Art. XII. The Descent of Liberty, a Mask. 8vo. pp. lix. 82. price 6s. boards.

By Leigh Hunt. Small Gale and Co. 1815.

PREFIXED to this little Poem is a di-course On the Origin and Nature of Masks.' Mr Hunt is not inclined to fetter so lively and airy a composition, in the bonds of a too strict definition; he considers it as

A mixed Drama, allowing of natural incidents as of every thing else that is dramatic, but more essentially given up to the fancy, and abounding in machinery and personification, generally with a particular allusion.'p. xxiv.

Milton's Comus, he considers, as the best indeed, but, at the same time, the least specific work of its kind. Perhaps, common readers will have their idea of a mask best formed by being referred to that in Shakspeare's Tempest.

Mr Hunt's piece is of a much more extensive and varied nature; extremely gorgeous in its pageants, rich in its imagination, and delightfully romantic and fanciful in its diction, To some readers, indeed, the diction may appear as too much an imitation of our old poets; but to us, any thing that brings them to recollection is charming. Neither can Mr. Hunt be called, properly, an imitator; he has imbued himself richly with the wild fancies and picturesque language of those good old bards, but he has at the same time his own manner.

The subject, as the reader will guess by the title, is the return of Liberty and Peace to the earth, after the downfall of Buonaparte; and we think the political purport now and then peeps rather too broadly through the fancy of the piece. Shepherds are introduced as having heard, for some days, sweet music in the air, a

new sound,

The first, of any comfortable breath,
Our wood has heard for years.'

Hence, they augur some glad change at hand, some relief from the enchanter who has so long been the curse of the ' weary land.'

I know not why,

But there is such a sweetness in the touch
Of this mysterious pipe that's come among us,
Something so full of trilling gladsomeness,
As if the heart were at the lip that fill'd it,
Or went a rippling to the fingers' ends,

That it forebodes, to me, some blessed change.' p. 8.,

Of this music and of their conjectures they resolve to inform old Eunomus,

• Who used to set

So rare a lesson to the former court,

But now shuts his sorrows in this corner; p. 8.
How has he suffered?

Both his sons gone,-the first one by his death
Breaking the mother's heart, the second now

Torn from his bride, and dead too as they say.'-p. 10.

This Eunomus and his daughter-in-law Myrtilla are charmingly described; and, at the request of the latter, put forth in a sweet song, a spirit announces the coming of Liberty. The destruction of the enchanter is then shewn in an aërial pageant, and the twilight, which had before lain upon the face of the whole country, vanishes. Spring descends to prepare the earth for the approach of Liberty; and perhaps we could not quote any thing more characteristic of the Author's lighter and more playful style, than the description which is given of her flowers.

Then the flowers on all their beds

How the sparklers glance their heads!
Daisies with their pinky lashes,
And the marigold's broad flashes,
Hyacinth with sapphire bell
Curling backward, and the swell
Of the rose, full-lipp'd and warm,
Round about whose riper form
Her slender virgin-train are seen
In their close-fit caps
of green:

Lilacs then, and daffodillies,
And the nice-leav'd lesser lillies,
Shading like detected light,

Their little green tipt lamps of white;
Blissful poppy, odorous pea,
With its wings up lightsomely;
Balsam with his shaft of amber,
Mignonette for lady's chamber,
And genteel geranium,
With a leaf for all that come;
And the tulip, trick d out finest,
And the pink, of smell divinest;
And as proud as all of them
Bound in one, the garden's gem,
Heartsease, like a gallant bold,

In his cloth of purple and gold.' pp. 28–19,

We return to earth, and we are delighted with the inno cent fancies of Myrtilla.

• You've heard me, Sir,

In my young fancy picture out a world,

Such as our present-timed, unfinal eyes,

Knowing but what they see,-and not even that,-
Might gather from the best of what's before them,
Leaving out evil as a vexing thorn,

Whose use they know not ;

2nd Shep.

This change appears?

Myrt.

Such a world, you say,

I do, it seems to me,

In it's fresh whisper, and delighted eye,
And all this burst of out-o'-door enjoyment,
Just like a new creation.-Spring and Summer
Married, and Winter dead to be no more.
Was ever so much horror, at the best,

Follow d by such a time,-change, wondrous change
In what has busied all your talk by the way,
And with it all this luxury,-flowers, blossoms,
And heaps of leafiness on every side

About and overhead with beams between,

And quick-voic'd birds that steep the trees in music,
Green fields, and crystal waters, and blue skies,
With here and there a little harmless cloud
That only wants a visible cherub on it
To ride its silver,- happy human beings
O'ertaking us mean time at every step

With smile that cannot help itself, and turning,
As they pass quick, with greeting of the day,
Exchanging blessedness :-Oh sir, Oh father,
There's such a look of promise all about us,
A smile so bidding, something that almost
Seems to say yes to what the tip-toe heart,
Hanging on Nature's neck, would ask of her,
Even to the raising of a buried joy,

That I could fancy-but-forgive me, pray,
For talking of those things.' pp. 31-33.

