CURRENT LITERATURE.

Pozrnr.—Songs Now and Then. By T. Ashe. (Bell and Sons.)—Mr. Ashe does not seem to advance. He made a place for himself some years ago, in what may be called the "remove" of the class of oxpectants of the dignity of poet, but be has not bettered himself since then. His thought wants vigour; there is no really great human interest about

it ; he gives us •

"Phyllidas, Hypsipylas, et vatnm plorabile si quid," and nothing more. He is best certainly when he keeps to the classical line which made his reputation. " The Gift of Here," where we have an account of the feelings of Deiopela when the goddess had made a pre- sent of her to the blustering .7Eolus, and " Psamathe," the tale of the sea- maiden whom Means loved and deserted in his old age, are poems of much grace and beauty, though we cannot allow that they have the genuine classical spisit.• That they miss, for want, as it seems to us, of self- restraint.

"Luscious fruits delirious as love's bliss,"

is very modern indeed. Against one classical revival of Mr. Ashe's, "A New Alexis," we feel bound to enter the strongest protest. This is not the first Hite that we have seen men meddle with these abomina- tions of Greek and Roman life. It seems to us the most sinister de- velopment of the creed which puts art in the place of morality and religion.--Songs of Many Seasons. By Jemmett Browne. (Simpkin and Marshall.) The anther will, we trust, take the criticism as it is meant, for praise of no mean kind, when we say that he is at his best when he most reminds us of Mr. Frederick Locker. "A Christmas Rose" is a very p-etty "London Lyric" indeed. This is a nice little

picture :—

.•suramer was shining in her eyei.

Her cheeks were bright with exercise, Her lips like cherries.

The falling snow in crystals flecked tier dress, and cloak. and bonnet decked With crimson berries. Her hair, the hue of molten gold, • Around her head was simply roleti, Hair soft and shiny.

I marked, too, as she lifted high Her dress, to keep her flmnces dry, Her feet were tiny."

But the writer never falls below a really good level of graceful verse. "Count Riol's Repentance," " Rondinella Pelegrina," and "Lady Ash- ford's Ball "are especially noteworthy. Mr. Jemmett Browno writes with care, and has matter on which it is worth while to expend his toiL He might have been, we may conjecture, much more of a poet than he is, if the opportunity had served.—Laurella, and other Poems. By John Todhunter. (Henry S. King and Co.)—Here, again, we have the work of a cultivated man, gifted with no little skill in versification. " Lanrella" is a story of a somewhat mad wooing of two Italian lovers, told in the style of "Heppe." Mr. Todhunter has, however, not quite the necessary command of language to make him perfect in this kind of writing, which never should jar on the ear, or suggest the idea of a "fill up," such as we see in the second rhyme of,— " She deigned no notice of this loud appeal, But for the distant shore swam bravely on, Going along easily as a little seal,

Her bare feet through the water glancing wan."

The third line, too, is not very effective. "The Daughter of Hippocrates : a Legend of Cos," a weird story, common to all countries, of beauty transfigured into some lower shape redeemed by love, is well told. A man is generally at his best in his sonnets, and we give one of Mr. Todhunter's

"Tug FLRST SPRING DAY.

But one short week ago the trees were bare, And winds were keen, and violets pinched with frost : Winter was with 1111; but the larches tost Lightly their crimson buds, and here and there Rooks cawed. To-day the Spring is in the air And in the blood: sweet sun-gleams come and go Upon the hills, in lanes the wild-flowers blow, And tender leaves are bursting everywhere.

About the hedge the small birds peer and dart, Each bush is full of amorous flutterings And little rapturous cries. The thrush apart Sits throned, and loud his ripe contralto rings.

Music is on the wind, and in my heart Infinite love for all created things."

—Poems, by Henry Weybridge Ferris (Henry S. King and Co.) do not contain anything that either rises above or falls below the common average of verse which an English gentleman ought to write,—and may we add, not to publish ? If we are to make an exception, it would be in favour of a short piece, " Abused Authority." The translations are not better than the original verses. Mr. Ferris has not caught the secret of blank verse, and his lyric attempt at the famous " Colontis " Chorus of Sophocles is not happy, as when we read that the olive,— " Here chiefly buds ; which none in youth Nor yet in age may mark for fall, Nor work destruction with his hand, Nor ruin bring thereto at all."

