Year: 1866

plttcl lulsappOlntn1cnt.


We readily admit that verse-makinp


is an elegant accomplishment, an limo
cent amusement, and a real auxiliary in


the education of the mind to elevated


habits, and a daily recognition of the


comcly and ideal in spite of the peril


nacious intrusion of the inevitable vul-


garitics of life. 1t Is, or it can be trained


to be, protection against those low


aims and selfish purposes into the adop-


tion of which we are so easily betrayed


AS the record of our best experiences
and healthiest discipline, as memo


randum of our sincerest resolutions and


most earnest regrets, as a relief to the


sorrow which otherwise might too bit


terly prey upon the mind, as grateful


tribute to love or affection, as the natu-


raj expression of certain class of noble


and lovely thoughts, verse may be the


readiest and most appropriate form of


recording so much of our life as we wish


especially to remember. 1t may train


the hand as a fine landscape trains the
eye, and make the best words and phra-
ses habitual in our conversation. But
the chief charm not less than the chief
utility of this private verse-making is
in its indomitable privacy, and in the


Indignation and just self-estimate with


which it shrinks from publication. 81


have painted many bad pictures" said
agentleman in our hearing, "but have
never exhibited them; :" and there was


wisdom in the painting no less than in


the privacy. 1t was well to paint-it


was well also to conceal; it is well to


write verse-it may be excellent to keep
it in ones portfolio, to be resolute
against sending it to the newspapers, to
be chary of reading it to the best be-
loved and most patient of friends. 1t is
certainly no argument against the va


lidity of any composition that it en-


bodies thoughts and feeling which,


though novel to the individual, are vet
common to the race; but this cOnsid-
Grafton diminishes the necessity and


propriety of formal publication, and
should warn us against the sheer vanity
of parading truisms which, however


fine and familiar, are truisms still. 1t


is the secret of poetical vitality that it
expresses whatthe majority of men have


felt, and after one happy spirit has found


fit words and music for the general


thought, mockery of the original song


becomes easy to hundreds who sing
from a recollection of what has pleased
them, and ape the minstrel airs of the
Byron of yesterday or of the Tennyson
of to-day.


1t is wonderful how much clever
journey-worll of this kind is performed,
and from one point Of view it is encour-
aging, for the prevalence of this accom-
plishment does indicate, we are free to
admit, II degree of popular refinement,
and even good bit of appreciative
taste. But there is nothing new in it.
We suppose that there was mob of
gentlemen in Rome who wrote easily,
as we know that there was in England
in the days of Dryden. But schools,
newspapers have made this
poetical imitation cheap and common,
while the passion for printing has kept
pace with the multiplied mechanical
facilities of printing-the power-press
being responsible for thousands of vol
umes which nothing can save from OBJ
livion, and which represent more heart
burning, more Disappointment, and
more ludicrous self-complacency than
we care to compute. Poetry has grown
to he like photography. We have all !
ones friends and acquaintance in our
albums in their holiday raiment, and
with a perpetual putting on of their
best looks; and altogether they are not
worth so much to us as some old portrait
If some unknown man or woman long
'go dead, the painter of which knew the
secret of avoiding that air of conscious
which no sitter before the ca
nera can put off. There is no fault to
DC found with the photograph except
he paradoXical one that it is so extreme
y like that it is not like at all. 1t is
equally hard to say, sometimes, why or
N what poetical disciples are not the
EQUALS of their masters but the mystic
rious vice of imitation makes us indif-
'erent to their best stanzas, and deprives
heir finest tunes of the charm of sim
'erity. Byron said of Mr.. Sotheby that
ne had initiated all the poets of his time,
md had occasionally beaten all his mo-
lels; yet a verse-maker more entirely
forgotten than Mr.. Southeby we cannot
It this moment remember.


We protest, in conclusion, that we
nave no quarrel with the cdcOetheS scriG-
mdi, which we believe may often be
to good account. 1t is from the
oily of printing, or attempting to print,
hat we would good-naturedly dissuade |
of estimable persons. The
young gentleman who can make Il clev-
n sketch does not send ii to the Artists |
The young lady who can
)lay tolerably well II concerto of Bee
hoNen does not advertise Il concert at
he Academy. The best declaimer of
he "priVate thcatricals" does not apply |
o Mr.. Wallacll for an engagement. If
We have amateur fiddlers and painters
md pianists content with strictly do
nestle glory, why may we not have
Imateur versifiers building the lofty
'hyme without the least ambition, and
ending their sonnets to the scclusion of
heir desks, or to the albums of their
entle if not judicious friends? Itmay