We must give one more touch from the earthly part of the poem. It has something in it exquisitely touching. Philaret, the husband of Myrtilla, returns almost unhoped-for from the wars; and, on hearing of the kindness of his wife, during his absence, to his old father, breaks out into the following expressions of tenderness.

Did she do so? Did you do thus, my best

And tenderest heart,-my wife?-May heaven for this,
If only this, bring out that cheek again

Into its dimpled outline,-Heaven for this

Cool the dear hand I grasp with health and peace,

Bless thee in body and mind, in home and husband,---

And when old age, reverencing thy looks
In all it can, comes with his gentle withering,
Some thin and ruddy streaks still lingering on thee,
May it, unto the last keep thee thy children,
Full-numbered round about thee, to supply

With eyes, feet, voice and arms, and happy shoulders,
Thy thoughts, and wishes, books, and leaning-stocks,
And make the very yielding of thy frame
Delightful for their propping it.-Come, come,
We will have no more tears.'-pp. 35, 36.

Liberty at length descends; and the four spirits of the nations,' the Prussian, Austrian, Russian, and English genii, successively_enter, and are welcomed by her in appropriate speeches. Peace is then invoked by some of the spirits of Liberty, who introduces, with a profusion of sweet songs and gorgeous imagery, Music, Painting, and Poetry. Then enter, with appropriate pageantry and attendants, Experience and Education. After this, Peace invokes Ceres in the following simple and beautiful song.

THE FOURTH SONG OF PEACE,

O, Thou that art our Queen again
And may in the sun be seen again
Come, Ceres, come,

For the war's gone home;

And the fields are quiet and green again.

The air. dear Goddess, sighs for thee,
The light-heart brooks arise for thee,
And the poppies red

On their wistful bed

Turn up their dark blue eyes for thee.

Laugh out in the loose green jerkin
That's fit for a goddess to work in,
With shoulders brown,

And the wheaten crown

About thy temples perking.

And with thee come Stout Heart in,
And Toil, that sleeps his cart in,

And Exercise,

The ruddy and wise,

His bathed fore locks parting.

And Dancing too, that's lither
Than willow or birch, drop hither,

To thread the place

With a finishing grace,

And carry our smooth eyes with her.' pp. 63, 64,

We cannot but add the trio and chorus in which Ceres is

welcomed.

TRIO AND CHORUS."

All joy to the giver of wine and of corn,
With her elbow at ease on her well-fill'd horn,
To the sunny cheek brown,

And the shady wheat crown,

And the ripe golden locks that come smelling of morn.
Stout Heart. "Tis she in our veins that puts daily delight;
Toil. is she in our beds puts us kindly at night;
Exercise. And taps at our doors in the morning bright,
Chorus. Then joy to the giver, &c.

We'll sling on our flaskets, and forth with the sun,
With our trim-ancled yoke-fellows, every one;
We'll gather and reap

With our arm at a sweep,

And oh! for the dancing when all is done;

Exercise Yes, yes, we'll be up when the singing bird starts;
Toil. Weil level her harvest, and fill up her carts;

Stout Heart. And shake off fatigue with our bounding hearts,
Chorus. Then hey for the laskets,' &c. pp. 67, 68.

CHORUS OF A FEW VOICES MALE AND FEMALE.

And see, to set us moving, here is Dancing here,
With the breezes at her ancles, and her winsome cheer,
With her in-and out deliciousness, and bending ear;

Nay, trip it first a while

To thine own sweet smile,

And we'll follow, follow, follow to thee, Dancing dear.' p. 67. The pageants are here on a sudden interrupted by the hasty entrance of a sable genius with fetter-rings at his wrists, a few of the links broken ott.' He has been disturbed by dreams of still impending evils, but is sent away re-assured by the promises of Liberty. The poem closes with the goddess's wisest contrast, the pageants of true and false glory.

Such of our readers as measure merit by length, breadth, and thickness, will think that we have dwelt too long on this unpretending volume; but we feel it necessary to apologize to our more imaginative readers, for so soon letting it out of our hands. It has given as infinitely more pleasure than many a handsome quarto from more fashionable pens. Indeed we know not that a thing of such continued and innocent fancy, so finely mixed up with touches of human affections,-a Manners** poem, in short, so fitted for a holyday hour on a bright spring morning,has ever come under our critical cognizance,