conspicuous place. Neither Anderson nor Chalmers make any mention of him*. It is to honest Izaac Walton that the world is indebted for the preservation of the Poem of Thealma and Clearchus. Our poet formed a kind of personal link between the old angler and the author of The Faery Queen. Chalkhill shook hands with Spenser, and Walton with Chalkhill. It was in his ninetieth year (the last of his life), that Walton published the poem of his friend, to which he affixed an affectionate preface. The pastoral character of this work must have been highly congenial to the taste of one who wrote so fine a prose-poem of a rural nature, as the Complete Angler. Chalkhill's poem was published only three or four years after the author's death, but had been written long before. The only information that Walton gives us of his friend, is in the following paragraph, with which he concludes his preface :

"I have this truth to say of the author, that he was in his time a man, generally known, and well beloved; for he was humble and obliging in his behaviour, a gentleman, a scholar, very innocent and prudent: and indeed his whole life was useful, quiet, and virtuous. God send the story may meet with, or make, all readers like him."

Chalkhill's two songs, given in the Complete Angler, are in praise of fishing; and it is probable that he shared with his old friend Walton, in the love and practice of an amusement that none but a patient and tranquil-minded man can thoroughly enjoy. Leigh Hunt, in his Indicator, is rather severe upon this sport; and though he does not exactly agree with the old joke, attributed sometimes to Swift and sometimes to Doctor Johnson, that it is "a stick and a string, with a fly at one end and a fool at the other," he insists upon it that it is a very cruel and censurable pleasure. He erroneously ascribes one of Chalkhill's songs to

Since this article was written I have read a notice of Chalkhill in the Retrospective Review.

Walton, and ridicules and reproves the patriarch of anglers for

the sentiment in one of the stanzas which concludes as follows:

"Other joys

Are but toys,

And to be lamented."

The

Leigh Hunt ought to have allowed for some little extravagance in a laudatory lyric upon the writer's favorite amusement. name of John Chalkhill is affixed to the song, and yet a critic like Leigh Hunt gives the authorship to another :-this is fame. I had nearly forgotten to mention, that Mr. Singer is said to have given the public a reprint of Thealma and Clearchus, but I have never met with it, and perhaps the poem is, at this day, almost as good as manuscript. Walton's old edition of the book fell into my hands but a few days ago, and it is the first copy I ever saw. As it is not very likely that of my many readers have been equally fortunate, I trust they will not be displeased to have some account of it, and a few characteristic extracts. It may be regarded as a remarkable indication of the obscurity of the author, that Mr. Singer in his reprint of the work, is said to have thrown out a conjecture, that, as Walton had been silent upon the life of his friend Chalkhill, he might be altogether a fictitious personage, and be only a pseudonyme for Walton himself*. Rennie, in his new edition of the Complete Angler, laughs at this conjecture; and, to convince us that it is quite unreasonable, informs us, that the tomb-stone of John Chalkhill is still to be seen in Winchester Cathedral, where Walton himself was buried. But the epitaph is given by Warton in his History of Winchester, and from this it appears, by a comparison of dates, that the John Chalkhill, who lies in his last sleep, in Winchester Cathedral, could not have been the "friend and acquaintant" of Spenser. The tomb-stone tells us, that it covers the remains of one who died in the year 1679, aged eighty years. He was therefore born in 1599, The Critic in the Retrospective Review is of the same opinion.

the year after Spenser's death. This somewhat perplexes us in our speculations regarding the history of our author; but it is difficult to believe that honest Izaac Walton would have put forth a poem under a feigned name, and have attempted to deceive mankind in his venerable old age, when he was probably preparing himself for another world. There was too much simplicity and truth in his character, to have enabled him to reconcile his conscience to an act of this nature. The fervid commendation, moral and critical, which he has lavished on the author, he never could have bestowed upon himself. But the office of paying a tribute to the memory, and preserving the literary remains of a friend, was an occupation in exact keeping with his character. It was a sacred duty, and the manner in which he has performed it, adds considerably to our respect for the name of Walton. It is certainly, however, to be regretted that, while paying an ardent tribute to the character of the author, he was not a little more explicit in the details of his personal history.

