Should I be herded with their nameless dust? Then shook himself and laughed his humour off A fight there will be; ay, a game of blows, We have some friends at court in either camp; For him who wins!" He laughed, and I was dumb Loathing my husband. But I tried him more— "O lord," I said, “let me arise and arm thee. The cause of Israel is the holy one. These heathen are as dust upon the earth. Then the battle shocks A goodly man and footsore, whom I knew ; And slay him; and behold eternal fame Thomas Ashe. 1836-1889. THOMAS ASHE was born in 1836 at Stockport, Cheshire, "on a Midsummer night, When fairies keep their revels, and delight His father, who was a clergyman, was also an enthusiastic amateur artist. Young Ashe went up from the Grammar School of his native town to St. John's, Cambridge, and graduated with mathematical honours. He was ordained and became a schoolmaster, publishing his first volume, "Poems" (some written as early as 1855), while at Peterborough, in 1859, and following it up by "Dryope, and other Poems" in 1861. At this time he was for a while curate of Silverstone, in Northamptonshire, but he soon resigned his connection with the Church, to resume teaching. He wrote in after years, in a private letter: "Rev.' need not be rooted up that I see. Still, it is so." In "Pictures, and other Poems" (1864), written, one supposes, on the shores of Lake Leman, Ashe told anew in his own delicate and minute fashion that story of Psyche with which Apuleius appealed so strongly to the modern imagination. In 1866 appeared a drama, The Sorrows of Hypsipyle," followed in 1873 by the story of "Edith" (written, however, four years earlier), told in a metre which is an attempt to reproduce the classic hexameter. "Songs Now and Then" (1875) contains the finest and most mature work of this writer. In 1865 Mr. Ashe had become mathematical and modern form master at Leamington College, and in 1867 at Queen Elizabeth's School, Ipswich, remaining there nine years. After a residence of some time in Paris, which left an impress on his latest work, Ashe wrote (about 1879) "Bettws-y-Coed," and more songs. These later poems were issued at intervals, privately. In 1881 he settled in London, and in 1886 published in one volume a complete and definitive edition of his "Poems." At about the same time he was occupied in the preparation of an edition of Coleridge's works,-the poems in two volumes for the Aldine Series, and three volumes of Miscellanies, Table-talk and Lectures. In 1888 he printed privately at the Chiswick Press a new volume of poems and translations, mostly very short, entitled "Songs of a Year." In some of these songs there was a new note of almost socialistic sympathy with the poor and suffering. Ashe led a lonely and, one gathers, a somewhat sad life, not untouched by poverty and illness. At no time popular, his works were once received with applause by the accredited critics; latterly it was not so; he felt this indifference, but accepted it with resignation. A small number of persons cherished his work with warm affection and admiration; he was cheered by their appreciation, and met it with simple-hearted gratitude. He died on December 18th, 1889. Ashe was a true singer, with a personal and attractive note of his own. He has failed to make any deep impress on the literature of his time, partly, it seems, because his range was so limited, partly, perhaps, because while his work was so genuine and spontaneous there was some lack of severity in self-judgment, and it fell short of perfection. It must be said also that while his work at the best possesses delicacy, charm, pathos, it is always wanting in that robust energy which, in art as well as in life, seems an essential element of success. His longer poems are mostly failures; 'Edith," the longest of all, possesses unity, indeed, and a pleasant though faint aroma of the poet's peculiar quality; and there is in its workmanship a remarkable evenness of level, but it is rather a low level. "The Sorrows of Hypsipyle" is the best of these long poems. Like the others it is lacking in strength, but there is a certain breadth of vision about it, and a true breath of Greek feeling; its refinement never becomes trivial, and the final impression satisfies. But it is only in the short song that he reaches his finest and most personal utterance. 46 This poet-a fairy changeling, as he called himself, "for this that seems Myself, would best befit a world of dreams," -is, above all, the singer of April and of all April |