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fort and support in life ' s troubles and temptations ; as a pledge of communion -with the Heavenly Father , and of His constant and intimate protection , fidelity to these watchwords is the motto of the tale . In the deepest and truest sense this story of The Three Boys is a religious story ; only , the religion is the religion of childhood , l ooking out on nature with trustfuleyes , and listening to the voice of the Father in the mysterious harmonies of £ * ffl * fiM ATIf \ OifV ~ * " ' ' The illustrations are worthy of the text , exquisite . in feeling ^ and in dignity . We fervently hope Mrs . Hay will be encouraged to write more children ' s stories ; never was there finer sympathy of pen and pencil ; never were pen and pencil better employed . We say emphatica ll y to all mothers , here are oases pure as a mother ' s love , written by a woman of genius , for
her own chad . Head this story to your children : it will make them happier , stronger , more patient , more affectionate : it will teach them to live valiantly , and to die , like children , in a Father ' s arms . As we put it aside , we feel a debt of thankfulness : it has brought to life again for a moment that golden age of hope and aspiration to which , as we advance into the thickening troubles , we look back as upon a vanishing distance reflected by the last rays of a sun setting behind the hills of life . And all this is to-be found in thirty-two pages of a pretty little child ' s story ! Reader , judge
for yourself ! . A strange contrast to The Three Boys is Mother and Son : a Tale ( J . H . Parker ) , proposed , it seems , to be the first of a series of tales , equally well intentioned , no doubt , and , as we think , mistaken in design and tendency . Nothing can be more correct and strict than the moral of this well-principled story , which we can imagine any healthy child rejecting as a pill not even disguised in sugar . The subject is the development of the dispositions and the destinies of the victims of self-will and over-indulgence ; one of the many new versions which will never equal the old , of the famous story of the boy who bit off his mother ' s ear at the gallows-foot . It is interspersed with harsh doctrines , and cheerfully hints at misery hereafter as the proper reward for happiness here . We should be glad to find the succeeding volumes of the promised series a little less theological , and a little more humane .
Miss Corner has arranged the favourite old storj' ofMother Chose as a play for miniature actors and actresses . We agree with her in thinking these charades a very harmless and even improving amusement for young people . The illustrations of the tableaux , in the play of Mother Goose , are by Harrison Weir , the Landseer of the poultry-yard . There is wonderful life and character in his geese , and his human figures are drawn with spirit and elegance . We said there was wonderful life in his geese ; we should add that the dead __ goOse ( p . 24 ) is equally remarkable for its melancholy truth . •'_ - ¦¦ '
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POETS OF THE WAR . The Agamemnons of the present siege of Troy are not likely to perish inwept for want of poets , when a * retjred Liverpool merchant" bursts into > allads as the Tyrtseus of Balaklava and Inkerman . ( Arthur Hall , Virtue , and Co . ) We needed not the touching couplet prefixed to his title-page" Critics forbear , rain not your blows on him , A touch of pity makes the -whole world kin "lor even the announcement that the proceeds would be applied to the ? atriotic Fund * to commend the honest emotion of his verses , anoVto judge hem by no other standard than that of the impulse and the intention . ¦ Mr . John William Fletcher ., author of Tryphena and other Poems ( R . Pheobald ) , sings the battle of Alma with a muse so facile and so spontainv fashioned into
leous , that he reads like the Times correspondent , erse , easy Jtemate rhymes by a turning-lathe . East and West ; a Song of the War George-Bell ) r is neither verse nor-prose , but-Jt is grim , and earnest in hought and expression . " The Bugle in the Black Sea ( Robert Hard wick ) s less political and more l yrical ; it has the alarum of martial music and the in « - of true metal in its episodes of the battle-field , and in the more donestac and tranquil p ieces there is freshness and power , a homely pathos , md a generojis simplicity more effective than the most laboured art . The 3 ugle & the voice of a poet , and its sounds will live . The writer gracefully icknowled <* es his debt to the Times correspondent , but in his case the acknowedgment was scarcely due : the spirit and the sentiment are his own . Mr . Westland Marston , so universal is the warlike infection , has ceased or the moment to be the Hamlet of sentimental passion in blank verse , to tcquit his debt of enthusiastic homage to the gallant men who spurred to leath in the charge ofLight Cavalry at Balaklava .
The Death Ride ; a Tale of the Light Brigade ( G . Mitchell ) , has something » f the sweep and the suddenness of the charge m the rhythm of the stanzas . tfn Marston also confesses that " the masterly records of the war in the ournals— " records which are at once histories and poems , leave to formal > oetry only this task—to comment as it were upon their glorious texts . The last on our present list of war-rhymes is , we are disposed to assert , he best and bravest that has yet appeared . We do not except Alexander imith , whose sonnets , as we read them again , do not quite sustain , we onfess , our first and more favourable opinion . The thought was too often tetcnea
. bscure—the phrase too ambitious , and the feeling too tar- . xnere rostoo much cleverness and conscious cleverness , too much manipulation , too ittle heart . In these War Waits , by Gerald Massey ( D . Bogue ) , " windalls , " he says in a caustic preface , " shook down in this wild blast of war , re recognise the unbidden voice of a singer Vho sings as others merely speak , > ecause he cannot choose but sing , and not because he has published a suc-! essful volume of poems . We judged Mr . Gerald Massey with so muchseverity > a former occasion , that we arc all the more proud to bo able to praise lini" when we can . Wo did him , as we believe , justice then , as we do now , ind we regretted his mistaken resentment at a senoua impartiality which vas the truest recognition of real merit amidat the defects of youth and mmaturity . Mr . Gerald Massoy is probably still too young to appreciate ; hc advantage of honest severity , and to understand that critics do not yaste severe counsels on unripeness without promise . Our present comnendation is doubled in value b y that severity which aroused Mr . Gerald Mossey ' s inconsiderate and foolish wrath .
