The Works of Thomas Hood

verse, which may explain the indifference of Mr. REYNOLDS to his poetical reputation :

SONNET.

I once had thought to have embalmed my name
With Poesy-to have served the gentle Muses
With high sincerity-but Fate refuses,

And I am now become most strangely tame,
And careless what becomes of Glory's game—

Who strives-who wins the wondrous prize-who loses!
Not that the heavy world my spirit bruises;
But I have not the hear to rush at Fame.
Magnificent and mental images

Have visited me oftentimes, and given

My mind to proud delights;-but now it sees
Those visions going like the lights of even:
All intellectual grandeur dimly flees-
And I am quiet as the stars of heaven!

We are not quite certain that we could, in every case, refer the compositions of the copartnership to their respective authors, though, in our judgment, most of them can be correctly assigned by internal evidence. The one that we most hesitate about is the Address to Mr. Dymoke. There is a letter of Edward Herbert's in the London Magazine giving an account of the Coronation, and mentioning the circumstances which are alluded to in the address, and in the first study of it that may be found in the Notes; but we are in doubt whether the verses are to be ascribed to Hoop or REYNOLDS. We may better leave this question for every reader to decide for himself, without seeking to anticipate his judgment. Perhaps no one will find much difficulty in coming to a correct deci

sion, for there is nothing more remarkable in HOOD's verse than its entire originality. His imagination is singularly fertile. His invention is marvellous. Hence it is that though he sometimes copies himself, he never mimics another; and though you can not always say that a poem is not HooD's, a poem that is really his you would hardly attribute to any one else.

Since the first edition of this volume was published, we have been furnished, from a source on which we rely, with the following assignment of the Odes and Addresses to their respective authors:

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