from far-distant, undiscovered islands, over dim oceans, illimitable and unexplored. He owns it in all noble thoughts—in all unworldly motives-in all holy impulses-in all chivalrous, generous, and self-sacrificing deeds. He feels it in the beauty of woman

manifestation of the Principle is always found in an elevating excitement of the Soul, quite independent of that passion which is the intoxication of the Heart, or of that truth which is the satisfaction of the Reason. For in regard to Passion, alas! its tendency is to degrade rather than to elevate the Soul.—in the grace of her step-in the luster of Love, on the contrary-Love-the true, the divine Eros-the Uranian as distinguished from the Dionæan Venus-is unquestionably the purest and truest of all poetical themes. And in regard to Truth if, to be sure, through the attainment of a truth we are led to perceive a harmony where none was apparent before, we experience at once the true poetical effect-but this effect is referable to the harmony alone, and not in the least degree to the truth which merely served to render the harmony manifest.

We shall reach, however, more immediately a distinct conception of what the true Poetry is, by mere reference to a few of the simple elements which induce in the Poet himself the true poetical effect. He recognizes the ambrosia which nourishes his soul, in the bright orbs that shine in Heaven-in the volutes of the flower in the clustering of low shrubberies-in the waving of the grain-fields in the slanting of tall Eastern trees in the blue distance of mountainsin the grouping of clouds-in the twinkling of half-hidden brooks-in the gleaming of silver rivers in the repose of sequestered lakes in the star-mirroring depths of lonely wells. He perceives it in the songs of birds in the harp of Eolus-in the sighing of the night-wind-in the repining voice. of the forest-in the surf that complains to the shore-in the fresh breath of the woods -in the scent of the violet-in the voluptuous perfume of the hyacinth-in the suggestive odor that comes to him at eventide

her eye-in the melody of her voice-in her soft laughter-in her sigh-in the harmony of the rustling of her robes. He deeply feels it in her winning endearments— in her burning enthusiasms in her gentle charities-in her meek and devotional endurances-but above all-ah, far above all -he kneels to it, he worships it in the faith, in the purity, in the strength, in the altogether divine majesty of her love.

Let me conclude by the recitation of yet
another brief poem-one very different in
character from any that I have before
quoted. It is by Motherwell,1 and is called
The Song of the Cavalier. With our modern
and altogether rational ideas of the absurdity
and impiety of warfare, we are not precisely
in that frame of mind best adapted to sym-
pathize with the sentiments, and thus to
appreciate the real excellence of the poem.
To do this fully we must identify ourselves in
fancy with the soul of the old cavalier.
Then mounte! then mounte, brave gallants, all,
And don your helmes amaine:
Deathe's couriers, Fame and Honor, call
Us to the field againe.
No shrewish teares shall fill our eye

When the sword-hilt's in our hand,-
Heart-whole we'll part, and no whit sighe
For the fayrest of the land;
Let piping swaine, and craven wight,
Thus weepe and puling crye,
Our business is like men to fight,
And hero-like to die!

1 Scottish poet (1797-1835).

10

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW (1807-1882)

Longfellow was born at Portland, Maine, on 27 February, 1807. After attending the Portland Academy, he went to Bowdoin College, was in the same class as Nathaniel Hawthorne, and was graduated in 1825. Upon his graduation he was offered the chair of modern languages at Bowdoin, with the understanding that he was to have the opportunity of study and travel in Europe to prepare himself for the post. He accepted the appointment and sailed for France in the spring of 1826, remaining abroad until the summer of 1829. His time was spent in France, Spain (where he met Irving), Italy, and Germany. In 1831 he married Miss Mary S. Potter, of Portland. In 1834 he was offered the Smith Professorship of modern languages at Harvard, in succession to George Ticknor, and was told that he might spend a year or more abroad in the study of German. He sailed for England in April, 1835, spending some months there and in the Scandinavian countries and Holland. In the latter country Longfellow's wife became ill and died. He proceeded to Heidelberg, where he was engaged in study for some seven or eight months, returning to America in the fall of 1836. Not many months after he took up his work at Harvard he began to live in Craigie House, then owned by Mrs. Andrew Craigie, and in this house he lived during the remainder of his life. In 1843 he married Miss Frances Elizabeth Appleton, of Boston, which increased his income as well as his happiness; and at this time Miss Appleton's father purchased Craigie House for Longfellow. He held his post at Harvard until 1854, with only one long vacation spent abroad. In 1861 Mrs. Longfellow was tragically burned to death, which darkened life for the poet, though in the course of time he regained his serenity. In 1868-1869 he was abroad for over a year, receiving many tokens of his distinction, and among them honorary degrees from both Cambridge University and Oxford. He died at his home in Cambridge on 24 March, 1882.

