solemnly, that the evil one becomes aware of a divine pur pose of restoration. One of the many beautiful passages, is a part of the dialogue between Adam and Eve, when they have fled to the extremity of the sword-glare shooting from the closed gate of Eden out into the dreary wilderness, and come upon the wild open country. The first evening of their expulsion is darkening around them; but the shadows are not only of the night: "Adam. How doth the wide and melancholy earth Gather her hills around us, grey and ghast, And stare with blank significance of loss Right in our faces! Is the wind up? Eve. Nay. Adam. And yet the cedars and the junipers Eve. O Life, Which is not man's nor angel's! What is this? Is crazed with curse, and wanders from the sense Yea, I plucked the fruit With eyes upturned to heaven, and seeing there My heart, which beat then, sinks. The sun hath sunk Adam. Night is near. Eve. And God's curse, nearest. Let us travel back And stand within the sword-glare till we die; Believing it is better to meet death Than suffer desolation. Adam. Nay, beloved! We must not pluck death from the Maker's hand, Eve. Ah! ah! dost thou discern what I behold? Adam. I see all. How the spirits in thine eyes, From their dilated orbits, bound before To meet the spectral dead! Eve. I am afraid, Ah-ah! the twilight bristles wild with shapes And mystic bearings, which o'ercreep the earth, How near they reach,-and far! how gray they move, And fluttering on the darkness without wings! Some keep one path like sheep; some rock like trees; Adam. Some spring up like fire,- Eve. Ah-ah! dost thou pause to say Like what?-coil like the serpent when he fell And writhed, and could not climb against the curse, Because we are not pure. Dear Pity of God, Adam. "the throng Of shapeless spectra merge into a few And hold us in a circle and a calm. Eve. Strange phantasms of pale shadow ! there are twelve." These are the twelve figures of the zodiac, and are exhibited as dim exponents of the creature life contained in the earth. It is thus that the powers of organic and inorganic nature, represented by spirits with an aspect of individuality, "and by one voice expressing many griefs," rise up against the fallen pair, and complain that the curse has sorely wounded their innocent life! The bitter and wide-extending consequence of their transgression is made known to Adam and Eve, by anticipations of coming wo, to be felt through the great heart of Nature! The song of the morning-star to Lucifer, and the love borne towards her by the fallen spirit, though exquisitely poetical, are embellishments, where departure from simplicity is dangerous, and out of keeping with the scriptural tone of the piece. We object, also, to the frequent introduction of conceits, intended to heighten the effect of the picture, or give force to the idea, but unworthy the sublimity of the subject. Thus Lucifer, describing his fall from heaven: "When countless angel faces, still and stern, Trampled down by your stillness, and struck blind Here the awful beauty of the picture is entirely marred by the image in the first two lines. Again, in Gabriel's reply to Lucifer's question, if man is destined to fill the thrones left vacant in heaven: "Glory and life Fulfil their own depletions; and if God Sighed you far from Him, His next breath drew in A compensative splendor up the skies, Flushing the starry arteries!" Not less puerile is the following image: "Gabriel. I charge thee by the choral song we sang, The depths of the creation swelled and broke,— On thunder edges." But these defects are only occasional, and there is so much to admire that we lose sight of them.-The author vindicates her introduction of the divine Saviour in a vision, towards the close, speaking and transfigured into humanity and suffering, by the example of other poets, and by Milton's design, when he thought of writing a drama on the subject of Paradise Lost, of introducing the "Heavenly Love" among his personages. We cannot help thinking, however, she would have done better by not attempting that to which no human conception could possibly rise. We like much better the passage, where the hope in the future of the exiles is faintly shadowed forth in the brief converse between Ga briel and the Spirit of Evil; the response being given from heaven to the questioning from the depths of despair: "First Voice. Is it true, O thou Gabriel, that the crown Of sorrow which I claimed, another claims? That He claims THAT too? Second Voice. Lost one, it is true. First Voice. That He will be an exile from His heaven, Second Voice. It is true. First Voice. That He will be an exile by His will, Second Voice. It is true. First Voice. That I shall stand sole exile finally, Second Voice. It is true," etc. Next to the "Drama of Exile," we come upon a series of sonnets, if such they may be called, being not more irregular in structure than many English poems that are called by courtesy-sonnets. These abound in beautiful and truthful thoughts. The two best are those entitled “Work” and "Patience taught by Nature,”—of which we extract the first as a specimen: "What are we set on earth? Say, to toil,- To wrestle, not to reign; and He assigns For younger fellow-workers of the soil Take patience, labor, to their heart and hands From thy hands, and thy heart, and thy brave cheer, "The Romaunt of the Page" is a ballad, breathing of chivalrous honor and woman's love, stronger than death. "The Lay of the Brown Rosarie," is a moral story, told in ballad style, and adorned with rich graces of poetry. It was the first ballad we ever saw of Miss Barrett's, and reminded us somewhat of Tennyson; abounding, moreover, in startling yet natural imagery, and expressions that more than paint the thought. It seems to belong to a strong conception, intuitively to combine words for its own use, far more power ful than mere study or research could have devised. In no one respect does our author show more convincingly the strength of her poetic faculty;-her words are vivid pictures. To illustrate by a random instance or two; how distinct is the idea conveyed to the mind by the following figure in one of her sonnets, asserting that hopeless grief is passionless: "Full desertness In souls, as countries, lieth silent, bare, And the line in the sonnet on Wordsworth: "And very meek with inspirations proud," how much does it express! Again, in the poem upon Exaggeration : "We walk upon The shadow of hills across a level thrown, But the reader of these volumes will find abundant illustrations more striking than these. "Lady Geraldine's Courtship" is a "Romance of the Age;" in fact a capital magazine story thrown into singular but harmonious measure. In lively prose it would rival some of the novellettes of Mr. Willis, and be much in his own style. The story is the old one, of a fair, noble and wealthy lady, receiving the homage of numerous noble suitors, and wedding, to please herself, one lowly born, but belonging to the aristocracy of mind. Fain would we find room for the "Mournful Mother," a lament over a dead blind boy; one of the most finished and exquisite of the shorter pieces. The second volume opens with "A Vision of Poets," the next longest to "The Drama of Exile," in the collection. In this the author has vindicated the necessary relations of genius to suffering and self-sacrifice. In the eyes of a true poet, his mission is a solemn one. The self-denial it enjoins may not be put off; the sorrow it implies must be accepted; the great work must be wrought out with pain; he must have an abiding sense of what Balzac has beautifully and truly called, "la patience angélique du génie." "We learn in suffering what we teach in song," is a truth our author has made her maxim; and from all her saddened experience, |