New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1877-03-24

Homer and Shakespeare. After the Three Hun
dred,' a lofty and terrible poem wherein the Sea
makes three hundred soldiers to overthrow Xerxes
at Thermopyle, because he gave it three hundred
lashes, this Song Of Sophocles at Sdams is bouquet
of roses on the bosom of death:
Thou with the sword as thy servant,
And as follower the lightnings brand
Choose me a maiden feryent
No" with thy Iateful hahd!-
Who smiles, and her smile dscloses
A Her innocent STILL and fair,
Divine with the budding Of roses
On the peaks 81 her bosom bare;
Who claims but a swift devotion
From the man the back fates bar,
As the deems Of Ncptunr's ocean
Give 10 the mOrning-star!
Let me clasp. till thu zone of her bodice
Against my warm heart burst;
But not til know love frstl
When the poet descends to the familiar drama of
the family and pauses in love at the figure of a
child. like his Little Paul" what a fountain of
poignant emotions He is also the first family poet;
before him, the sublime child baptized by Chateau
BRAND, no one ever shed such lovely tears by the
iresde, or smiled in such pure joy. He set poetry
where there was nothing but doggcrel before. This
is the intermes:O of the drama where the great epic
gives its motion to superhuman figureS-the Hin
doo the Antique, the French Epic!
Be not too much afirighted by the great noises
made by the gods,-caps of thunder, epic tempests,
embraces of the stars, yells of laughter wrath of
Titans Jupiter sometimes descends from Olympus
to rest little, and become a god for Diana's
nymphs: so Victor Hugo dcscends from his nights
to make bouquet of idyls with his friends of all
ages-Orpheus, Solomon, Arstophanes, TheocritUs,
Virgil Dante, Petrarca, Ronsard, Shakespeare, All
DIRE Chenier. Here he is again young at twenty
with all the amorous woodland SAVIOR The legend
airy women, loved by the poets, seem to come,
dan yrit no OlOrS
the grass with their feet defowering the wild roses.
and agtating the branches. Neither Theocritus nor
Chenier was ever antique perhaps they were
never so penetrated with that panthelsm which
possesses itself OF lOve-ntoxicated Nature:
LOSGUS.
Nude Chloe dazzles now the forest lone;
She Smiles clothed on with innocence or her own;
Nude. and yet pleascd-lOvely and yet she seems
Wlcss of likouess to adoIinc dreams.
White lilies view her, void of shame or scOrn;
To Might she's Venus Psyche TO the Morn
Spring is a tender aud fierce mystery;
In air the involuntary sin floats free,
Failing, with 'und of wind and nurInurlng nood'
In human souls as i'll the birds o the wood
sap-Hymen! spring comes, with surprise TO take
Nauie,-and, being divine, sweet love to wake
In forests flowers and hearts. Come let us love!
The nymph mllhanded glcaIns her fOiHi above,
In trees the dryads, and in man the faun;
The stolen Kiss sheds aims the lips upon!
Nevertheless, we must not look for smiles and
violins in the Legend of the Ages this work severe
as the bas-reliefs of the Partheno. the grand
forms of the 10th century. God has given the poet
a crown of white hair: he disdains the roses of Ana
creOn, because he is always august in his abors he
places the wreaths of the heads of children
Smitlen by the injustice of his time and the cruel
ties of fate he lifts his brow toward the SUBMITS,
and SAYS like Chener: There is something there"
Yes, there is something there. France awaits his
words, the world is fed by his ideas. He must obey
his destiny. At his hOspitable table he sin his true
place; whether he sparkles with repartee, laughs at
fools charms women, or amuses little children In
his love he has surpassed the RoseGardcn of Saadi
vet he sings now no more the song of the streets
and the woods. He has scaled the rough steep with
its peak of snow whence the words of gold fall with
Il graver and more ringing tone. The nearer man
of genius approaches to God tie greater is his charge
of souls. Votare said, when dying: " All will be
we'll" That will be hundred years ago, to-mor-
row. But all is not we'll yet, though the world has
walked according to the ideas of Voltarcthat great
poet in his philosophy, that little poet in his verses
Victor Hugo, in this advancing world, marches in
advance In his admirable Hymn to the Earth "
he cries
Strike not thOu thunder; these dwollcrs, here
The Earth is good; grave Is sLc, and severe
Pure as herself her roses resi-; 5000
They please her most who hope, and toll, and think
Her innocence is milk that all may drIGk,
Justice her mOtheT-breast!
When we read Victor Hugo, many ideas take
hold Of us that in our bedazzlemcnt, we know not
what 20 say. had almost forgotten to spca; Of the
power Of the poet i'll renewing the forms OF French
verse: in ali his hundred thousand lines there is not
one which does not bear his stamp. He also
pTises us by the unexpcctedncss Of the art the word
the rhyme but, though we feel the arr everywhere,
we never feel the labor. Phidias concealed his
chisel as Leonardo da Vinci concealed his palette:
IT seems as if god had passed that way. 1t is SAID
that great men shape their az" after their own
image: Victor lingo has created the XlXth Literary
Century. Malherbe was sent to unmake the IAN
euage, Victor Hugo sent to TcmaIe it, Those
who love him. and those who injure him, live
equally upon his substance; only he minis for HIM
self gold crowns, while we must live upon his small
COIN
His noble language Of marble, so amply draped,
and fed with ideas and images, makes Victor Hugo
All antique, while he is the most modern Of all the
llode!ns. But every great man has one foot in the
Past and another in the Future. | have Just said
that Victor Hugo still suffers injury, but see with
JOY that the Legend of the Ages proyokes an I'M
lncnse concord of enthusiasm. That is well: am
indignant, however, that the dramatic works of
Victor Hugo not heard every stage iii France.
But he will soon have his drama, like Shakespeare
and MoliGrc The latter will still be a master be-
side him. since he will divide the authors profts-I
mean the applausc-with Victor Hugo
On beginning this gossip. l spoke OF Socrates. !
compared or rather set side by side the dwellings, Of
the two Why should | not say that if Socrates
was the wisdom of Antiquity giided by the rays of
the future, Victor Hugo is Modern Wlsdom,-the
wisdom Of To-day, already illumined by the dawn
of Tomorrow ARSENE lIuUSsAYE.
T.. Sat one of the dinners on this glorious ami
yer>ary after having mentioned that Socrates
drank hemlock lifted my glass and exclaimed
" Ii will not cost me so dearly to speak the truth"
| recitcd all the gIorics of Victor Hugo, and then