THE DISCIPLES.* THE volume contains five poems, to which, but

for the ill-health of the author, a sixth would have been added. We can only regret a cause which has prevented not only the completion of the series, but also, it is evident, the due elaboration and correction of that which has been given to the world. The author would, we are sure, resent any supposition on our part that she is putting in a plea of ill-health by way of arresting that critical judgment which publication invites, and would much prefer that we should com- ment on what seem to us the defects of her work, without refer- ence to a cause which may be supposed to have been concerned in producing them. At the same time, it is only right that the fact of a partially disabling trouble should be known. Such know- ledge must affect our estimate of the author's powers, though not of her actual work. Three of the five poems are lyrical pieces of no great length, and not showing much power either of thought or of expression, though not wanting in a certain fervour and pathos. To the general reader they must be rendered unattractive by their obscurity. Everyone of them absolutely wants an explanatory note, which is not furnished, to make them interesting, or even intelli- gible. There remain the "Overture," which, as having apparently received the author's correction, we take to represent fairly enough hernoetical powers; and the poem of "Ugo Bassi," which is obviously incomplete and unfinished.

The "Overture," setting forth the motive and purpose of the work, is, in fact, a dedication to Joseph Mazzini :-

" He, the Seer, the Master and the Saint,

Named me his poet, crowned me laureate Of his Republic."

Therefore she sings of his " Disciples." She will not willingly let die the names of men the fame of whose devotion has been obscured by failure, who gave their lives to the work of which he was the master-spirit, but were not permitted, as he was, to see its accom- plishment. To some, doubtless, the language of this dedication will seem overstrained and extravagant. And yet, even if we jadge only by the event, Mazzini was a man whose greatness justi- fies some fervour of praise. Covered with obloquy or ridicule, pro- scribed and outlawed, almost up to the day of his death, never appearing in the field of action except to fail, and driven to those arts of the conspirator which so discredit a cause in the eyes of the world, he yet saw the work of his life accomplished. We may well believe that this success was furthered rather than hindered by the personal failure of the man ; that had the Roman Re- public, for instance, not been overthrown by external violence, the unity of his country might still be in the future,—and that could he have dealt as he wished with the Monarchy, which has been found an influence so strongly uniting, Italy might be presenting to-day the same lamentable spectacle which we see in Spain ; but still, it is unquestionable that from him came the inspiration without which Garibaldi, and Cavour, and the House of Savoy would have laboured in vain. Mrs. Hamilton King speaks of him as the "Saint." The word is associated with feelings and convictions which were alien to the mind of Mazzini, but it is nevertheless in one sense applicable. He had the influence of true disinterested- ness and of a purely ideal devotedness over his fellow-men. There seemed to radiate from him, as there has from such men as Francis of Assisi and Xavier, though from different moral causes, an overmastering power, which brought the hearts * The Disciples. By Harriet Eleanor Hamilton Sing. London: Henry S. King and Co. of men into an absolute, unquestioning submission to him, a power which had for its strength the conviction of a perfectly

pure and unselfish purpose of life, while it was helped by those pleasant characteristics of " the face that none could paint " and " the voice that none could reach." Readers who have these feelings of sympathy with him, the " Overture " will interest and touch in no common degree. Its literary merits are consider- able, though Mrs. Hamilton King wants, just as Mrs. Browning wanted, the power of compression and the courage to reject super- fluous ornament. We will give an instance of a figure which might well be admired, were it properly placed, but which, as it stands, only burdens the thought. The author is looking forward to a day when her recollection of the great man will be one of her moat precious possessions, and says :-

"When I am old,

And my eyes fail from following in their flights The autumn birds into the far-off heavens," &c.

This would be an appropriate illustration in describing the old age of a hunter ; here it is simply superfluous. And we must notice such a carelessness as the use of such a form as " meetedst," which it is impossible to account for grammatically. Nor can we but think that the poem is disfigured by its fierce denunciations of governing classes, denunciations which seem even alien to the width of Mazzini's own political convictions. But after all deduction made, there remains a really powerful work, personal

indeed in its interest, and telling us more of what the writer felt about Mazzini, and the work he commissioned her to do,.

than about the teacher himself, but within these limits great.

Here is a passage which seems to us conceived in a genuinely poetical spirit. The author has been telling us that her Master had once seemed impatient of her long silence, and of how she had justified it to him, and she continues :—

"And now I speak, not with the bird's free voice, Who wakens the first mornings of the year With low sweet pipings, dropped among the dew ; Then stops and ceases, saying, 'All the spring And summer lies before me ; I will sleep; And sing a little louder, while the green Builds up the scattered spaces of the boughs ; And faster, while the grasses grow to flower Beneath my music ; let the full song grow With the full year, till the heart too is filled.'

