmed with Gray's writings : the latter used to carry a copy of them in his pocket, to read during his morning walks, till at length, he says, he could repeat them all. Byron considered Gray's Elegy the corner-stone of his glory. Tuckerman, with all a poet's appreciation, thus refers to this remarkable production : — " Almost everv line is a select phrase, not to be improved by taste or ingenuity. The subject is one of the happiest in the range of poetry. Who has not strayed at sunset into the quiet precincts of a country churchyards' Who has not sought the spot where ' the rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep ?' Who has not felt a melancholy pleasure steal upon his soul, as he has stood among the graves, and received the solemn teachings of the scene ' amid the lingering light ?' The spirit of such reveries, the tone and hues of such a landscape. Gray has caught, and en- shrined forever in his verse." Listen to the sweet, mournful music of some of the stanzas : — The curfew tolls the knell of parting day. The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea. The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,' And leaves the world to darkness and to me. Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, And all the air a solemn stillness holds, Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight. And drowsv tinklings lull the distant folds : Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower. The moping owl does to the moon complain Of such as, wand'ring near her secret bower, Molest her ancient solitary reign. * * * Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade. Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap. Each in his narrow cell forever laid, The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. The breezv call ot incense-breathing morn. The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed, ' This line admits of eighteen different transpositions, without destroying the sense or rhyme. Ill The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn, No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed. For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn, Or busy housewife ply her evening care : No children run to lisp their sire's return. Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share. Let not ambition mock their useful toil. Their homely joys, and destiny obscure ; Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile The short and simple annals of the poor. The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power. And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, Await alike th' inevitable hour : The paths of glory lead but to the grave ! Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault If Memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise, Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault The pealing anthem swells the note of praise. Can storied urn, or animated bust. Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath ? Can honour's voice provoke the silent dust. Or flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of death ? Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire : Hands, that the rod of empire might have swayed, Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre. * * * Full many a gem ot puresu lay serene, The dark, unfathomed caves of ocean bear ; Full many a flower is born to blush unseen. And waste its sweetness on the desert air. vc •/!: * For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey, This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd, Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind ? * * * On some fond breast the parting soul relies, Some pious drops the closing eye requires ; Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries, Even in our ashes live their wonted fires. It is said that on the evening preceding the memorable battle of the Plains of Abraham, General Wolfe repeated the noble line, " The paths of glory lead but to the grave !" which must have seemed at such a time fraught with mournful meaning ; and turning to his officers, said : '* Now, gentlemen, I would rather be the author of that poem than take Quebec !" There are two manuscripts of the Elegy in existence ; and they were recently (in 1854) sold at auction — one for one hundred pounds, and the other — which contained five additional stanzas, never printed in the published editions — for one hundred and thirty pounds. The old tower of Upton church (Gray's " ivy-mantled tower") is still a most picturesque object, although fast falling into decay. The memory of the bard is, however, even more closely associated with another locality — that of Stoke. It was here he wrote, wandered, and died ; and here, all that was mortal of him sleeps, under the yew-tree's shade. Gray, with a friend, once attended an auction sale of books, where he saw an elegant book-case, filled with a choice collection of French classics, handsomely bound ; the price being one hundred p 113 guineas. He had a great longing for this lot, but could not then afford to buy it. The conversation between the poet and his friend being overheard by the Duchess of Northumberland, who was ac- quainted with the latter, she took the opportunity of ascertaining who his friend was, and was told it was Gray, the poet. Upon their retiring, she bought the book-case, with its contents, and sent it to Gray's lodgings, with a note, importing that she *' was ashamed of sending so small an acknowledgment for the infinite pleasure she had received in reading the Elegy in a Country Churchyard^ — of all others her most favourite poem." Gray was remarkably fearful of fire, and kept a ladder of ropes in his bed-room. On one occasion, some of his mischievous com- panions at Cambridge roused him at midnight with the cry of fire, saying the staircase was in flames. Up went the window, and the poet hastened down his rope-ladder as quickly as possible, but into a tub of cold water placed at the bottom to receive him. This practical joke extinguished his fear of fire, but he would not forgive the trick, and immediately changed his college. That oft-quoted line, " Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise," we derive from Gray's Ode to Eton College : — Yet ah ! why should they know their fate, Since sorrow never comes too late. And happiness too swiftly flies ? Thought would destroy their paradise No more : where ignorance is bliss, 'Tis folly to be wise. Turning reluctantly, however, from this our favourite bard, let us carry with us, like a lingering strain of sweet and solemn music, the opening lines ot his beautiful Hymn to Adversity : — Daughter ot Jove, relentless power. Thou tamer of the human breast, 114 Whose iron scourge and tort'ring hour The bad affright, afflict the best ! Bound in thy adamantine chain, The proud are taught to taste of pain. And purple tyrants vainly groan With pangs unfelt before, unpitied and alone. When first thy sire to send on earth Virtue, his darling child, design'd. To thee he gave the heavenly birth. And bade to form her infant mind. Stern, rugged nurse ! thy rigid lore With patience many a year she bore : What sorrow was thou bad'st her know. And from her own she learn'd to melt at others' woe. Here is a beautiful passage by Akenside, written in the last year of his life : — O ye dales Of Tyne, and ye most ancient woodlands ; where, Oft as the giant flood obliquely strides. And his banks open and his lawns extend, Stops short the pleased traveller to view. Presiding o'er the scene, some rustic tower Founded by Norman or by Saxon hands ; ye Northumbrian shades, which overlook The rocky pavement and the mossy falls Of solitary Wensbeck's limpid stream ! ^ How gladly I recall your well-known seats. Beloved of old, and that delightful time When, all alone, for many a summer's day, 1 wandered through your calm recesses, led In silence by some powerful hand unseen. "5 Nor will I e'er forget you ; nor shall e'er The graver tasks of manhood, or the advice Of vulgar wisdom, move me to disclaim Those studies which possessed me in the dawn Of life, and fixed the colour of my mind For every future year ; whence even now From sleep I rescue the clear hours of morn, And, while the world around lies overwhelmed In idle darkness, am alive to thoughts Of honourable fame, of truth divine Or moral, and of minds to virtue won By the sweet magic of harmonious verse. There aj:e some noble thoughts in the celebrated Ode by Sir William Jones, the Orientalist. Here are some of the hnes : — What constitutes a State ? Not high-raised battlement or laboured mound, Thick wall or moated gate ; ii6 Not cities proud, with spires and turrets crowned ; Not bays and broad-armed ports, Where, laughing at the storm, rich navies ride ; Not starr'd and spangled courts. Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride. * * * Men who their duties know. But know their rights, and, knowing, dare maintain ; Prevent the long-aimed blow. And crush the tyrant, while they rend the chain : These constitute a State. Bishop Berkeley's memorable lines, prophetic of planting the arts in the New World, are of enduring interest to us 5 these are the closing stanzas : — There shall be sung another golden age, The rise of empire and of arts. The good and great inspiring epic rage. The wisest heads and noblest hearts. Not such as Europe breeds in her decay ; Such as she bred when fresh and young, When heavenly flame did animate her clay. By future poets shall be sung. Westward the course of empire takes its way; The first four acts already past, A fifth shall close the drama of the day ; Time's noblest offspring is the last. This poem was written when the author was residing at New- port, Rhode Island. To prove that the prophecy has been in great measure verified, we need but refer to the record of noble names in science, history, philosophy, and song, which adorn our American annals. Among the earlier American poets were Barlow, Trum- BULL, Freneau, and Allston, who was also a renowned painter. While residing in Europe, Allston enjoyed the friendship of Southey, Coleridge, and Lamb ; as well as of Washington Irving, who ex- presses a reverence and affection for his pure and noble character, no less than for his genius. While referring to Irving, we cannot refrain from adding to the world's applause our humble but grateful tribute of regard, as well for the memory of his beautiful character as for his imperishable productions. His name ought undoubtedly to be classed in the category of poets, since much of his charming prose is essentially poetry. He rarely wrote in verse ; but there is a little waif of his extant, which he improvised at the instance of his friend Stuart Newton, to accompany his picture of an old philo- sopher reading from a folio to a young beauty asleep on a chair opposite. Here it is, quaint and characteristic : — Frostie age, frostie age ! vain all thy learning ; Drowsie page, drowsie page evermore turning. Young head no lore will heed. Young heart's a reckless rover -, Young beautie, while you read — Sleeping, dreams of absent lover. Allston's principal poem is his Sylphs of the Seasons ; but his lines on Boyhood are short and sweet : — Ah, then how sweetly closed those crowded days ! The minutes parting one by one, like rays That fade upon a summer's eve. But, oh ! what charm, or magic numbers, Can give me back the gentle slumbers Those weary, happy days did leave ? When by my bed I saw my mother kneel, And with her blessing took her nightly kiss ; Whatever Time destroys, he cannot this — E'en now that nameless kiss 1 feel. ii3 His noble Address to England^ which was first printed in Cole- ridge's Sibylline Leaves^ 1810, commences with this stanza: — All hail, thou noble land ! our fathers' native soil ! Oh, stretch thy mighty hand, gigantic grown by toil. O'er the vast Atlantic wave to our shore ! For thou with magic might Canst reach to where the light Of Phoebus travels bright The world o'er. * * * The poem thus ends : — While the manners, while the arts, that mould a nation's soul, Still cling around our hearts, — between let ocean roll, Our joint communion breaking with the sun : Yet still from either beach The voice of blood shall reach, More audible than speech — We are one ! Dana's principal poem. The Buccaneer^ is considered a fine pro- duction : it is a tale of crime and remorse. The opening stanzas are finely descriptive : — The island lies nine leagues away ; along its solitary shore, Of craggy rock and sandy bay, no sound but ocean's roar. Save where the bold, wild sea-bird makes her home, Her shrill cry coming through the sparkling foam. But when the light winds lie at rest, and on the glassy, heaving sea. The black duck, with her glossy breast, sits swinging silently. How beautiful ! no ripples break the reach. And silvery waves go noiseless up the beach. 119 And inland rests the green, warm dell ; the brook comes tinkling down its side ; From out the trees the Sabbath bell rings cheerful, far and wide, Mingling its sound with bleatings of the flocks, That feed about the vale among the rocks : Nor holy bell, nor pastoral bleat, in former days within the vale ; Flapped in the bay the pirate's sheet ; curses were on the gale ; Rich goods lay on the sand, and murdered men ; Pirate and wrecker kept their revels then. Dana's Little Beach-Bird may be indicated as one of his happiest efforts : — Thou little bird, thou dweller by the sea. Why takest thou its melancholy voice ? And with that boding cry o'er the waves dost thou fly ? O ! rather, bird, with me through the fair land rejoice ! Thy flitting form comes ghostly dim and pale, As driven by a beating storm at sea ; Thy cry is weak and scared, as if thy mates had shared The doom of us : thy wail — what does it bring to me ? Percival thus interprets to us The Language of Flowers : — In Eastern lands they talk in flowers. And they tell in a garland their loves and cares ; Each blossom that blooms in their garden bowers,- On its leaves a mystic language bears. The Rose is a sign of joy and love — Young blushing love in its earliest dawn ; And the mildness that suits the gentle dove, From the Myrtle's snowy flower is drawn. Innocence shines in the Lily's bell, Pure as the light in its native heaven ; Fame's bright star and glory's swell, In the glossy leaf of the Bay are given. The silent, soft, and humble heart. In the Violet's hidden sweetness breathes ; And the tender soul that cannot part, A twine of Evergreen fondly wreathes. The Cypress, that daily shades the grave. Is sorrow that mourns her bitter lot ; And Faith, that a thousand ills can brave. Speaks in thy blue leaves, Forget-me-Not. Then gather a wreath from the garden bowers, And tell the wish of thy heart in flowers. Here is the commencement of his fine poem. The Coral Grove : — Deep in the wave is a coral grove. Where the purple mullet and the gold-fish rove ; Where the sea-flower spreads its leaves of blue, That never are wet with falling dew, But in bright and changeful beauty shine Far down in the green and glassy brine. The floor is of sand, like the mountain drift, And the pearl-shells spangle the flinty snow ; From coral rocks the sea-plants lift Their boughs, where the tides and billows flow ; The water is calm and still below, For the winds and waves are absent there. And the sands are bright as the stars that glow In the motionless fields of the upper air. There, with its waving blade of green. The sea-flag streams through the silent water, And the crimson leaf of the dulse is seen To blush, like a banner bathed in slaughter. * * * Mrs. Sigourney's productions, mostly didactic, have long en- joyed a deserved popularity. Her lines. To an early Blue-Bird^ form a pleasing picture : — Blue-bird ! on yon leafless tree. Dost thou carol thus to me, " Spring is coming — Spring is here ?" Say'st thou so, my birdie dear ? What is that in misty shroud Stealing from the darkened cloud ? Lo, the snow-flake's gathering mound Settles o'er the whitened ground, Yet thou singest blithe and clear, " Spring is coming — Spring is here !" Strik'st thou not too bold a strain ? Winds are piping o'er the plain. Clouds are sweeping o'er the sky, With a black and threatening eye ; Urchins, by the frozen rill, Wrap their mantles closer still •, Yon poor man, with doublet old. Doth he shiver at the cold ? Hath he not a nose of blue ? Xell me, birdling, tell me true. There are some beautiful and pathetic lines by Pierpont, entitled Passing Axvay^ commencing : — Was it the chime of a tiny bell. That came so sweet to my dreaming ear, Like the silvery tones of a fairy's shell That he winds on the beach so mellow and clear, When the winds and the waves lie together asleep, And the moon and the fairy are watching the deep, She dispensing her silvery light. And he his notes, as silvery quite, While the boatman listens and ships his oar. To catch the music that comes from the shore ? — Hark ! the notes, on my ear that play. Are set to words : as they float, they say, " Passing away ! passing away !" * * * His lines on the loss of his Child are full of natural pathos : — I cannot make him dead ! His fair, sunshiny head Is ever bounding round my study chair : Yet, when my eyes grow dim with tears, I turn to him. The vision vanishes — he is not there ! I walk my parlour floor, and, through the open door, I hear a foot-fall on my chamber stair ; 123 I'm stepping toward the hall to give the boy a call ; And then bethink me that — he is not there ! I thread the crowded street ; a satchelled lad I meet, With the same beaming eyes and coloured hair : And, as he's running by, follow him with my eve, Scarcely believing that — he is not there ! * * * I cannot make him dead ! When passing by the bed, So long watched over with parental care. My spirit and my eye seek him inquiringly. Before the thought comes that — he is not there ! ♦ 3i< 5^ 5^ Drake has enriched American literature by a remarkable poem, The Culprit Fay ,• which discovers exquisite fancy and rare poetic beauty. The scene is laid in the Highlands of the Hudson, and the subject is a fairy story, decked with all the dainty accessories of Fairyland and forest scenery. The origin of the poem is traced to a conversation with Cooper, the novelist, and Halleck, the poet, who, speaking of the Scottish streams and their romantic associa- tions, insisted that our own rivers were unsusceptible of the like poetic uses. Drake thought otherwise, and, to make his position good, produced, in three days after, this exquisite fairy tale. The opening passage of the poem is a description of moonlight on the Highlands of the Hudson : — 'Tis the middle watch of a summer's night — The earth is dark, but the heavens are bright : Naught is seen in the vault on high But the moon, and the stars, and the cloudless sky, And the flood which rolls its milky hue, A river of light on the welkin blue. The moon looks down on old Cronest, She mellows the shades on his shaggy breast, And seems his huge gray form to throw In a silver cone on the wave below : His sides are broken by spots of shade, By the walnut-bough and the cedar made : And through their clustering branches dark, Glimmers and dies the fire-fly's spark, Like starry twinkles that momently break Through the rifts of the gathering tempest's rack/ The stars are on the moving stream, And fling, as its ripples gently flow, A burnished length of wavy beam In an eel-like, spiral line below ; The winds are whist, and the owl is still, The bat in the shelvy rock is hid, And naught is heard on the lonely hill But the cricket's chirp, and the answer shrill Of the gauze-winged katy-did ; And the plaint of the wailing whip-poor-will. Who moans unseen, and ceaseless sings Ever a note of wail and woe. Till morning spreads her rosy wings, And earth and sky in her glances glow. * * * Here we have introduced to us the Fairy culprit: Wrapt in musing stands the sprite : 'Tis the middle wane of night. * * * He cast a saddened look around. But he felt new joy his bosom swell. When, glittering on the shadowed ground, He saw a purple muscle-shell ; 125 Thither he ran, and he bent him low, He heaved at the stern and he heaved at the bow, And he pushed her over the yielding sand, Till he came to the verge of the haunted land. She was as lovely a pleasure-boat As ever fairy had paddled in. For she glowed with purple paint without. And shone with silvery pearl within ; A sculler's notch in the stern he made. An oar he shaped of the bootle-blade -, Then sprung to his seat with a lightsome leap, And launched afar, on the calm, blue deep ! * * * No American can forget that to Drake we are indebted for our National Ode, which commences, — When Freedom, from her mountain height, Unfurled her standard to the air. She tore the azure robe of night, And set the stars of glory there ! 