CURRENT LITERATURE.
"Home They Brought Her Warrior Dead." An In Memories& to the late Prince Imperial of Prance. By Julian Home. (Newman.) —This book really passes all human patience. The author begs the reader's indulgence, because he wrote his "thousand verses" in the "short space of two months." Why not "four thousand," for that is nearer the real number ? The plea is wholly inadmissible. Why should he write them ? If he must express himself in verse, and had two months only to catch the market, why four thousand ? Does he suppose that Mr. Tennyson wrote his poem at the rate of seventy lines per day ? As for the volume, it is about as like to its model as a monkey is like a man. The resemblance is, in a way, close ; but it is unbearably irritating. Take, for instance, the following :—
" 0 Life, 0 Youth, 0 primrose years, Now scudding by the ambrosial shore 0 days that live, when Time is o'er, Return through cyclings of tears,
And hide, within your shimmering beam, The hours of exile, break the gloom ; And veil his saddened English room, Where Fortune cast no silvered gleam ; And cover all the griefs I cnrs'd, And flash one glow of splendour, light The darkening hours, and dim from sight The lonely graves at Chislehurst.
And when the intervening bars Of Time break into minor key, Fling eagles wings of flight round me, To refuge in the scarlet stars."
There is a sort of mocking echo here which provokes one to the last degree. After this specimen, some readers may wonder when we say that the book is not absolutely without promise. If the writer would only make himself acquainted with the rules of poetry and grammar, write one couplet a day instead of thirty, and above all, publish nothing for ten years, there might be some hope of him.
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