Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub

Parsonage," ," "Can You forgive Her?" "The Last Chronicle of Barset," and several other novels of great merit. Ralph, the Heir," now publishing.

CHARLOTTE BRONTË. - 1816-1855. Better known as "Currer Bell," a novelist of original power, true genius. "The Professor," "Jane Eyre," "Shirley," and "Villette."

[ocr errors]

WILKIE COLLINS. 1824. "Life of his Father," " Antonina,' "The Frozen Deep," a drama; "The Dead Secret," No Name," "Basil," "After Dark,”

[ocr errors]

Life,"
Romola," "

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

"Queen of Hearts," "Woman in White," and others of much popular favor. GEORGE ELIOT (Miss Evans?). - Very popular author of "Scenes of Clerical "The Mill on the Floss, Adam Bede," 66 "Silas Warner," Felix Holt," The Spanish Gypsy," and "How Lisa loved the King." WILLIAM CARLETON.-1798. "Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry," "Fardorougha the Miser," "Valentine McClutchy," "Willy Reilly," and others. WILLIAM H. AINSWORTH. - - 1805. "Rockwood," "Jack Sheppard,” “The Tower of London," Old St. Paul's," and "Windsor Castle," of an historical nature. SAMUEL WARREN.-1807. "Passages from the Diary of a Late Physician," "Ten Thousand a Year," and others.

66

DINAH MARIA MULOCK.-1826. "The Ogilvies,' ," "John Halifax, Gentleman," "Olive," and several others; also volume of poems.

JAMES HANNAY.-1827. "Singleton Fontenoy," "Eustace Conyers," "Lectures on Satire and Satirists," and "Essays from Quarterly Review." ELIZABETH GASKELL.

GEORGE GLEIG. 1796.

66

Mary Barton," and "Life of C. Brontë."

"The Subaltern," "The Chelsea Pensioners.”

SAMUEL LOVER.-1797. "Rory O'More," "Handy Andy," and Irish songs. JOHN BANIN. 1800-1842. "The O'Hara Tales."

ANNE MARSH. — 1798.

"Two Old Men's Tales," "Emilia Wyndham."

CATHERINE GORE. 1799-1861. "Mothers and Daughters;" "Cecil, or the Adventures of a Coxcomb."

"The Munster Tales," "The Collegians."
"Stories of Waterloo," "Hector O'Halloran.”
Marian," "Lights and Shadows of Irish

GERALD GRIFFIN. 1803-1840. WILLIAM H. MAXWELL.-1850. ANNA M. HALL." The Buccaneer," Life."

ALBERT SMITH.-1816--1860. pole," and " Mr. Ledbury."

99 66

"Mont Blanc and China," "6 Christopher Tad

SHIRLEY BROOKS. 1816. "The Gordian Knot," "Aspen Court," "The Silver Cord," and others.

ANGUS B. REACH. 1821-1856. "Clement Lorimer," "Leonard Lindsay," "Natural History of Bores and Humbugs," Claret and Olives."

99 66

JAMES GRANT. — 1822. "Romance of War," "Jane Seton," "Memorials of Edinburgh Castle."

GEORGE AUGUSTUS SALA. - "Gaslight and Daylight in London," "Hogarth," "Seven Sons of Mammon," and others.

CHARLES READE. — “Peg Woffington," "Christie Johnston," "Never Too Late to Mend," and several others.

THOMAS HUGHES. - "Scouring of the White Horse," "Tom Brown's SchoolDays,' ""Tom Brown at Oxford."

FRANK SMEDLEY.—“Frank Fairlegh's Lewis Arundel.”

MAYNE REID.-"Scalp-Hunters."

GERALDINE JEWSBURY.-"Zoe," and "Half-Sisters."

Mrs. CATHARINE CROWE.. "Susan Hopley," "The Night-Side of Nature." And a legion, besides, of modern novelists.

ALFRED TENNYSON.

BORN 1810.

Poet Laureate since 1850. Critics somewhat divided as to his merits. Resembles Longfellow; and equally popular at home and abroad. The first of living English poets.

PRINCIPAL PIECES.