126 She mingled with its gorgeous dyes The milky baldric of the skies, And striped its pure, celestial white With streakings of the morning light ; Then, from his mansion in the sun, She called her eagle bearer down, And gave into his mighty hand The symbol of her chosen land. Another of our American bards, Sprague, has given us the fol- lowing sweet bird-song : suggested by seeing two swallows flying into a church in Boston : — Gay, guiltless pair, what seek ye from the fields of heaven ? Ye have no need of prayer, ye have no sins to be forgiven. Why perch ye here, where mortals to their Maker bend ? Can your pure spirits fear the God ye never could offend ? Ye never knew the crimes for which we come to weep. Penance is not for you, bless'd wanderers of the upper deep. To you 'tis given to wake sweet nature's untaught lays ; Beneath the arch of heaven to chirp away a life of praise. * * * The poem by which this author is most known, entitled Curiosity^ has a singular history. Griswold states that it was published in Cal- cutta a few years ago as an original production by a British officer, with no other alterations than the omission of a few American names, and the insertion of others in their places ; and in this form it was reprinted in London, where it was much praised. Now listen to the following song : — Day, in melting purple dying. Blossoms, all around me, sighing. Fragrance, from the lilies, straying, Zephyr, with my ringlets playing, Ye but waken my distress ; I am sick of loneliness. 127 Save thy toiling, spare thy treasure, All I ask is friendship's pleasure ; Let the shining ore lie darkling, Bring no gems in lustre sparkling : Gifts and gold are naught to me, I would only look on thee ! Tell to thee the high-wrought feeling, Ecstasy but in revealing : Paint to thee the deep sensation. Rapture in participation, — Yet but torture, if comprest In a lone, unfriended breast. * * * These glowing stanzas, from Mrs. Brooks's Zophiel^ — an exqui- Mu-e story of a Jewish exiled maiden and her lovers, — exhibit the Style of the authoress, whom Southey designated, in The Doctor^ as " the most impassioned and imaginative of poetesses." Turn we for a moment to a sweet, familiar ditty — known to all (overs of lyric verse, — 'tis about the little sanctuary of Home : — 'Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam. Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home : A charm from the skies seems to hallow it there. Which, go through the world, you'll not meet elsewhere. Home, home, sweet home ! There's no place like home ! Every person knows that sweet household lyric ; but it is not every one who has heard the life-story of its author. That immor- tal song, so brim-full of tender pathos and natural feeling, would cause many to drop a tear of sympathy over the sad fate of its author, Howard Payne, were they to be told that, — an American adventurer jn the heart of Paris, Vienna, and London, while hearing 128 \ j- 11^ h ?.- N- \ nil •^ I . ^ ' k- ft! f ^ ; '■^^ I- persons singing his own beautiful lines on the pleasures of home, — he was not only denied the possession of one himself, but was even destitute of the necessaries of life. The following beautiful little lyric is from the pen of General BuRGOYNE, of our Revolutionary annals : — When first this humble roof I knew. With various care I strove ; My grain was scarce, my sheep were few, My all of life was love. By mutual toil our board was dressed. The spring our drink bestowed ; But when her lip the brim had pressed. The cup with nectar flowed ! Content and peace the dwelling shared, No other guest came nigh ; In them was given, though gold was sparea. What gold could never buy. No value has a splendid lot. But as the means to prove, That from the castle to the cot. The all of life is — love Here is Darwin's sweet Song to May : — Born in yon blaze of orient sky. Sweet May ! thy radiant form unfold \ Unclose thy blue voluptuous eve. And wave thy shadowy locks of gold. For thee the fragrant zephyrs blow. For thee descends the sunny shower ; The rills in softer murmurs flow. And brighter blossoms gem the bower. R 129 Light graces decked in flowery wreaths, And tiptoe joys their hand combine, And Love his sweet contagion breathes. And, laughing, dances round thy shrine. Warm with new Hfe, the glittering throng, On quivering fin and rustling wing. Delighted join their votive song. And hail thee Goddess of the Spring ! This charming American song, the 0/d Oaken Bucket^ is by WOODWORTH : — I How dear to this heart are the scenes of my childhood. When fond recollection presents them to view ; 130 The orchard, the meadow, the deep-tangled wild-wood, And every loved spot which my infancy knew : The wide-spreading pond, and the mill which stood by it, The bridge and the rock where the cataract fell ; The cot of my father, the dairy-house nigh it, And e'en*the rude bucket which hung in the well. The old oaken bucket, the Iron-bound bucket, The moss-covered bucket which hung in the well. That moss-covered vessel I hailed as a treasure ; For often, at noon, when returned from the field, I found it the source of an exquisite pleasure — The purest and sweetest that nature can yield. How ardent I seized it, with hands that were glowing, And quick to the white-pebbled bottom it fell ; Then soon, with the emblem of truth overflowing, And dripping with coolness, it rose from the well, — Th° old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket, The moss-covered bucket arose from the well. Reverting again in imagination to one of the " nooks and corners'* of Old England, yclept the '•'Grecian CofFee-House," let us endea- vour to recall from the buried past, that once famous rendezvous of the wits, poets, and playwrights. It was here that a somewhat portly personage, of ungainly gait, but of good-tempered face, was wont to meet with his cosy companions, and while away many an hour consecrated to poetry, politics, and potations. We refer to *' poor Goldy," as he was familiarly called ; and a more generous- hearted, gifted man, — one so studious of the happiness of others, and as strangely indifferent to his own, — it would not be easy to instance. His eccentricities of character have imparted to his his- tory a romantic; interest, rarely found in the record of a scholar's life. A restless love of adventure, combined with an incorrigible 131 imprudence, perpetually involved him in difficulties ; so that while the powers of his genius provoked the admiration of the world, his ludicrous inconsistencies of conduct no less excited its ridicule. Our smiles and tears are alilce provoked by his mad exploits, his College career, his flight to Cork, his utter destitution, and also his unconquerable passion for roaming over Europe on foot, — beguiling his troubles and replenishing his purse, meanwhile, by means of his flute : or, as we follow him to his infelicitous, though brief, apprenticeship to " the poor chemist," — from which condition his good friend and patron, Johnson, not only released him, but introduced him to the world of letters. Speaking of Goldsmith, Johnson remarked, that " no man was more foolish than he was when he had not a pen in his hand, or none more wise when he had." The Doctor was, indeed, a true friend to the author of The Vicar of Wakefield^ in a time of especial need, — that critical dilemma with his landlady. Goldsmith was a hard worker with his brain. He considered four lines a day, good work. Occasionally he read much at night, in bed ; and when he wished to extinguish his candle, it is said he used to throw his slipper at it, — for, like Thomson and others, he was afflicted with a very indolent body. He was greatly astonished when Dodsley, his publisher, offered five shillings a couplet for his Deserted J^illage^ when each line was fairly worth as many pounds ; for it took him seven years in beating out its pure gold. Of all his poems, this bears the palm for finished excellence ; and our interest in it is not lessened by knowing that it describes scenes in which he was, in early life, himself an actor. Auburn, the poetical name for the village of Lissoy, is situated in the county of Westmeath ; the name of the schoolmaster was Paddy Burns, " a man severe to view ;" and the ale-house, with its large spreading hawthorn bush, has also been identified, — where Imagination fondly stoops to trace The parlour splendours of that festive place. 132 OLIVER GOLDSMITH. The church which tops the neighbouring hill, the mill, and the brook, all remain the same as when his brother was the officiating clergyman. Mark how gracefully the poem opens : — Sweet Auburn ! loveliest village of the plain, Where health and plenty cheer'd the labouring swain Where smiling Spring its earliest visit paid, And parting Summer's lingering blooms delayed ; Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease, Seats of my youth, when every sport could please ; How often have I loitered o'er thy green. Where humble happiness endeared each scene ! How often have I paused on every charm, The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm. The never-failing brook, the busy mill. The decent church that topped the neighbouring hill, The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade. For talking age, and whispering lovers made ! How often have I blest the coming day, When toil remitting lent its turn to play, And all the village train, from labour free, Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree ; While many a pastime circled in the shade, I The young contending as the old survey'd ; And many a gambol frolick'd o'er the ground, And sleights of art and feats of strength went round; And still, as each repeated pleasure tired. Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired ; The dancing pair that simply sought renown, By holding out, to tire each other down ; The swain, mistrustless of his smutted face. While secret laughter tittered round the place ; The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love. The matron's glance, that would those looks reprove ; i3i These were thy charms, sweet village ! sports like these. With sweet succession, taught e'en toil to please ; These round thy bowers their cheerful influence shed. These were thy charms, — but all those charms are fled. Now let us con over his tribute to Retirement : — O blest Retirement ! friend to life's decline, Retreats from care, that never must be mine. How blest is he who crowns, in shades like these, A youth of labour with an age of ease : 134 Who quits a world where strong temptations try, And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly ! For him no wretches, born to work and weep. Explore the mine, or tempt the dangerous deep ; No surly porter stands in guilty state. To spurn imploring famine from the gate : But on he moves to meet his latter end. Angels around befriending virtue's friend ; Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay. While resignation gently slopes the way : And, all his prospects brightening to the last. His heaven commences ere the world be past. ^ ^ ^ He thus picturesquely portrays the clergyman of the vi'lage : — Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride. And e'en his failings leaned to virtue's side ; But in his duty prompt at every call. He watched and wept, he prayed and felt for all : And, as a bird each fond endearment tries. To tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies, He tried each art, reproved each dull delay. Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way. E'en children followed, with endearing wile. And plucked his gown, to share the good man's smile. His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed, Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distrest. To them his heart, his love, his griefs, were given, But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven. As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form. Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm, Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, Eternal sunshine settles on its head. What a grand simile is that contained in the closing lines ! His Traveller opens -with this beautiful tribute to Home : — Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow, Or by the lazy Scheld, or wandering Po ; Or onward, where the rude Carinthian boor Against the houseless stranger shuts the door: Or where Campania's plain forsaken lies, A weary waste expanding to the skies ; Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see, My heart, untravelled, fondly turns to thee : Still to my brother turns, with ceaseless pain, And drags at each remove a lengthening chain. Eternal blessings crown my earliest friend. And round his dwelling guardian saints attend. Blest be that spot, where cheerful guests retire To pause from toil, and trim their evening fire ; Blest that abode, where want and pain repair, And every stranger finds a ready chair ; Blest be those feasts, with simple plenty crown'd. Where all the ruddy familv around Laugh at the jests or pranks that never fail. Or sigh with pity at some mournful tale ; Or press the bashful stranger to his food. And learn the luxury of doing good. Gray, who, when dying, had the Deserted Village read to him, exclaimed, "That man is a poet." Among the peculiarities of Goldsmith was his thirst for notoriety : wherever he went, he was desirous of being the object of attention. On a summer's excur- sion to the Continent, he accompanied a lady and her two beautiful 136 daughters, and often expressed a little displeasure at perceiving that more attention was paid to them than to himself. On their entering the town of Antwerp, the populace surrounded the door of the hotel at which they alighted, and expressed a desire to welcome the ladies in a demonstrative manner; and on their appearing at the balcony to acknowledge the compliment, the poet went with them. He soon discovered, however, that it was at the shrine of beauty the people did homage. The characteristic excellence of Goldsmith's poetry is its truth- fulness to nature, and it is this all-pervading charm that has em- balmed his memory in the common heart. "The new spirit which had penetrated all departments of human thought and action, and which was evoked with the opening of the present century, told more immediately on poetry than on any other kind of literature, and recast it into manifold and more original forms. The breadth and volume of that poetic outburst can only be fully estimated by looking back to the narrow and artificial channels in which English poetry, since the days of Milton, had flowed. In the hands of Dryden and Pope, that which was a natural, free-wandering river, became a straight-cut, uniform canal. Or, without figure, poetry was withdrawn from country life, and made to live exclusively in town and affect the fashion. Forced to appear in courtly costume, it dealt with the artificial manners and outside aspects of men, and lost sight of the one human heart, which is the proper haunt and main region of song.'" Pass we now from the poet of nature to the poet of the affec- tions, CowPER, — the poet who " has brought the muse, in her most attractive form, to sit down by our hearths, and has breathed a sanctity over the daily economy of our existence." He not only restored natural emotion and the language of life to song ; but his poetry "influences the feelings as a summer-day affects the body — and the reader has a sense of enjoyment, calm, pure, and lasting : ' North British Review. s 137 the tasteful read him for his grace, the serious for his religion. "^ Physically feeble and sensitive, he never engaged in the active pur- suits of life, but early devoted himself to his muse. Although con- stitutionally predisposed to melancholy, he yet possessed a vivid perception of the ludicrous, as his inimitable 'John Gilpin sufficiently attests. Not merely a humorist, he vv^as eminently a master of pathos ; witness his exquisite lines to his Mother's Portrait^ — lines so familiar to us all, but so choice as to extort from Southev the confession that he would willingly barter all he had written — and that was not little, as the world knows — for its authorship. " I would forgive a man for not reading Milton," once said Charles Lamb, " but I would not call that man my friend who should be offended with the divine chit-chat of Cowper." What grace and harmony are combined in the following passage from The Task^ descriptive of the scenerv of the River Ouse : — Nor rural sights alone, but rural sounds. Exhilarate the spirit, and restore The tone of languid nature. Mighty winds. That sweep the skirt of some far-spreading wood Of ancient growth, make music, not unlike The dash of ocean on his winding shore. And lull the spirit while they lill the mind ; — Unnumbered branches waving in the blast, And all their leaves fast fluttering all at once; Nor less composure waits upon the roar Of distant floods, or on the softer voice Of neighbouring fountain, or of rills that slip Through the cleft rock, and chiming as they fall Upon loose pebbles, lose themselves at length In matted grass, that with a livelier green Betrays the secret of their silent course. Nature inanimate displays sweet sounds. But animated nature sweeter still, To soothe and satisfy the human ear. Ten thousand warblers cheer the day, and one The livelong night : nor these alone whose notes Nice-fingered art must emulate in vain, But cawing rooks, and kites that swim sublime In still-repeated circles, screaming loud. The jay, the pie, and even the boding owl. That hails the rising moon, have charms for me. Sounds inharmonious in themselves and harsh. Yet heard in scenes where peace forever reigns, And, only there, please highly for their sake. ' * * * «5s'^s*^fe^t O Winter .' ruler of the inv.erted year. Thy scattered hair with sleet like ashes filled, Thy breath congealed upon thy lips, thy cheeks Fringed with a beard made white with other snows Than those of age, thv forehead wrapped in clouds, A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne 139 A sliding car, indebted to no wheels, But urged by storms along its slippery way, I love thee, all unlovely as thou seem'st, And dreaded as thou art ! Cowper's poetry is replete with sententious gems of thought : such as the following : — Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much ; Wisdom is humble that he knows no more. * * * The path of sorrow, and that path alone. Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown. * * * A soul without reflection, like a pile Without inhabitants, to ruin runs ! * * * 'Tis pleasant, through the loop-holes of Retreat, To peep at such a world : To see the stir of the great Babel, and not feel the crowd : To hear the roar she sends through all her gates. At a safe distance, where the dying sound Falls a soft murmur on th' uninjured ear. That favourite poem. The Sofa^ owes its existence to Lady Aus- ten's suggestion, as she and the poet were conversing together on the sofa. It presents a variety both of subject and style, without the violation of order and harmony, while it breathes a spirit of the purest and most exalted morality, Campbell savs, It glides like a river, which, rising from a playful little fountain, gathers beauty and magnitude as it proceeds. While the sweet melodies of Cowper were filling English hearts and homes with music, a rustic peasant in the North was tuning his reed to J Mountain Daisy ^ or singing his love-plaints to some fairy- footed nymph beside a Scottish stream. The minstrelsy of Burns 140 has stirred the hearts of all classes and degrees among men -, but especially for the sons of Scotia has he enshrined in his verse the sentiments, tastes, and feelings, as well as the old heroic traditions of her glory, in strains " so simple, yet so sublime, that the world stood still to listen." That such a gifted one should have arisen from the ploughshare to become a great national poet, may well provoke astonishment ; but that his personal career should have proved so inauspicious, no less stirs our sympathy and regret. A strange and significant contrast is exhibited between the lowly birth- place of Burns and his costly mausoleum.' Scott, when young, met Burns ; and he tells us the poet's eye, " which indicated the poetic temperament and character, was large, and of a dark cast ; it glowed — I say, literally glowed — when he spoke with feeling or interest : I never saw such another eye in a human head, though I have seen the most distinguished men of my time." A brother poet thus tenders a loving tribute ; — " The simple bard, unbroke by rules of art. He pours the wild effusions of his heart; And if inspired, — 'tis Nature's powers inspire, — Hers all the melting thrill, and hers the kindling fire !" True, " thoughtless follies laid him low, and stained his name ;" but here draw the mantle of charity, and let pity drop the tributary tear over his sorrows and sufferings ; for he was bereft of sympathy and succour when most he needed their aid. Need we then wonder that he sang thus plaintively : — Pleasures are, like poppies, spread — You seize the flower, its bloom is fled : Or, like the snow-falls on the river, A moment white, then melts forever : ' It is in the form of a Grecian temple: in the basement story are placed the bust of the peer, and the Bible he gave to his Highland Mary, fastened to one of the covers of which is a loclf of her golden hair. 141 Or like the borealis race, That flit ere you can point their place: Or like the rainbow's lovely form, Evanishing amid the storm. What a beautiful homily on that queenliest of graces, Charity, does he here offer us : — Then gently scan your brother man ; still gentler, sister woman ; Though they may gang a kennin wrang, to step aside is human. ^ One point must still be greatly dark, the moving why they do it ; But just as tamely can we mark how far, perhaps, they rue it. Wha made the heart, 'tis He alone decidedly can try us ; He knows each chord, its various tone ; each spring, its various bias. Then at the balance let's be mute, we never can adjust it ■, What's done, we partly may compute, but know not what's resisted. Burns was little more than sixteen when he wrote some of his most remarkable effusions ; and the brief limit of thirty-seven years made up the poet's short span of life — a life so prolific of pleasure to the world ; so checkered and unpropitious to himself. " Or his humorous pieces, the Tarn to Him Who drowned a world, and heaped the waters far Above its loftiest mountains ?-=— a light wave. That breaks, and whispers of its Maker's might. Brainard is not unknown to fame by his fine poem. The Connecti- cut River; which commences thus: — From that lone lake, the sweetest of the chain. That links the mountain to the mighty main. Fresh from the rock and swelling by the tree. Rushing to meet, and dare, and breast the sea — Fair, noble, glorious river ! in thy wave The sunniest slopes and sweetest pastures lave : 164 The mountain torrent, with its wintry roar, Springs from its home and leaps upon thy shore : The promontories love thee — and for this Turn their rough cheeks, and stay thee for thy kiss. The young oak greets thee at the water's edge, Wet by the wave, though anchored in the ledge. 'Tis there the otter dives, the beaver feeds. Where pensive osiers dip their willowy weeds, And there the wild-cat purs amid her brood. And trains them, in the sylvan solitude. To watch the squirrel's leap, or mark the mink Paddling the water by the quiet brink ; Or to outgaze the gray owl in the dark. Or hear the young fox practising to bark. Dark as the frost-nipp'd leaves that strew'd the ground, The Indian hunter here his shelter found ; Here cut his bow and shaped his arrows true. Here built his wigwam and his bark canoe, Spear'd the quick salmon leaping up the fall. And slew the deer without the rifle-ball : Here his young squaw her cradling-tree would choose. Singing her chant to hush her swart pappoose : Here stain her quills and string her trinkets rude, And weave her warrior's wampum in the wood. No more shall they thy welcome waters bless. No more their forms thy moonlit banks shall press. No more be heard, from mountain or from grove, His whoop of slaughter, or her song of love. Something of the Promethean fire of the Elizabethan age seems to glow in the following lines by Pinkney, of Maryland : — ' i6s I fill this cup to one made up of loveliness alone, A woman, of her gentle sex the seeming paragon ; To whom the better elements and kindly stars have given A form so fair, that, like the air, 'tis less of earth than heaven. Her every tone is music's own, like those of morning birds. And something more than melody dwells ever in her words ; The coinage of her heart are they, and from her lips each flows As one may see the burthened bee forth issue from the rose. Affections are as thoughts to her, the measures of her hours ■, Her feelings have the fragrancy — the freshness of young flowers. * * * Her health ! and would on earth there stood some more of such a frame, That life might be all poetry, and weariness a name ! Cutter, cne of the poets of the West, is the author of this striking poem, entitled The Song of Steam : — Harness me down with your iron bands. Be sure of your curb and rein. For I scorn the power of your puny hands, As the tempest scorns a chain. How I laughed, as I lay concealed from sight For many a countless hour. At the childish boast of human might. And the pride of human power ! When I saw an army upon the land, A navy upon the seas. Creeping along, a snail-like band. Or waiting the wayward breeze ; When I marked the peasant faintly reel With the toil which he daily bore, \ As he feebly turned the tardy wheel, Or tugged at the weary oar ; i66 When I measured the panting courser's speed, The flight of the carrier-dove, As they bore the law a king decreed, Or the Hnes of impatient love ; — I could but think how the world would feel, As these were outstripped afar. When I should be bound to the rushing keel, Or chained to the flying car. Ha, ha, ha ! they found me at last, They invited me forth at length ; And I rushed to my throne with a thunder-blast, And laughed in my iron strength. * * * The following graceful little melody is from the pen of George D. Prentice : — In Southern seas there is an isle. Where earth and sky forever smile ; Where storms cast not their sombre hue Upon the welkin's holy blue ; Where clouds of blessed incense rise From mvriad flowers of myriad dves. And strange bright birds glance through the bowers, Like mingled stars, or mingled flowers. Oh, dear one ! would it were our lot To dwell upon that lovely spot. To stray through woods with blossoms starred. Bright as the dreams of seer or bard ; To hear each other's whispered words Mid the wild notes of tropic birds, And deem our lives, in those bright bowers. One glorious dream of love and flowers ! 167 These pleasing lines, on Olden Memories^ are by CisT, of Cin- cinnati : — They are jewels of the mind ; they are tendrils of the heart, That with our being are entwined — of our very selves a part. They the records are of youth, kept to read in after-years : They are manhood's well of truth, filled with childhood's early tears. Like the low and plaintive moan of the night-wind through the trees. Sweet to hear, though sad and lone, are those olden memories ! In our days of mirth and gladness, we may spurn their faint control. But they come, in hours of sadness, like sweet music, to the soul : And in sorrow, o'er us stealing with their gentleness and calm. They are leaves of precious healing, they are fruits of choicest balm. Ever till, when life departs, death from dross the spirit frees, Cherish in thine heart of hearts, all thine olden memories. Now let us in imagination turn our gaze towards the magnificent spectacle of an iceberg, which our American bard, Buchanan Read, so well portrays : — A fearless shape of brave device, our vessel drives through mist and rain. Between the floating fleets of ice — the navies of the northern main. These Arctic ventures, blindly hurled, the proofs of Nature's olden force. Like fragments of a crystal world long shattered from its skyey course. These are the buccaneers that fright the middle sea with dream of wrecks, And freeze the south winds in their flight, and chain the Gulf-stream to their decks. At every dragon prow and helm there stands some Viking as of yore ; Grim heroes from the boreal realm where Odin rules the spectral shore. i6S And oft beneath the sun or moon their swift and eager falchions glow, While, like a storm-vexed wmd, the rune comes chafing through some beard of snow. And when the far North flashes up with fires of mingled red and gold. They know that many a blazing cup is brimming to the absent bold. Up signal there, and let us hail yon looming phantom as we pass ! Note all her fashion, hull and sail, within the compass of your glass. See at her mast the steadfast glow of that one star of Odin's throne ; Up with our flag, and let us show the Constellation on our own, * * * No answer, but the sullen flow of ocean heaving long and vast ; An argosy of ice and snow, the voiceless North swings proudly past. w 169 Very sweet and refreshing are his liquid Hnes to the Wayside Spring : — Fair dweller by the dusty way — bright saint within a mossy shrine, The tribute of a heart to-day, weary and worn, is thine. The earliest blossoms of the year, the sweet-brier and the violet. The pious hand of Spring has here upon thy altar set. And not alone to thee is given the homage of the pilgrim's knee. But oft the sweetest birds of heaven glide down and sing to thee. Here daily from his beechen cell the hermit squirrel steals to drink. And flocks, which cluster to their bell, recline along thy brink. * * * And oft the beggar, masked with tan, in rusty garments, gray with dust. Here sits and dips his little can, and breaks his scanty crust ; And, lulled beside thy whispering stream, oft drops to slumber unawares. And sees the angel of his dream upon celestial stairs. Dear dweller by the dusty way, thou saint within a mossy shrine, The tribute of a heart to-day, weary and worn, is thine ! The following exquisite lines are from the same source : — She came, as comes the summer wind, a gust of beauty to my heart ; Then swept away, but left behind emotions which shall not depart. Unheralded she came and went, like music in the silent night — Which, when the burthened air is spent, bequeathes to memory its delight. Oi; like the sudden April bow that spans the violet-waking rain, She bade those blessed flowers to grow which may not fall or fade again. For sweeter than all things most sweet, and fairer than all things most fair. She came, and passed with footsteps fleet, a shining wonder in the air ! 170 Gallagher's fine poem on the Miami IVoods contains this glow- ing picture of Indian Summer. This poet of the West seems to have caught inspiration from the bold, primeval aspects of Nature : — What a change hath passed upon the face Of Nature, where the wa\'ing forest spreads, Once robed in deepest green ! All through the night The subtle frost hath plied its mystic art ; And in the day, the golden sun hath wrought True wonders ; and the winds of morn and even Have touched with magic breath the changing leaves. And now, as wanders the dilating eve Across the varied landscape, circling far, What gorgeousness, what blazonry, what pomp Of colors, bursts upon the ravished sight ! Here, where the maple rears its yellow crest, A golden glorv ; yonder, where the oak Stands monarch of the forest, and the ash Is girt with flame-like parasite, and broad The dogwood spreads beneath, a rolling flood Of deepest crimson •, and atar, wnere looms The gnarled gum, a cloud of bloodiest red ! * * * The two following extracts are from the same source : — When last the maple-bud was swelling, When last the crocus bloomed below. Thy heart to mine its love was telling. Thy soul with mine kept ebb and flow : Again the maple-bud is swelling — Again the crocus blooms below — In heaven thy heart its love is telling. But still our hearts keep ebb and flow. 171 When last the April bloom was flinging Sweet odours on the air of Spring, In forest-aisles thy voice was ringing, Where thou didst with the red-bird sing ; Again the April bloom is flinging Sweet odours on the air of Spring, — But now in heaven thy voice is ringing, Where thou dost with the angels sing. Broad plains — blue waters — hills and valleys, That ring with anthems of the free ! Brown-pillared groves, and green-arched alleys, That Freedom's holiest temples be ! These forest-aisles are full of story : Here many a one of old renown First sought the meteor-light of glory. And mid its transient flash — went down. Historic names forever greet us. Where'er our wandering wav we thread ; Familiar forms and faces meet us. As, living, walk with us the dead. Man's fame, so often evanescent. Links here with thoughts and things that last ; And all the bright and teeming Present Thrills with the great and glorious Past ! * * * Perkins, another of the woodland minstrels of the West, thus gilds his verse with sunshine : — Oh ! merry, merry be the day, and bright the star of even, — For 'tis our duty to be gay, and tread in holy jov our way ; Grief never came from heaven, my love, it never came from heaven. 172 Then let us not, though woes betide, complain of fortune's spite. As rock-encircled trees combine, and nearer grow and closer twine. So let our hearts unite, my love, so let our hearts unite. And though the circle here be small of heartily approved ones, There is a home beyond the skies, where vice shall sink and virtue rise, Till all become the loved ones, love, till all become the loved ones. Then let your eye be laughing still, and cloudless be your brow ; For in that better world above, O ! many myriads shall we love, As one another now, my love, as one another now. Byron, notwithstanding all his errors of creed and conduct, seems to have been possessed of fine sensibilities, as the following incident will prove : — On a certain occasion, when in London, he was solicited to subscribe for a volume of poems, by a young lady of good education, whose connections were impoverished by re- verses. He listened to her sad story, and, while conversing with her, wrote something on a piece of paper ; he then, handing it to her, said, ^' This is my subscription, and I heartily wish you success." On reaching the street, she found it to be a check for fifty pounds. That Byron was endowed with brilliant powers, none will deny ; but all do not as readily admit that those gifts were sadly perverted. It is not true, as his false morality teaches, that great crimes imply great qualities, and that virtue is a slavery : it is in the converse of the proposition that truth rests. No wonder that Byron should have recorded, in this sad refrain, his own bitter experience : — " My days are in the yellow leaf; The fruits and flowers of love are gone, — The worm, the canker, and the grief, Are mine alone." 173 What a magnificent picture does he give us in these descriptive lines, one of the finest passages in all poetry : — Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean — roll ! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain ; Man marks the earth with ruin — his control Stops with the shore ; — upon the watery plain The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain A shadow of man's ravage, save his own. When, for a moment, like a drop of rain. He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd, and unknown. 174 His steps are not upon thv paths, — thy fields Are not a spoil for him, — thou dost arise And shake him from thee ; the vile strength he wields For earth's destruction, thou dost all despise, Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies. And send'st him, shivering, in thy plavful sprav, And howling, to his gods, where haply lies His petty hope in some near port or bay. And dashest him again to earth : there let him lay. The armaments which thunder-strike the walls Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake. And monarchs tremble in their capitals ; The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make Their clay creator the vain title take Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war ; These are thy toys, and as the snowy flake. They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar Alike the Armada's pride, or spoils of Trafalgar. Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee — Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they? Thy waters wasted them while thev were free And many a tyrant since ; their shores obey The stranger, slave, or savage ; their decay Has dried up realms to deserts : — not so thou. Unchangeable save to thv wild waves' plav — Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow — Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time. Calm or convulsed — in breeze, or gale, or storm. Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime Dark-heaving ; — boundless, endless, and sublime^ '75 The image of Eternity — the throne Of the Invisible •, even from out thy sUme The monsters of the deep are made ; each zone Obeys thee ; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone. And I have loved thee. Ocean ! and my joy Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be Borne, like thy bubbles, onward : from a boy I wanton'd with thy breakers — they to me Were a delight ; and if the freshening sea Made them a terror — 'twas a pleasing fear, For I was as it were a child of thee. And trusted to thy billows far and near. And laid my hand upon thy mane — as I do here. * * * The foregoing suggests another beautiful passage, — The Ship- wreck^ — in Don Juan : — Then rose from sea to sky the wild farewell — Then shriek'd the timid, and stood still the brave, — Then some leap'd overboard with dreadful v^I^i As eager to anticipate their grave ; And the sea yawn'd around her like a hell. And down she suck'd with her the whirling wave, Like one who grapples with his enemy, And strives to strano-le him before he die. And first one universal shriek there rush'd. Louder than the loud ocean, like a crash Of echoing thunder : and then all was hush'd, Save the wild wind and the remorseless dash Of billows ; but at intervals there gush'd, Accompanied with a convulsive splash, A solitary shriek, the bubbling cry Of some strong swimmer in his agony. 176 Another vivid picture is iliat of an Alpine storm : — The sky is changed ! — and such a change ! O night, And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous strong; Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light Of a dark eve in woman ! Far along, From peak to peak, the rattling crags among, Leaps the live thunder ! Not trom one lone cloud, But every mountain now hath found a tongue, And Jura answers, through her misty shroud, Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud ! And this is in the night : — Most glorious night ! Thou wert not sent for slumber ! let me be A sharer in thy fierce and far delight, — A portion of the tempest and of thee ! How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea. And the big rain comes dancing to the earth ! And now again 'tis black,— and now the glee Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain-mirth, As if they did rejoice o'er a young earthquake's birth. Here is another fine allusion to the grandeur of Alpine scenery:— Above me are the Alps, The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps. And throned eternity in icy halls Of cold sublimity, where forms and falls The avalanche, — the thunderbolt of snow ! All that expands the spirit, yet appals, Gathers around these summits, as to show How earth may pierce to heaven, yet leave vain nian below. * * * X 177 Byron's power is seen in the following passage, because it admira- bly exemplifies the union of great simplicity, both in conception and expression, with true poetic sublimity. The scene which excites the emotion is the memorable plain of Marathon, situated between a range of mountain^ on the one side, and the sea on the other :-^ The mountains look on Marathon, and Marathon looks on the sea ; And musing there an hour alone, I dreamed that Greece might still be free ; For, standing on the Persian's grave, I could not deem myself a slave. A king sat on the rocky brow which looks o'er sea-born Salamis ; And ships, by thousands, lay below, and men in nations ; all were his ! He counted them at break of day ; And when the sun set, — where were they ? Campbell used to say, that the lines which first convinced him that Byron was a true poet, were these, from the Childe^ Harold : — Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags as wild ; Sweet are thy groves, and verdant are thy fields, Thine olive ripe as when Minerva smiled. And still his honeyed wealth Hymettus yields ; There the blithe bee his fragrant fortress builds. The free-born wanderer of thy mountain air j Apollo still thy long, long summer gilds. Still in his beam Mendali's marbles glare ; Art, glory, freedom fail, but Nature still is fair ! The Childe Harold^ which appeared at various intervals, is gene- rally supposed to be a narration of the author's life and travels. Shall we cite more of the brilliant passages which sparkle over its ' Childe is the old word for Knight. 178 I pages f Rogers thought Byron's finest passage was that on Solitude, in the second canto ot the poem : — To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell, To slowly trace the forest's shady scene, Where things that own not man's dominipn dwell, And mortal foot hath ne'er, or rarely, been ; To climb the trackless mountain all unseen, With the wild flock that never needs a foid ; Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean ; This is not solitude ; 'tis but to hold Converse with Nature's charms, and see her stores unroll'd. But midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men. To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess. And roam along, the world's tired denizen. With none who bless us, none whom we can bless ; Minions of splendour shrinking from distress ! None that, with kindred consciousness endued. If we were nut, would seem to smile the less. Of all that flattered, followed, sought, and sued: This is to be alone ; this, this is solitude ! Here are his moral reflections on a skull : — Look on its broken arch, its ruined wall. Its chambers desolate, and portals foul : Yes, this was once ambition's airv hall. The dome of thought, the palace of the soul : Behold through each lack-lustre, eyeless hole, The gay recess of wisdom and of wit. And passion's host, that never brook'd control Can all saint, sage, or sophist ever writ. People this lonely tower, this tenement refit ? 179 How vividly he presents to us the scene of a Spanish bull- fight :- The lists are oped, the spacious area cleared, Thousands on thousands piled are seated round ; Long ere the first loud trumpet's note is heard, No vacant space for lated wight is found ; Here dons, grandees, but chiefly dames, abound, Skill'd in the ogle of a roguish eye. Yet ever well inclined to heal the wound : None through their cold disdain are doom'd to die. As moon-struck bards complain, by love's sad archery. Hushed is the din of tongues — on gallant steeds, With milk-white crest, gold spur, and light-poised lance, Four cavaliers prepare for venturous deeds, And lowly bending to the lists, advance • Rich are their scarfs, their chargers featly prance : iSo If in the dangerous game they shine to-day, The crowd's loud shout and ladies' lovely glance, Best prize of better acts, they bear away, And all that kings or chiefs e'er gain, their toils repay. In costly sheen and gaudy cloak arrayed. But all a-foot, the light-limb'd Matadore Stands in the centre, eager to invade The lord of lowing herds ; but not before The ground, with cautious tread, is traversed o'er, Lest aught unseen should lurk to thwart his speed : His arms a dart, he fights aloof, nor more Can man achieve without the friendly steed, — Alas ! too oft condemn'd for h'm to bear and bleed. Thrice sounds the clarion ; lo ! the signal falls. The den expands, and Expectation mute Gapes round the silent circle's peopled walls. Bounds with one lashing spring the mighty brute. And, wildly staring, spurns, with sounding foot, The sand, nor blindly rushes on his foe : Here, there, he points his threatening front, to suit His first attack, wide waving to and fro His angry tail ; red rolls his eye's dilated glow. Sudden he stops : his eye is fix'd : away. Away, thou heedless boy ! prepare the spear : Now is thy time to perish, or display The skill that yet may check his mad career. With well-timed croupe the nimble coursers veer ; On foams the bull, but not unscathed he goes ; Streams from his flank the crimson torrent clear ; He flies, he wheels, distracted with his throes ; Dart follows dart ; lance, lance ; loud bellowings speak his woes. * * * Foiled, bleeding, breathless, furious to the last, Full in the centre stands the bull at bay. Mid wounds and clinging darts, and lances brast, And foes disabled in the brutal fray ; And now the Matadores around him play, Shake the red cloak, and poise the ready brand : Once more through all he bursts his thundering way — Vain rage ! the mantle quits the conynge hand. Wraps his fierce eye — 'tis past — he sinks upon the sand ! * * * Byron was a facile writer, — he composed his Bride of Ahydos ir» a single night, and, it is said, without once mending his pen : this is not improbable, since his chirography was not remarkably distinct. The Corsair^ which has been thought by some critics his best pro- duction, was written in three weeks. Byron is said to have received from Murray, his publisher, for the entire copyrights of his works, upwards of thirty thousand guineas. Among the numerous fine images which adorn Bvron's poetry, Wordsworth considered the two following the most felicitous : — Yet, Freedom ! yet thy banner, torn, but flying. Streams like the thunder-storm against the wind ! For Freedom's battle, once begun. Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son, Though baffled oft, is ever won ! Here are some more beautiful gems : — Between two worlds life hovers like a star, 'Twixt night and morn, upon the horizon's verge How little do we know that which we are ! How less what we mav be ! The eternal surge Of time and tide rolls on, and bears afar Our bubbles ; as the old burst, new emerge, Lash'd from the foam of ages ; while the graves Of empires heave but like some passing waves. There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore. There is society, where none intrudes. By the deep sea, and music in its roar : I love not Man the less, but Nature more. From these our interviews, in which I steal From all I may be, or have been before, To mingle with the Universe, and feel What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. The Rainbow : — A heavenly chameleon, The airy child of vapour and the sun, Brought forth in purple, cradled in vermilion. Baptized in molten gold, and swathed in dun, Glittering like crescents o'er a Turk's pavilion, And blending every colour into one. Poetry has been sometimes styled the " flower of experience ;" and we have an illustration of this in the case of Crabbe, who so well knew, from his own early struggles and privations, both how to pity and portray those of others. He was the poet of the poor, and for the fidelity of his sketches has been called " the Hogarth of verse." Well might Washington Irving — referring to the nume- rous instances in which the poetic gift has been cradled in obscurity and poverty — quaintly remark, " Genius delights to nestle its ofF- 183 spring in strange places !" Let us read a few lines addressed by Crabbe tj a Library : — Wisdom loves This seat serene, and virtue's self approves : Here come the grieved, a change of thought to find, — The curious here, to teed a craving mind ; Here the devout their peaceful temple choose, And here the poet meets his favourite muse. With awe, around these silent walks I tread, — These are the lasting mansions of the dead : " The dead !" methinks a thousand tongues reply — - ** These are the tombs of such as cannot die ! Crowned with eternal fame, they sit sublime, And laugh at all the little strife of time !" Sir Walter Scott, who has been styled " the potent wizard of romance, at the waving of whose wand came trooping on the stage of life again, gallant knights and ladies fair, foaming chargers and splendid tournaments, with their flashing armour and blazoned shields," was also the poet who loved to sing of knightly deeds of valour and old traditional love-lays. He was endowed with a wonderful facility of composition. His brain has been compared to a high-pressure engine, the steam of which was " up " as soon as he entered his study, which was generally at six o'clock in the morning. After three hours' labour came breakfast, and after that he resumed his studies till dinner- time. Scott is believed to have acquired over half a million of pounds sterling by his various literary labours, — an amount altogether unap- proached by any other author of ancient or modern times. His own life-story, so full of vicissitude and surprising incident, has been styled a greater marvel than any of his romantic fictions. 184 SIR WALTER SCOTT. His severe literary toils were not intermitted even amid the heavy financial disasters which overtook him in connection with the failure of his publishers ; but with heroic determination he persevered in the noble purpose of discharging these obligations. Having accom- plished the herculean task, his physical strength began to fail ; and after a tour to Italy, he returned to Abbotsford, totally exhausted. When he arrived there, his dogs came about his knees, and he sobbed over them till he was reduced to a state of stupefaction. After lingering for two months, his mind became more clear, when he would ask to be placed at his desk, but the fingers refused to grasp the pen, and he sunk back, weeping. On the list of September, 1832, Sir Walter breathed his last. Not long before he died, he said : " I have been, perhaps, the most voluminous author of the day, and it is a comfort to me to think that I have tried to unsettle no man's faith, to corrupt no man's principles, and that I have written nothing which, on my death-bed, I should wish blotted." Melrose he has consecrated by his genius, Abbotsford by his living presence, and Dryburgh is made sacred by his sleeping dust : while Nature herself may be said, in his own beautiful lines, to do homage to the memory of his muse : — Call it not vain ; they do not err, Who say that when the poet dies, Mute Nature mourns her worshipper, And celebrates his obsequies : Who say, — tall cliff and cavern lone, For the departed bard make moan : That mountains weep in crystal rill, — That flowers in tears of balm distil, — Through his loved groves that breezes sigh, And oaks in deeper groan reply ; And rivers teach the rushing; wave To murmur dirges round his grave. Y 185 In his Rokeby we have this fine song : — Allen-a-Dale has no fagot for burning, AUen-a-Dale has no furrow for turning, Allen-a-Dale has no fleece for the spinning, Yet Allen-a-Dale has red gold for the winning. Come, read me my riddle ; come, hearken my tale I And tell me the craft of bold Allen-a-Dale. The Baron of Ravensworth prances In pride, And he views his domains upon Arkindale side. The mere for his net, and the land for his game, The chase for the wild, and the park for the tame ; Yet the fish of the lake, and the deer of the vale, Are less free to Lord Dacre than Allen-a-Dale. Allen-a-Dale was ne'er belted a knight. Though his spur be as sharp, and his blade be as bright ; Allen-a-Dale is no baron or lord. Yet twenty tall yeomen will draw at his word •, And the best of our nobles his bonnet will vail, Who at Rere-cross on Stanmore meets Allen-a-Dale. Allen-a-Dale to his wooing is come ; The mother, she asked of his household and home : *' Though the Castle of Richmond stands fair on the hill. My hall," quoth bold Allen, " shows gallanter still ; 'Tis the blue vault of heaven, with its crescent so pale, And with all its bright spangles," — said Allen-a-Dale. The father was steel, and the mother was stone ; They lifted the latch, and they bade him begone ; But loud, on the morrow, their wail and their cry ! He had laughed on the lass with his bonnie black eye. And she fled to the forest to hear a love-tale. And the youth it was told by was — Allen-a-Dale ! Let us now note the interview of the Last Minstrel with the Duchess : — He passed where Newark's stately tower Looks out from Yarrow's birchen bower : The Minstrel gazed with wistful eye — No humbler resting-place was nigh. 187 With hesitating step at last The embattled portal-arch he passed, Whose pond'rous grate and massy bar Had oft rolled back the tide of war, But never closed the iron door Against the desolate and poor. The Duchess marked his weary pace, His timid mien, and reverend face. And bade her page the menials tell, That they should tend the old man well : For she had known adversity. Though born in such a high degree ; — In pride of power, in beauty's bloom. Had wept o'er Monmouth's bloody tomb I * * * The aged Minstrel audience gained. But when to tune his harp he tried, His trembling hand had lost the ease Which marks security to please ; And scenes long past, of joy and pain, Came wildering o'er his aged brain — He tried to tune his harp in vain. The pitying Duchess praised its chime, And gave him heart, and gave him time, Till every string's according glee Was blended into harmony. And then, he said, he would full fain He could recall an ancient strain He never thought to sing again. It was not framed for village churls. But for high dames and mighty earls : i88 He had played it to King Charles the Good, When Ije kept court in Holyrood ; And much he wished, yet feared to try The long-forgotten melody. Hear his tribute to the Worth of Woman : — O woman ! in our hours of ease, Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, And variable as the shade By the light quivering aspen made. When pain and anguish wring the brow, A ministering angel thou .' We all remember his fine lines on Patriotism : — Breathes there the man, with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land ? Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned, As home his footsteps he hath turned. From wandering on a foreign strand ? If such there be, go, mark him well ; For him no minstrel's raptures swell ; High though his titles — proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish can claim ; — Despite those titles, power, and pelf. The wretch, concentred all in self. Living, shall forfeit fair renown. And doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust from whence he sprung. Unwept, unhonoured, and unsung. Scattered through his prose writings, we occasionally meet with 189 some of his little songs : here is an admonitory one, trom The An- tiquary^ on Tune : — *' Why sitt'st thou by that ruined hall, Thou aged carle, so stern and gray ? Dost thou its former pride recall. Or ponder how it passed away ?" " Know''si thou not me r" the Deep Voice cried ; " So long enjoyed, so oft misused — Alternate, in thv hckle pride, Desired, neglected, and accused ! '' Before my breath, like blazing flax, Man and his marvels pass away ; And changing empires wane and wax. Are founded, flourish, and decay. " Redeem mine hours — the space is "brief — While in my glass the sand-grains shiver, And measureless thv jov or grief, When Time and thou shalt part forever !" Now for a dainty little Serenade, from The Pirate: — Love wakes and weeps, while Beauty sleeps ! O for Music's softest numbers. To prompt a theme for Beauty's dream, Soft as the pillow of her slumbers ! Through groves of palm sigh gales of balm. Fire-flies on the air are wheeling ; While through the gloom comes soft perfume, The distant beds of flowers revealing. 