Band, and gusset, and seam, Seam, and gusset, and band, Till the heart is sick, and the brain benumbed, As well as the hand. weary "Work-work-work! In the dull December light, And work-work-work! When the weather is warm and brightWhile underneath the eaves The brooding swallows cling, As if to shew me their sunny backs, And twit me with the spring. 'Oh, but to breathe the breath Of the cowslip and primrose sweetWith the sky above my head, And the grass beneath my feet; And the walk that costs a meal! 'Oh, but for one short hour! A respite however brief! A little weeping would ease my heart, My tears must stop, for every drop With fingers weary and worn, With eyelids heavy and red, A woman sat, in unwomanly rags, In poverty, hunger, and dirt; And still, with a voice of dolorous pitch- The following stanzas possess a sad yet sweet reality of tone and imagery: The Death-bed. We watched her breathing through the night, As in her breast the wave of life So silently we seemed to speak, So slowly moved about, As we had lent her half our powers Our very hopes belied our fears, For when the morn came dim and sad, Another morn than ours. Hood's works have been collected into four volumes Poems of Wit and Humour; Hood's Own, or Laughter from Year to Year; and Whims and Oddities in Prose and Verse. A son of Mr Hood's (commonly termed TOM HOOD) was also a professional littérateur, author of several novels, books for children, and other works: he was also editor of a comic periodical, Fun. He died in 1874, aged 39. DAVID MACBETH MOIR. Under the signature of the Greek letter Delta, DAVID MACBETH MOIR (1798 1851) was a large poetical contributor to Blackwood's Magazine. His best pieces are grave and tender, but he also wrote some lively jeux d'esprit, and a humorous Scottish tale, The Autobiography of Mansie Wauch, which was published in one volume, in 1828. His other works are- -The Legend of Genevieve, with other Tales and Poems, 1824; Outlines of the Ancient History of Medicine, 1831; Domestic Verses, 1843; and Sketches of the Poetical Literature of the Past Half-century, 1851. His Poetical Works, edited by Thomas Aird who prefixed to the collection an excellent memoir of the poetwere published in two volumes in 1852. Mr Moir practised as a surgeon in his native town of Musselburgh, beloved by all who knew him. Of his poetry, Mr Aird says: 'In Delta's earlier strains there are generally fancy, and feeling, and musical rhythm, but not much thought. His love of poetry, however, never suffered abatement, and as "a maker," he was improving to the very last. To unfaded freshness of heart he was adding riper thought such was one of the prime blessings of his pure nature and life. Reserve and patience were what he wanted, in order to be a greater name in song than he is.' : When Thou at Eve art Roaming. I. When thou at eve art roaming Along the elm-o'ershadowed walk, Where fast the eddying stream is foaming, And falling down-a cataract, 'Twas there with thee I wont to talk ; Think thou upon the days gone by, And heave a sigh. II. When sails the moon above the mountains, And sparkle in her light the fountains, III. When wakes the dawn upon thy dwelling, And lingering shadows disappear, As soft the woodland songs are swelling A choral anthem on thine ear, Muse, for that hour to thought is dear, And then its flight remembrance wings To bypast things. IV. To me, through every season, dearest ; REV. JOHN MOULTRIE. Associated with Praed, Macaulay, Henry Nelson Coleridge, and others in the Etonian and Knight's Quarterly Magazine, was the REV. JOHN MOULTRIE (1799-1874), for some time rector of Rugby an amiable and accomplished man, and one of the most graceful and meditative of the minor poets. He published two volumes-My Brother's Grave, and other Poems, 1837; and The Dream of Life, and other Poems, 1843; also a volume of Sermons preached in the Parish Church of Rugby, 1852. A complete edition of Moultrie's poems was published in 1876, with memoir by the Rev. Derwent Coleridge, one of the most attached and admiring of his college friends. The following is part of one of his earliest and best poems: My Brother's Grave. Beneath the chancel's hallowed stone, In simplest phrase recorded there: The living eye hath never known.' Those windows on the Sabbath day; And lips and hearts to God are given, Of earthly ills, in thought of heaven; And if a voice could reach the dead, Now stands beside thy lowly grave. It is not long since thou wert wont These stones which now thy dust conceal, Were holiest objects to thy soul; On these thy spirit loved to dwell, Untainted by the world's control. And years have passed, and thou art now Forgotten in thy silent tomb; And cheerful is my mother's brow, My father's eye has lost its gloom; And years have passed, and death has laid Another victim by thy side; With thee he roams, an infant shade; But not more pure than thou he died. And that dear home, which saw your birth, THE HON. MRS NORTON. The family of Sheridan has been prolific of genius, and MRS NORTON has well sustained the honours of her race. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, by his marriage with Miss Linley, had one son, Thomas, whose convivial wit and fancy were scarcely less bright or less esteemed than those of his father, and whose many amiable qualities greatly endeared him to his friends. He died at a comparatively early age (in 1817), while filling the office of Colonial Paymaster at the Cape of Good Hope. In 1806, Thomas Sheridan was in Scotland, in the capacity of aide-de-camp to Lord Moira, and he there married a daughter of Colonel and Lady Elizabeth Callender of Craigforth, by whom he had a numerous family.