SOME POETS OF THE YEAR. WFor little books. E have before us a goodly row They are bright in their blue, their red, their green, and their pretty pink covers. Outside they make a very creditable show as the volumes of new poetry published within the last few months; inside they have, most of them, so much of merit that it is a pity for the fame of their writers that they did not flourish a hundred and fifty years earlier than they do. We do not see how in justice many of them could have been excluded from the collections of British Poets made in the last century, if they had then presented themselves for admission to them. In language, in versification, in general good taste, a vast majority of the gentlemen who now produce verses exhibit a proficiency which formerly would have entitled them to muster at least among the rank and file of the enrolled and registered poets of the land. Under George I. or George II. the best of them might, in Eton phrase, have fairly looked to be sent up for good.' The worst of them indeed, and some of those even who might then have found admirers, can now expect only, in the same language, to be 'told to wait!' But seriously, the enormous quantity of respectable -and more than respectablepoetry which is annually published in England, is at least a proof of cultivation and refinement-of a desire to excel and to follow in the path of distinction; and it is a phenomenon not to be merely disposed of by quoting the old Horatian denunciation of mediocre poets. The increasing propensity to imitation is the least satisfactory part of the business; and unfortunately the model usually selected, though really almost unapproachable, admits of a certain specious simulation, not very difficult of execution. There are, of course, various degrees of merit in these imitations. We were once taken through the wardrobe of a large London theatre. The ordinary regalia of the stage kings and queens, and the diamonds of their courtiers, were displayed to our gaze. These, however, as we were informed by our conductor, were only of glass, or even of still humbler tinfoil. With vast pride he next showed us a jewelled star belonging to the great actor of the day. These,' he said, 'are real paste.' So we have Tennyson, pure from the Golconda where such gems are formed; next to it ‘real paste' Tennyson, which may pass for genuine by gaslight; and lastly, tinsel Tennyson, which can impose on nobody. Whether readers of poetry multiply in the same proportion as writers of poetry, may be questioned. Probably they do not; and under existing circumstances it would be useful to the community at large if some legislative steps could be taken to restrain or limit the indiscriminate reading of poetry. We do not mean to say that we think it necessary that the authorities should interfere to stop the reading of bad poetry, although this is what we may naturally be supposed to intend. That, however, is an evil confined to the person who chooses to inflict it upon himself. It stops with him, and goes no farther. It is an evil, too, of small dimensions, and one which is pretty sure to cure itself. Bavius and Mævius may read each other's poetry as much as they please, or as much as they can, and the public will be none the worse for it. Our suggested prohibition would be in a totally different quarter. What we want to stop, except under certain conditions, is the reading of good-nay, of the very best poetry. What we mean is, that we would not allow any one who possessed in any degree the dangerous faculty of verse-making, to read Tennyson, without first entering into a bond with sufficient sureties, that he would not himself write anything in imitation of the Laureate's style. It is so easy to issue counters which for a moment shall pass current as the real coin of that mint. It is so tempting to counterfeit that true image and superscription-the ring of the metal can be made to sound so like the real money-although it is instantly detected when tried in the balance that it is perhaps only surprising that there is not more than there is of this spurious coinage in circulation. There is a Cambridge story, say of Brown and Jones, a couple of easy-going undergraduates who answered very badly in Paley's Evidences, and who both in consequence narrowly escaped being plucked in their Little-go Examination. Brown, however, as it presently appeared, had much the closest shave through of the two; for the Examiner afterwards reported to their common friends that he believed neither Brown nor Jones had ever read a word of Paley, but that Jones had made his Paley much the best of the two. We do not suppose that any of Mr. Tennyson's imitators have neglected to read him in quite so audacious a manner as this brace of young 453 gentlemen pretermitted their Paley; but we know which of them can make their Tennyson the best, and we are all the more inclined to be angry with some of them for devoting to the manufacture of copies an amount of genius and ability well worthy of being applied to the production of original designs. Where to begin? To which of our poets shall we give precedence? We will adopt the safe diplomatic rule, which among ambassadors and ministers of different nations at the same court, always gives the first place to the representative who may happen to have resided the longest at the particular place. If rumours on the subject of its parentage are correct, the reputed authors of Tannhäuser will not be inclined to dispute the general propriety of this rule; and it operates on the present occasion to put them first before us, for their volume, as it occurs, has been longest on our table, and is therefore entitled to the earliest attention. Tannhäuser is described as Minstrel, knight, the man in whom With sculpture rough, hath deck'd the summer haunts He was of Thuringia, in the Middle Ages, before the superstitions of Paganism had entirely ceased to have vitality, and in a district where the heathen goddess of Love was still open to be worshipped. At the hill of Hörselthe mount of Venus of mediaval romance-her revels of luxurious enjoyment were still held; and there misguided mortals might be captured in her attractive toils, and become the helpless and convicted slaves of sensuality. Tannhäuser has fallen under the influence of these fatal and degrading enchantments. Of such story as there is in this short poem he is the centre; and Elizabeth, the niece of the Landgrave of Thuringia, is the heroine. A scene between them is thus finely told : Time put his sickle in among the days. : * Tannhäuser; or, The Battle of the Bards. A Poem. By Neville Temple and Edward Trevor. London: Chapman and Hall. 1861. VOL. LXIV. NO. CCCLXXXII, HH The great south garden. All her simple hair . Then, while he look'd Had love between them been a spoken sound For after speech to lean on; only here And there, where scatter'd pauses strew'd their talk, Seen through a tender trouble of light clouds. But, in that moment, some mysterious touch, A thought-who knows ?