The Sun.
London, England, 1868-10-12 00:00:00

HER MAJESTY.

BALMORAL CASTLE, Oct. 10.
The Queen, accompanied by Princess Christian
awl atteudcd by Lady Churchill, went out yes-
terday morning,.

In the afternoon her Majesty drove out, accom-
panied by Princess LDuise.
Princes ChristiAn and the Princess of Tee
drove out.

Prince l'eck went out deer stalking.

Their Royal Ilighneises the Prince and Princesl
of Wales and Prince John of Glucksburg, with the
lion. Mrs. Coke and Lieut. Col. KeppLll in Waiting,
attended Di:•ine service at the Chapel Royal, bt•
James's, yesterday.

LITERATURE.

Longfellow's- New Work.

New England Tragedies.

By Henry Wadsworth

Longfellow. One Vol., pp. 221. George Rout-
ledge and Sons, London and New York.

A new volume by Professor Longfellow must,
under any circumstances, be sure of a hearty wet'
come here in London. It cannot but be peculiarly
entitled to this welcome, however, at the present
moment—appearing, as it does, so soon after his
arrival for the fourth time amongst us, as the guest,
in one sense, of the whole English population. It is
interesting, besides this, to know at the time of the
book's publication that the illustrious American poet
has returned, from the place of his family's sojourn
upon the Continent, on a flying visit to our shores
for the purpose of himself here in London seeing
his new work fairly through the press, and thus
being present, in a manner, upon the occasion of its
first appearance. The book has a character and an
importance of its own here, were it regarded purely
and simply in the light of an Anglo-American pub'
lication. For, consequent upon a recent decision in
the Houses of Parliament, the book is one in which
au American author has for the first time been
enabled to secure to himself the advantages acruisig
to a writer through an English copyright. It is
satisfaction to think that, at last, any arrangement
of the kind should by any conceivable contrivance
have been rendered feasible—and it will be re'
garded as a happy coincidence that it should have
been rendered thus feasible for the drat time in tho
instance of a newwork from a man so e ninentlf
distinguished upon both sides of the Atlantic as
Professor Longfellow.
The "sew England Tragedies" here recounted
aro two in number—dividing the volume into two
equal halves—" Endicott" and " Giles Corey of the
Salem Farms." Each is in five acts—each in.
blank verse. The earlier tragedy, that is "
cotta" is illustrative of the close of the sanguinari
persecution (in the New World) of the Quakers and
others, but more especially of the Quakers, by the
Puritans. The later tragedy, to wic, " Giles Coral
of the Salem Farms," is a delineation of the cruelty
and bloodthirstiness engendered in an ignorant
age by a terror of IVitchcraft. As works of
art, both of these effusions of Professor Long'
fellow's genius may be pronounce 1 at °ace
—perfectly symmetrical in form, but utterly
colourless. They are are like sketches in sePi°,
or neutral tint upon toned paper—but sketches
(of that kind) by a master-hand. Mr. Lengfell°
has, however, so accustomed us hitherto either to
the ineffable music of rhythm, as in the buoyant
and elastic swing of his " Hiawatha," or to the Yeti
more haunting melodies of rhyme, as in almost all
his other rhythmical productions, that verse fro°
him which is in a manner without either, which i 5
at any rate nothiug more than blank verse of the
simplest and most colloquial character, comes to
us almost as a disappointment. By his wonder'
ful translation of the Divina Comtnedia of Dante
Allighicri, he hal in some measure prepared us
for this later phase in his intellectual developm:ll.
For, there, in th at marvellously truthful renderiog
of the great Italian poem, rhythmic illy, into Ole
English language—the work as a work of art
in the same way, to our thinking at least, perfectly
symmetrical but utterly colourless. It was a Hoar
translation so marvellous of its kind, it was a rely
deriug of Dante's imaginings from one lango'gf
into another so exact, 133 scrupulously accurate, in
every minute particular—and yet so eJluttrlos3
that it might be compared the most aptly, aS Vie
conceive, to the almost magical effects Pro-
duced by what are called Skeleton Plants'
Don't we all know them—those skeleton
plants—daintily preserved un ler glass sha less
—delicately presenting to view in lace-like "'
ticulations and decussations," as Dr. Johns°
would call them, the outward form and the interier,
tracery of the leaves and blossoms in all the,'
most wonderful involutions. Quite as marvellous 14
its way is the rendering to us is that elaborate trans'
lation by Professor Longfellow of the whole net'
work of the Divina Commedia of the great Floreao
tine. Just as marvellous—and just as colourless•
lit
is, therefore, in a manner, perfectly in keeping
those sustained and minutely elaborated evidence
of his later predilections as a poet—it is entirely cci:r
sistent with his manifest preference of late for fcrel
as compared with colour that these " New Engle
Tragedies" should be precisely as they are—that
to say precisely as we have described them to bus
according to our own view of them, namely, !Li
neutral tinted or sepia sketches, but sketches
sepia by a master-hand. Charity may be described
as being, so to ;speak, in each picture, the vanie.,t
ing point—the vanishing point through the preeell'o
(or the past :made present to us again by t
wizardry of the poet) into the everlasting hereafteri
In this, the aim and object of the book, as avoye
by its author at the very outset, is to the full °t'
tamed. Quoth he :
" Why touch upon such themes 2' perhaps some friend
May ask, incredulous ; and to what good end?
Why drag again into the light of day
The errors of an age long passed away ?'"
[Themes and errors such as Witchcraft and - 0
old Puritan Persecution—the subject-matter, as /I't
have said, of these New England Tragedies? °,6
" Endicott " and " Giles Corey of the Sole
Farms."]

"I answer: For the lesson that they teach ;
The tolerance of opinion and of speech.
Hope, Faith, and Charity remain—those three
And greatest of them all is Charity.' "
That charity—born of an abiding sense a 3
universal brotherhood of man of all times D'l/0
of all races—that noble " tolerance of opiO
and of speech" the book inculcates with a Pie
and simple but irresistible persuasiveness. or
eloquent enforcement of that grand moral 3
unbounded charity or toleration is as resonant sae
sustaltic as a psalm. Otherwise than, thus, lil t
inner meaning of these "New England TragedieSo,
the book is hardly recognizable as Longfellovrio
Once, and once only, we might say with truth Olio
his voice is distinctly recognizable. And that Olio
the very opening passage of the whole book, in t
first few lines of the " Prologue."
"To-night we strive to read, as we may best,
This city, like an ancient palimpsest;
thought., here, is exquisite.]
And bring to light upon the blotted page,
The mournful recant of an earlier age,
That pile and half-effaced lies hidden away
Bineath the fresher writing of to-day." frOo
And then it is, that he summons back to life,
ho,
their long-f ogotten graves, those shapes and s"of
dews of the past formerly peopling the titreeo
Boston—bringing them back thus—
"To leave the footprints of their bloody feet
Once more upon the pavenunt of the street." og
Especially does the poet recall to life itil.,llo,
those vanished forms Edith the young 'OO,
keress, beloved by John Endicott, and i\-10
the young wife of Giles Corey, of of
Salem Farms. Redivivus,
:thus at the becl‘Ait
Professor Longfellow—the old times are bran;
before us anew in these "New England Tragedi
with all their incidents and accessories perfectilicli
keeping—the various characters introduced in `of
of the two tragedies (tavern keepers, ministerii,of
the Gospel, magistrates, sea captains) being 5
them in admirable proportion.