But as the Swan (who has passed through the spring, And found it snow still in the white North land, And over perilous wilds of Northern seas, White wings above the white and wintry waves, Has won, through night and battle of the blasts, Breathless, alone, without one note or cry) Sinks into summer by a land at last; And knows his wings are broken, and the floods Will bear him with them whither God shall will;— And knows he has one hour between the tides ;— And sees the salt and silent marshes spread Before him outward to the shining sea, Whereon was never any music heard."

The poem of " Ugo Bassi" occupies about five-sixths of the whole volume. It tells the story of the Italian Revolution of 1848-9, especially as it culminated in the defence of Rode. It aims, in fact, at something of an epics! character. Epics which have had for their subjects passages of modern history have, for

the most part, been dreary failures. Lucan made what is perhaps the most successful effort, in his Pharsalia ; and this is redeemed not

by the historical narrative, which is indeed far better read in prose, but by the splendid passages with which his genius was enabled to adorn it. Mrs. Hamilton King has not succeeded where so many have failed. Much of the narrative part of her poem is tedious in the extreme, and we are sorry that she did not refer her readers to ordinary histories for other parts of her story besides the assault and bombardment of Rome, which it was her purpose, had her strength permitted, to have related in verse. This tediousness she seems to have felt herself ; in the narrative passage the verse is often halting and nnpoetical to a high degree. The poem has other faults, the chief of which, perhaps, is the want of dramatic propriety. Nothing could be more inappropriate than the twenty pages of ethical and metaphysical talk, often very abstruse, which Ugo is represented as uttering by way of sermon to the inmates of a hospital ; nor can any reader accept as probable the open and undisguised baseness and malignity of the letter in which the Cardinal Lambruschini in- structs the Superior of the monastery of San Liverino how the troublesome monk may be got rid of. Such a cynical avowal of wickedness is simply an impossibility. And the passage about Beatrice Cenci, beautiful as it is, seems altogether out of place.

We should be passing our limits were we to attempt anything like an epitome of the story of " Ugo Bassi." It is told by a

peasant whom Bassi, then a monk of the Barnabite Order, has rescued from a starving, fever-stricken village, and who thence- forward follows him with an unwavering devotion. One of the finest passages in the poem describes the sudden pang of regret which strikes through the youth's heart as he is leaving his home for ever :— " Suddenly The mountain-fats whereon I had my home At a sharp winding of the road stood out All full and clear upon us, golden-blue

Amid the sunset, calling, clasping me,—

There was my mother !—and as suddenly Vanished for ever, as another turn Took us between the foldings of the hills.

And in that moment I had said farewell For ever to my youth and liberty, And to the country of my youth.—Farewell, Cialdole! the hill that nearest heaven

Lies ever, under the blue sky, or cloud ;

Where the larks sing, and the wild goats rejoice, And locusts whirr in the hot summer day, And all life goeth joyously,—farewell!

For some whom I have loved and lost on earth I shall yet find again, I think, in heaven, But never, in heaven or earth, Cialdole I" The monk had fallen under the ban of his superiors for thinking and speaking too freely. When the movement for Italian liberty and unity began, he threw himself heart and soul into it, and the story of how he lived and died for the cause is told with a power of pathos and description which makes us regret the more the interruption of tedious historical details. If the author could have chosen those, and those only, which were really available for her purpose, the result would have been something much more likely to live than what she has given us. What, for instance, could be finer than the following version of what was doubtless a real occurrence? The citizens of Bologna are making their offerings for the war,—

"And still the voice And smile of Ugo answered ovary one, Till in a moment's pause, his eyes were fixed, Where a girl, poor, but lovelier than the rest, Stept out barefooted from the swarthier throng, With grey eyes starry under moonlight brows, And hair too glorious for one flower or pearl To break its glittering miracle of wares ; Blood of the ocean or some northern hills Marking the tenderer blue along her veins; She stood so formed, so coloured, from the rest,

A golden lily among marigolds ; • But still her hands were empty and her gown Was but the blue of Venice, roughly wove.

The eyes of Ugo met her, and the tint

Of the wild rose flew np along her cheek, And deepened there, and full in front she stood, Gazing half-sadly,—and then suddenly Took from her neighbour's belt the hanging shears, Lifted her white bare arms, and from her head Sheaf after sheaf let fall the wondrous hair, Swiftly, till all was gathered, round her neck ; And sprang towards Ugo, and upon his arm Laid heavily the cloud-like heaps of gold; And for a moment all the air seemed still,

While those two fairest faces in the crowd Were leaning to each other in the light That flushed from each to each, and then drew back With a deep breath, parting without a word,— And she was gone in the press. And ore the red

Had faded from his cheek, another stood

Before him, all the people making way—

A venerable woman, bowed and grey, And of the poorest, holding by the hand A youth with shining eyes and growing limbs, Almost a child—and saying, 'Take my son!

The last one left me.' So the day wore on."

We can only mention the fine description on p. 230, where the beauty of nature so strongly contrasts "a ith the misery of men ; and the exquisitely pathetic scene of the last days of Anita, the wife of Garibaldi. We hope that the author's health will permit her to give the poem the revision which is needed to make it a finished work.