190 O wake and live ! No dream can give A shadowed bliss the real excelling ; No longer sleep, from lattice peep, And list the tale that love is telling ! His Marmion is replete with glowing and picturesque passages, stirring descriptions, and the tumult and clash of arms. When Cap- tain Ferguson was serving in the Peninsular war, a copy of this work reached him ; and while his men were lying prostrate on the ground, and he kneeling at their head, he read aloud the description of the battle in the sixth canto, — the listening soldiers interrupting him only by a joyous huzza whenever the French shot struck the banks close above them. This incident presents one of the most remark- able instances on record of the power of verse. Listen to a brief extract, full of the action and excitement of the field ; — it is just when twilight falls upon the scene of conflict : — But naught distinct they see : While raged the battle on the plain ; Spears shook, and falchions flashed amain ; Fell England's arrow-flight like rain ; Crests rose, and stooped, and rose again, Wild and disorderly. * * * But as they left the darkening heath, More desperate grew the strife of death. The English shafts in volleys hailed, In headlong charge their horse assailed ; Front, flank, and rear, the squadrons sweep. To break the Scottish circle deep. That fought around their king. But yet, though thick the shafts as snow. Though charging knights like whirlwinds go. Though bill-men ply the ghastly blow, Unbroken was the ring. 191 The stubborn spearmen still made good Their dark, impenetrable wood, Each stepping where his comrade stood The instant that he fell. No thought was there of dastard flight ; Linked in the serried phalanx tight. Groom fought like noble, squire like knight, As fearless and as well : Till utter darkness closed her wing O'er their thin host and wounded king. * * * A yet more stirring passage is that of the death-scene of the hero, which closes thus : — The war, that for a space did fail. Now, trebly thundering, swelled the gale. And " Stanley !" was the cry : A light on Marmion's visage spread. And fixed his glazing eye : With dying hand, above his head He shook the fragment of his blade. And shouted "Victory!" " Charge, Chester, charge ! On, Stanley, on !" Were the last words of Marmion. Hogg, the " Ettrick shepherd," has written many beautiful lyrics : we select two of his most admired. The first is entitled. When the Kye come home. This is the latest version of this very beautiful pastoral song : — Come all ye jolly shepherds that whistle through the glen, I'll tell ye of a secret that courtiers dinna ken, — What is the greatest bliss that the tongue o' man can name ^. 'Tis to woo a bonnie lassie when the kye come hame. 19a When the kye come hame, when the kye come hame, 'Tween the gloamin' and the mirk, when the kye come hame. 'Tis not beneath the burgonet, nor yet beneath the crown, 'Tis not on couch of velvet, nor yet on bed of down — 'Tis beneath the spreading birch, in the dell without a name, Wi' a bonnie, bonnie lassie, when the kye come hame. 7 193 Then the eye shines so bright, the hale soul to beguile, There's love in every whisper, and joy in every smile ; O, wha wad choose a crown, wi' its perils and its fame. And miss a bonnie lassie, when the kye come hame ? See yonder pawkie shepherd, that lingers on the hill. His ewes are in the fauld, and his lambs are lying still : Yet he downa gang to bed, for his heart is in a flame — To meet his bonnie lassie, when the kye come hame. Awa' wi' fame and fortune — what comfort can they gi'e ? And a' the arts that prey upon man's life and liberty : Gi'e me the highest joy that the heart o' man can frame — My bonnie, bonnie lassie, when the kye come hame. His Skylark is a general favorite, for its rich melody : — Bird of the wilderness, blithesome and cumberless, Sweet be thy matin o'er moorland and lea ! Emblem of happiness, blest is thv dwelling-place — O to abide in the desert with thee ! Wild is thy lay and loud, far in the downy cloud. Love gives it energy, love gave it birth. Where, on thy dewy wing, where art thou journeying ? Thy lay is in heaven, thy love is on earth. O'er fell and fountain sheen, o'er moor and mountain green, O'er the red streamer that heralds the day. Over the cloudlet dim, over the rainbow's rim, Musical cherub, soar, singing away ! Then, when the gloaming comes, low m the heather bloonu Sweet will thy welcome and bed of love be ! Emblem of happiness, blest is thy dwelling-place — O to abide in the desert with thee ! 194 Lamb — the gentle, genial '•'■ Elia" — thus soliloquizes upon the loss of friends : — I have had playmates, I have had companions. In my days of childhood, in my joyful school-days ; All, all are gone, the old familiar faces ! I have been laughing, I have been carousing, Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cronies ; All, all are gone, the old familiar faces ! * * * Ghost-like I paced round the haunts of my childhood ; Earth seemed a desert I was bound to traverse. Seeking to find the old familiar faces. Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother. Why wert not thou born in my father's dwelling ? So might we talk of the old familiar faces : How some they have died, and some they have left me, And some are taken from me ; all are departed -, All, all are gone — the old familiar faces ! The genius of Kirke White, which elicited the beautiful trib- ute of Byron, is seen in the following lines, addressed to An Early Primrose : — Mild offspring of a dark and sullen sire ! Whose modest form, so delicately fine. Was nursed in whirling storms, and cradled in the winds : Thee, when young Spring first questioned Winter's sway, And dared the sturdy blusterer to the fight. Thee on this bank he threw, to mark his victory. In this low vale, the promise of the year. Serene, thou openest to the nipping gale, Unnoticed and alone, thy tender elegance. So virtue blooms, brought forth amid the storms Of chill adversity ; in some lone walk Of life she rears her head, obscure and unobserved ; While every bleaching breeze that on her blows, Chastens her spotless purity of breast. And hardens her to bear serene the ills of life. Hear Montgomery's glowing apostrophe to Home: — There is a spot of earth supremely blest — A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest — Where man, creation's tyrant, casts aside His sword and sceptre, pageantry and pride ; While in his softened looks benignly blend The sire, the son, the husband, brother, friend ; Here woman reigns, — the mother, daughter, wife, — Strews with fresh flowers the narrow way of life ; In the clear heaven of her delighted eye, An angel-guard of loves and graces lie ; Around her knees domestic duties meet. And fireside pleasures gambol at her feet. * * * The beautiful lines which he wrote upon Burns, will win a wel- come from every reader : — What bird, in beauty, flight, or song, can with the Bard compare, Who sang as sweet, and soared as strong, as ever child of air ? His plume, his note, his form, could Burns for whim or pleasure change ; He was not one, but all by turns, with transmigration strange : — ' The blackbird, oracle of Spring, when flowed his moral lay ; The swallow, wheeling on the wing, capriciously at play ; 196 The humming-bird, tVom bloom to bloom, inhaling heavenly balm ; The raven, in the tempest's gloom, the halcyon in the calm : * * * The woodlark in his mournful hours, the goldfinch in his mirth ; The thrush, a spendthrift of his powers, enrapturing heaven and earth ; The swan, in majesty and grace, contemplative and still : But roused — no falcon in the chase could like his satire kill •, The linnet, in simplicity ; in tenderness, the dove ; But more than all beside was he the nightingale in love. Oh ! had he never stooped to shame, nor lent a charm to vice, How had devotion loved to name that bird of paradise ! Peace to the dead ! In Scotia's choir of minstrels great and small. He sprang from his spontaneous fire, the phoenix of them all ! One of the most spirit-stirring poems in the language is Mont- gomery's Patriot's Pass-word. It is founded on the heroic achieve- ment of Arnold de Winkelried, at the battle of Sempach, in which the Swiss insurgents secured the freedom of their country against the despotic power of Austria, in the fourteenth century : — Ir arms the Austrian phalanx stood, — A living wall, — a human wood ! Impregnable their front appears. All horrent with projected spears. Whose polished points before them shine. From flank to flank, one brilliant line. Bright as the breakers' splendors run Along the billows to the sun. Opposed to these, a hovering band Contended for their fatherland. * * * Marshalled once more at Freedom's call, They came to conquer, or to fall, — 197 Where he who conquered, he who fell. Was deemed a dead or living Tell. Such virtue had that patriot breathea. So to the soil his soul bequeathed, That wheresoe'er his arrows flew. Heroes in his own likeness grew, And warriors sprang from every sod Which his awakening footstep trod. And now the work of life and death Hung on the passing of a breath ; The fire of conflict burned within, The battle trembled to begin ; Yet while the Austrians held their ground. Point for assault was nowhere found ; Where'er the impatient Switzers gazed, The unbroken line of lances blazed ; That line 'twere suicide to meet, And perish at their tyrants' feet : How could they rest within their graves. To leave their homes t^e haunts of slaves t Would they not feel their children tread. With clanking chains, above their head r It must not be ; — this day, this hour. Annihilates the invader's power ; All Switzerland is in the field, She will not fly, she cannot yield, — She must not fall ; her better fate Here gives her an immortal date. Few were the numbers she could boast. Yet every freeman was a host, And felt as 'twere a secret known. That one should turn the scale alone. While each unto himself was he On whose sole arm huna; victory ! It did depend on one mcfeed ; Behold him — Arnold Winkelried ! There sounds not to the trump of fame The echo of a nobler name. Unmarked he stood amidst the throng, In rumination deep and long, Till you might see, with sudden grace, The very thought come o'er his face. And by the motion of his form Anticipate the bursting storm. And by the uplifting of his brow 199 Tell where the bolt would strike, and how. But 'twas no sooner thought than done ! The field was in a moment won : — " Make way for Liberty !" he cried, Then ran, with arms extended wide, As if his dearest friend to clasp ;— Ten spears he swept within his grasp ; — ** Make way for Liberty !" he cried ; Their keen points crossed from side to side ; He bowed amidst them like a tree, And thus made way for Liberty ! Swift to the breach his comrades fly ; " Make way for Liberty !" thev cry, And through the Austrian phalanx dart, As rushed the spears through Arnold's heart, While, instantaneous as his fall. Rout, ruin^ panic seized them all ; An earthquake could not overthrow A city with a surer blow. Thus Switzerland again was free, — Thus death made way for Liberty ! It was remarked by Wordsworth, that many great men of this age had done wonderful things^ but that Coleridge was the only wonderful man he ever knew : and this opinion was shared by many others who visited the author of The Ancient Mariner. His charac- ter has been compared to a vast unfinished cathedral or palace, — beautiful in its decoration and gigantic in its proportions, but in- complete. Coleridge is said to have left behind him a prodigious amount of treatises — unfinished. Lamb informs us that, two days before his death, he wrote to a bookseller, proposing an epic poem, on The Wanderings of Cain., to be in twenty-four books. His early devotion to metaphysical studies continued with him through life, as well as his love of poesy, which he tells us had been to him " its own exceeding great reward." This is seen, indeed, in the gush of poetic joy which pervades the following beautiful retrospect : — Verse, a breeze mid blossoms straying, Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee, — Both were mine ! Life went a-Maying With nature, hope, and poesy, When I was young ! When I was young ? — Ah, woful when ! Ah ! for the change 'twixt now and then ! This breathing house not built with hands, This body that does me grievous wrong, O'er aerv cliffs and glittering sands. How lightly then it flashed along ; Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore. On winding lakes and rivers wide, That ask no aid of sail or oar. That fear no spite of wind or tide ! Naught cared this body for wind or weather When Youth and I lived in't together. Flowers are lovely •, love is flower-like ; Friendship is a sheltering: tree ; Oh, the joys that came down shower-like, Of friendship, love, and liberty. Ere I was old ! Ere I was old ? — Ah, woful ere ! Which tells me. Youth's no longer here ! O Youth ! for years so many and sweet 'Tis known that thou and I were one j I'll think it but a fond conceit — It cannot be that thou art gone ! Thy vesper-bell hath not yet toll'd — ' And thou wert aye a masker bold. What strange disguise hast now put on, To make believe that thou art gone ? I see these locks in silvery slips, This drooping gait, this altered size ; But spring-tide blossoms on thy lips, And tears take sunshine from thine eyes ! Life is but thought ; so think I vi^ill. That Youth and I are house-mates still. Coleridge was an impressive talker. On one occasion he asked Charles Lamb if he ever heard him preach ? " I never heard you do any thing else," was his reply. His changeful career exhibits many phases ot character ; but to us he is most interesting as a poet. After leaving the Lakes — the neighbourhood of Southey, and the birth-place of Chr'istahel — he took up his abode at Highgate, near London, ostensibly for medical treatment of his passion for opium, an indulgence for which he paid a fearful penalty. This habit of intoxication accounts for the strange mystery of his poetry ; which has caused him, indeed, to be styled "a magnificent dreamer." Yet his wildest and most mystic poems are so thoughtful, dulcet, and fascinating, that they hold us spell-bound. His Ancient Mariner^ Chr'istahel^ and Kubla Khan^ are of this class. The last named, which is so remarkable for its rich delicacy of colouring, as well as its melody, owes its origin to the following incident : — The author relates that, in the summer of 1797, he was residing in a lonely farm-house, where, being unwell, he took an anodyne, from the effects of which he fell asleep in his chair, at the moment he was reading the following sentence in Purchases Pilgrims : — ^^ Here the Khan Kubla commanded a palace to be built, and a stately garden thereunto ; and thus ten miles of fertile ground were enclosed with a wall." He continued asleep for three hours, during which he vividly remembered having composed from two to three hundred lines, and this without any consciousness of effort. On awaking, he remembered the whole, and, talcing his pen, began instantly and eagerly to commit it to paper. He had written as far as the pub- lished fragment, when he was interrupted by some person on urgent business, which detained him about an hour. On resumino- his pen, he was mortified to find that, with the exception of a few lines, all had vanished from his memory. Coleridge's sweet and simple lines, written in early life. To Gene- vieve^ evince a beautiful delicacy of sentiment : — Maid of my love, sweet Genevieve I In beauty's light you glide along : Your eye is like the star of eve. And sweet your voice as seraph's song. Yet not your heavenly beauty gives This heart with passion soft to glow ; Within your soul a voice there lives — It bids vou hear the tale of woe. When, sinking low, the sufferer wan Beholds no hand outstretched to save ; Fair as the bosom of the swan, That rises graceful o'er the wave, I've seen your breast with pity heave. And therefore love I you, sweet Genevieve ! Coleridge had extraordinary power of summoning up images in his own mind ; a remarkable instance of this is, his poem purport- ing to be " composed in the Vale of Chamouni," since he never was at Chamouni, or near it, in his life, as we learn from Words- worth. The origin of the Ancient Mariner^ as related by Words- worth, is somewhat humorous. "It arose," he says, "out of the want of five pounds which Coleridge and I needed to make a tour together in Devonshire. We agreed to write, jointly, a poem, the subject of which Coleridge took from a dream which a friend of his 203 had once dreamt concerning a -person suffering under a dire curse from the commission of some crime. I supplied the crime, the shooting of the Albatross, from an incident I had met with in one of Shelvocke's voyages. We tried the poem conjointly for a day or two, but we pulled different ways, and only a few lines of it are mine." This fascinating poem is familiar to us all. Coleridge's exquisite stanzas, entitled Love^ were originally pre- ceded by the following beautiful lines : — O leave the lily on its stem ; O leave the rose upon the spray ; O leave the elder bloom, fair maids ! and listen to my lay. A cypress and a myrtle bough this morn around my harp you twined. Because it fashioned mournfully its murmurs in the wind. And now a tale of love and woe, a woful tale of love I sing ; Hark, gentle maidens ! hark, it sighs, and trembles on the string. But most, my own dear Genevieve, it sighs and trembles most for thee ! O come, and hear the cruel wrongs befell the Dark Ladie. Then follow the well-known stanzas, which were intended to form part of a projected poem, entitled The DSrk Ladie : — All thoughts, all passions, all delights, whatever stirs this mortal frame. All are but ministers of Love, and feed his sacred flame. Oft in my waking dreams do I live o'er again that happy hour, When midway on the mount I lay beside the ruined tower. The moonshine, stealing on the scene, had blended with the lights of eve ; And she was there, my hope, my joy, — my own dear Genevieve ! She leaned against the armed man, — the statue of the armed knight ; She stood and listened to my lav, amid the lingering light. 204 J Few sorrows hath she of her own, my hope, my joy, my Genevieve! She loves me best whene'er I sing the songs that make her grieve. I played a soft and doleful air, I sang an old and moving story, — An old, rude song, that suited well that ruin wild and hoary. She listened with a flittmg blush, with downcast eyes and modest grace ; For well she knew, I could not choose but gaze upon her face. Here is introduced the story of the knight -, after which the poet continues : — But when I reached that tenderest strain of all the ditty. My faltering voice and pausing harp disturbed her soul with pitv. She wept with pity and delight — she blushed with love and virgin shame ; And, like the murmur of a dream, I heard her breathe mv name. Her bosom heaved, she stepped aside ; as conscious of my look, she stepped ; Then suddenly, with timorous eye, she fled to me and wept. She half enclosed me with her arms — she pressed me with a meek embrace ; And bending back her head, looked up, and gazed upon my face. 