So this wing'd hour is dropt to us from | Night sucks them down, the tribute of the pit, above. Whose names, half entered in the book of

Oh! clasp we to our hearts, for deathless

dower,

This close-companioned inarticulate hour
When twofold silence was the song of love.

Life,

Were God's desire at noon. And as their

hair

And eyes sink last, the Torturer deigns no whit

To gaze, but, yearning, waits his destined The Sin still blithe on earth that sent them wife,

there.

There are several minor sequences within the main work, wherein, as it were, the momentary mood is clung to and lingered over, and the transcripts occupy two or three successive sonnets. Such are "Willowwood" and three charming sonnets on "True Woman" in Part I., and "The Choice," "Old and New Art," The Sun's Shame," and "Newborn Death," in Part II. These sub-movements lend variety and interest to the theme, which, as now elaborated, contains an important embodiment of a philosophical theory. As a specimen of the sober manner, after life's morning march is over and the spirit is no longer young, let us take this vision of Lady Beauty seen by the eye to which experience has given force of penetration and thorough-value rests on their beautiful form and the ness of insight:

"The House of Life" is a standing answer to those that carp at the sonnet on the ground of its mechanical limitations and its little narrowness and general futility. We may object to Mr. Rossetti's method, we may feel that the hill air is an indispensable antidote to his moving and relaxing strains, we may say that he is simply wasting words for the sake of warm glow and rich color; but all that will not affect the excellent structure and the undoubted vitality of these sonnets. They form a unique and valuable contribution to our poetic literature, and their essential

deep and true character of the embodied thought. Within the narrow compass of each duly limited entity, the poet has managed to insert a clear idea, well formulated and graced with illustrative material, and certain to be suggestive of long distances to the reflective reader. The and especially (in this connection) several same qualities characterize the poems, short lyrics of singular beauty. Mr. Rossetti lays his spell upon some apparently chance thought or trifling incident, and the result is found in such transfigured loveliness as characterizes "The Woodspurge," "Love-Lily," "Sudden Light," with its

grass beyond the door, The sweet keen smell, The sighing sound, the lights around the shore. His philosophy finds impulse in a neg lected spray of honeysuckle, or lingers over the coming possibilities of a young fir wood, or grapples (in "The Sea-Limits") with the "sea's listless chime"

Time's self it is made audible,

The murmur of the earth's own shell.

This quick observing power and nimble. ness of transfiguring method are still further exemplified in the longer poems, in which, moreover, the poet's quaint idi osyncrasy of choice is invariably a striking feature. To one that knows the poetical attitude manifested in the sonnets it will be apparent that such themes as "The Blessed Damozel," "Dante at Verona,"

"The Stream's Secret," "Love's Noc | his interest in Jenny, the very mention of turn," and others are in keeping with it, whose name shocked the propriety of Mrs. and that they are besides such as Mr. Quickly. It is an experience of a novel Rossetti may fairly claim by right of su- and memorable kind to read of preme prerogative. When we learn, for example, that

The blessed damozel leaned out

From the gold bar of Heaven,
we know that we are listening to the stu-
dent and modern interpreter of Dante;
and then comes a pleasing thrill as we are
told of her bold outlook into space and
the cosmical sweep of her gaze. The
vast grandeur of this is unusually stimu-
lating to the imagination : —

From the fixed place of Heaven she saw
Time like a pulse shake fierce

Through all the worlds.

Her gaze still strove
Within the gulf to pierce
Its path; and now she spoke as when
The stars sang in their spheres.

The sun was gone now; the curled moon
Was like a little feather
Fluttering far down the gulf; and now
She spoke through the still weather.
Her voice was like the voice the stars
Had when they sang together.

"The Stream's Secret" is one of the

Lazy laughing languid Jenny,

Fond of a kiss and fond of a guinea, and to come with the poet from her room at the opening dawn, with the piercing twitter of the awaking sparrows and the sounds of the new day in one's ears. Similarly one would not like to miss the potent weirdness and the magic witchery of "Troy Town" and "Eden Bower," nor the fascinating spell that lures into the vengeful presence of "Sister Helen." Those who know how the witch in "Macbeth" could make her victim "peak and pine" will understand the allusion in

this:

"Why did you melt your waxen man,

Sister Helen?
To-day is the third since you began."
"The time was long, yet the time ran,

