Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1867-07-18
WALT WHITMAN.
An English Opinion OF tho Poet and his
Leaves of Grass.

An English Opinion OF the Poet and his
Leaves of Grass.
The London Review has an elaborate
notice of the last edition of Walt Whit
mans Leaves OF Grass" from which
we take some extracts: -..
A careful perusal OF these remarkable
productions has convinced us that a
vague impression we have now and then
encountered that Walt Whitman is a
Learned pig" is far from correct I'VE can
not pretend to name his species exactly,
but it is certainly winged. That there is
genius in these poems sunquestionable;
yet it is difficult to assign their author
to any place i'm literature, unless, indeed
one may assume the veracity of mete-
mpsychosis, and say that here is Hafiz
again, only drunk now with Catawba
wine instead of the Saoma, and worship
ing the Mississippi river instead of the
Saravati, which having dried upin Persia,
may be supposed to have also transmit
grated westward. Here is the lofty OPP
timism of Hafiz preterring dust-grains
of pearl, and his auiacity, believing that
he will gain Paradise only by notshunning
hell. And indeed there are some poems
of Whitman's in which he seems TO
yearn toward the East from westward
outlook, as if he were more akin to il
than 10 what America has inherited
from Europe.
There is in these poems fullness of eX-
preston for clear and vehement convic-
tions; stateliness of both thought and
language; an innocent forgetfulness OF
all conventionalities; an unconscious
nakedness of images; pictorial words
without any of the usual poetic conceits
and metaphors. There are also swamps
and deserts to be passed through, and
long stretches of the names of places
and occupations which are evidently con-
dens ed poems to the author, but which
become as hard to get over as Brighton
shingles to the ordinary reader. 1t has,
| indeed, something of the vastness OF
the succession of objects in nature, as
forest or savanna, but one does not like
to get lost even in forest sublimities.
Nevertheless we have'no apprehension
that any one with eyea who shall read
this volume, will fail to place very
ligh value upon it. Much has been
said of its coarseness. There are, in
deed. q few--a very few--portions of it
which are coarse, and there are others
which, without being coarse, are plain
spoken to degree not generally permit
ted TO contemporaries, though sometimes
praised in ancient books. Whatever
may be said Of the passages To which we
refer, this at least should we say, that
they are not written in any defiant or
destructive spirit. rt.I ..sy.-rf -,r
We feel a certain responsibility in al
luding to this strange work hut there is
that in it, with all its eceentricity and
vagueness, which removes il from the
category of commonplace books, and
places IL among those of which a critic
Is bound to give fairand impartial ac-
count. 1t is unfortunate that this odd
poet should have spoiled SO much beau
tiful work with even One'smear of nasti-
ness but however we may regret his hav-
ing done SO, we eannot afford to lose
what he has given ps because he has not
given it in pure spirit. He is far more
chaste than Mr.. Swineburne, whole re-
sembles ia many particulars; he is not
more irreverent than Shelly; he is in
some points more dramatic than either,
and far less hurtfuL. TheEe u a wild nat
ural exhnberance ST aIdalalism display;
ed by Whitman of a thoroughly original
kind, an open-air abandonment, a weird