* Caroline Elizabeth Sarah was one of three sisters; she was born in 1808, and in her nineteenth year was married to the Hon. George Chapple Norton, son of the first Lord Grantley. This union was dissolved in 1840, after Mrs Norton had been the object of suspicion and persecution of the most painful description. Mr Norton was for thirty years recorder of Guildford; he died in 1875. From her childhood, Caroline Sheridan wrote verses. Her first publication was an attempt at satire, The Dandies' Rout, to which she added illustrative drawings. In her seventeenth year she wrote The Sorrows of Rosalie, a poem embodying a pathetic story of village-life, but which was not published until 1829. Her next work was a poem founded on the ancient legend of the Wandering Lady Elizabeth, the mother of Mrs Norton, was a daughter of the Earl of Antrim. She wrote a novel, entitled Carwell. Those who trace the preponderance of talent to the mother's side, may conclude that a fresh infusion of Irish genius was added to the Sheridan family by this connection. It Jew, and which she termed The Undying One, 1831. A novel, The Wife and Woman's Reward, 1835, was Mrs Norton's next production. In 1840 appeared The Dream, and other Poems. In 1845, she published The Child of the Islands, a poem written to draw the attention of the Prince of Wales, when he should be able to attend to social questions, to the condition of the people in a land and time wherein there is too little communication between classes,' and too little expression of sympathy on the part of the rich towards the poor. This was no new theme of the poetess: she had years before written letters on the subject, which were published in the Times newspaper. At Christmas 1846, Mrs Norton issued two poetical fairy tales, Aunt Carry's Ballads for Children, which charm alike by their graceful fancy and their brief sketches of birds, woods, and flowers. In 1850 appeared a volume of Tales and Sketches in Prose and Verse, being a collection of miscellaneous pieces originally contributed to periodicals. Next year a bolder venture was tried, a three-volume novel, entitled Stuart of Dunleath, a Story of Modern Times. The incidents of this story are too uniformly sad and gloomy-partly tinged by the bitter experiences of the authoress; but it presents occasional passages of humour and sarcasm, and a more matured though unfavourable knowledge of the world. seemed as if the mind of the accomplished writer had been directed more closely to 'the evils done under the sun,' and that she longed passionately for power to redress them. In 1854 she wrote English Laws for Women in the Nineteenth Century; in 1862, The Lady of Garaye; in 1863, a novel entitled Lost and Saved. Her subsequent public appearances have been chiefly on topics of social importance; and the recent improvement in the English marriage laws may be traced primarily to the eloquent pleadings and untiring. exertions of Mrs Norton. This lady,' says a writer in the Quarterly Review, 'is the Byron of our modern poetesses. She has very much of that intense personal passion by which Byron's poetry is distinguished from the larger grasp and deeper communion with man and nature of Wordsworth. She has also Byron's beautiful intervals of tenderness, his strong practical thought, and his forceful expression. It is not an artificial imitation, but a natural parallel.' The truth of this remark, both as to poetical and personal similarity of feeling, will be seen from the following impassioned verses, addressed by Mrs Norton to the late Duchess of Sutherland, to whom she dedicated her Poems. The simile of the swan flinging aside the turbid drops' from her snowy wing is certainly worthy of Byron. But happily Mrs Norton has none of Byron's misanthropy or cold hopelessness. To the Duchess of Sutherland. Once more, my harp! once more, although I thought A wandering dream thy gentle chords have wrought, And unto thee-the beautiful and pure— To thee-whose friendship kept its equal truth Through the most dreary hour of my embittered youth I dedicate the lay. Ah! never bard, In days when poverty was twin with song; Nor wandering harper, lonely and ill-starred, Cheered by some castle's chief, and harboured long; Not Scott's Last Minstrel, in his trembling lays, Woke with a warmer heart the earnest meed of praise! For easy are the alms the rich man spares To sons of Genius, by misfortune bent; Thou, then, when cowards lied away my name, Thou gav'st me that the poor do give the poor, steal O'er minds like these, an easy faith to win; And tales of broken truth are still believed Most readily by those who have themselves deceived. But like a white swan down a troubled stream, Whose ruffling pinion hath the power to fling Aside the turbid drops which darkly gleam, And mar the freshness of her snowy wing— So thou, with queenly grace and gentle pride, Along the world's dark waves in purity dost glide: Thy pale and pearly cheek was never made To crimson with a faint false-hearted shame ; And though my faint and tributary rhymes Shall set some value on his votive lay; So when these lines, made in a mournful hour, So-with such dark majestic eyes, where shone Less terror than amazement-nobly came Peruvia's Incas, when, through lands unknown, The cruel conqueror with the blood-stained name Swept with pursuing sword and desolating flame. In The Winter's Walk, a poem written after walking with Mr Rogers the poet, Mrs Norton has the following graceful