Little brother." (0 Mother, Mary Mother, Three days to-day, between Hell and Heaven!) It is a story of revenge, unsurpassed in steadiness and directness of purpose, most finely idealized and tenderly touch-coercive of tragical destiny, and realistic firm, unswerving grip of fell circumstance ing of English love poems. It is the sonneteer under a new aspect, but with motive and aim unchanged. He commits his secret, in the good old-fashioned style, to the stream that flows by, in hopes that he may thus win gently into the presence of his distant love; and the result, of course, is the gradual awakening of the poet and the quiet, industrious indifference of the stream. The conception is very fine, and the elaboration both of thought and imagery singularly beautiful and effective. Listen to the onomatopoeic expressiveness of the closing stanza, and note the steady gradation of effects. One knows how water laps and sways and rolls, with mysterious significance, on over some comparative level to its remote destination; but one does not always get, along with the perception, the grave movement of a pathetic experience: O water whispering

presentation of heart-rending sighs and
shadowy utterances from the borderlands
of woe.
majestic "Burden of Nineveh" — the
These poems, together with the
poet's lofty meditation on the winged bull
brought to the British Museum some
years ago "Stratton Water," and "The
Staff and Scrip," may be conveniently
grouped along with the three that Mr.
Rossetti himself specializes as ballads
The King's Tragedy." These all ex-
"Rose Mary," "The White Ship," and
hibit workmanship of a very high order,
and still further illustrate the poet's mas-
rious. In this particular department of
tery of what is quaint, weird, and myste-
poetic interpretation Mr. Rossetti stands

very

of spells, charms, and mythical influences, much alone; he holds the monopoly or, at any rate, his seizure and presentation of them are so thoroughly individual, and at the same time so forcible and graphic, that there is probably no feature

Still through the dark into mine ears, As with mine eyes, is it not now with hers?-of his work by which in time to come he Mine eyes that add to thy cold spring, Wan water, wandering water weltering,

This hidden tide of tears.

The same quickness of outlook and readiness of sympathy that enable the poet to dwell upon such exceptional topics as have been mentioned account for

will be more readily identified. He has entered upon Coleridge's ground a perilous enterprise enough and the differ-. ence of attitude and method, as well as the specialities of success characteristic of each, will, doubtless, form an interesting study for those acquainted with the

1

two poets. No one in our day has writ-
ten ballads like these, which, as with the
great legendary ballads, owe their success
very much to the presence of the grim
and mysterious fatalistic influences which
the poet grasps with such energetic and
diffusive potency. The beryl-stone is the
magic centre of "Rose Mary," in which,
while describing a thrilling interview be
tween a mother and a daughter over the
discovery of the daughter's fatal secret,
Mr. Rossetti rises as near as ever he does
to true natural feeling and great surges of
passion. In "The White Ship" the poet
tells the legendary story of the drowning
of King Henry's son and daughter, the
fatal power at work in this instance being
the king's own tyrannical tendency and
the natural reward of its mysterious but
righteous overthrow. The twofold refrain
of the first stanza strikes the key-note of
the piece -

Lands are swayed by a king on a throne.

That room was built far out from the house;
And none but we in the room

Might hear the voice that rose beneath,
Nor the tread of the coming doom.

As already said, it would be difficult at
present to estimate how Mr. Rossetti is
likely to stand with posterity, but there is
no difficulty whatever in giving judgment
so far. The subtle intricacies and the
frequently delicate fibre of his sonnets,
together with their highly colored and
sometimes slightly fantastic imagery, may
prevent them from striking the popular
taste; while the grace, the rapid and vig.
orous movement of at any rate several of
his ballads, and their weird significance,
will hardly fail to impress even the aver-
age imagination. Still, he will be above
all a poet's poet; and it is as yet impossi-
ble and unnecessary to say whether, with
his fit audience, he will be more cherished
as a writer of ballads or a graceful son-
neteer.
THOMAS Bayne.

From The Saturday Review. MARCH IN THE COUNTRY.

The sea hath no king but God alone. "The King's Tragedy" tells with masterly power and rare rapidity and energy of movement the assassination of King James I. of Scotland; and here Mr. RosWe know not whether March may go setti finds in Scottish superstition an ex-out like a lamb, but assuredly it has not cellent opportunity for the exercise of his come in like a lion. Instead of blusterspecial method. His weird woman is ap ing winds and bitter morning frosts, every propriately introduced, and her activities thing in its opening days was soft and are always apposite and telling. The en- springlike. The gardens were almost gay ergy and the penetrating thrill of these with spring flowers; the shrubberies and stanzas are exceedingly forcible and effeccopses were budding and shooting; the tive: clustering tufts of the yellow primroses were flowering thickly under the hedgeroots; and the birds, in a not unnatural

And now beneath the window arose
A wild voice suddenly:

And the king reared straight, but the queen delusion, were singing as if they were

fell back

As for bitter dule to dree;

And all of us knew the woman's voice
Who spoke by the Scottish Sea.

"O king," she cried, "in an evil hour

They drove me from thy gate;

And yet my voice must rise to thine ears;
But alas! it comes too late!

"Last night at mid-watch, by Aberdour,
When the moon was dead in the skies,

O king, in a death-light of thine own
I saw thy shape arise.

"And in full season, as erst I said,

The doom had gained its growth;
And the shroud had risen above thy neck
And covered thine eyes and mouth.

