GOBLIN MARKET.*

AMONGST those—and they are not a few—of Coleridge's critical maxims which are at once so deep and so subtly expressed that they are apt almost to tyrannize over the reason of smaller critics, is his distinction between fancy and imagination: " You may conceive the difference between the Fancy and the Imagination in this way —that if the check of the senes and the reason were withdrawn, the first would become delirium and the last mania. The Fancy brings together image which have no connexion, natural or moral, but are yoked together by the poet by means of some accidental coincidence. The Imagination modifies images and gives unity to variety ; it sees all things in one." The dictum goes no doubt to the heart of a true distinction, but it by no means exhausts it. It is, for example, by no means necessarily true that the imagination is stronger m a poet whose visions are stamped with one stamp, like Milton's, than in a poet whose imagination is ever throwing itself into new forms, and mio-rating from one mental centre to another, like Shakspeare's. Co�eridge clearly means that the tenacity of the creative power is represented by the imagination, its variety by the fancy ; the one the gravitating, the other the centrifrugal force; the one the power that compels all kinds of analogies into a special service, the other the discursive power that multiplies indefinitely the superficial analogies from which to choose. But granting the main distinction, it may well be doubted whether the imaginative fancy, which, chameleon- like,—as Shelley's for example,—while never resting for an instant • Goblin Market and other Poems. By Christina Rossetti Ifarmilban

together in the same phase, transmigrates into a thousand different forms, retaining its central significance all through,—or the fanciful imagination which, like Coleridge's own, in the "Ancient Mariner," for instance, keeps by preference to a single attitude of mind and thought, while introducing a constant succession of varying colours— a rainbow full of ever changing rays—is the more really indicative of deep poetic imagination. Without attempting to discuss so very general a question—pro- bably far too general for profitable discussion at all—we may say that the latter is by far the most safe and wholesome school for an ex- uberant and facile fancy, such as we see in the authoress of these poems. Miss Rossetti has a delicate and truly poetic mind, but there is but one of these poems which has enough of a distinct stamp on it to impress it on the memory—the first and longest, from which the volume takes its name. The rest have almost all of them unity of colour, so to speak, that is, unity of sentiment, of mood, but little to bind and mark them as the offspring of a single mental effort, little of that true singleness of root which a poem requires. Many of them are almost like photographs of atmosphere alone, showing tints and tones which,. if they were thrown upon any specific picture, would give it a rare beauty, but, for want of this, fade away almost as you gaze. This is the danger of exuberant fancy, that, unless it be possessed by some haunting spirit of intellectual identity, it rolls away as it were under the very touch of creative effort, and we see nothing but a succession of images connected at most by a key-note of emotion. It must be a very keen feeling or emotion which rings so clearly through such a succession of changing forms as to rivet them closely in the imagination of others : and hence, ceteris paribus, it requires, we believe, a deeper and more piercing imagination to pene- trate with true unity such strings of images as Shelley delighted in than to animate any scene or story in winch there is a natural unity of subject. Miss Rossetti's fertile fancy can no doubt produce deli- cate trifles like the following, in almost any profusion;

A BIRTHDAY.

"My heart is like a singing bird

Whose nest is in a watered shoot ; My heart is like an appletree Whose boughs are bent with thickset fruit; My heart is like a rainbow shell That paddles in a halcyon sea - My heart is gladder than all these Because my love is come to me.

"Raise me a dais of silk and down ; Hang it with vair and purple dyes ; Carve it in doves, and pomegranates, And peacocks with a hundred eyes ; Work it in gold and silver grapes, In leaves, and silver fleurs-de-lys; Because the birthday of my life Is come, my love, is come to me."

There is one line here of true poetry—the line we have italicized ; but Miss Rossetti's poetic power is strong enough to spare all such blossoms as these, and we are inclined to think she would do well to prune away these lesser buds in order to concentrate her efforts on something of more strength and substance. This is not a mere metaphor. It is a matter of fact, we think, that to give the reins to fancy when nothing like a ruling idea, or even passionate lyrical im- pulse, is upon the mind, is to form an intellectual habit unfavourable to poetic concentration, and to the subordination of the merely illus- trative to the creative faculty. It seems clear to us that there is not that intensity in Miss Rossetti's mind which produces what Mr. Arnold calls the " lyrical cry ;" and therefore we regret that so many of the smaller poems, delicate in texture as they often are, are entirely dependent on shades of sentiment for their poetic life. Something more is wanted to constitute poetry than they usually have ; and even such a sodnet as the following, graceful and thought- ful as it is, passes like a gleam over the imagination which it is difficult to recal :

A TRIAD.