'Twas partly love and partly fear, and partly 'twas a bashful art. That I might rather feel than see the swelling of her heart. I calmed her fears, and she was calm, and told her love with virgin pride. And so I won my Genevieve, — my bright and beauteous bride ! The following playful lines were recently found on the back of one of the manuscripts of Coleridge : — Love's Burial-place : a Madrigal, Lady. If Love be dead — (and you aver it !) Tell me, Bard, where Love lies buried. Poet. Love lies buried where 'twas born : Ah, faithless nymph ! think it no scorn, If in my fancy I presume To call thy bosom poor Love's tomb. And on that tomb to read the line, — " Here lies a Love that once seemed mine, But took a chill, as I divine. And died at length of a decline !" Coleridge thus condenses Courtship into a couple of stanzas :— We pledged our hearts, my love and I, I in my arms the maiden clasping ; I could not tell the reason why. But, oh ! I trembled like an aspen. Her father's love she bade me gain ; I went, but shook like any reed ! I strove to act the man — in vain ! We had exchanged our hearts indeed. Edgar A. Poe, whose minstrelsy sounds like the " echoes of strange, unearthly music," is best known bv that remarkable pro- duction, The Raven., which, like The Ancient Mariner., holds the reader spell-bound by its mystic fascination. His song of Annabel Lee is a general favourite : — It was many and many a year ago, in a kingdom by the sea, That a maiden lived, whom you may know by the name of Anna- bel Lee : :o6 And this maiden she lived with no other thought than to love, and be loved by me. I was a child and she was a child, in this kingdom by the sea ; But we loved with a love that was more than love, I and my An- nabel Lee, — With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven coveted her and me. And this was the reason that, long ago, in this kingdom bv the sea, A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling mv beautiful Annabel Lee : So that her high-born kinsman came, and bore her away from me, To shut her up in a sepulchre in this kingdom by the sea. * * * But our love it was stronger by far than the love of those who were older than we, Of many far wiser than we ; 207 And neither the angels in heaven above, nor the demons down under the sea, Can ever dissever my soul from the soul of the beautiful Annabel Lee. For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams of the beau- tiful Annabel Lee ; And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes of the beautiful Annabel Lee. And so all the night-tide I lie down bv the side Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride, In the sepulchre there by the sea, in her tomb by the sounding sea ! Poe's Bells are full of ringing melody. Listen : — Hear the sledges with the bells — silver bells ! What a world of merriment their melody foretells ! How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, in the icy air of night ! While the stars that oversprinkle All the heavens, seem to twinkle with a crystalline delight ; Keeping time, time, time, in a sort of Runic rhyme, To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells From the bells, bells, bells, From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells. Hear the mellow wedding-bells — golden bells ! What a world of happiness their harmony foretells ! Through the balmy air of night how they ring out their delight ! From the molten golden notes, and all in tune, What a liquid ditty floats To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats on the moon ! Oh, from out the sounding cells what a gush of euphony volumi- nously wells ! How it swells ! how it dwells on the future, how it tells Of the rapture that impels 208 c^S^J^ <>. -/^/;rM^ I J To the swinging and the ringing of the bells, bells, bells. To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells ! Hear the loud alarum-bells — brazen bells ! What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells ! In the startled ear of night how they scream out their affright ; Too much horrified to speak, thev can only shriek, shriek, out of tune. In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire. In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire. Leaping higher, higher, higher, with a desperate desire. And a resolute endeavour, now, now to sit, or never. By the side of the pale-faced moon. Oh, the bells, bells, bells ! what a tale their terror tells of despair ! How thev clang, and clash, and roar ! what a horror they outpour On the bosom of the palpitating'air ! * * * Mrs. Hemans's poetry has been compared to a cathedral chant — deep, solemn, and impressive ; entrancing rather than exciting the spirit. The feeling of gloom and sadness which characterizes many of her fine poems, causes little surprise to those who are familiar with the history of her domestic sorrows and sufferings. Her numerous productions, it is well known, are marked by religious purity and womanly tenderness and grace. The last contribution of her muse was a fine sonnet on The Sabbath^ — a "soul-full efi^ision" of despondency and aspiration, written three weeks before she died. Her death was serene, and illustrative of one of her own beautiful dirges, — fittingly, indeed, inscribed over her tomb : — Calm on the bosom of thy God, Fair Spirit, rest thee now ; Even while with us thy footsteps trod. His seal was on thy brow, z B 209 Dust to its narrow house beneath, Soul to its place on high ! They that have seen thy look in death, No more may fear to die. How full of touching beauty is her poem entitled The Hour of Death !— Leaves have their time to fall. And flowers to wither at the north wind's breath, And stars to set ; but all, Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O Death ! Day is for mortal care. Eve for glad meetings round the joyous hearth. Night for the dreams of sleep, the voice of prayer ; But all for thee, thou mightiest of the earth ! * * * What a charming description has she given us of the Homes of England : — The stately homes of England, how beautiful they stand ! Amidst their tall ancestral trees, o'er all the pleasant land. The deer across their greensward bound through shade and sunny gleam. And the swan glides past them, with the sound of some rejoicing stream. The merry homes of England ! Around their hearths by night, What gladsome looks of household love meet in the ruddy light ! There woman's voice flows forth in song, or childhood's tale is told. Or lips move tunefully along some glorious page of old. * * * Among her best productions we class her Greek Song of Exile^ Treasures of the Deep^ and The Forest Sanctuary ; but they must be perused entire, to enjoy their touching beauty. Familiar as they are to us, from their home interest, yet we never grow weary of her admirable stanzas on the Landing of the Pilgrims : — The breaking waves dashed high on a stern and rock-bound coast, And the woods against a stormy sky their giant branches tossed : And the heavy night hung dark the hills and waters o'er, When a band of exiles moored their bark on the wild New England shore. Not as the conqueror comes, they, the true-hearted, came. Not with roll of stirring drums, and the trumpet that sings of fame : Not as the flying come, in silence and in fear, — They shook the depths of the desert's gloom with their hymns of lofty cheer. Amidst the storm they sang, and the stars heard and the sea ! And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang to the anthem of the free ! The ocean eagle soared from his nest by the white wave's foam. And the rocking pines of the forest roared — this was their welcome home ! There were men with hoary hair amidst that pilgrim band — Why had they come to wither there, away from their childhood's land ? There was woman's fearless eye, lit by her deep love's truth ; There was manhood's brow, serenely high, and the fiery heart of youth. What sought they thus afar ? bright jewels of the mine ? The wealth of seas, the spoils of war ? — they sought a faith's pure shrine ! Ay, call it holy ground, the soil where first they trod -, They have left unstained, what there they found — freedom to wor- ship God ! Mrs. Hemans thus gracefully enshrines in verse a beautiful Indian legend from Chateaubriand's Souvenirs d' Jmerique : — We saw thee, O Stranger, and wept ! We looked for the youth of the sunny glance, Whose step was the fleetest in chase or dance ! The light of his eye was a joy to see, The path of his arrows a storm to flee ! But there came a voice from a distant shore : He was call'd — he is found midst his tribe no more! He is not in his place when the night-fires burn. We look for him still — he will yet return ! His brother sat with a drooping brow In the gloom of the shadowing cypress bough : We roused him — we bade him no longer pine, For we heard a step — but the step was thine. We saw thee, O stranger, and wept ! We looked for the maid of the mournful song — Mournful, though sweet — she hath left us long ! We told her the youth of her love was gone. And she went forth to seek him — she passed alone: We hear not her voice when the woods are still. From the bower where it sang, like a silvery rill. The joy of her sire with her smile is fled. The winter is white on his lonely head. He hath none by his side when the wilds we track He hath none when we rest — yet she comes not back ! , We looked for her eye on the feast to shine, For her breezy step — but the step was thine ! We saw thee, O Stranger, and wept ! We looked for the chief who hath left the spear And the bow of his battles forgotten here ! We looked for the hunter, whose bride's lament On the wind of the forest at eve is sent ; We looked for the first-born, whose mother's cry Sounds wild and shrill through the midnight sky ! Where are they ? — thou'rt seeking some distant coast — O ask of them. Stranger ! — send back the lost ! Tell them we mourn by the dark blue streams, Tell them our lives but of them are dreams ! Tell how we sat in the gloom to pine. And to watch for a step — but the step was thine ! Another exquisite poem. The Messenger-Bird^ by the same gifted poetess, is founded upon a tradition among the Brazilian tribes, to the effect, that this bird is a messenger sent by their deceased rela- tives with news from the other world. SouTHEY, one of the most voluminous of writers (exceeding Scott in this respect), is said to have destroyed more verses between his twentieth and thirtieth year than he published during his whole life. His books were his most cherished and constant companions: as he, indeed, tells us in one of his poems :. — My days among the dead are passed ; around me I behold Where'er these casual eyes are cast, the mighty minds of old : My never-failing friends are they. With whom I converse night and day. With them I take delight in weal, and seek relief in woe ; And, while I understand and feel how much to them I owe, My cheeks have often been bedewed With tears of thoughtful gratitude. * * * It is a mournful fact to add, also, that for nearly three years pre- ceding his death, he sat amongst these silent " companions" in hope- less vacuity of mind, unable to hold further "converse" with them: yet it is stated by Wordsworth, that even then he found him patting his books with both hands, affectionately, like a child. He died, thus in eclipse, at Keswick, and his body now sleeps "amid the stillness and grandeur of his old Cumberland hills." The following refrain seems tinged with his own sorrow : — The days of infancy are all a dream ; How fair, but, oh ! how short they seem — 'Tis life's sweet opening Spring ! The days of youth advance ; The bounding limb, the ardent glance. The kindling soul they bring — It is life's burning Summer-time. Manhood, matured with wisdom's fruit. Reward of learning's deep pursuit. Succeeds, as Autumn follows Summer's prime. And that, and that, alas ! goes by ; And what ensues ? — the languid eye. The failing frame, the soul o'ercast ; 'Tis Winter's sickening, withering blast. Life's blessed season — for it is the last. It is thus he moralizes on the Holly-tree : — O reader ! hast thou ever stood to see the holly-tree ? The eye that contemplates it well perceives its glossy leaves, Ordered by an Intelligence so wise As might confound the Atheist's sophistries. * Below a circling fence its leaves are seen, wrinkled and keen ; No grazing cattle through their prickly round, can reach to wound ; But as they grow where nothing is to fear. Smooth and unarmed the pointless leaves appear. 214 I love to view these things with curious eyes, and moralize ; And in this wisdom of the hollv-tree can emblems see Wherewith, perchance, to make a pleasant rhyme, One which may profit in the after-time. Thus, though abroad, perchance, I might appear harsh and austere. To those who on mv leisure would intrude, reserved and rude ; Gentle at home, amid my friends, I'd be, Like the high leaves upon the holly-tree. And as, when all the summer trees are seen so bright and green. The holly leaves their fadeless hues display less bright than they ; But when the bare and wintry woods we see, What then so cheerful as the holly-tree ? So serious should my youth appear among the thoughtless throng. So would I seem amid the young and gay, more grave than they, That in mv age as cheerful I might be As the green winter of the holly-tree. His sweet Ivric, on the immortality of Love^ is universally ad- mired : — They sin, who tell us love can die : With life all other passions fly. All others are but vanity : In heaven ambition cannot dwell. Nor avarice in the vaults of hell ; — Earthly these passions as of earth. They perish where they have their birth : But love is indestructible, — Its holy flame forever burneth — From heaven it came, to heaven returneth : Too oft on earth a troubled guest. At times deceived, at times oppressed. It here is tried and purified, — Then hath in heaven its perfect rest : It soweth here with toil and care. But the harvest-time of love is there. Moore's Lake of the Dismal Siuamp^ vi^ritten at Norfolk, in Vir- ginia, is founded on the following legend : — "• A voung man who lost his mind upon the death of a girl he loved, and who, suddenly disappearing from his friends, was never afterwards heard of. As he had frequently said, in his ravings, that the girl was not dead, but gone to the Dismal Swamps it is supposed he had wandered into that dreary wilderness, and had died of hunger, or been lost in some of its dreadful morasses :" — 21 6 7k(/- /hoor£^ " They made her a grave too cold and ua...j^ For a soul so warm and true ; And she's gone to the Lake of the Dismal Swamp, Where, all night long, by a fire-fly lamp, She paddles her white canoe. " And her fire-fly lamp I soon shall see. And her paddle I soon shall hear ; Long and loving our life shall be. And I'll hide the maid in a cypress tree. When the footstep of Death is near." y Away to the Dismal Swamp he speeds — His path was rugged and sore. Through tangled juniper, beds of reeds, Through many a fen, where the serpent feeds, And man never trod before. And when on the earth he sank to sleep. If slumber his eye-lids knew. He lay where the deadly vine" doth weep its venomous tear, and nightly steep The flesh with blistering dew.! And near him the she-wolf stirred the brake, And the copper-snake breathed in his ear. Till he starting cried, from his dream awake, " Oh ! when shall I see the dusky Lake, And the white canoe of my dear?" He saw the Lake, and a meteor bright Quick over its surface played, — " Welcome !" he said, " my dear one's light !" And the dim shore echoed, for many a night. The name of the death-cold maid. Till he hollowed a boat of the birchen bark, Which carried him off from shore ; Far, far he followed the meteor-spark. The wind was high and the clouds were dark, And the boat returned no more. But oft, from the Indian hunter's camp. This lover and maid so true Are seen, at the hour of midnight damp. To cross the Lake by a fire-fly lamp, And paddle their white canoe ! " Anacreon Moore," as the author of the Irish Melodies has been called, like Byron, was a poet of passion, rather than of profound thought. His imagery, dazzling and gorgeous with Oriental splen- dour, as well as the rich melody of his verse, combine to render the Lalla Rookh and Loves of the Angels works of rare fascination. They may be said to be fragrant with Oriental odours. Moore wrote the former in his cottage, near Dove-dale ; here he also composed many of his lyrics. He received for his Lalla Rookh three thousand guineas ; the copyright of his several poems produced to him over thirty thou- sand pounds. Here is a passage from the work last named : — False flew the shaft, though pointed well : The tyrant lived, the hero fell ! Yet marked the Peri where he lay. And when the rush of war was past, Swiftly descending on a ray Of morning light, she caught the last — Last glorious drop his heart had shed. Before its free-born spirit fled. " Be this," she cried, as she winged her flighty ** My welcome gift at the Gates of Light : Though foul are the drops that oft distil On the field of warfare, blood like this, For Liberty shed, so holy is. It would not stain the purest rill That sparkles among the bowers of bliss ! Oh, if there be on this earthly sphere A boon, an offering Heaven holds dear, 'Tis the last libation Liberty draws From the heart that bleeds and breaks in her cause !-" Moore wrote those undying lines, the Canadian Boat-Song^ during his passage of the St. Lawrence, from Kingston. He pencilled the lines, nearly as they stand in his works, in the blank page of a book which happened to be in his canoe. Some thirty years afterwards, a friend showed this original draught to Moore, when he recalled his youthful days, and alluded in a touching manner to his passage down the rapids of life. His prelude to The Loves of the Angels is very beautiful: — 'Twas when the world was in its prime. When the fresh stars had just begun Their race of glory, and young Time Told his first birth-days by the sun : When, in the light of nature's dawn, Rejoicing men and angels met On the high hill and sunny lawn, — Ere Sorrow came, or Sin had drawn 'Twixt man and heaven her curtain yet ! When earth lay nearer to the skies Than in these days of crime and woe. And mortals saw, without surprise. In the mid-air, angelic eyes Gazing upon this world below. 219 < One of Moore's fine heroic son^s commences : — As by the shore, at break of day, a vanquished chief expiring lay. Upon the sands, with broken sword, he traced his farewell to the free -, And there, the last unfinished word he, dying, wrote, was — " Liberty !" * * * Another no less striking, we all remember it, beginning — The harp that once through Tara's halls the soul of music shed. Now hangs as mute on Tara's walls as if that soul had fled. So sleeps the pride of former days — so glory's thrill is o'er. And hearts that once beat high for praise, now feel that pulse no more. The following lyrics possess great beauty : — Let Fate do her worst, there are relics of joy, — Bright dreams of the past, which she cannot destroy : And they come in the night-time of sorrow and care, To bring back the features that joy used to wear. Long, long be my heart with such memories filled ! Like the vase in which roses have once been distilled ; You may break, you may ruin the vase if you will, But the scent of the roses will hang round it still. Oft in the stilly night, ere slumber's chain has bound me, Fond memory brings the light of other days around me j The smiles, the tears of boyhood's years. The words of love then spoken ; The eyes that shone, now dimmed and gone. The cheerful hearts now broken ! When I remember all the friends, so linked together, I've seen around me fall, like leaves in wintrv weather. 