Casting their dappled shadows at my feet; I will be grateful for that simple boon, In many a thoughtful verse and anthem sweet, And bless thy dainty face whene'er we meet. In the Gem, a literary annual for 1829, Mr Hood published a ballad entitled The Dream of Eugene Aram, which is also remarkable for its exhibition of the secrets of the human heart, and its deep and powerful moral feeling. It is perhaps to be regretted that an author who had undoubted command of the higher passions and emotions, should so seldom have frequented this sacred ground, but have preferred the gaieties of mirth and fancy. He probably saw that his originality was more apparent in the latter, and that popularity was in this way more easily attained. Immediate success was of importance to him; and until the position of literary men be rendered more secure and unassailable, we must often be content to lose works which can only be the ripened fruits of wise delay.' The following is one of Hood's most popular effusions in that style which the public identified as peculiarly his own : A Parental Ode to my Son, aged Three Years and Five Months. Thou happy, happy elf! (But stop-first let me kiss away that tear) Thou tiny image of myself! (My love, he's poking peas into his ear!) Untouched by sorrow, and unsoiled by sin, Thou little tricksy Puck! With antic toys so funnily bestuck, Light as the singing bird that wings the air, (The door! the door! he 'll tumble down the stair!) Thou darling of thy sire! (Why, Jane, he 'll set his pinafore afire !) Thou imp of mirth and joy! In Love's dear chain so strong and bright a link, Thou cherub-but of earth; (That dog will bite him if he pulls its tail!) Toss the light ball-bestride the stick, (I knew so many cakes would make him sick!) With fancies buoyant as the thistle-down, Prompting the face grotesque, and antic brisk With many a lamb-like frisk, (He's got the scissors, snipping at your gown!) Thou pretty opening rose! (Go to your mother, child, and wipe your nose!) Balmy, and breathing music like the south, (He really brings my heart into my mouth!) Fresh as the morn, and brilliant as its star, (I wish that window had an iron bar!) Bold as the hawk, yet gentle as the dove, (I'll tell you what, my love, I cannot write, unless he 's sent above!) The Song of the Shirt. With fingers weary and worn, With eyelids heavy and red, In poverty, hunger, and dirt; 'Work-work-work! While the cock is crowing aloof! And work-work-work! Till the stars shine through the roof! It's oh! to be a slave, Along with the barbarous Turk, Where woman has never a soul to save, If this is Christian work! 'Work-work-work! Till the brain begins to swim ; Work-work-work! Till the eyes are heavy and dim! Seam, and gusset, and band, Band, and gusset, and seam, Till over the buttons I fall asleep, And sew them on in a dream! men, with sisters dear! O men, with mothers and wives, It is not linen you 're wearing out! But human creatures' lives! Stitch-stitch-stitch! In poverty, hunger, and dirt; Sewing at once, with a double thread, A shroud as well as a shirt. 'But why do I talk of Death? It seems so like my own, O God! that bread should be so dear, 'Work-work-work! My labour never flags; And what are its wages? A bed of straw, That shattered roof-and this naked floorA table-a broken chair; And a wall so blank, my shadow I thank 'Work-work-work! From weary chime to chime, Work-work-work As prisoners work for crime! Band, and gusset, and seam, Seam, and gusset, and band, Till the heart is sick, and the brain benumbed, As well as the weary hand. "Work-work-work! In the dull December light, When the weather is warm and bright- 'Oh, but to breathe the breath Of the cowslip and primrose sweetWith the sky above my head, And the grass beneath my feet; 'Oh, but for one short hour! A respite however brief! No blessed leisure for love or hope, A little weeping would ease my heart, My tears must stop, for every drop With fingers weary and worn, With eyelids heavy and red, A woman sat, in unwomanly rags, In poverty, hunger, and dirt; And still, with a voice of dolorous pitch- The following stanzas possess a sad yet sweet reality of tone and imagery: The Death-bed. We watched her breathing through the night, As in her breast the wave of life So silently we seemed to speak, So slowly moved about, As we had lent her half our powers Our very hopes belied our fears, We thought her dying when she slept, For when the morn came dim and sad, Another morn than ours. Hood's works have been collected into four volumes: Poems of Wit and Humour; Hood's Own, or Laughter from Year to Year; and Whims and Oddities in Prose and Verse. A son of Mr Hood's (commonly termed TOM HOOD) was also a professional littérateur, author of several novels, books for children, and other works: he was also editor of a comic periodical, Fun. He died in 1874, aged 39. DAVID MACBETH MOIR. Under the signature of the Greek letter Delta, DAVID MACBETH MOIR (1798 1851) was a large poetical contributor to Blackwood's Magazine. His best pieces are grave and tender, but he also wrote some lively jeux d'esprit, and a humorous Scottish tale, The Autobiography of Mansie Wauch, which was published in one volume, in 1828. His other works are-The Legend of Genevieve, with other Tales and Poems, 1824; Outlines of the Ancient History of Medicine, 1831; Domestic Verses, 1843; and Sketches of the Poetical Literature of the Past Half-century, 1851. His