The poem of Thealma and Clearchus, though left unfinished by the author, extends to considerably more than three thousand lines. Of the story, which is very intricate, I shall not take the trouble to offer a complete analysis. It will be necessary, however, to explain as much of it as will render the extracts intelligible. The scene is laid in Arcadia. The actors are princes and princesses, and other personages of distinction, who have been induced, by various circumstances, to conceal their real characters, and beguile their sorrows in a pastoral life. The design is sufficiently fantastic, but the execution is often exquisitely natural. The poem opens with Thealma, at once a princess and a shepherdess, leading forth her "tender ewes," early in the morning, just as the sun begins to gild the tops of the mountains. Her soul is darkened with melancholy thoughts, on account of the absent Clearchus, whom she supposes to be dead. The cheerfulness of morning sheds no light upon her despondent spirit. But let the

poet himself describe her state in his own harmonious numbers: :

The airy choir salute the welcome day,

And with new carols sing their cares away;

Yet move not her: she minds not what she hears:

Their sweeter accents grate her tender ears,
That relish nought but sadness: joy and she
Were not so well acquainted: one might see
E'en in her very looks a stock of sorrow

So much improved, 'twould prove despair to-morrow.

Here follows a description of a river, on the banks of which she seated herself, to indulge, at leisure, her tender sadness:

Down in a valley 'twixt two rising hills,

From whence the dew in silver drops distils

To enrich the lowly plain, a river ran,

Hight Cygnus, (as some think from Læda's Swan
That there frequented ;) gently on it glides,
And makes indentures in her crooked sides,
And with her silent murmurs, rocks asleep
Her watery inmates: 'twas not very deep,
But clear as that Narcissus looked in, when

His self-love made him cease to live with men.

In the following passage, the allusion to Collin is evidently a compliment to Spenser :

Close by the river, was a thick-leav'd grove,
Where swains of old sang stories of their love;
But unfrequented now since Collin died,
Collin that king of shepherds, and the pride
Of all Arcadia.

At noon, her servant, Caretta, brings a pastoral refection of curds, creams, and cheesecake. The faithful and affectionate domestic tries very hard to persuade her mistress to partake of these dainties. For a long time, her arguments and entreaties are without effect. At last, the poor girl hits upon the right string, by pressing the attention of her mistress to the fact that the fate of Clearchus was not clearly ascertained, and that it

was quite possible that fate had sent some lucky hand to save him in an extremity of danger; for Thealma herself had been snatched from a watery grave in which many of her friends supposed her still immured. There is a touch of genuine nature in the manner in which this consolatory suggestion breaks through Thealma's troubled thoughts, like a sudden light between shifting clouds.

Thealma, all this while with serious eye,
Ey'd the poor wench, unwilling to reply ;
For in her looks she read some true presage,
That gave her comfort, and somewhat assuage
The fury of her passions; with desire

Her ears suck'd in her speech, to quench her fire:
She could have heard her speak an age, sweet soul,
So pretty loud she chid her, and condole
With her in her misfortunes. O, said she,
What wisdom dwells in plain simplicity!
Prithee (my dear Caretta) why dost cry?
I am not angry; good girl, dry thine eye,
Or I shall turn child too.

She then consents to partake of her servant's pastoral delicacies, if she will only promise to be merry. This change in her mistress, for a moment, overwhelms Caretta with conflicting emotions of grief and joy.

Still Caretta wept,

Sorrow and gladness such a struggling kept
Within her for the mastery: at the length

Joy overcame, and speech recovered strength.

While the mistress and her maid are thus occupied in an interchange of kind expressions, they are startled by the sudden appearance of a boar pursued by a huntsman; and as the chace is described with great force and freshness, I shall lay the entire passage before the reader. The passages in italics are highly graphic.