-a memory-something caught Among the sunset clouds, or scented gusts Of evening through the gorgeous glooms, shrunk up The carnal creature sleeping in the flesh. -a In spite of this glimpse of rescue, the unworthy knight succumbs to the temptations of the Hill of Hörsel, and for a season is seen no more at the court of the Landgrave. Partly to cheer his disconsolate niece, that potentate determines to hold a battle of the bards, at which they are to contend in singing their compositions for a prize. Wolfram-a sort of Tressilianfriend of Tannhäuser's, and a rival, but hopeless suitor of Elizabeth, is the means of bringing him back to the world, and to take his part in the impending contest of the minstrels. Love is given out as the theme upon which the competing bards are to descant. Wolfram begins, and sings in honour of a distant, pious, and reverential love. His strain is not powerful. The lyrical pieces indeed, introduced as the songs of the bards, are not, in our judgment, equal to the rest of the poem; and of them Wolfram's are not the best. Next comes Tannhäuser, fresh from the fascinations of his recent abiding place, and he bursts into a glowing rhapsody in praise of such love as that under whose spell he has lately been wasting his life and destroying his soul. To him replies a certain Walter of the Heron-chase, and again in rejoinder is heard Tannhäuser in repetition of his former sensuous strain. One Sir Wilfrid of the Hills expounds the love of honour and chivalry; and Tannhäuser, who is ready to meet all comers, is roused to a still more profligate flight of song, and to a bolder note of defiance. The two minstrels are on the point of fighting out the rest of the compe tition with their swords instead of their lyres. A mild remonstrance from Wolfram is so much relished by the assembly that they are ready to give the prize to him (an award in which we cannot concur), when a last and shameless avowal by Tannhäuser of his Of all that awe-struck womanhood remain'd, That, swathed with whirlwind, to the bleak rock clings In mockery of splendid state, still sat; Still watch'd the waste that widen'd in her life; The creeping billow of calamity Sprays all his hair with cold; but hand or foot The fury of the men is turned against the author of this outrage upon womanhood; and, in spite of the rebukes of the Landgrave against the exercise of such sudden justice, he seems likely to fall a victim to their anger, when the most injured person of all intercedes in his favour. She passionately pleading thus, her voice Then sinks; but leaves the night not all forlorn Tannhäuser goes forth a degraded man and an exile. He undertakes a pilgrimage to Rome. Elizabeth is left to disappointment, to grief, and to prayer. At the end of two years there is a return of pilgrims. -Tannhäuser is not among them; she can obtain no assurance that his offences had been absolved at the holy place; and she dies broken hearted. Tannhäuser returns penitent but unpardoned by the Pope. He, too, dies, and is buried in the same grave with Elizabeth, a miraculous assurance being vouchsafed of his final acceptance as a repentant sinner. We must admire the address to Wolfram, spoken before he learns the death of the lady: Whereat Tannhäuser, turning tearless eyes May drain the deluge from my heart, no more Thou, therefore, Wolfram-for her face, when mine Is dark for ever, thine eyes may still behold Tell her, if thou unblamed may'st speak of one There his voice, Even as a wave that, touching on the shore Throughout the poem are many passages pregnant with power and full of a deep sense of the beautiful. We could only wish that the authors had provided a better setting for the precious gems of which the work presents so large a collection. The story is too slight to carry all that is confided to it, and is in its earlier passages almost repulsive. The characters fail to interest, and indeed want personality. Tannhäuser behaves like a beast or a madman, and it is impossible to feel much concern for his ultimate fate. In the songs at the Battle of the Bards, we can discover no sufficient appreciation of the grounds for the highest and best form of devotion to woman. We have the voluptuous lays of the be-glamoured knight. The feelings of a respectful but frigid adoration are described. So are the points of such a chivalric and highmettled ardour as set cavaliers in the saddle to do battle for their lady loves, or evoked the zeal of knights errant to travel to the rescue of distressed damsels. But we miss the recognition of the best and truest development of love. We discover no sense of the highest functions and capacities of womanhood, nothing that vibrates in unison with the old poet's lines when he described The reason firm, the temperate will, The poem should perhaps be considered rather as a kind of allegory than as a story from life, and in that view it may be excused for the want of reality usually incident to allegorical pieces. In common, too, with many other attempts to enforce morality by exhibiting indulgence and its fatal effects, the painting of the warmer parts of the picture may in some instances have the effect of destroying the improving results which the whole is intended to produce. There is, however, throughout, a conscious strength, and a mastery over language and metre, which, if the poem were the work of untried authorship, would give large promise of still greater excellence for the future; and which, on the other hand, is not unworthy of the best established reputations. Some blemishes of language there are which are quite repugnant to the generally good and sterling English of the poem. There is no authority and no occasion for the use of such a novelty as 'caressent,' which occurs more than once. 'Reachlessness' is not a good word. We do not like 'hell's sick spume.' There is sound and alliteration, but little expression of meaning, in the line— The castle swarmed from bridge to barbican. Some-indeed most-of the similes are full of thought and beauty. The following is finely and thoroughly pursued to its end: Sorrowfully Sunder'd by savage seas unsociable From kin and country, in a desert isle Dwelling till half dishumanized, beholds Haply, one eve, a far-off sail go by, That brings old thoughts of home across his heart; |