While he was yet a student at Bowdoin Longfellow cherished literary aspirations. In his senior year he wrote to his father: "I most eagerly aspire after future eminence in literature; my whole soul burns ardently for it, and every earthly thought centers in it." His father wished him to study the law. Fortunately active conflict was forestalled by the invitation which launched the poet upon his academic career. Such an opening, if not ideal for his purpose, was yet sufficiently better than the law. And indeed, while Longfellow was heartily tired of his professorship for some time before he finally resigned it, still, the two periods of study abroad which his acceptance of academic posts procured him were of inestimable importance for his literary work. It was through his acquaintance with European culture and his reading of romantic literature that he found himself. At first he worked as a man of letters, interpreting the culture of the Old World to the busy, unsophisticated inhabitants of the New. It was only gradually that he became primarily a poet. His success as a poet was nothing less than phenomenal, if it can be measured in terms of the number of readers both in England and in America whom he gained, and in terms of the love and veneration which that vast multitude of readers bestowed upon him. At the present time, while some of his lyrics and narratives continue and rightly continue to interest young readers, it may as well be said that Longfellow's intrinsic importance has diminished in our eyes, though his career and work remain significant from the historical point of view. Professor W. P. Trent has admirably and tactfully said that Longfellow's reputation "was amply deserved in the poet's day, and rested in the main on his gifts as a storyteller in verse, on his power to transplant to American literature some of the color and melody and romantic charm of the complex European literatures he had studied, and, more especially, on his skill in expressing in comparatively artless lyrics of sentiment and reflection homely and wholesome thoughts and feelings which he shared with his countrymen of all classes throughout a broad land the occupation of which proceeded apace during his own span of years. . . . His place is not with the few eminent poets of the world, or even of his century, as the admiration of the mass of his countrymen and the critical lucubrations of some of them might be held to imply; but it is, legitimately and permanently, in the forefront of the small band of important writers in verse and in prose who during the first century of the republic's existence laid firmly and upon more or less democratic lines the foundations of a native literature." (Camb. Hist. Am. Lit., II.)

Some of Longfellow's more important volumes and their dates follow: Outre-Mer, A Pilgrimage beyond the Sea (prose, 1833-1834); Hyperion, A Romance (prose, 1839); Voices of the Night (the first volume of poems, 1839); Ballads and Other Poems (1842); Poems on Slavery (1842); The Spanish Student (a play lacking in dramatic interest, 1843); The Poets and Poetry of Europe, with Introductions and Biographical Notices (1845); Evangeline (1847); The Golden Legend (1851); The Song of Hiawatha (1855); The Courtship of Miles Standish, and Other Poems (1858); Tales of a Wayside Inn (1863); The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri (metrical translation, 1865-1867); The Divine Tragedy (1871); Michael Angelo (1883).

And this is the sweet spirit, that doth fill The world; and, in these wayward days of youth,

My busy fancy oft embodies it,

As a bright image of the light and beauty 40
That dwell in nature; of the heavenly forms
We worship in our dreams, and the soft
hues

That stain the wild bird's wing, and flush the
clouds

When the sun sets. Within her tender eye
The heaven of April, with its changing light,
And when it wears the blue of May, is
hung,

And on her lip the rich, red rose. Her hair
Is like the summer tresses of the trees,
When twilight makes them brown, and on
her cheek

Blushes the richness of an autumn sky, 50
With ever-shifting beauty. Then her breath,
It is so like the gentle air of Spring,

As, from the morning's dewy flowers, it

comes

Full of their fragrance, that it is a joy
To have it round us, and her silver voice
Is the rich music of a summer bird,
Heard in the still night, with its passionate
cadence.