Poetical Works, edited by Thomas Aird—who prefixed to the collection an excellent memoir of the poetwere published in two volumes in 1852. Mr Moir practised as a surgeon in his native town of Musselburgh, beloved by all who knew him. Of his poetry, Mr Aird says: In Delta's earlier strains there are generally fancy, and feeling, and musical rhythm, but not much thought. His love of poetry, however, never suffered abatement, and as "a maker," he was improving to the very last. To unfaded freshness of heart he was adding riper thought such was one of the prime blessings of his pure nature and life. Reserve and patience were what he wanted, in order to be a greater name in song than he is.' When Thou at Eve art Roaming. I. When thou at eve art roaming Along the elm-o'ershadowed walk, Where fast the eddying stream is foaming, And falling down-a cataract, 'Twas there with thee I wont to talk; Think thou upon the days gone by, And heave a sigh. II. When sails the moon above the mountains, III. When wakes the dawn upon thy dwelling, As soft the woodland songs are swelling IV. To me, through every season, dearest ; REV. JOHN MOULTRIE. Associated with Praed, Macaulay, Henry Nelson Coleridge, and others in the Etonian and Knight's Quarterly Magazine, was the REV. JOHN MOULTRIE (1799-1874), for some time rector of Rugby an amiable and accomplished man, and one of the most graceful and meditative of the minor poets. He published two volumes-My Brother's Grave, and other Poems, 1837; and The Dream of Life, and other Poems, 1843; also a volume of Sermons preached in the Parish Church of Rugby, 1852. A complete edition of Moultrie's poems was published in 1876, with memoir by the Rev. Derwent Coleridge, one of the most attached and admiring of his college friends. The following is part of one of his earliest and best poems: My Brother's Grave. Beneath the chancel's hallowed stone, In simplest phrase recorded there: The living eye hath never known.' Those windows on the Sabbath day; And lips and hearts to God are given, Of earthly ills, in thought of heaven; And if a voice could reach the dead, It is not long since thou wert wont These stones which now thy dust conceal, Were holiest objects to thy soul; On these thy spirit loved to dwell, Untainted by the world's control. My brother, these were happy days, My soul was then, as thine is now, And years have passed, and thou art now Forgotten in thy silent tomb; And cheerful is my mother's brow, My father's eye has lost its gloom; And years have passed, and death has laid Another victim by thy side; With thee he roams, an infant shade; But not more pure than thou he died. And that dear home, which saw your birth, THE HON. MRS NORTON. The family of Sheridan has been prolific of genius, and MRS NORTON has well sustained the honours of her race. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, by his marriage with Miss Linley, had one son, Thomas, whose convivial wit and fancy were scarcely less bright or less esteemed than those of his father, and whose many amiable qualities greatly endeared him to his friends. He died at a comparatively early age (in 1817), while filling the office of Colonial Paymaster at the Cape of Good Hope. In 1806, Thomas Sheridan was in Scotland, in the capacity of aide-de-camp to Lord Moira, and he there married a daughter of Colonel and Lady Elizabeth Callender of Craigforth, by whom he had a numerous family.* Caroline Elizabeth Sarah was one of three sisters; she was born in 1808, and in her nineteenth year was married to the Hon. George Chapple Norton, son of the first Lord Grantley. This union was dissolved in 1840, after Mrs Norton had been the object of suspicion and persecution of the most painful description. Mr Norton was for thirty years recorder of Guildford; he died in 1875. From her childhood, Caroline Sheridan wrote verses. Her first publication was an attempt at satire, The Dandies' Rout, to which she added illustrative drawings. In her seventeenth year she wrote The Sorrows of Rosalie, a poem embodying a pathetic story of village-life, but which was not published until 1829. Her next work was a poem founded on the ancient legend of the Wandering *Lady Elizabeth, the mother of Mrs Norton, was a daughter of the Earl of Antrim. She wrote a novel, entitled Carwell. Those who trace the preponderance of talent to the mother's side, may conclude that a fresh infusion of Irish genius was added to the Sheridan family by this connection. Jew, and which she termed The Undying One, 1831. A novel, The Wife and Woman's Reward, 1835, was Mrs Norton's next production. In 1840 appeared The Dream, and other Poems. In 1845, she published The Child of the Islands, a poem written to draw the attention of the Prince of Wales, when he should be able to attend to social questions, to the condition of the people in a land and time wherein there is too little communication between classes,' and too little expression of sympathy on the part of the rich towards the poor. This was no new theme of the poetess: she had years before written letters on the subject, which were published in the Times newspaper. At Christmas 1846, Mrs Norton issued two poetical fairy tales, Aunt Carry's Ballads for Children, which charm alike by their graceful fancy and their brief sketches of birds, woods, and flowers. In 1850 appeared a volume of Tales and Sketches in Prose and Verse, being a collection of miscellaneous pieces