OTHER RECENT BOOKS
Circe and Ulysses. By William Browne of
THERE has been a confluence of talent in the production of this book. The printers have given us a physical object of great beauty. The letterpress is handsome, and Mr. Severin's engravings combine the virtues of the decorative and the dramatic. The editor has given us a charming note on the masque form, an account of the author, and a text 'as close to the manuscripts as a desire to be serviceable to Browne and Poetry perrints.' Moreover, Professor Jones Praises his author well.
And so to William Browne. if he is a minor poet, he is minor on the right side of the `minimus' and the minissimus.' Richly has he contributed to this book: Professor Jones rightly claims that his masque stands `among the very best masques in English.' The framework of its story is pleasing, and, as always with Browne, the clothing of it is sometimes beyond praise—as in these lines beginning a charm:
Sonne of Erebus and Nighte, Hye away; and aime thy flighte Where consorte none other fowle Then the battc and sullen owle, Where upon the lymber grasse Poppy and Mandragoras,
With like simples not a few, Hang for ever droppes of dewe, Where flowes Lethe without coyle Softly like a streame of oyle....
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