17 JULY 1886, Page 26

POETRY. — The Poems of Henry Abbey. New and Enlarged Edition. (Henry

Abbey, New York.)—This is a book of which it is very difficult to speak. On almost every page there are lines which are singularly happy in expression, and the leading thought of many of the pieces is strikingly original ; above all, there is an appreciation of the beautiful in Nature, and a sympathy with the pathetic in human life, which ought to give the writer a high place among the minor poets. But almost every piece in this volume leaves an impression of careless and hurried writing. Take, for instance, the following stanza from "The City of Decay : "— " Down the highway to the city

Came the greybeard through the valley, While its sunset skies were glossy,

And approached the crumbling wall. At the gateway, high and mossy,

Soon he paused, his strength to rally ; And expectancy allured him With the joy that would befall."

We think better of Mr. Abbey than to believe than he really con- siders " glossy " a good epithet to apply to a sunset. If it had not rhymed so conveniently with "mossy," we feel sure that it would have been rejected. Again, he is sometimes very careless about his metre, although the swing and music of many of the poems show that he has a quite exceptional power of melodious composition. That these two lines-

" Reflecting the inaccessible stars;" and- " The buckwheat and the barley, once so bonny and so blithe,"

should have been written by the same person, is almost incredible. Mr. Abbey is at his best in short lyrical pieces, and his best is some- times very good. We will conclude our notice by a specimen :—

"As thoughts possess the fashion of the mood That gave them birth, so every deed we do Partakes of our inborn disquietude

That spurns the old and reaches towards the new. The noblest works of human art and pride, Show that their makers were not satisfied.

For, looking down the ladder of our deeds, The rounds seem slender ; all past work appears Unto the doer faulty : the heart bleeds, And pale regret comes weltering in tears, To think bow poor our best has been, bow vain, Beside the exoellence we would attain."