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Is human life nought but a lusty living,
A day of pleasure nighted by the grave,
With no hereafter dawning, no forgiving

Of all the eternal hopes our spirits crave?

Is love the mere lamp of a wanton chamber, Whose walls are grave-stones, ne'er so finely hid? Is all the height where Love and Hope can clamber, Alas! no higher than our coffin-lid?

Is Love a fool for all its future-yearning?
Wise only in the drunkenness of bliss?
Is there no flame divine within us burning?
Is hope betray'd so cheaply with a kiss?

Why hath God led thy noble beauty hither?
Why doth celestial light inform thine eyes?
Is it to guide the lone wayfarer? Whither?

The Star of the East hangs not o'er Paradise.

Some girl with delicate skin and golden tresses, And eyes that float in their voluptuous light, Holding her boy-adorer in the jesses

Of her caprice, staying his spirit's flight,

Smoothing his folded pinions with light fingers,
Kissing his vigor to a pleasant swoon,
Until the God sunk in the Dreamer lingers
Fondly beside her for the frailest boon.

Is this the highest end of all thy beauty?
O noble woman? art thou but a girl?
Hast thou no thought of all the scope of duty?
No aim beyond the fingering of a curl?

Why hath God made thee beautiful and loving?
Only to bear the bacchanal cup of life?
Cup-bearing Hebe! seek thou Jove's approving:
O Beauty! be thou Strength's diviner wife.

IPHIGENIA AT AULIS.

I AM Achilles. Thou wast hither brought
To be my wife; not for a sacrifice.

Greece and her kings may stand aside as nought
To what thou art in my expectant eyes.

Or kings or gods: I, too, am heaven-born.
I trample on their auguries and needs.
Where the foreboding dares to front my scorn,
Or break the promise from my heart proceeds?

But thou, Belovéd! smilest down my wrath So able to protect thee. Who should harm Achilles' Bride?-Thou pointest to the path Of sacrifice, yet leaning on my arm.

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THE NEW YORK PUBLICERAPY

ASTOR, LENOY AMG TILDEN FOUNDATIONI

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THEODORE WATTS.

Two were sitting in Sorrow's shadow;
Dead in the cradle their love's fruit lay:
Did they think of the sunny meadow
And the honey of yesterday?

Two are there in the graveyard lying
Under the roots of the blossoming trees;
Love with love, but no replying:
Naught is heard but the honey-bees.

YOUNG LOVE.

So young were we that when we kiss'd
We had no other thought:
The joy that first love brought
Naught farther miss'd.

To watch the dawning of a maiden smile
Was worth one's while.

In those young days, what though we kiss'd,
We kiss'd without a thought:
That tender of love sought

Did hope assist,

"T was but as hope helps in a morning dream, When things scarce seem.

But now, O Love! when'er we kiss

(Be dumb, my thought!)

The joy by her kiss brought

Yet more doth miss.

O love! thou wast sufficient in young days
For innocent praise.

O Love-Desire! renew the kiss
That had no farther thought;
Or lead to the Besought

Whom now we miss:

Thee, Hymen,-Love no more enough for us Grown curious.

ADONIS.

IN vain! in vain! I must refuse
The love so freely proffer'd me:
I may not love but where I choose,
Though Venus' self the wooer be.
Hadst thou but waited, who can tell
What happy gatherer might pass?
The fruit that of its own weight fell
Is left to wither on the grass.

In vain thy love-ripe lips, thy arms
Twined round me to compel my stay:
Were but reserve among thy charms,
Perhaps I had not turn'd away.

THEODORE WATTS.

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place in contemporary letters is admittedly unique. Within the space of a few weeks, the second and most important volume of Dante Rossetti's poems (Ballads and Sonnets) and one of the most notable volumes of Mr. Swinburne's ("Tristram of Lyonesse") were dedicated to him in terms of affectionate admiration such as are not often surpassed, and about the same time his own birthday sonnet to Lord Tennyson showed how intimate was his friendship with the venerable poet of whom we are all proud-Englishmen and Americans alike. Mr. Hall Caine, in his "Recollections of Rossetti," says, "Throughout the period of my acquaintance with Rossetti he seemed to me to be always peculiarly, and, if I may be permitted to say so without offence, strangely liable to Mr. Watts's influence in his critical estimates." And then he goes on to tell how Rossetti shrank from printing an additional stanza to his poem "Cloud Confines" which he himself approved and Mr. Watts did not; because "in a question of gain or loss to a poem I feel that Watts must be right." Mr. Joseph Knight, also, in his pleasant monograph on the same poet, quotes a letter from him in which he defends a certain addition to "Sister Helen" on the ground that it "has quite secured Watts's suffrage." The widespread curiosity about Mr. Watts and his work is therefore quite inevitable. But all those who read the following extracts will, I think, agree with Mr. Stedman, that profoundly as he has influenced others his own individuality has remained inviolable. As a critic he has no doubt shown himself to be familiar enough with the work of his contemporaries; and yet, as far as his own verses show, he might never have read a line of any living poet except Tennyson.