1 feel like one who treads alone Some banquet hall deserted, Whose lights are fled, whose garland's dead, And all but he departed ! Thus in the stilly night, ere slumber's chain has bound me. Sad memory brings the light of other days around me. Believe me, if all those endearing young charms. Which I gaze on so fondly to-day. Were to change by to-morrow, and fleet in my arms. Like fairy gifts fading away. Thou wouldst still be adored, as this moment thou art, Let thy loveliness fade as it will, And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart Would entwine itself verdantly still. It is not while beauty and youth are thine own. And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear. That the fervour and faith of a soul can be known, To which time will but make thee more dear ; No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets. But as truly loves on to the close, As the sun-flower turns on her god, when he sets. The same look which she turned when he rose. We should honour any poet who gives utterance to so brave a sentiment as the following : — Yes, 'tis not helm nor feather — For ask yon despot, whether His plumed bands could bring such hands And hearts as ours together. Leave pomps to those who need 'em. Give man but heart and freedom. And proud he braves the gaudiest sla\ es That crawl where monarchs lead 'em. The sword may pierce the beaver, Stone walls in time may sever, 'Tis mind alone, worth steel and stone. That keeps men free forever ! The following lines illustrate Moore's exquisite taste and skill : — Oh, what a pure and sacred thing is Beauty curtained from the sight Ot the gross world, illumining one only mansion with her light ! Unseen by man's disturbing eye, the flower that blooms beneath the sea. Too deep for sunbeams, doth not lie hid in more chaste obscurity. A soul, too, more than half divine, where, through some shades of earthly feeling. Religion's softened glories shine, like light through summer foliage stealing. Shedding a glow of such mild hue. So warm, and yet so shadowy too. As makes the very darkness there More beautiful than light elsewhere ! Our national bard, Bryant, like Wordsworth, is eminently a poet of nature, for he eloquently interprets to us her beautiful les- sons. Calm and meditative are his varied productions ; and while they are characterized by classic elegance and grace, they also breathe a spirit of pure and exalted philosophy. The Lines to a Waterfowl^ one of his earlier poems, and one of his most justly admired, is now before us : — Whither, midst falling dew. While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary way ? Vainly the fo v.ler's eye Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, As, darivlv seen against the crimson sky, Thy hgure floats along. Seek'st thou the plashy brink Of weedv lake, or marge ot" river wide, Or where the rockv billows rise and sink On the chafed ocean side ? There is a Power whose care Teaches thv wav along that pathless coast, — The desert and illimitable air, — Lone wandering, but not lost. All day thy wings have fanned. At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere, Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land, Though the dark night is near. aa3 And soon that toil shall end ; Soon shalt thou find a summer home and rest, And scream among thy fellows ; reeds shall bend, Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest. Thou'rt gone, the abyss ot heaven Hath swallowed up thy form ; yet, on my heart Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given. And shall not soon depart. He who, from zone to zone, Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone. Will lead my steps aright. That noble poem, Thanatopsis^ so full of Miltonic grandeur and harmony, was composed by Mr. Bryant, in his eighteenth year. Listen to its majestic lines : — To him who, in the love of Nature, holds Communion with her visible forms, she speaks A various language ; for his gayer hours She has a voice of gladness, and a smile And eloquence of beauty, and she glides Into his darker musings, with a mild And healing sympathy, that steals away Their sharpness ere he is aware. When thoughts Of the last bitter hour come like a blight Over thv spirit, and sad images Of the stern agony, and shroud and pall. And breathless darkness, and the narrow house. Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart : Go forth under the open sky, and list To nature's teachings. * * * 224 ^^LLIAM CTJLLI:N BRYANT. What can be finer than the closing passage : — So live, that, when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, which moves To that mysterious realm, where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death. Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave. Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. A playful fancy pervades the following beautiful lines addressed to a bird, known to us by the name Bob-o-link : — Merrily swinging on brier and weed. Near to the nest of his little dame, Over the mountain-side or mead, Robert of Lincoln is telling his name : "Bob-o-link, bob-o-link, spink, spank, spinkj Snug and safe is that nest of ours, ' Hidden among the summer flowers : Chee, chee, chee." Robert of Lincoln is gayly drest, Wearing a bright black wedding-coat ; White are his shoulders and white his crest ; Hear him call in his merry note, " Bob-o-link, bob-o-link, spink, spank, spink j Look, what a nice new coat is mine. Sure there was never a bird so fine — Chee, chee, chee." Robert of Lincoln's Quaker wife. Pretty and quiet, with plain brown wings, Passing at home a patient lite, Broods in the grass while her husband sings — '* Bob-o-link, bob-o-link, spink, spank, spink : Brood, kind creature ; you need not fear Thieves and robbers while I am here — Chee, chee, chee." Modest and shy as a nun is she ; One weak chirp is her only note. Braggart, and prince of braggarts is he, Pouring boasts from his little throat : " Bob-o-link, bob-o-link, spink, spank, spink : Never was I afraid of man ; Catch me, cowardly knaves, if you can — Chee, chee, chee." The Prairies : — These are the gardens of the Desert, these The unshorn fields, boundless and beautiful. For which the speech of England has no name — The Prairies. I behold them for the first. And my heart swells, while the dilated sight Takes in the eiK:ircling vastness. Lo ! they stretch In airy undulations, far away. As if the ocean, in his gentlest swell, Stood still, with all his rounded billows fixed. And motionless forever. Motionless ? — No- thev are all unchained again. The clouds Sweep over with their shadows, and, beneath. The surface rolls and fluctuates to the eye ; Dark hollows seem to glide along and chase The sunny ridges. Breezes of the South ! Who toss the golden and the flame-like flowers. And pass the prairie-hawk that, poised on high, Flaps his broad wings, yet moves not — ye have played Among tlie palms of Mexico and vines Of Texas, and have crisped the limpid brooks That from the fountains of Sonora glide Into the calm Pacific — have ye fanned A nobler or a lovelier scene than this ? ■^ * * The following stanzas form part of his poem, entitled, The Battle-field : — Soon rested those who fought ; but thou, Who minglest in the harder strife For truths which men receive not now, Thy warfare only ends with life. A friendless warfare ! lingering long Through weary day and weary year. A wild, and many-weaponed throng Hang on thy front, and flank, and rear. Yet nerve thy spirit to the proof, And blench not at thv chosen lot. The timid good may stand aloof, The sage may frown — yet faint thou not. Nor heed the shaft too surelv cast. The foul and hissing bolt of scorn ; For with thy side shall dwell, at last, The victory of endurance born. Then follows the oft-cited, magnificent verse, — Truth, crushed to earth, shall rise again ; The eternal years of God are hers ; But Error, wounded, writhes with pain, And dies among his worshippers ! 227 The Hunter of the Prairies is another fine poem : — Ay, this is freedom ! — these pure skies Were never stained with village smoke : The fragrant wind, that through them flies. Is breathed from wastes by plough unbroke. Here, with mv rifle and my steed, And her who left the world for me, I plant me, where the red deer feed In the green desert — and am free. For here the fair savannas know No barriers in the bloomy grass ; Wherever breeze of heaven mav blow. Or beam of heaven may glance, I pass. In pastures, measureless as air. The bison is mv noble game ; 22S The bouiia.jig cIk, wiiose antlers tear The branches, falls before mv aim. Mine are the river-fowl that scream From the long stripe of waving sedge ; The bear, that marks my weapon's gleam. Hides vainly in the forest's edge; In vain the she-wolf stands at bay ; The brinded catamount, that lies High in the boughs to watch his prey. Even in the act of springing, dies. With what free growth the elm and plane Fling their huge arms across my way. Gray, old, and cumbered with a train Of vines, as huge, and old, and gray ! Here, from dim woods, the aged past Speaks solemnly ; and I behold The boundless future in the vast And lonely river, seaward rolled. * -,* * Another of Mr. Bryant's most admired productions is his Forest Hynin^ commencing : — The groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave. And spread the roof above them, — ere he framed The lofty vault, to gather and roll back The sound of anthems ; in the darkling wood, Amid the cool and silence, he knelt down. And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks And supplication. For his simple heart Might not resist the sacred influences Which, from the stilly twilight of the place. And from the gray old trunks that high in heaven Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound Of the invisible breath that swayed at once All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed His spirit with the thought of boundless power And inaccessible majesty. Ah, why Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore Only among the crowd, and under roofs That our frail hands have raised ? Let me, at least, Here, in the shadow of this aged wood. Offer one hymn — thrice happy, if it find Acceptance in His ear. * * " The name of Leigh Hunt," says Smiles, " is associated in our minds with all manner of kindness, love, beauty, and gentle- ness. He has given us a fresh insight into nature, made the flowers seem gayer, the earth greener, the skies more bright, and all things more full of happiness and blessing." He has given us some fine poems. Here is one about the Floiuers^ with a touch of the quaint- ness of the elder poets : — We are the sweet flowers, born of sunny showers, (Think, whene'er you see us, what our beauty saith) ; Utterance mute and bright, of some unknown delight. We fill the air with pleasure by our simple breath : All who see us, love us — we befit all places ; Unto sorrow we give smiles, — and to graces, graces. Mark our ways, how noiseless all, and sweetly voiceless. Though the March winds pipe to make our passage clear; Not a whisper tells where our small seed dwells. Nor is known the moment green when our tips appear. We thread the earth in silence, in silence build our bowers, — And leaf by leaf in silence show, till we laugh a-top, sweet flowers! 230 Take also the following, as examples of his style : — Jbou Ben Jdhejn (may his tribe increase !) Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace, And saw within the moonlight in his room, Making it rich and like a lily in bloom, An Angel writing in a book of gold : Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold. And to the Presence in the room he said — " What writest thou ?" The vision raised its head, And, with a look made of all sweet accord, Answered — " The names of those who love the Lord." "And is mine one r" said Abou ; " Nay, not so," Replied the Angel. Abou spoke more low. But cheerly still ; and said, " I pray thee, then, Write me as one that loves his fellow-men." The Angel wrote, and vanished. The next night It came again, with a great wakening light, And showed the names whom love of God had blessed — And, lo ! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest. May : — May, thou month of rosy beauty, Month when pleasure is a duty ; Month of bees and month of flowers, Month of blossom-laden bowers ; May, thy very name is sweet ! I no 'sooner write the word. Than it seems as though it heard, And looks up and laughs at me. Like a sweet face, rosily ; Like an actual colour bright. Flushing from the paper's white. 231 If the rains that do us wrong Come to keep the winter long, And deny us thy sweet looks, I can love thee, sweet, in books: Love thee in the poet's pages. Where they keep thee green for ages ; Mav's in Milton, May's in Prior, May's in Chaucer, Thomson, Dyer ; May's in all the Italian books ; She has old and modern nooks. Where she sleeps with nymphs and elves, In happy places they call shelves. With a drapery thick with blooms. And will rise and dress your rooms. Come, ye rains, then, if you will. May's at home, and with me still ; But come, rather, thou, good weather, And find us in the fields together ! One evening Leigh Hunt was the bearer of some good news to Carlyle, when the wife of the latter, who was also present, was so delighted, that she impulsively sprang from her chair and kissed the poet. The following morning he sent to her a bouquet of flowers, with these lines : — Jenny kissed me when we met, jumping from the chair she sat in ; Time, you thief! who love to get sweets into your book, — put that in : Say I'm weary — say I'm sad — say that health and wealth have missed me, — Say I'm growing old — but add, 'Jenny kissed me ! Amelia Welby, of Kentucky, is the author of the following sweet lines : — 232 Sweet warblers of the sunny hours, forever on the wing, I love them as I love the flowers, the sunlight, and the Spring. They come like pleasant memories in Summer's joyous time, And sing their gushing melodies as I would sing a rhyme. In the green and quiet places, where the golden sunlight falls, We sit with smiling faces to list their silver calls. And when their holy anthems come pealing through the air. Our hearts leap forth to meet them with a blessing and a prayer. * * * Like shadowy spirits seen at eve, among the tomhs they glide, Where sweet pale forms, for which we grieve, lie sleeping side by side. They break with song the solemn hush where peace reclines her head. And link their lays with mournful thoughts that cluster round the dead. * * * Another poetess, Mrs. Nicholls, of Cincinnati, thus beautifully moralizes on Indian Summer : — It is the Indian Summer-time, the days of mist, and haze, and glory. And on the leaves, in hues sublime, the Autunm paints poor Sum- mer's story : " She died in beauty," sing the hours, " and left on earth a glorious shadow ;" " She died in beauty, like her flowers," is painted on each wood and meadow ; She perished like bright human hopes, that blaze awhile upon life's altar ; And o'er her green and sunny slopes the plaintive winds her dirges falter. It is the Indian Summer-time ! the crimson leaves like coals are . gleaming, The brightest tints of every clime are o'er our Western forests streaming ; How bright the hours ! yet o'er their close the moments sigh in mournful duty, And redder light around them glows, like hectic on the cheek of beauty ! Madame Botta's fine lines. On a Library^ will form a fitting peroration to our Fourth Evening with the Minstrels : — Speak low — tread softly through these halls, — here Genius lives enshrined ! Here reign, in silent majesty, the monarchs of the mind ! A mighty spirit-host they come from every age and clime ; Above the buried wrecks of years, they breast the tide of Time, And in their presence-chamber here they hold their regal state. And round them throng a noble train, — the gifted and the great. O, child of earth ! when round thy path the storms of life arise^ And when thy brothers pass thee by with stern, unloving eyes, Here shall the poets chant for thee their sweetest, holiest lays. And prophets wait to guide thy steps in wisdom's pleasant ways. Come, with these God-anointed kings be thou companion here, And in the mighty realm of mind thou shalt go forth a peer. 234 ..^', PoIIok, Morns, Rogers, Boies, Campbell, Osgood. Hood, Maclean, Eastman, Elliott, Blanchard, Moir, opencer, Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, V/hittier, Keble, BuTDidge, Eliza Cook, Milman, Swain, Mrs. Norton. Hervey, Tuckerman, Bowles, Praed, Linen, Motherwell, Mrs. Browning, Barbauld, Lover, Peabodv, Sterling, Jones, V/ilson, Mackay, Vedder, Cooke, Willis, Clarke, Smith. T)LEASANT were many scenes, but most to me The solitude of vast extent, untouched By hand of art, where Nature sowed herself. And reaped her crops ; whose garments were the clouds ; Whose minstrels, brooks ; whose lamps, the moon and stars ; Whose organ-choir, the voice of many waters ; Whose banquets, morning dews ; whose heroes, storms ; Whose warriors, mighty winds ; whose lovers, flowers ; Whose orators, the thunderbolts of God ; Whose palaces, the everlasting hills ; Whose ceiling, heaven's unfathomable blue ; And from whose rocky turrets battled high. Prospect immense spread out on all sides round, — Lost now beneath the welkin and tb.c main, Now walled with hills that slept above the storms. Most fit was such a place for musing men. Happiest sometimes when musing without aim. It was, indeed, a wondrous sort of bliss The lovely bard enjoyed, when forth he walked — Unpurposed — stood, and knew not why ; sat down, And knew not where ; arose, and knew not when •, Had eyes, and saw not ; ears, and nothing heard ; And sought — sought neither heaven nor earth — sought naught j Nor meant to think ; but ran, meantime, through vast Of visionary things ; fairer than aught That was ; and saw the distant tops of thoughts, Which men of common stature never saw. Greater than aught that largest worlds could hold, Or give idea of, to those who read. This bold and beautiful conception of Nature, and her influences upon a heart and intellect attuned to her ministries, is from PoL- lok's Course of Time. The author, like Kirke White, became an early victim of his devotion to the Muse ; for the same year that he gave his epic to the world, he had himself to bid adieu to it. Morris's song, Woodman., spare that Tree ! has not only taken its place among our household lyrics, but is not unknown abroad. It owes its existence to the following incident : — The author, some years since, was riding out with a friend in the suburbs of New Z38 York city, and when near Bloomingdale, they observed a cottager in the act of sharpening his axe under the shadow of a noble ancestral tree. His friend, who was once the proprietor of the estate on which the tree stood, suspecting that the woodman intended to cut it down, remonstrated against the act, and accompanying the protest with a ten-dollar note, succeeded in preserving from destruction this legendary memorial of his earlier and better days. Now for the song : — Woodman, spare that tree ! — touch not a single bough ! In youth it sheltered me, and I'll protect it now. 