originally contributed to periodicals. Next year a bolder venture was tried, a three-volume novel, entitled Stuart of Dunleath, a Story of Modern Times. The incidents of this story are too uniformly sad and gloomy-partly tinged by the bitter experiences of the authoress; but it presents occasional passages of humour and sarcasm, and a more matured though unfavourable knowledge of the world. It seemed as if the mind of the accomplished writer had been directed more closely to 'the evils done under the sun,' and that she longed passionately for power to redress them. In 1854 she wrote English Laws for Women in the Nineteenth Century; in 1862, The Lady of Garaye; in 1863, a novel entitled Lost and Saved. Her subsequent public appearances have been chiefly on topics of social importance; and the recent improvement in the English marriage laws may be traced primarily to the eloquent pleadings and untiring exertions of Mrs Norton. This lady,' says a writer in the Quarterly Review, 'is the Byron of our modern poetesses. She has very much of that intense personal passion by which Byron's poetry is distinguished from the larger grasp and deeper communion with man and nature of Wordsworth. She has also Byron's beautiful intervals of tenderness, his strong practical thought, and his forceful expression. It is not an artificial imitation, but a natural parallel.' The truth of this remark, both as to poetical and personal similarity of feeling, will be seen from the following impassioned verses, addressed by Mrs Norton to the late Duchess of Sutherland, to whom she dedicated her Poems. The simile of the swan flinging aside the turbid drops' from her snowy wing is certainly worthy of Byron. But happily Mrs Norton has none of Byron's misanthropy or cold hopelessness. To the Duchess of Sutherland. Once more, my harp! once more, although I thought A wandering dream thy gentle chords have wrought, And unto thee-the beautiful and pure- To thee-whose friendship kept its equal truth Through the most dreary hour of my embittered youth I dedicate the lay. Ah! never bard, In days when poverty was twin with song; Nor wandering harper, lonely and ill-starred, Cheered by some castle's chief, and harboured long; Not Scott's Last Minstrel, in his trembling lays, Woke with a warmer heart the earnest meed of praise! For easy are the alms the rich man spares To sons of Genius, by misfortune bent; Thou, then, when cowards lied away my name, Thou gav'st me that the poor do give the poor, steal O'er minds like these, an easy faith to win ; And tales of broken truth are still believed Most readily by those who have themselves deceived. But like a white swan down a troubled stream, Whose ruffling pinion hath the power to fling Aside the turbid drops which darkly gleam, And mar the freshness of her snowy wingSo thou, with queenly grace and gentle pride, Along the world's dark waves in purity dost glide: Thy pale and pearly cheek was never made To crimson with a faint false-hearted shame ; And though my faint and tributary rhymes Shall set some value on his votive lay; So when these lines, made in a mournful hour, In a poem entitled Autumn there is a noble simile: I know the gray stones in the rocky glen, So-with such dark majestic eyes, where shone Less terror than amazement-nobly came Peruvia's Incas, when, through lands unknown, The cruel conqueror with the blood-stained name Swept with pursuing sword and desolating flame. In The Winter's Walk, a poem written after walking with Mr Rogers the poet, Mrs Norton has the following graceful and picturesque lines: Gleamed the red sun athwart the misty haze Beauty still lives, though nature's flowerets die, All was beheld, and nothing unadmired; The affectionate attachment of Rogers to Sheridan, in his last and evil days, is delicately touched upon by the poetess : And when at length he laid his dying head He found (though few or none around him came Picture of Twilight. O Twilight! Spirit that dost render birth To dim enchantments; melting heaven with earth, Not Lost, but Gone Before. How mournful seems, in broken dreams, When icy Death hath sealed the breath When pale, unmoved, the face we loved, And the hand lies cold, whose fervent hold Oh, what could heal the grief we feel Oh, sadly yet with vain regret The widowed heart must yearn; And mothers weep their babes asleep In the sunlight's vain return; The brother's heart shall rue to part From the one through childhood known; For death and life, with ceaseless strife, O world wherein nor death, nor sin, Where eyes awake, for whose dear sake Are changed for heaven's sweet hymn; Oh! there at last, life's trials past, We'll meet our loved once more, Whose feet have trod the path to God'Not lost, but gone before.' THOMAS KIBBLE HERVEY-ALARIC A. WATTS. MR HERVEY, a native of Manchester (18041859), for some years conducted the Athenæum And, though such radiance round him brightly glows, literary journal, and contributed to various other Marks the small spark his cottage-window throws. Dear art thou to the lover, thou sweet light, periodicals. He published Australia, and other Poems, 1824; The Poetical Sketch-book, 1829; Illustrations of Modern Sculpture, 1832; The English Helicon, 1841 ; &c. His verses are characterised by delicate fancy and feeling. The Convict Ship. Morn on the waters! and, purple and bright, And her pennon streams onward, like hope, in the gale; The winds come around her, in murmur and song, |