with that which tells how Night, 'deep-drenched in misty Acheron, Heaved up her head, and half the world upon Breathed darkness forth'; from Robert Greene two lines of a lovely passage: 'Cupid abroad was lated in the night, His wings were wet with ranging in the rain'; from Ben Jonson's Hue and Cry (not throughout fine) the stanza: 'Beauties, have ye seen a toy, from Francis Davison: 'Her angry eyes are great with tears'; from George Wither: 'I can go rest On her sweet breast That is the pride of Cynthia's train '; from Cowley: 'Return, return, gay planet of mine east'! The poems in which these are cannot make part of the volume, but the citation of the fragments is a relieving act of love. At the very beginning, Skelton's song to 'Mistress Margery Wentworth' had almost taken a place; but its charm is hardly fine enough. If it is necessary to answer the inevitable question in regard to Byron, let me say that in another Anthology, a secondary Anthology, the one in which Gray's Elegy would have an honourable place, some more of Byron's lyrics would certainly be found; and except this there is no apology. If the last stanza of the 'Dying Gladiator' passage, or the last stanza on the cascade rainbow at Terni, 'Love watching madness with unalterable mien,' had been separate poems instead of parts of Childe Harold, they would have been amongst the poems that are here collected in no spirit of arrogance, or of caprice, of diffidence or doubt. The volume closes some time before the middle of the century and the death of Wordsworth. A. M. POOR SOUL, THE CENTRE OF MY SINFUL EARTH O ME! WHAT EYES HATH LOVE PUT IN MY HEAD SHALL I COMPARE THEE TO A SUMMER'S DAY? WHEN IN THE CHRONICLE OF WASTED TIME THAT TIME OF YEAR THOU MAY'ST IN ME BEHOLD HOW LIKE A WINTER HATH MY ABSENCE BEEN BEING YOUR SLAVE, WHAT SHOULD I DO BUT TEND WHEN IN DISGRACE WITH FORTUNE AND MEN'S EYES THEY THAT HAVE POWER TO HURT, AND WILL DO FAREWELL! THOU ART TOO DEAR FOR MY POSSESSING WHEN TO THE SESSIONS OF SWEET SILENT THOUGHT DID NOT THE HEAVENLY RHETORIC OF THINE EYE THE FORWARD VIOLET THUS DID I CHIDE HOW OFT, WHEN THOU, MY MUSIC, MUSIC PLAY'ST FULL MANY A GLORIOUS MORNING HAVE I SEEN |