404 I' OPE. 



For hopeless wretches sucli as I 

 Kindly proviiHiig means to die: 

 As mothers do their children keep, 

 So Nature feeds and makes us sleep. 

 The indisposed she does invite 

 To go to bed before 't is night." 



Correctness in this case is but a synonyme of monotony, 



and words are chosen for the number of their syHables, 



for their rubbishy value to fill-in, instead of being forced 



upon the poet by the meaning which occupies the mind. 



Language becomes useful for its diluting properties, 



rather than as the medium by means of whiclj the 



thought or fancy precipitate themselves in crystals upon 



a connecting thread of purpose. Let us read a few 



verses from Beaumont and Fletcher, that we may feel 



fully the difference between the rude and the reformed 



stvles. This also shall be a speech of Aspatia's. An- 



tiphila, one of her maidens, is working the story of 



Theseus and Ariadne in tapestry, for the older masters 



loved a picturesque background and knew the value of 



fanciful accessaries. Aspatia thinks the face of Ariadne 



not sad enough : — 



" Do it by me, 

 Do it again by me, the lost Aspatia, 

 And you shall find all true but the wild island. 

 Suppose I stand upon the seabeach now. 

 Mine arms thus, and my hair blown with the wind, 

 Wild as that desert; and let all about ine 

 Be teachers of my story. Do my face 

 (If ever thou hadst feeling of a sorrow) 

 Thus, thus, Antiphila; strive to make me look 

 Like sorrow's monument; and the trees about me 

 Let them be dry and leafless ; let the rocks 

 Groan with continual surges; and behind me 

 Make all a desolation." 



What instinctive felicity of versification ! what sobbing 

 breaks and passionate repetitions are here ! 



We see what the direction of the new tendency was, 

 but it would be an inadequate or a dishonest criticism 