Three sang of love together : one with lips Crimson, with cheeks and bosom in a glow, Flushed to the yellow hair and finger tips; And one there sang who soft and smooth as snow, Bloomed like a tinted hyacinth at a show; And one was blue with famine after love, Who like a harpstring snapped rang harsh and low The burden of what those were singing of.

One shamed herself in love ; one temperately Grew gross in soulless love, a sluggish wife ; One famished died for love. Thus two of three Took death for love and won him after strife ; One droned in sweetness like a fattened bee:

All on the threshold, yet all short of life.

But it is clear that Miss Rossetti need not limit herself to purely lyrical poems, in which we doubt if she can ever really excel. The first and longest poem in the book is one of very great and fresh beauty, and of a very original kind. Without possessing lyrical depth or intensity, or, on the other hand, anything either epic or dramatic, it hovers in that region of lively fable, verging on alle- gory, yet clear of it, which at once gives full play to fancy and yet compels it to a certain unity of outward theme and subject. With a touch of Hans Christian Andersen's childlike simplicity in airi- ness of fancy, and also more than a touch of his delight n simple natural life, this poem, clothed in the easy, irregular, narrative verse that Mr. Browning has accustomed us to, narrates a humourous little goblin story, showing, indeed, clear glimpses of deeper meaning, but without any ostentation of allegoric or parabolic wisdom. With less humour we should be more impatient of a certain vagueness of mean- ing. and clamour for interpretation • with less meaning we should not feel the humour and be impatient Of the half-preternanralism ; with less delicate fancy we should find little charm in it ; with less sim- plicity of feeling, none. But these qualities are all combined in so unique a way as gratify the fancy, make the mind smile throughout i with pleasure as in one of Andersen's quaint stories, to stimulate intel- lectual cariosity, and to gratify artistic taste. We scarcely like to spoil the beauty and unity of this quaint little poem by any extract that may destroy the freshness of the goblin fruit-merchants, or of the two exquisite little figures exposed to their enticements, for the reader. The mere artistic execution of the poem is, however, so much better than anything else in the book that we should not do justice to it without one extract :

" 'Come buy,' call the goblins

Hobbling down the glen.

Oh,' cried Lizzie, 'Laura, Laura, You should not peep at goblin men.'

Lizzie covered up her eyes, Covered close lest they should look; Laura reared her glossy head, And whispered like the restless brook : ' Look, Lizzie, look, Lizzie, Down the glen tramp little men.

One hauls a basket, One bears a plate, One lugs a golden dish Of many pounds weight.

How fair the vine must grow Whose grapes are so luscious; How warm the wind must blow Through those fruit bushes.'

No,' said Lizzie: ' No, no, no ; Their offers should not charm us, Their evil gifts would harm us.'

She thrust a dimpled finger In each ear, shut eyes and ran: .

Curious Laura chose to linger

Wondering at each merchant man. One had a cat's face,

One whisked a tail,

One tramped at a rat's pace, One crawled like a snail, One ince a wombat prowled obtuse and furry, One like a ratel tumbled hurry skurry.

She heard a voice like voice of doves Cooing all together: They sounded kind and full of loves In the pleasant weather.

Laura stretched her gleaming neck Like a rush-imbedded swan, Like a lily from the beck,

Like a moonlit poplar branch,

Like a vessel at the launch, When its last restraint is gone.

Backwards up the mossy glen Turned and trooped the goblin men, With their shrill repeated cry, Come buy, come buy.' "

This is true poetry of its own fanciful and unambitious kind, with its little pictures as clear and brilliant as the reflexions in a sunny river. With these impressions left on the mind of our readers, and without offering any further explanations of any kind, we must leave the poem. We believe fully that in that border-land of the marvellous—half dream, half-awaking intellect, half conscience,—which seems the most natural poetic expression of the upward-pushing thoughts of thought- ful children in the north of Europe, Miss Rossetti has found a true field for her genius. She handles her little marvel with 'that rare poetic discrimination which neither exhausts it of its simple wonders by pushing symbolism too far, nor keeps those wonders in the merely fabulous and capricious stage. In fact, she has produced a true chil- dren's poem which is far more delightful to the mature than to chil- dren, though it would be delightful to all.