and picturesque lines: Gleamed the red sun athwart the misty haze Beauty still lives, though nature's flowerets die, All was beheld, and nothing unadmired; The affectionate attachment of Rogers to Sheridan, in his last and evil days, is delicately touched upon by the poetess : And when at length he laid his dying head He found (though few or none around him came Picture of Twilight. O Twilight Spirit that dost render birth To dim enchantments; melting heaven with earth, Not Lost, but Gone Before. How mournful seems, in broken dreams, The memory of the day, When icy Death hath sealed the breath Of some dear form of clay; When pale, unmoved, the face we loved, And the hand lies cold, whose fervent hold Oh, what could heal the grief we feel Oh, sadly yet with vain regret The widowed heart must yearn; And mothers weep their babes asleep In the sunlight's vain return; The brother's heart shall rue to part From the one through childhood known; For death and life, with ceaseless strife, O world wherein nor death, nor sin, Where eyes awake, for whose dear sake And faint accords of dying words Are changed for heaven's sweet hymn; Oh! there at last, life's trials past, We'll meet our loved once more, Whose feet have trod the path to God'Not lost, but gone before.' THOMAS KIBBLE HERVEY-ALARIC A. WATTS. MR HERVEY, a native of Manchester (18041859), for some years conducted the Athenæum literary journal, and contributed to various other And, though such radiance round him brightly glows, periodicals. He published Australia, and other Marks the small spark his cottage-window throws. Still as his heart forestalls his weary pace, The rich man's chariot hath gone whirling past, Dear art thou to the lover, thou sweet light, Poems, 1824; The Poetical Sketch-book, 1829; Illustrations of Modern Sculpture, 1832; The English Helicon, 1841 ; &c. His verses are characterised by delicate fancy and feeling. The Convict Ship. Morn on the waters! and, purple and bright, Full to the breeze she unbosoms her sail, And her pennon streams onward, like hope, in the gale; The winds come around her, in murmur and song, Pauses to think, amid glitter and glow, Night on the waves !—and the moon is on high, and The Duke of Mercia, 1823; also of A Song of Faith, and other Poems, 1842. The last volume is dedicated to Wordsworth, who had perused and 'rewarded with praise' some of the pieces.-Sir Aubrey's third son, AUBREY THOMAS DE VERE (born in 1814), has published several pieces both in verse and prose-The Waldenses, with other Poems, 1842; The Search after Proserpine, 1843; Mary Tudor, a Drama, 1847; Sketches of Greece Like a heart-cherished home on some desolate plain! and Turkey, 1850; The Infant Bridal, and other Who-as she smiles in the silvery light, A phantom of beauty-could deem, with a sigh, 'Tis thus with our life, while it passes along, As the smiles we put on, just to cover our tears; Like heart-broken exiles, lie burning below; The Poetical Sketches (1822) and Lyrics of the Heart (1850) of MR ALARIC ALEXANDER WATTS (1799-1864) are similar to the productions of Mr Hervey. Their author-a native of London-was connected with the periodical press, and was also among the first editors of those illustrated annual volumes once so numerous, in which poems and short prose sketches from popular or fashionable writers of the day were published. The Literary Souvenir ran to ten volumes (1824-34), and the Cabinet of Modern Art to three volumes (183538). Though generally very poor in point of literary merit, these illustrated annuals unquestionably fostered a taste for art among the people. In 1853, a pension of £300 was settled upon Mr Watts. GEORGE DARLEY-SIR AUBREY AND AUBREY A critic has said that many 'pensive fancies, thoughtful graces, and intellectual interests blossom beneath our busier life and our more rank and forward literature.' Some of these we have had the pleasure of pointing out, and among the graceful contributors of such poetry, we may include MR DARLEY, author of Sylvia, or the May Queen, 1827; of Thomas à Becket and Ethelstan, dramas; Errors of Extasie, and other Poems. Mr Darley-who was a native of Dublin-died at a comparatively early age in 1846. He was in the latter part of his life one of the writers in the Athenæum, and an accomplished critic.-SIR AUBREY DE VERE (died in 1846) was author of two dramatic poems, Julian the Apostate, 1822, Poems, 1864; &c. ARCHBISHOP TRENCH. Though of late chiefly known as a theologian and prose author, RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH early attracted attention by some poems evincing genuine feeling and graceful expression. The Story of Justin Martyr, and other Poems, appeared in 1835; Sabbation, Honor Neale, &c. in 1838; Elegiac Poems, 1850; Poems from Eastern Sources, 1851, &c. This accomplished divine is a native of Dublin, born in 1807. Having studied for the church, he was some time engaged in different places as curate. In 1845, he became Rector of Itchin-Stoke, near Alresford; Hulsean Lecturer at Cambridge in 1846; Professor and Examiner at King's College, London, in 1847; Dean of Westminster in 1856; and in 1864 he succeeded Dr Whately as Archbishop of Dublin. Evening Hymn. To the sound of evening bells Beasts unto their forest lairs. All things wear a home-bound look, On the far-off barren foam. Yonder glowing sunset seems Only seen till now in dreams. Pilgrim! here compelled to roam, Doth not yearning sad, sublime, At this season stir thy breast, Some Murmur, when their Sky is Clear. If one small speck of dark appear In palaces are hearts that ask, |