The Press. — London, England, 1858-07-17 00:00:00

fidelity records the death of perished before its walls, con protest against the injustice wing comrades. be continued.) orks of the late Alfred John oiworth ; with Memoirs of the ited by Dr. Gearge Sexton. Vol. I. London : C. J. first be surprised to find " Childe ipell of Love and War," reaching - in two years; not because it to do so, for it is by no means :poetical power, but because its most glaring and repulsive kind, reading of it both difficult and 2is surprise, however, vanishes as consider the extraordinary circum ' in the memoir prefixed to the iublic have been attracted by a re purchased a wild fiction of the for the sake of an equally wild feteenth which is bound up with tergyman lost his life on Snowdon, so far as to read his sermons. recorded his opinion that if a King been elected by universal suffrage 1814, the choice might have Breton gentleman, who was descended from Louis XIII. Man in the Iron Mask. So much do. When we consider that the poet now before us is as doubtful iebrated character just mentioned, -orth is only the name of the nurse intrusted in infancy, we should surprised at the success of his ten times the faults or but a tenth .ich they actually have. poems derive so much of their the character of their author, we Abridge for the reader's benefit the here printed. year 1818 a child was born near Of his father nothing whatever is told mother little more than the fact that child under the care of an old Hollingsworth, who was to pass The boy seems never again to upon his true mother. He re the old woman till he was about and then passed into the family of Aving on his cure near Liverpool, tcealing his name, communicates all this about his charge. From this boy, who showed himself to possess ick parts and an inquisitive spirit., _ readily to his book, derived that northern antiquities which gives to his peculiar and rather disagreeable was an old-fashioned boy, not waywardness, the love of solitude, in nursing the images of his own derived from books, which are presage the coming poet. He was and not very amiable ; in fact, his a very decided disposition extrava -errate himself and underrate his Ibis course of study was completely ►y the influence of his imagination. •hat interested him, and could never ipon to study anything which did ►ve usually indulged themselves in and it is commonly supposed that best fitted for these exceptional its is the one which they give them the other side, the judgment of be quoted, who regretted nothing so life as the licence he had allowed Jose years when his genius was being reading and reflection. up, the riddle of his birth neces ., itself upon Hollingsworth's atten account for the difference of his posi - roof of a clergyman, and that which ,bered in the humble abode of the old he had been taught to call mother, rich uncle in London having taken fortunes was invented, but as this ..- showed himself and the nephew was Aced to visit him, Hollingsworth natu - suspicious and discontented. Assured, that his subsistence was provided for, with praiseworthy every officer who p( taro so strong a shown to his surviv ( To The Poetical Word stone Hollingswo, Author. Edited Second Edition. Skeet. WE might at first Ercon wold, a Spell a second edition does not deserve 1 without marks of faults are of the m, and make the rea unpleasant. This soon as we consid stances related in volume. The put romance, and have eleventh century I story of the ninet( it. When a clerg: the public went ljeranger has rem of France had bee of the nation in fallen upon a believed to be through the Man could mystery do very name of the as that of the celet that Hollingswort to whom he was i not need to be E poems had they t( of the merit whit] Since the poe interest frlm the may as well abri( memoir of him he About the yea' London. Of his us ; of his mothe she pl ac ed her woman named F for his parent. ' have set eyes u mained with the ten years old, ani a clergyman livii who, concealing information alx guardian the bol remarkably quit and who took re; taste for norther poems their pe flavour. He NI without the wa the pleasure in fancy or those supposed to p re delicate, shy, ani poems display a gently to oven neighbours. II determined by He studied wha be prevailed up not. Poets has this manner ; a the education creative spirits selves, On ti Goethe may be much in later li himself in those formed by read As he grew tardy forced it: lion. To ace° lion under the he remembere nurse whom , the s t ory of a charge of his I uncle never sb never allowed rally grew sus however, that THE PRESS, JULY 17, 1858 . he might have reconciled himself to his situation, if he had not at this very time experienced the practical inconvenience of having no parentage to produce. He fell in love, and, on proposing marriage, met with a contemptuous repulse. Maddened with rejection, perplexity, and the want of somebody upon whom he might charge his misfortunes, he quarrelled with his guardian, demanded a supply of money, and left the coun try. From 1839 to 1844 he remained absent, travelling in France for a part of the time, according to his own account, and for the rest studying at a German university. When he returned, it was only to get more money. This object being attained, he again departed, and wandered for five years in Spain and Portugal. In 1849 he returned, received another remittance, and departed. Once more, in 1853, his old tutor saw him, again filled his purse, and bade him farewell. It was, pro bably, during this long course of travel that Hollingsworth made that observation which more than any other appears to have influenced his character. Through observing men of diffe rent countries, classes, and pursuits, through ex tending his acquaintance with the varieties of human character, he became deeply sensible how enormous is the error of exclusiveness and par tiality in all their thoughts and judgments which most men commit. He saw each man living in a narrow inclosure which he called the world, following a certain local fashion which he called universal morality, adopting the opinions of a certain clique which he called truth. Hence the ruling thought of his mind came to be a con tempt for sects, professions, schools—and, in short, for every shape and name of dogmatism, and a reverence for the catholic faith of man, for that unwritten creed, quod semper, quod übique, quod ab omnibus. This ruling thought he expresses over and over again in his own head strong, reckless, and arrogant manner ; but it is, notwithstanding, the best thing about him, and has suggested some of his best verses as well as some of his worst ; as for example : I care not for what wigged Learning say, For