The Sun.
London, England, 1849-10-06 00:00:00

ELIZA COOKS JOURNAL. Part V.

UpvN ards of five calendar months have elapsed since
the popular poet adventured upon a new path in
literature, and already she has become a popular
journalist. Our felicitations are hers, but —better
than all felicitations—she has secured to herself the
knowledge that, through her own graceful efforts to
devote the character of cheap periodicals, she has
rendered her name more than ever a favourite in the
households of England. Those already familiar with
the effusions ct Eliza Cock's sensitive heart and
fertile fancy cannot, however, be in any degree sur-
prised that she has chosen her materials so judiciously
—that she has collected such fragrant blossoms in her
poetical herbarium—that she has gathered into her
titerary casket such gems of thought and: jewels of
imagination. For all that we can conjecture, her
acquaintance with conchology may be small; yet we
would trust to her capacity to select the most brilliant
shells in a ramble along the sea-beach. She may be
no lapidary ; yet we would wager her appreciation
of precious stones is not narrow. She may be but
slightly versed in the science of botany; yet we are
morally certain she would discern beauties in the
wild wood-flowers as well as in the more cultivated
cfflareseence of a garden or a conservatory. A nosegay
in her hands, we doubt not, would be arranged as
eloquently as any floral billet d amour ever dropped
from an oriental lattice in the twilight. For Eliza
Cook, though many may fear she has " degenerated"
into the journalist, is still, still the poet. In
illustration of this we need not point alone
to the five charming compositions contained
in the present " part" of her periodical—
verses not unworthy of the bard of " Melaia"—
but the fact is visible in the general tenor of the
Journal, and in the charms of very many of its
contributions. " A Song for the Ragged Schools" is
written in a key singularly plaintive, and with a
pathetic and appealing cadence at the close of each
stanza. It is a voice chaunting the plea of wretched-
ness in the mother-tongue of so many kindred cele-
brities. It breathes the language of Hood and
Proctor, of one who has sung of the outcast of
London—

No one heareth her, no one heedeth her

But hunger her friend, with his cold gaunt hand,
Graspeth her throat, whispering harshly,
What dost thou in a Christian land?'"

Who that has lingered with pleasure over Eliza Cook's
lines on the " Old Farm Gate," on the " Old Straw
Hat," or, best and sweetest melody of them all, her
" Old Arm-chair," will not love the music of her
recent verses on " The Churchyard Stile ?" Her
stanzas again on " Fortune and Love" will not only
have been welcomed for the beauty of that golden
ejaculation—

" Lot the desert of Life give Eternity's blossom!"
but will doubtless have induced many to have applied
to the writer herself that previous exclamation—
" Oh! 'Lis pleasant to know there are beings about us
Who tune the most exquisite strings in our heart !"

Of a different tone is her bitter and sarcastic allusion
to those who are " Better Fed than Taught." The

:ouching sketch of the " Blindßoy," reprinted only a

few days since in our own columns, will have been
sufficiently admired by our readers to require no
explicit commendation from ourselves. Silverpen,
among the miscellaneous, and, generally speaking,
anonymous contributors, still continues to be indus-
trious—instance the agreeable and earnest biography
of "John Ashmore, of. Birmingham." Several essays
of considerable excellence are scattered through the
successive numbers—the most charming of which are
" The Oasis in the Desert," and " The Sunshine of
Life," the former having our decided preference.
. . .

Stories, fragments, memoirs, criticisms, and a swarm
of brilliant particles of wit and wisdom, christened
very felicitously " Diamond Dust," compose the
rest of the varied and entertaining materials of Eliza
Cook's periodical.