—Rays from the Southern C? ass, by Georgians Peacocko (Henry 8. King and Co.), are disappointing, in that they have gained no special colouring from the place of their birth. Mrs. Peacocke's versos, written under the Southern Cross, are very mach like the verses which well- educated ladies with a gift of rhyming make under the Great Bear. Some descriptions of scenery may seem to be exceptions, but change the names of the trees and the birds, and they would do equally well for productions of this hemisphere. Judged apart from this consideration, the verses are of a quite ordinary type. "They are," says the writer, "published almost entirely for the perusal of my personal friends ;" still if they are put into a critic's hands, ho must say what he thinks about them.—That New World, and other Poems, by Mrs. S. M. B. Pratt (Osgood, Boston, U.S.; Triibner, London), is a volume which shows the careful workmanship which we are accustomed to see in the verse which comes to us from across the Atlantic. The first set of poems, from which the volume takes its name, is ineffective, because it is obscure. "The New World," it must be understood, is Hades, and Mrs. Pratt deals not without some force and pathos with phases of the eternal problem of death. The "other poems" have often the same subject. The most striking is "The Longest Death-Watch," dealing with the story of mad Joanna of Castile and her husband. "At Hans Andersen's Funeral" is else good—Oils and Water-Colours. By William Renton. (Edmonston and Douglas.) This volume has the merit, rare in the kind of literature with which we are now concerned, of having a special and distinct subject. Mr. Renton paints landscape in words, and uses with the skill and fluency of an artist the nomen- clature, including even some of the technicalities of his craft. We shall best discharge our office by giving a specimen entire, happily not too long for our space:— "THE Pon.

A pool by the wood where the water plashes The livelong day,—

A pool whence the current washes As best it may And ere the sun is over the trees She yields to the beams that come from above, That have fallen in love With her tranquil deers, And wakes from sloth to a gorgeous ease.

For it seems as if all the lights that roam In autumn torrents, or summer skies While the twilight keeps, Were folded here and gathered home: Where fawn on jasper spies Above shelving rocks and their broken shards, And the jasper wards Against lukewarm humonrs and lavender-smoke, That scarcely know for their sullen part Of that same olive-dark tract that rose The first to light, nor of light that broke The fairest upon the pool and glows Warm in her orange amber heart."

This is good in its way, but the reader can imagine that one hundred and fifty pages are a little tiresome ; in fact, to borrow an expression from one of the volumes before us, it is "too much paint, too little brush."—The volume which contains this happy phrase, The Sculptor, and other Poems, by G. Hunt Jackson (Hodder and Stough- ton), has some little merit, but not enough to justify its publication. Sometimes the writer has a real idea to express, and this is aomething, though he his not any mastery of expression. There is an idea in The Sculptor, but then the workmanship, which should be the writer's best, considering the prominence of the poem, is very feeble. Take the first stanza :—

"I saw a sculptor all intent Upon his marble white, And all his energies were bent To mould it day and night.

With mallet hard and tools of strength,

And many strokes severe,

The block was made to feel at length That skilful handa were near."

Nearly every epithet is misplaced or inappropriate. But many of the poems have nothing in them at all.—Out of the Silence, and other Verses. By John Bower. (J. and J. H. Rutherford, Kelso.) This is as pro- mising a volume of verse as we have seen for some time. It is clear that the author has really thought, and that his poetry is the expression of something real. Chiefly this something is a feeling of revolt against the popular theology (though there is also to be frequently seen a religious spirit), and the aspiration after political ideals. His mind, too, is much occupied with the inexhaustible problems of another life. He has much to learn. Even such an elementary rule as that words like elite and hauteur are inadmissible in serious poetry does not seem to have occurred to him. But he has some of the essentials of his art. First, he has something to say ; next, he has expression; thirdly, he has an -uncommon power of versification. We shall give the first poem, ex- pressing, at the same time, a hope, not often expressed in dealing with minor poets, to meet Mr. Bower again.:—

"OUT Or THE SILENCE!

Out of the Silencer The night has fled: The sun has risen—the east is gay; And fair, like a maiden garmented For loving espousal, comes the day! Song is before her, and sound behind— Ripple of river, and swell of sea; Songsters, adoring, pour on the wind Chorus of infinite melody !

'Out of the Silence!' The hours are fleet, And time is a torrent none can stay; Manhood and youth with feverish heat Laugh for a little, and pass away! So for a summer I seek to soar,

Sing through the season the roses reign- Ah I will listen to doubt no more, One must adventure if one would gain!

'Out of the Silence !' For weal or woe. Robed in the raiment of modest trust ; Nobler to strive with a stronger foe Than rest in a slothful ease, and rust! So for the day ! and I kneel and pray The fates would favour an early flight ; Sweeten the way for a first essay Out of the Silence to sound and light!"

—idylls of the Rink. (Hard wickeand Bogue.) —These are parodies, only moderately succcessf al, of well-known poems, Mr. Tennyson's "Brook," Gray's "Elegy," and the like. There is a certain cleverness about them, but the effect is somewhat tedious. "A Rink's a Rink for a' that," after Burns, is the best.—The First Meeting, and other Poems. By C. F. Forster. (Deighton and Bell; Bell and Sons.) "The First Meeting" and the poems which follow it are inspired by a personal feeling which gives them a certain force. A man of culture, writing from the heart, can scarcely fail to attain a certain success. More than this we cannot say. The occasional poems are inferior sometimes, it would seem, from want of revision, and of the exercise of the severe taste which we should expect from the author. The "Cross and the Crescent" cannot be repre- sented as either " weeping," or "swearing eternal amity."—Legends and Poems, by F. Malcolm Doherty (Provost), are graceful and tender, written with more power of expression and versification than are common. "To Muriel" is especially good.