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Hope promised but to bring us here,
And reason takes the guidance now.
One backward look-the last-the last,

One silent year-for youth is past !”

These are natural, manly verses, and show how much Mr. Willis has lost by not cultivating this simpler style. The whole of this poem is so good that we shall quote it.

"Who goes with hope and passion back?
Who comes with me and memory on?
Oh! lonely looks that downward track-
Joy's music hushed-Hope's roses gone.
To pleasure and her giddy troop

Farewell, without a sigh or tear!
But heart gives way, and spirits droop,

To think that love may leave us here."

There is a pathos in the last line which had Mr. Willis more frequently displayed, would have rendered him one of the most charming of modern American Poets.

"Have we no charm when youth has flown,

Midway to death left sad and lone"

"Yet stay, as 'twere a twilight star

That sends its thread across the wave,

I see a brightening light from far,

That shows a path beyond the grave,
And now-bless God!--its golden line

Comes o'er, and lights my shadowy way,

And shows the dear hand clasped in mine!
But list what those sweet voices say:

The better land's in sight,

And, by its chastening light,

All love for life's midway is driven,

Save her whose clasped hand will bring thee on to Heaven."

The close of this is certainly too much in the old orthodox school, but they are almost entirely free from the faults of style we have before objected to.

There seems to us a great affinity between the poetry of Barry Cornwall and Willis; not so much the imitation of the younger one, as a natural resemblance. If Mr. Proctor excels his younger competitor in verse, Mr. Willis has the advantage over him in prose, and they will make an admirable parallel in some future poetical Plutarch.

Who would believe that the author of the tinsel tawdry verses we have presented to our readers had written the following natural poem:

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"For it stirs the blood in an old man's heart,

And makes his pulses fly,

To catch the thrill of a happy voice,

And the light of a pleasant eye.

"I have walked the world for fourscore years, And they say that I am old,

That my heart is ripe for the reaper Death, And my years are well nigh told.

"It is very true: it is very true,

I am old and I bide my time,

But my heart will leap at a scene like this,
And half renew my prime.

"Play on, play on, I am with you there,
In the midst of your merry ring,
I can feel the thrill of the daring jump,
And the rush of the breathless swing.

"I hide with you in the fragrant hay,
And I whoop the smothered call,
And my feet slip up on the seedy floor,
And I care not for the fall.

"I am willing to die when my time shall come, And I shall be glad to go,

For the world at best is a weary place,
And my pulse is getting low.

"But the grave is dark, and the heart will fail

In treading its gloomy way,

And it whiles my heart from its dreariness,
To see the young so gay."

Some critics have contended that this poem is deficient in sympathetic consistency, inasmuch as the latter part differs from the commencement, and consequently jars that fine artistic sense which is inseparable from the pure poetic mind.

This is, however, a hypercriticism we shall not venture into, and we merely name it as a critical problem for the reader's entertainment. We well remember the first time we read these verses many years ago, and they became a part of the heart's household from that very hour.

Had Mr. Willis often written in this style criticism would have been needless, for they would have at once settled the question by seizing upon the hearts of all readers.

We think it the unalienable right of every writer to be judged by his whole case: yet how frequently is an author condemned for failure in one branch of literature, while his triumph in other and loftier departments is forgotten or neglected! We think in this we perceive a great difference between American and English criticism. In the latter country an author's reputation generally remains where it was before the publication of the unsuccessful work; if he gains nothing, he loses nothing, except possibly a portion of that prestige which always accompanies success-he has a corps de reserve to retire upon. But in America a writer may lose all on account of one failure, and be well abused into the bargain. There is a monomaniacal spirit of detraction in their critical press which is truly astounding, and would be ludicrous were it not for the injurious tendency it has upon the literature of the country. Agreeably to this view, we not only wish to consider Mr. Willis as a poet, but also to test his powers in the

various branches of that divine art. We have already weighed him in the scale of sacred descriptive poetry, and found him wanting, and have likewise expressed our admiration of his occasional verses; we now present him in another light, as a writer of devotional impulse, and as a proof quote the "Dedication Hymn," sung at the consecration of Hanover Street Church, Boston.

"The perfect world by Adam trod,
Was the first temple, built by God:
His fiat laid the corner-stone,

And reared his pillars one by one.
He hung its starry roof on high-
The broad illimitable sky;

He spread its pavements, green and bright,
And curtained it with morning light.

"The mountains in their places stood-
The sea-the sky-and all was good:
And when its first pure praises rang,
The morning stars together sang-
Lord, 't is not ours to make the sea,
And earth, and sky, a house for thee:
But in thy sight our offering stands,
A humbler temple made with hands.”

This is certainly better than the descriptive poetry on sacred subjects, but the same defect spoils this, although in a lesser degree; the hymn is very pretty, and herein the failure consists.

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