Latin Doctor's frown, or critic's dart. If I should die not with my fleeting day, I'd live in every good old woman's heart ; Be known to John the Boots, and Poll the Nurse, And judged by loving maidens of my land. Then down with Mystics! Mme shall be the verse That men may study, children understand. Certainly, no man devoting himself to poetry, or to any other liberal pursuit, can do wrong in persuading himself that the function of learning in this world has its limits, that the best know ledge is that which is common to all—in short, that it is much to be a scholar or a philosopher, but more to be a man. A persuasion like this, however, will be of little benefit to the person in whom it resides, if it lead him to pour contempt upon learning and philosophy themselves, and to consider cultivation and refinement as value less because they are not worth all that some people have imagined them to be. The point less sarcasms which this author flings at a much better man than himself; the poet NVordsworth, are just in the conceited strain of the dogmatists who have provoked his spleen. Because Words worth's poems are not universally intelligible, therefore, forsooth, they must be worthless, and their author an impostor. There would have been no difficulty in conceding to any one who might think it worth while to repeat the truism, that Wordsworth would have shown greater mastery of his art if he had succeeded in moving the hearts of plain people, and had not contented himself for the most part with addressing a select audience of educated thinkers. It might have been readily conceded that Wordsworth is to some extent the poet of a class, as Pope is to a still greater extent, as all who have observed what a difficulty the uneducated find in understanding his English will confess Milton to be. But the conclusion that because this is so, therefore Wordsworth is no poet at all, startles a plain man, though to Mr. Hollingsworth it is so self evident that he demands — Was England drunk in those old Tory days, When such wish•wash as hii won gold and praise ? As in this same poem we, in common with the whole guild of critics, have had our cuffing beforehand, we may remark, without any fear for the consequences, that Wordsworth was never supposed to have got much gold by his poetry, and that in the " old Tory days" he received certainly quite as much sneering as praise, since, 679 right or wrong, the fashion of praising him dates from the dawn of the present school of criticism. But that which precedes is still more remarkable. Ile quotes IVordsworth's lines, Praise it is enough for me, If there be but three or four Who will love my little Rower! and comments upon them as follows : Praise is enough? Egad! methinks so too. Pronounce his flower, floor; and then 'twill do. But " praise it is." What pretty mode of speech! Which he it is, his friends it is, would teach. We are not by any means sure that we under stand this refined criticism. It appears, how ever, that the critic supposes Wordsworth to have written praise it is enough for praise is enough, inserting the it for the sake of metre. Of course the reader sees that this is quite a. mistaken view of the passage. But it is not im portant to discover Hollingsworth's precise meaning; the amusing insolence of the will appear to the reader when we haveshall issae produced some specimens of his own diction. It is a light thing to observe that rhymes as im perfect as that of four and flower occur fre quently in the "Legend of Childe Erconwold." Stanzas like the following are common : Our sheen pranked earls, our sceptred lord full thought And woe-foreboding gloom. laSlow follow Tostig's come that it be brought To kingly tomb. Full thought for full of thought, and that it be brought for while it is brought ! " What pretty mode of speech !" Again, we have, " Thou wert fault, thou darling one, of this," fault being written for cause. " Ah, Booth, 'tie pine to tell," is far from an elegant phrase. We do not wish to weary our readers with any more of these races of diction ; but they are as " plenty as blackberries " in the poem. Not less common are lines totally destitute of metre ; e.g. : But followed by long black shadow flickering with each head. It was unfortunate that Mr. Hollingsworth should choose to bring the charge of incorrect diction against so careful a writer as Words worth, when his own poetry abounds with gram matical errors more than any other poetry that we remember to have read. It is equally unfortunate that he should charge Wordsworth with writing for a class. The " Legend of Childe Erconwold" is written for one of the narrowest cliques that can be men tioned—for the clique of Anglo-Saxon scholars. It is strictly an antiquarian poem, abounding in words, phrases, and allusions, both unintelligible and unattractive to the uninitiated. We should like to know what " John the Boots and Poll the Nurse " would make of the following passage : What elvish mood.—what filet bloody crime] Makes thee to wander at this :inked time? To walk the brag one's road like outlawed thrall ? To come where spae-wires dwell, and ling-eels crawl ? Love-blinking maid will make thee sorrow less. There's nought for . thee in this drear unkedness. It is true that most of the outlandish words we have italicised are explained in notes at the bottom of the page ; but we think that John the Boots would soon grow tired of a language needing such continual explanation. It is true, also, that Dr. Sexton applauds the use of these in comprehensible words. This was only likely if, as we presume, Dr. Sexton belongs to Hollings worth's Anglo-Saxon clique. His observation is as follows : Hollingsworth had an intense love for that grand and expressive language, Anglo-Saxon, now so much neglected for the barbarous jargon--semi-Latin cum French—which prevails so erensively in our literature. We cannot understand this except as a sneer at the language which has been spoken in Eng land for the last five or six centuries, and an implied recommendation to us to return to the standard of the classical period of our tongue, which we suppose to be the time of Alfred the Great. Certainly ever since the Norman Conquest our language has been more or less a barbarous jargon, by which Dr. Sexton appears to mean a compound language. We certainly do feel it an objection to this rather radical measure of reform that it would oblige us t 6 part for ever with the whole literature we have hitherto been so proud of, and which has the misfortune of being written in this jargon ; that it would oblige us, in short, to shut up Shakespeare, and confine.ourselves for the future to the lucid page of ingsworth We have, however, no intention to Ildby that this A