instrument; and as he has given notes of beauty in this rehearsal, we trust, he will not lay his harp down after having strung it. The "Woodman's Daughter" is better in execution, but the subject is unpleasant: it turns upon the seduction of a poor girl by the squire's son, who had known her from a child. These themes are better left alone: poetry is meant to delight all; not to read in holes and corners. The old dramatists and poets have dealt in the disagreeable and revolting; let modern writers select those which elevate as well as stir; the painful matter is not redeemed by the manner in which it is treated; and at times there are asterisks placed which means either that the poet was not equal to the theme, and so broke down or skipped it, or else that the thing to be described being improper and indelicate, he left it to the reader's imagination. "But Berton's thoughts were less confused; • What? I wrong ought so good?' Beside, the danger that is seen Is easily withstood; Then loud- The sun is very warm,' And they walked into the wood!" Then follow Mr. Patmore's mysterious but very significant "asterisks." Her shame is soon apparent. She drowns the evidence of her guilt and goes mad! From this let us turn to a very pretty little bit of musical affectation. TO A FLIRT. ""Tis fine, I vow, to see you now, To some, it will be finer still, Scoffed at, where you used to scoff, But finer much 'twill be to such, The poem of "Lilian" is a female counterpart to "Lockesley Hall," we shall pass it over with the quotation of a few stanzas— "O Heaven, then can I no where Plant my hope, but there advance Of that mighty brothel, France!" The bad taste and coarseness of this are perfect!—To take the unpleasant flavor off the readers mind we shall give him one of the last verses in the poem. "She loved: words, all things told it: eye to eye, and palm to palm: As the pause upon the ceasing of a thousand voiced psalm, Was the mighty satisfaction, and the full eternal calm. This still and saintlike beauty, and a difference between Our years, she remembered twenty, mine were scarcely then eighteen, Made my love the blind idolatry which it could not else have been." The son of an old friend of her father's comes on a visit to Lilian, the "Saintlike beauty"-He comes: his name is Winton: when they met the lover felt a horror run through him, a presentiment of evil. He is thus described by his rival : "He had learnt in well taught boyhood, under quick and wary eyes, Doctrines, a sharp mind led him first to doubt, and then despise, Better to be greatly foolish, than to be so little wise!" Without entering into the philosophy of this line, which is a kind of. "A little learning is a dangerous thing," there is a boldness in Patmore's expression, which convinces us there is material in him worthy of cultivation. His attractive manners attach the lover as well as Lilian. The next stanza I quote for the critical investigation of the ladies. “For when he uttered common things, and clear to sight, He looked at you so intently, you hardly thought them trite, Being ten years older than the lover (and two years older than the lady) the youthful admirer was flattered by his friendship. The "Saintlike Lilian" begins to love the Infidel Winton, corrupted by that mighty brothel France. "O friend, if you had seen her, heard her speaking, felt her grace, When serious looks seemed filling with the smiles, which in a space Broke sweet as Sabbath sunshine, and lit up her shady face.' The next verse is funny :-it comes in the midst of a great thunderstorm of indignation against his "Saintlike Lilian,' "Remember states of living ended ere we left the womb, And see an awful something flashing to us from the tomb:- A tremendous dash truly. Winton and his youthful lover are riding out-they meet an acquaintance of Winton's: they stop "So I've heard your suit's successful? truly stuff for a romance After your favorite fashion: But, ah, ha! should Percy chance'Nay-Percy's here,' said Winton, pointing towards me with a glance." "The murder's out "-Percy, for so for the first time we hear his name-resolves to question Lilian. He demands an answer "She heard me saw how surely my convictions now were built, This is very hard upon the "Saintlike Lilian." It never seems this lad of eighteen had been accepted by the woman of twenty-six ! a true poet never commits these "startling ignorances." Her reply is masterly— "By what right is it (said she) you are here to question me? There make your wide inducement, which acknowledges the plea Lest he, a man, hatch insult, pleading perhaps, his 'wrong' his right!" It appears that Winton had corrupted the heart of Lilian by lending her French Romances !—well, Percy and Lilian separate : we are left in the dark as to whether Winton marries her or not. After two years Percy tells his friend the whole history of his unfortunate "calf love." There are good verses in the poem, but too many of the stanzas are broken and disjointed, like Mr. Browning's "Sordello." It is therefore as difficult at times to read as a sentence of Properties to a school-boy, who has first to find the nominative case in order to get at the verb: but Mr. Patmore is not thirty; he has time yet to be an ornament to English poetry ;let him try: above all, let him take our remarks in a good earnest spirit, and believe us when we say that had there been no promise in him, we should not have given him a place in this volume. We bid good bye to Mr. Patmore, by giving the reader a specimen of his powers as a sonnet writer. SONNET III. "At nine years old I was love's willing page: Poets love earlier than other men, And would love later, but for the prodigal pen, Of all the eleven springs gone by since then? |