1832.] A Winter Evening with the Poets. 389 



are sincerely happy to find however, that Mr. Pickering limited the 

 " Oxford" minstrel's biographical talents to the author of the " Seasons/' 

 and that we are not disgusted by his " Omnipresence" in any other of 

 the Aldine. 



Thomson was the founder of the descriptive school of poets, and 

 it may be affirmed that by none of his numerous followers has he 

 been surpassed, very rarely equalled. The love of nature and her 

 works, which in many of our modern bards is a fictitious passion, was in 

 the poet of the seasons a genuine feeling of the heart. The exquisite 

 stanza in the Castle of Indolence, in which he so touchingly pourtrays 

 this sentiment, is, we trust, in the recollection of our readers. Thom- 

 son's life may be considered a delightful scholiast upon his poetry. In 

 a letter addressed to his friend Mr. Paterson, we find him giving an 

 account of his innocent and simple occupations. t( Retirement and 

 nature," he says, " are more and more my passion every day ; and now, 

 even now, the charming time comes on ; Heaven is just on the point, or 

 rather in the very act, of giving earth a green gown. The voice of the 

 nightingale is heard in our lane. You must know that I have enlarged 

 my rural domain much to the same dimensions as you have done yours. 

 The two fields next to me, from the first of which I have walled no, no 

 paled in, about as much as my garden consisted of before, so that the 

 walk runs round the hedge, where you may figure me walking any time 

 of the day, and sometimes in the night." 



Thomson was an ungraceful letter writer, but his simplicity of man- 

 ner and expression is sometimes very pleasing. We wish he had occa- 

 sionally carried more of this quality into his poetry. His pictures of 

 scenery and natural objects are commonly vivid and beautifully true, 

 but they are often injured by a pomp of language and exaggeration of 

 imagery. He not unfrequently exchanged the wild-flower band of his 

 muse for a golden girdle, which ill-assorted with the graceful negli- 

 gence of her attire. Poetry, purely descriptive, is not entitled to a 

 very distinguished rank. It requires little imagination, and no inven- 

 tion. The beauty of the pictures of scenery in the Seasons consist in 

 their truth. The sound of the cataract, and the whispering of the sum- 

 mer waves, and the singing of the birds, all live in the verse, every word 

 seems to be imbued with a particular colour. Thomson is the Claude 

 of poetry. Mark how terribly he paints the rising of the storm. 



A boding silence reigns 



Dread thro* the dun expanse : save the dull sound 

 That from the mountain, previous to the storm, 

 Rolls o'er the muttering earth, disturbs the flood, 

 And shakes the forest leaf without a breath, 

 Prone to the lowest vale the aerial tribes 

 Descend : the tempest-loving raven scarce 

 Dares wing the dubious dusk. In rueful gaze 

 The cattle stand, and on the scowling heavens 

 Cast a deploring eye ; by man forsook, 

 Who to the crowded cottage hies him fast, 

 tefjj . Or seeks the shelter of the downward cave. 



Tis listening fear and dumb amazement all : 

 When to the startled eye the sudden glance 

 Appears far south, eruptive thro' the cloud, 

 And following slower, in explosion vast 

 The thunder raises his tremendous voice, 