"The May Queen;""In Memoriam; " "Locksley Hall;" "Maud;" "The Idylls of the King; ""The Princess, a Medley; ""Morte d'Arthur; ""Godiva;' "Enoch Arden;" "The Holy Grail."

IN MEMORIAM.*

I.

I HELD it truth, with him who sings
To one clear harp in divers tones,
That men may rise on stepping-stones
Of their dead selves to higher things.

But who shall so forecast the years,
And find in loss a gain to match?

Or reach a hand through time to catch
The far-off interest of tears?

Let Love clasp Grief, lest both be drowned;
Let Darkness keep her raven gloss:
Ah! sweeter to be drunk with loss,
To dance with death, to beat the ground,

Than that the victor Hours should scorn
The long result of love, and boast,
"Behold the man that loved and lost!
But all he was is overworn."

II.

OLD Yew, which graspest at the stones
That name the underlying dead,
Thy fibers net the dreamless head;
Thy roots are wrapt about the bones.

The seasons bring the flower again,
And bring the firstling to the flock;
And, in the dusk of thee, the clock
Beats out the little lives of men.

Oh! not for thee the glow, the bloom,
Who changest not in any gale;
Nor branding summer suns avail
To touch thy thousand years of gloom.

* A hundred and thirty short poems in memory of the poet's friend, Arthur II. Hallam,

And gazing on thee, sullen tree,
Sick for thy stubborn hardihood,
I seem to fail from out my blood,
And grow incorporate into thee.

III.

O SORROW, cruel fellowship!

O Priestess in the vaults of Death!
O sweet and bitter in a breath!
What whispers from thy lying lip?

"The stars," she whispers, "blindly run;
A web is woven across the sky;
From out waste places comes a cry,
And murmurs from the dying sun;

"And all the phantom, Nature, stands,
With all the music in her tone,
A hollow echo of my own,
A hollow form with empty hands."

And shall I take a thing so blind?

Embrace her as my natural good? Or crush her, like a vice of blood, Upon the threshold of the mind?

IV.

To Sleep I give my powers away;
My will is bondsman to the dark :
I sit within a helmless bark;
And with my heart I muse, and say,·

"O heart! how fares it with thee now, That thou shouldst fail from thy desire, Who scarcely darest to inquire,

'What is it makes me beat so low?'

"Something it is which thou hast lost;

Some pleasure from thine early years. Break, thou deep vase of chilling tears, That grief hath shaken into frost!"

Such clouds of nameless trouble cross

All night below the darkened eyes: With morning wakes the will, and cries, "Thou shalt not be the fool of loss."

V.

I SOMETIMES hold it half a sin

To put in words the grief I feel; For words, like Nature, half reveal, And half conceal, the soul within.

But, for the unquiet heart and brain,
A use in measured language lies;
The sad mechanic exercise,
Like dull narcotics, numbing pain.

In words, like weeds, I'll wrap me o'er,
Like coarsest clothes against the cold;
But that large grief which these infold
Is given in outline, and no more.

VI.

ONE writes that "other friends remain,"
That "loss is common to the race;"
And common is the commonplace,
And vacant chaff well meant for grain.

That loss is common would not make
My own less bitter; rather more:
Too common! Never morning wore
To evening, but some heart did break.

O father, wheresoe'er thou be,

Who pledgest now thy gallant son!
A shot, ere half thy draught be done,
Hath stilled the life that beat from thee.

O mother, praying God will save

Thy sailor! while thy head is bowed,
His heavy-shotted hammock-shroud
Drops in his vast and wandering grave.

Ye know no more than I who wrought
At that last hour to please him well;
Who mused on all I had to tell,
And something written, something thought:
Expecting still his advent home;

And ever met him on his way

With wishes, thinking, "Here to-day,
Or here to-morrow, will he come."

Oh! somewhere, meek, unconscious dove,
That sittest ranging golden hair,
And glad to find thyself so fair,
Poor child, that waitest for thy love!

For now her father's chimney glows

In expectation of a guest;

And thinking, "This will please him best,"

She takes a ribbon or a rose :

For he will see them on to-night;

(And with the thought her color burns :)

And, having left the glass, she turns

Once more to set a ringlet right;

[blocks in formation]
« ПредишнаНапред »