The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1859-08-10

Aotpeui W nuitlpAy examples Oh skill, the
perfection which is already knownto every reader
of MrlTESNTsos's- works. We shall equally re-
train from attempting any analysis of the plots Of
the several pieces. Each,-as we have said, has
story,-and that story has beginning-a middle
and an end The personages in each regularly in
trodrced, and regularly conducted to the conclu-
sion their career, of the particular adventure
which forms the argument of the poem. Enid
abounds most in Incidents more strictly
and completely epcal in its construction, and is the
''most perfect in plan and intention" says the
critic in The Ahenemn already referred to- We
shall not mar the readers interest in its perusa BY
indiscreety disclosing either the moral or the plot
Eivien is the most philosophical and Elaine, the
most pathetic of the idylls. The former describes
the means employed, and the success achieved by
an artful woman in binding the sense, and wheed-
ling to the loss Of life, and use, and name and fame
wise old man .s.. AN| Eu..a#
.. D. ---''whom at first
She played about with slight and sprightly talk
And vivid smiles, and family venom'd points
Of SANDER, glancing here and grazing there;
And yielding to his kinder moods, the Seer
You'd watch her at her petulance, and play,
Ev'n when they seem'd unlovable, and laugh
As those that watch kitten; thus he grew ..
| Tolerant of what he half dsdain'd, and she,
Perceiving that she was but half disdain'd
Began to break her sports with graver fits, -.
Turn red or pale, would often when they met
Sigh fully, or ail-silent gaze upon him
| With such fiXt devotion, that the old man. ..
Tho doubtful felt the fattery, AID at times
Would fatter his own wish in age for love,
And half believe her true; for thus at times
He waver'd but that other chung to him.
Ffxt in her will, and so the seasons VENT
Nor does the willy temptress confine herself to
such arts as. these. With voice of sweetest melody
she weaves sophistry into song, and seeks with
music to coax the old man to her purpose. Here is
love song, she sings
aHr SIN Love, if Love be Love, if Love be ours,
Faith and unfaith can ne er be equal powers:
Unfaith in aughtis want of faith in all
sit is the little rift within the Lutte
That by and by will make the music mute,
!. And ever widening slowly silence all. .Ta -..
- ''The little rift within the lovers Lutte.
Or little pitted speck in garner'd fruit,
That rotting inward slowly moulders all.
st is not worth the keeping: let it go: .a.
But shall it, answer, darling, answer, no.
And trust me not at all or all in ALL
The whole poem is full of deep and subtle thought
In the following lines profound theological truth
is expressed, all too frequently forgotten in this
world which often visits with severer condemnation
and more lasting consequences the transgression OF
moment than the wickedness of a lifetime:
1.-THE sin that practice burns into the blood
And not the one dark hour which brings remorse
Will brand u.s. after, of whose fold we be:
Or else were he, the holy King, whose hymns
Are chanted in the minister, worse than ALL"
Yet that there are sins, which once committed
must exclude the sinner forever after, from occupy
ing the rank and station as before, is also 6
truth not forgotten by the Poet, and is embodied il
another passage. 1t occurs in Gaiaeuere, and is
part of the farewell speech of ARTHUR to the Queen
Yet must leave thee, woman, to thy shame
hold that man the worst of public foes
Who either for his own or children's sake
10 save his blood from scandal let's the wife
Whom he knows false, abide and rule the house
For being thr0' his cowardce allow'd
Her station, taken everywhere for pure,
She like new disease, unknown to men,
Creeps, no precaution used, among the crowd,
| Makes wicked lightnfngs of her eyes, and saps
The fealty of our friends, and stirs the pulse
With DEVILS leaps, and poisons half the young
worst CT the worst were that he that reigns -
In Nvien also occurs the following passage which
shows that if the Poet failed in his late song, com
mencing-"Form, Rifemeni Form!"-to produce
lyric worthy of the occasion and of his fame, it wa
not for the want of just conception in his own mine
of all that war-song ought to be- 1t is after lis
tening to YIvIEN's love-lay, already quoted, tina
Merlin says:
Far other was the song that once heard
BY this huge oak, sung nearly where we sit
For here we met some ten or twelve ofus
And while we waited one the youngest of us
We could not keep him SILENT out he flashed
and into such a song, such fire for fame,
| Such trumpet owngs in it, coming down
TO such stern and iron-clashing close,
That when he sopt, we longed to hurI together
We cannot forbear, in this connection, duotin!
another song, which occurs in Enid, and which i
conceived in just such a spirit, if not of cage
courage, at least of manly fortitude, and calm he
roic self-reance, that it. too may be aptly callet
a GLORIOUS rounded
"Turn, Fortune, turn thy wheel and lower the proud;
Turn thy wild wheel through sunshine, storm and cloud
Thy wheel and thee Te neither love nor hate.
Turn, Fortune, turn thy wheel with smile or frown
with that wild wheel we go not up or down.
Our hoard is little, but our hearts are great.
"Smilc and We smile, the lords of many lands;
! Frown and we SMILE the lords of our own hands:
! For man is man and master of his fate
Turn, turE thy wheel above the staring crowd
! Thy wheel and thou are shadows in the cloud;
Thy wheel and thee we neither love nor hate
Elaine contains the story of the hapless love anC
untimely death of lovely maiden, 'lily-fair,
who loved the great Knight, Sir LANCELor, and he
peradventure, had he seen her first had loved
| her too
-''but now
The shackes Of an old love straitsned him,
His honor rooted in dishonor stood