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Though moving now at the very center of art and poetry, Mr. Watts's early surroundings seem to have been scientific rather than literary. cording to the biography of his father in Mr. Norris's "History of St. Ives," that gentleman was a lawyer who had a passion for natural science, and who, down to his death in his 76th year, was writing papers on scientific subjects. In pre-Darwinian days and afterwards, a well known figure in the scientific circles of London, Mr. Watts, senior, was an active member of many learned societies, and among the founders of several. Therefore the people who in his boyhood were known to the subject of this notice were not

the great poets with whom his name is now associated, but geologists and geographers such as Murchison, Lyell and Livingstone. This accounts for the intimate knowledge of the processes of nature which has often been commented on in connection with his poetry, and also for the frequent allusions in his prose writings to the latest scientific researches. Although it was as a brilliant conversationalist in circles more or less scientific that he first attracted attention, his desk was even then "choke-full of songs, sonnets, and such wares." And soon, at his chambers in St. Clements Danes where he used to give those receptions which have become almost classic on account of the people who congregated there, poets and literary men began to preponderate over all others. And suddenly he appeared as a writer of passionate verse and also as a literary critic-the chief literary critic of the Examiner. For Rossetti had read his sonnets and would not rest till he saw them in type, while Professor Minto (then editor of the Examiner) had heard him review books in talk and would not rest till he induced his friend to review books in print. It became evident at once that a new voice was speaking both in poetry and prose, and Mr. Watts was immediately invited to write in the Athenæum. Before a year had passed he became the chief poetical and literary critic on that journal and has remained so ever since. It is here, and in the ninth edition of the " Encyclopædia Britannica, his voice is heard at its strongest, though he has written in other publications, such as Mr. Humphrey Ward's "English Poets," The Nineteenth Century, "Chamber's Encyclopædia," and the Academy. On what he calls the Renascence of Wonder—his definition, now permanently accepted, of the neo-Romantic movement-he has written in his article on Rossetti in the "Encyclopædia Britannica" with more learning and more authority than any one else. But it was his treatise on "Poetry" in the same work that gave him, who had never published a book, a European reputation. As a reviewer said of this now celebrated essay, it contains enough suggestive matter to make the reputation of a dozen critics."

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It is, however, as a poet I have especially to speak of him here. Rossetti said, "He is a fine critic because he was first a finer poet," and Mr. Swinburne has affirmed that in the sonnet he has no surviving equal; and, although something must be discounted from the criticism of a house-mate and constant associate, it might be perilous to challenge the dictum. In one of the extracts from Mr. Watts's poems hereinafter given ("The Son

net's Voice"), he expounds for the first time his now well known theory of the flow and ebb of the octave and sestet of a certain form of the sonnet, though he has always, both by practice and precept, indicated that this form is but one variety of the Petrarcan sonnet and not necessarily the best. The longest poem he has yet printed is "The Armada," and it bids fair to become the most famous. This poem is too long to be given here, but the "Ode to Mother Carey's Chicken" (Mr. Rider Haggard's favorite poem, which he has publicly singled out as one of the three poems which have "touched and influenced him above all others") is of manageable length.

I have contented myself mainly by giving the opinions of other writers upon Mr. Watts and his work, because, from an intimate friend, warmth of praise may be easily misunderstood; otherwise I could have wished to have spoken freely of the charm and versatility of his conversation and of his personal kindliness always corrected and balanced by his unflinching honesty in criticising the literary work of even his closest friends,— an honesty so great in its desire for truth, as to overleap and even to be unconscious of that excessive though false courtesy which sometimes renders difficult, or even impossible, the expression of genuine opinion among men of letters as to each others' productions. H. T. M. B.

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