"For every man on God's ground, O king,
His death grows up from his birth
In a shadow-plant perpetually;

And thine towers high, a black yew-tree
O'er the Charterhouse of Perth !"

already in the middle of the spring. Of course the signs of the weather may prove fallacious; but it is pleasanter to hope that the genial winter may be followed by a summer tripping up the heels of spring; and we have prognostications that the hay crops may be mown in May, and that we may be in the height of the harvest in "the month of roses.' "" But a mild March is a phenomenon in England, and we can hardly hope to escape the edge of the easterly winds; and the spells of inclemency that may probably be in store for us, by nipping the advanced promise of the vegetation, may blight our hopes as well and turn premature joy to lamenta tion. But in any case, and in spite of those detestable winds, we maintain that March, on the whole, is a pleasant month. We fully admit its ordinary drawbacks; but then they are more than compen

soak

sated by its pleasures. We know noth-hedge-row. Should the weather prove ing more exhilarating than a bright March tolerably favorable, all ought to go well. day in the country, when a brisk northerly But bitter gales, with driving sleet or breeze is blowing. Nature has been hail, may search out the most sheltered shaking herself out of her gloomy winter corners; drenching rains may garments, and has been making those un- through the roughly thatched roof of obtrusive alterations in her toilet which straw or broom; or the snow may come are unmistakably suggestive of spring. heavily down with a falling thermometer, The buds have been visibly thickening on heaping itself in each angle in snowdrifts the trees, as you see when you take a that must be dug through or cleared away. survey of the sky through the branches. Then the mothers have as hard a time of The earlier plants are putting forth their it as their shepherd; while as for the leaves in the hedges, and the wild herbage lambs, they are landed in a world of soris expanding on the sides of the ditches. rows. The feeblest of them, crumpled up A faint flush of yellowish green has been and shivering, refuse to feed; and the spreading over the wintry brown of the shepherd has to turn dry-nurse to others, pastures. But it is on the ploughland and carry them to the fire in his tempothat the special signs of March are most rary shealing. In the course of a day or conspicuous, with the pleasant, earthy two, he may find more than sufficient ocodors of the newly turned soil, and the cupation for himself and any number of cawing flights of keen-eyed rooks follow- handy apprentices. For of course, in ing in the trail of the plough or the har- such unfavorable circumstances, some of row. The earth is being roughly awak- the mothers will perish in lamb-birth; ened from its winter rest, and turned up and the helpless orphans must have perto meet the caresses of the spring air and manent attention, when some bereaved the sunshine; and it is so much the worse ewe is not persuaded to adopt them. for the grubs and the worms. We know Should you come upon the shepherd at no prettier picture, whether sharply de- such a time, you will see a careworn man fined in a clear atmosphere or seen dimly whose preoccupied manner is opposed to through the haze of misty exhalations, all your classical memories of pipes and than the long teams of sleek and well- leisurely love-making and the felicity of groomed horses, moving with heavy, busi- the pastoral life. Yet, if you chanced to ness-like tread to the blithe music of the revisit him in more genial weather, a bells on the harness; while the bleating week or two later, you might find him the of the flocks from some neighboring very soul of cheerfulness. Thanks to the sheep-pen reminds us that the lambing- indefatigable energy and the practical time has fairly begun. knowledge which his master will substanIndeed March in our mind always asso- tially recognize, the anxious days have ciates itself with lambs and rookeries and been tided over far better than he had yellow daffodils. Yet, whoever may en- expected. The few ewes that were lost joy the month, it can hardly bring much perished through no fault of his; and the pleasure to the shepherd. He is over-score of the surviving lambs is more than weighted with incessant anxieties; has satisfactory. And as you heard the care for his companion whether sleeping or waking; and when he throws himself down to snatch some broken rest, must be ready to rouse himself at any moment from dreams of untimely additions to his responsibilities. It is true that all has been done that experience can suggest to render matters easy for the expectant or nursing mothers of the flock, and for the new-born lambs that are exposed to the many ailments of infancy. The sheep farm may probably lie on the bleak uplands; but the lambing-folds are in the most protected situation that can be found. They are in a quiet nook among the copses in the bottom of a valley; and the hurdles, thickly wadded and interwoven with straw, are backed up on the exposed quarters by a wall or a matted

bleating of the flock when many a field away, now you may admire the graceful play of the lambkins, who are perpetually indulging in gambols, and giving each other backs at leapfrog, when they are not dragging at their mother's teats. If they do not grow up sleek and vigorous, it will certainly not be owing to neglect of their opportunities, though their juvenile spirits might scarcely be so buoyant could they look forward to the impending cropping of their tails.

From the bleating of the sheepfolds it is a natural and pleasant change to the cawing of the neighboring rookery. We know nothing more lively than a clamorous colony of rooks, when they are busied over the reconstruction of their nests for the season. The situation of any rookery

END OF VOLUME CLII.