Stockton Herald, South Durham and Cleveland Advertiser. — 1890-01-18 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

POETRY. ' wife found a note in her husband's hanilwriting on a table, which read as follows:—" My darbog Last Saturday's Speaker contains an article by Martha, you willflnd me in the dock. Pray forgive Mr W. E. Gladstone on "British Poetry of the I me. I cannot live any longer. Good-bye, and God Nineteenth Century." The right hon. gentleman Almighty blesm,you. Take your money-box to Mrs , Bays :—"English poetry dates from Chaucer itsearly Trafford's for her to take care of." The dock was manhood. Even its beginnings were flushed with searched and the body found.—An octogenarian the coming glory, as those niay see who will con. named Rawkins, rate collector for the Sandown sult the charming volume of 'Poems from the Local Board, Isle of Wight, committed suicide yes- Dawn of British Literature,' published in 1863. terday at the Town Hall by hanging himself from , But from Chaucer's day we measure over four and the balustrade. He had been discharged for in-' l a half centuries. That is a long term for the poetic competency and offered the post of assistant. col- I bloom of a nation." Coming to the particular lector, and yesterday was to have handed over period of which he treats Mr Gladstone continues: the books. He took the matter so much to heart na—a4:Benfoowre the century cetnatkuaray was: theirtstyabyleaishrisedold biyt had a Ithat in the absence of the clerk he hanged himself. added six names, the greatness of which sufficiency of consent, to the poetry of Great Britain, and also of the world. It will at once be understood that-the reference is to Wordsworth, Coleridge, Scott, Byron, Shelley, Keats. It would be hard among the six to adjudge the primacy. The contest Would principally lie between Wordsworth, Shelley, and Byron. If continental opinion were to prevail Byron would bear the palm. But, apart from this question of prefer cure, on the whole it seems indubitable that in this first fraction of the eentin7 a great poetic age had been constituted. It would be perilous to attempt stating with particularity the extent to which the last sixty years have added to the great and durable performances of the preceding thirty, but manifestly it has been an immense addition. The state of contemporary judgment on the whole does not leave any doubt that for this period of history Lord Tennyson heads the band of the immortals. And that illustrious man will bequeath to us at least one lesson which the very last and least of us may learn in the loyalty, constancy, and intensity of his devotion to his calling. Probably no English poet, except it be Wordsworth, has paid so intense and absorbing a devotion to his muse. Pressing round or upon him, or walking in the same path, we have had many true poets, some of extraordinary and many of very considerable powers. Among those claiming the first of these descriptions I have mentioned Mr Browning, and the merest justice requires me to add at least the name of Mr fivrinburne." Speaking of the poetesses of the nineteenth century, Mr Gladstone selects the following SA the chief, and arranges them in the order of merit : Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Christina Rossetti, Adelaide Proctor, Jean Ingelow, Emily Bronte, Lady C. Elliot, Miss Naden, and the anonymous "V. ' (Mrs Archer Clive). He adds :—" Upon the whole, it may perhaps be allowable to say not only that the British poetesses of the la-it sixty years have developed in numerous instances splendid powers, but even that they are as a whole without a parallel in literary history." Mr Gladstone speaks of the body of what he calls "clergy poets" as baying furnished English literacnre with some most valuable contributions, and instances tbe names of Crabbe, Heber, Milman and Wolfe, and behind them Cary, Colton and iowlea, as belonging to the first portion of the century, and says that "Tennyson, Turner, Charles Kingsley, Hawker, Barnes, and Griffiths (the author of 'Short Poems and In Memoriam-1869') show thethe Bishop claletargy Lordt4 Alexanderb e Boughtonsl g hisin ther i: said rightful h non-clerical t l place laughingly t h e re, f domain.ahn ide friend, Archbishop Trench, that 'the unregenerate poetry.cocoWinm stsr yo were Cev,lreeAn:egYthcadesopib:e:79:lll.:Mwitnehg:rea.betof asrthh:aelhldnoepepkbanittoahwi nngatyn ageag. esuch arf level will be continuously sustained. Nature must have rest. But hope we may, and not unreasonably, that the retiring sun will 'trick his beams," and yet again Flame in the forehead of the morning sky."  Thomas Nicholson, coal carter, was arrested on Wednesday night on a charge of murdering Thomas Brown, whom, it is alleged, he threw to the ground during a quarrel. Tourist (to boy fishing): "How many fish have you caught, my man ?" Boy: "Oh, I can't count cci , califfht any, you little i t