'Twas my forefather's hand that placed it near his cot ; There, woodman, let it stand, — thy axe shall harm it not. That old familiar tree, whose glory and renown Are spread o'er land and sea, — and wouldst thou cut it down ? Woodman ! forbear thy stroke ! cut not its earth-bound ties ; Oh, spare that aged oak, now towering to the skies ! When but an idle boy, I sought its grateful shade ; In all their gushing joy, here, too, my sisters played ; My mother kissed me here, my father pressed my hand, — Forgive this foolish tear ; but let that old oak stand ! My heart-strings round thee cling, close as thy bark, old friend ! Here shall the wild-bird sing, and still thy branches bend. Old tree ! the storm still brave ; and, woodman, leave the spot ; While I've a hand to save, thy axe shall harm it not. This lyric is also by the same author : — To me the world's an open book, of sweet and pleasant poetry ; I read it in the running brook that sings its way towards the sea. It whispers in the leaves of trees, the swelling grain, the waving grass, And in the cool, fresh evening breez6, that crisps the wavelets as they pass. 139 The flowers below, the stars above, in all their bloom and brightness given, Are, like the attributes of love, the poetrv of earth and heaven. Thus Nature's volume, read aright, attunes the soul to minstrelsy, Tinging life's clouds with rosy light, and all the world with poetry. Rogers seems to have imbibed much of the spirit of Goldsmith in his poetry, as Campbell did that of Rogers. There is not only an analogy between T^he Pleasures of Hope and The Pleasures of Memory^ beyond the mere titles ; it is also observable in the style and structure of the poems. Rogers was engaged for nine years upon his first poem, and nearly the same space of tirrle upon his Human Lfe^ while his Italy was not completed in less than sixteen years. He was a princely patron of poor poets and artists, and had '"'' learned the luxury of doing good," — but he was possessed of ample means for the gratification of his noble purpose, as well as his artistic taste. His house in St. James's Place — a costly mu- seum of art — was, for many years, the resort of the most eminent men of letters from all parts of the world. He expended upwards of twenty thousand pounds upon the illustrated edition of his works, the beautiful engravings of which have scarcely to this day been surpassed. The life of this remarkable man was extended beyond the average term of human existence. When more than ninety, and a prisoner in his chair, he still delighted to watch the changing colours of the evening sky — to repeat passages of his favourite poets — or to dwell on the merits of the great painters whose works adorned his walls. There is such quiet, pensive music in his Pleasures of Memory y that it would be difficult to select a passage that would fail to please : here is one : — Ethereal power ! whose smile of noon, of night, Recalls the far-fled spirit of delight ; 240 Instils that musing, melancholy mood, Which charms the wise, and elevates the good ;— Blest Memory, hail ! * * * Lulled in the countless chambers of the brain. Our thoughts are linked by many a hidden chain Awake but one, and, lo, what myriads rise ! Each stamps its image as the other flies : Each, as the varied avenues of sense Delight or sorrow to the soul dispense. Brightens or fades, yet all, with magic art, Control the latent fibres of the heart. There is a favourite passage from his Human Life^ too good to pass over : — The lark has sung his carol in the sky. The bees have hummed their noontide harmony ; Still in the vale the village-bells ring round. Still in Llewellyn-Hall the jests resound : For now the caudle-cup is circling there. Now, glad at heart, the gossips breathe their prayer, And, crowding, stop the cradle to admire The babe, the sleeping image of his sire. A i^-w short years, and then these sounds shall hail The day again, and gladness fill the vale ; So soon the child a youth, the youth a man, Eager to run the race his fathers ran. Then the huge ox shall yield the broad sirloin ; The ale now brewed, in floods of amber shine , And, basking in the chimney's ample blaze, Mid many a tale told of his boyish days. The nurse shall cry, of all her ills beguiled, 2 r 241 " 'Twas on these knees he sate so oft, and smiled." And soon again shall music swell the breeze ; Soon, issuing forth, shall glitter through the trees Vestures of nuptial white, and hymns be sung. And violets scattered round ; and old and young. In every cottage-porch, with garlands green. Stand still to gaze, and, gazing, bless the scene : While, her dark eyes declining, by his side Moves in her virgin-veil the gentle bride. And once, alas ! nor in a distant hour. Another voice shall come from yonder tower : When in dim chambers long black weeds are seen. And weepings heard where only joy has been ; When by his children borne, and from his door, Slowly departing, to return no more, He rests in holy earth, with them that went before ! And such is human life ; so gliding on. It glimmers like a meteor, and is gone ! Rogers's Lines to a Butterfly are replete with grace and beauty : — Child of the sun ! pursue thy rapturous flight. Mingling with her thou lov'st in fields of light ; And, where the flowers of Paradise unfold, QuafF fragrant nectar from their cup^ of gold. There shall thy wings, rich as an evening sky, Expand and shut with silent ecs^tasy ! Yet wert thou once a worm, a thing that crept On the bare earth, then wrought a tomb and slept. And such is man : soon from his cell of clay To burst a seraph in the blaze of day. We might cull many pearls of thought from this poet, but we have only space for the following : — 241 The soul of music slumbers in the shell Till waked and kindled by the master's spell ; And feeling hearts, touch them but rightly, pour A thousand melodies unheard before ! A guardian angel o'er his life presiding, Doubling his pleasures, and his cares dividing. The good are better made by ill. As odours crushed are sweeter still. Far from the joyless glare, the maddening strife, And all the dull impertinence of life. Let us turn now, with Laura A. Boies, to a sweet domestic study — that of Little Children : — There is music, there is sunshine, where the little children dwell, — In the cottage, in the mansion, in the hut, or in the cell ; There is music in their voices, there is sunshine in their love, And a joy forever round them, like a glory from above. There's a laughter-loving spirit glancing from the soft blue eyes, Flashing through the pearly tear-drops, changing like the summer skies : Lurking in each roguis!i dimple, nestling in each ringlet fair ; Over all the little child-face gleaming, glancing everywhere. They all win our smiles and kisses in a thousand pleasant ways, By the sweet, bewitching beauty of their sunny, upward gaze ; And we cannot help but love them, when their young lips meet our own. And the magic of their presence round about our hearts is thrown. -43 W hen they ask us curious questions in a sweet confiding way, We can only smile in wonder, hardly knowing what to sav ; As they sit in breathless silence, waiting for our kind replies, What a world of mystic meaning dwells within the lifted eves ! When the soul, all faint and weary, falters in the upward way. And the clouds around us gather, shutting out each starry ray ; Then the merry voice of childhood seems a soft and soothing strain. List we to its silvery cadence, and our hearts grow glad again. Hath this world of ours no angels ? Do our dimly shaded eyes Ne'er behold the seraph's glory in its meek and lowly guise ? Can we see the little children, ever beautiful and mild. And again repeat the story — nothing but a little child ? The same facile American pen thus daintily discourses on the Rain : — Like a gentle joy descending, to the earth a glory lending, Comes the pleasant rain : Fairer now the flowers are growing. Fresher now the winds are blowing. Gladder waves the grain : Grove and forest, field and mountain. Bathing in the crystal fountain. Drinking in the inspiration, offer up a glad oblation — All around, about, above us. Things we love, and things that love us, Bless the gentle rain. Beautiful, and still, and holy, like the spirit of the lowly, Comes the quiet rain : 'Tis a fount of joy distilling, and the lyre of earth is trilling, — Swelling to a strain : Nature opens wide her bosom, bursting buds begin to blossom, 244 To her very soul 'tis stealing, all the springs of life unsealing, Singing stream and rushing river drink it in, and praise the Giver Of the blessed rain. We have already luxuriated over passages from the Pleasures of Imagination^ and lingered lovingly amid the sweet images bodied forth by Rogers in the Pleasures of Memory : shall we now hold colloquy with Campbell, and catch some glimpses of his bright visions of Hope ? He thus announces his beautiful theme : — At summer eve, when Heaven's ethereal bow Spans with bright arch the glittering hills below, Why to yon mountain turns the musing eye, Whose sun-bright summit mingles with the sky ? Why do those cliffs of shadowy tint appear More sweet than all the landscape smiling near ? 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view, And robes the mountain in its azure hue. Thus, with delight, we linger to survey The promised joys of life's unmeasured way , Thus, from afar, each dim-discovered scene More pleasing seems than all the past hath been, And every form, that Fancy can repair From dark oblivion, glows divinely there. * * * With thee, sweet Hope ! resides the heavenly light. That pours remotest rapture on the sight ; Thine is the charm of life's bewildered way, That calls each slumbering passion into play. * * * Auspicious Hope ! in thy sweet garden grow Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every woe. * * ^:- 245 Here is a fine apostrophe to Domestic Love : — Who hath not paused while Beauty's pensive eye Asked from his heart the homage of a sigh ? * * * And sav, without our hopes, without our fears, Without the home that plighted love endears, Without the smile from partial beauty won. Oh, what were man r — a world without a sun. Till Hvmen brought his love-delighted hour, There dwelt no jov in Eden's rosy bower ! In vain the viewless seraph, lingering there, At starry midnight charmed the silent air ; In vain the wild bird carolled on the steep. To hail the sun, slow wheeling from the deep ; In vain, to soothe the solitary shade, Aerial notes in mingling measure played ; The summer wind that shook the spangled tree. The whispering wave, the murmur of the bee ; — Still slowly passed the melancholy day, And still the stranger wist not where to stray. The world was sad ! the garden was a wild ! And man, the hermit, sighed — till woman smiled ! * * * This beautiful passage closes the poem : — Eternal Hope ! when yonder spheres sublime Pealed their first notes to sound the march of Time, Thy joyous youth began — but not to fade. When all the sister planets have decayed ; When, rapt in fire, the realms of ether glow, And Heaven's last thunder shakes the world below j Thou, undismayed, shalt o'er the ruins smile. And light thy torch at Nature's funeral pile I * * * Z46 Moir says, " I do not think I overrate the merits of the Pleasures of Hope ^ whether taking it in its parts or as a whole, in preferring it to any didactic poem of equal length in the English language. It is like a long fit of inspiration." Campbell wrote it at Edinburgh when he was but twenty-one ; and so prolonged was its popu- larity, that it ultimately brought to its author the sum of four thousand five hundred pounds. His patriotic Odes are so heroic and stirring, and his more serious poems are so inspiring and im- pressive, that it is no wonder they should have become to us as " household words." What fire and energy characterize those grand naval Odes, The Battle of the Baltic^ and Te Mariners of Eng- land ; and how sublimely roll out the stanzas of his Last Man^ What's Halloxved Ground? and The Rainbow ! Irving thought Campbell's Hohenlinden contained more grandeur and moral sublimity than is to be found anywhere else in the same compass of English poetry. This, like most of his descriptive poems, Campbell seems to have written under the very inspiration of the scene. Campbell's lyrics have an exquisite grace and delicacy of touch about them ; for example, the following : — Withdraw not yet those lips and fingers. Whose touch to mine is rapture's spell j Life's joy for us a moment lingers, And death seems in that word — farewell ! The hour that bids us part and go. It sounds not yet — oh no, no, no ! Time, whilst I gaze upon thy sweetness, Flies, like a courser nigh the goal : To-morrow where shall be his fleetness, Whe,n thou art parted from my soul ? Our hearts shall beat, our tears shall flow. But not together — oh no, no ! 247 How delicious is the winning Of a kiss at Love's beginning, When two mutual hearts are sighing For the knot there's no untying ! Yet remember, midst your wooing, Love has bliss, but love has ruing ; Other smiles may make you fickle, — Tears for other charms may trickle. Love he comes, and Love he tarries. Just as fate or fancy carries ; Longest stays when sorest chidden, — Laughs and flies — when pressed and bidden. Absence : — 'Tis not the loss of love's assurance, It is not doubting what thou art. But 'tis the too, too long endurance Of absence that afflicts mv heart. The fondest thoughts two hearts can cherish, When each is lonely doomed to weep. Are fruits on desert isles that perish, Or riches buried in the deep. What though, untouched by jealous madness. Our bosom's peace may fall to wreck, Th' undoubting heart, that breaks with sadness, Is but more slowly doomed to break. Absence ! is not the soul torn by it. From more than light, or life, or breath ? 'Tis Lethe's gloom, but not its quiet, — The pain, without the peace of death ! 248 Campbell has given the following little incident with wonderful felicity and effect ; it could scarcely be better told : — The ordeal's fatal trumpet sounded, and sad, pale Adelgitha came. When forth a valiant champion bounded, and slew the slanderer of her fame. She wept, delivered from her danger ; but when he knelt to claim her glove, ** Seek not," she cried, " oh, gallant stranger, for hapless Adelgitha's love ; For he is in a foreign far land whose arm should now have set me free. And I must wear the willow garland for him that's dead or false to me." *' Nay ! say not, that his faith is tainted !" He raised his visor; at the sight She fell into his arms and fainted : it was, indeed, her own true knight. Campbell's biographer. Dr. Beattie, writes : — " Coming home to mv house in Park Square, where, as usual, the poet had dropped in to spend a quiet hour, I told him that I had been agreeably detained listening to some street music near Portman Square. ' Vocal or instrumental ?' he inquired. ' Vocal : the song was an old favour- ite, remarkably good, and of at least forty years standing.' ' Ha !' said he, ' I congratulate the author, whoever he is.' ' And so do I — it was your own song. The Soldier's Dream ; and when I came away, the crowd was still increasing.' ' Well,' he added, musing, ' this is something like popularity.' " Yet the poet had, as far as a poet can, become for years indif- ferent to posthumous fame. In 1838, five years before his decease, he had been speaking to some friends in Edinburgh on the subject, thus : " When I think of the existence which shall commence when a G 249 the stone is laid over my head, how can literary fame appear to me, to any one, but as nothing? I believe, when I am gone, justice will be done to me in this way — that I was a pure writer. It is an inexpressible comfort, at my time of life, to be able to look back and feel that I have not written one line against religion or virtue." Is not this claim, which has been in his case well attested by the public censorship, the highest meed of praise that can be awarded to genius ? Campbell's funeral was a grand spectacle. As the solemn pro- cession moved towards the open grave in Poet's Corner, Westmin- ster Abbey, every voice was hushed, except that of the clergyman echoing along the vaulted aisles of the venerable pile — " I am the resurrection and the life." As the sad groups gathered around the grave, the solemn stillness was broken by a sweet strain of rich melody, alternating with grand bursts of chorus from the organ : it was the Dead March in Saul. A touching incident occurred just as the corpse was about being sprinkled with its native earth ; — a Polish officer came forward with a handful of dust, brought for the occasion from the tomb of Kos- ciuzko, and scattered it upon the coffin. It was a worthy tribute of affectionate regard to the memory of him who had done so much to immortalize the man and the cause. This sweet lyric we derive from our American poetess, Mrs. Osgood : — She comes, in light, aerial grace ; o'er Memory's glass the vision flies ; Her girlish form, her glowing face, her soft, black hair, her beaming eyes. I think of all her generous love ; her trustful heart, so pure and meek ; Her tears — an April shower — that strove with sunshine on her changing cheek. 150 She knows no worldly guile or art, but Love and Joy have made her fair : And so I keep her in my heart, and bless her in my silent prayer. Pass we now to the serio-comic Hood, — a poet whose memory is "emblazoned with a halo of light-hearted mirth and pleasantry, " but whose coruscations of wit and fancy do not more charm us, than do the genial charities and deep human sympathies which charac- terize his graver productions. If he was the " prince of punsters," he was also pre-eminently the poet of pathos ; for, as a portrayer of life in its various phases, his rich and graceful imagery, and vivid descriptions of sorrow and suffering, were no less conspicuous than the kindly spirit with which his sarcasms and satires are tempered. so that while thev cauterize, they cure. How much of human suffering has been mitigated, how many a home of sadness con- soled, by the pleadings of his powerful pen ! The spirit of his playful productions, so chaste, and so glittering with sportive gayety and humour, are yet enriched with the pure gold of wisdom, so that while thev charm the imagination, they also benefit the heart. Hood's fragile constitution was invaded, during his whole life, by a slow wasting disease, and it was terminated by protracted suffering. Referring to his own physical debility, he thus writes : — " That man who has never known a day's illness is a moral dunce, — one who has lost the greatest moral lesson in life, — who has skipped the finest lecture in that great school of humanity, the sick-chamber. Let him be versed in metaphysics, profound in mathematics, a ripe scho- lar in the classics, a bachelor of arts, or even a doctor in divinity, — yet he is one ot those gentlemen whose education has been neglected. For all his college acquirements, how inferior he is in wholesome knowledge to the mortal who has had a quarter's gout, or a half-year of ague, — how infinitely below the fellow-creature who has been soundly taught his tic-douloureux, thoroughly grounded in rheuma- tism, and deeply red in the scarlet fever !" It was while suffering from bodily sickness that poor Hood com- posed those touching and immortal poems, — The Bridge of Sighs, The Lady's Drearn^ The Lay of the Labourer, and The Song of the Shirt. It was the last-named that his wife at once pronounced one of the best things he ever wrote. Her verdict turned into a pro- phecy, for it obtained an immediate and long-continued popularity, and was also translated into several foreign languages : — O, men, with sisters dear ! O, men, with husbands and wives ! It is not linen you're wearing out, but human creatures' lives ! Stitch, stitch, stitch, in poverty, hunger, and dirt ; Sewing at once, with a double thread, a shroud as well as a shirt ! But why do I talk of death — that phantom of grislv bone ? I hardly fear his terrible shape, it seems so like my own ; 252 -^^W^^ ^^rt^L-^ Pi.^^^ I C?X^ ^itc-f^ ***<4.^ S^/lp^ ^Crv/