His War Waits are , as the writer expresses it , . * . * rough and ready , ** but they are none the l ess welcome for that qual ity : indeed , it is their flavour and bouquet . We may fairly consider Mr . Massey as a fit interpreter of the people ' s voice and will : and to be the poet of the British people is no mean prerogative . These lyrics are fierce , hearty , terribly in earnest : the Peace Society would brand them as bloodthirsty ; they do not treat war as a political fencing match , but as a wrestle of Titans for life and death . There is true feeling here , when he speaks of England— ' \ And Liberty oft to her arms doth come , ' . ¦ To ease its poor heart of tears . The following stanza may be revolutionary , it is not un-English : They would mock at her now , who of old lookt forth In their fear , as they heard her afar ; But loud will your wail be , O Kings of the Earth ! When the Old Land goes down to the war . , The Avalanche trembles half-launcht and half-riven , Her voice will in motion set :
O ring out the tidings , ye Winds of heaven ! There's life in the Old Land yet . There is gr im humour in " Nicholas and the British Lion ; " " Down in Australia" is a burst of triumphant welcome . In " Liberty ' s Bridal Wreath " we mark these lines : Now side by side , in the fields of fate , And shoulder to shoulder are we ; And toe know , by the grip of our hands in hate , ~\ What the strength of our love maybe . " After Alma" has some fine pictures : The fiery valour at white heat , Was flashing in their faces . .... For us they pour'd their blood like wine , From life's ripe gathered clusters .
At Inkerman : No Sun ! but none is needed—Men can feel their way to fight . With the lust of Battle ia their face—eyes filled with fiery light .... Like the old Sea , white-lipped with rage , they dash , in wild despair , On ranks of rock .... From morn till night , we fought our fight , and at the set of sun Stood Conquerors on Inkerman—our Soldiers'Battle won . That morn their legions stood like com in its pomp of golden grain ! That night the ruddy sheaves were reapt upon the mi 4 gr plain ! For we cut them down by thunder-strokes , and piled the shocks of slain : - The hill-side like a vintage ran , and reel'd Death ' s harvest-wain . We had hungry hundreds gone to sup in Paradise that night , Arid robes ~ of Immortality our ragged Braves bedight !
They fell in Boyhood ' s comely bloom , and Bravery's lusty pride ; But they made their bed o' the Russian dead , ere they lay down and died ; We gathered round the tent-fire in the evening cold and grey . And thought of those who rankt with us in Battle ' s rich array , Our Comrades of the morn who came no more from that fell fray ! The salt tears wrung out in the gloom of green dells far . away—The eyes of lurking Death that in Life ' s crimson bubbles play—The stern . white faces of the dead that on the dark ground lay Like Statues of old Heroes , cut in precious human day—Some with a smile as life had stopt to music proudly gay—The household Gods of many a heart all dark and dumb to-day ! And hard hot eyes grew ripe for tears , and hearts sank down to P ** 7-The Leader said last week that the Government had aroused a spirit that would not subside at their bidding . Mark these lines : " Certain Ministers
and the People : " .......... With . faces-turn'd from Battle , they went forth . . We marcht with ours set stern against the North . They shuttled lest their feet might rouse the dead : We went with martial triumph in our tread . They trembled lest the world might come to blows : We quiver'd for the tug and mortal close . They only meant a mild hint for the Czar : We would have bled him through a sumptuous war . We believe the bitter indignation of these verses to be a . message from thousands of inarticulate heroic hearts of Englishmen . Ministers may weU beware of the spirit they have raised but cannot quell .
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MISCELLANEA . The author of Blondelle went to Elba in the course of last summer in search of health . iHe empl oyed his time on the island m ^ visiting the spots made memorable by the brief sojourn of Napoleon , and in pusking up reminiscences of the Emperor from the oldest inhabitants , notably from Monsieur Claude Hollard , sometime gardener to Napoleon , a man whose troubled life began so far back as 1773 , and who had suffered every vicissitude of fortune ; in the service of Austria , of the French Republic , of Nj poleon , of a Grand Duchess of Tuscany , of Napoleon again , of thelUuko of Wellington , and finally of a Russian Prince , the proprietor of the St . Martino estatein the island of Elba . " j
, _ _ . _ ™ . - The author of Blondelle , on his passage from Leghorn to Elba , met « senator of the Second Empire , one of the very few genuine Bonapartg w still extant , who had been attached to the little army of Napoleon m Wj e " Island Empire" forty years ago . Our author did not ™ g tect * ° taU * X vantage of so fortunate and interesting an ^|^* g * ^ £ » t f which trip and of these acquaintances is an agreeable and h ™ J * yJ * ™ . ^ igZ the first part is the record of the writer ' s actual " » P ^™ £ ^™; yg 5 passed on the island , committed to writing of ™ *^ $ J * f £$$£ * *
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By the author of Blondelle , ( Bosworth . )
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JFakpaby 20 , 1855 . J THE LEADEB . 65
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Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 20, 1855, page 65, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2074/page/17/
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