pression that sometimes lapses into obscurity, in spite of these things, we think that Mr. Block has produced a very noble poem, a poem not unworthy of its great theme, and that stands in eloquent contrast to many efforts that we will not for a moment draw from kindly oblivion by naming. Mr. Block's poem is in four sections—"The Old World," "The Man," "The Deed," and "The New World"—with a dedication to the "Women of America." The first and last sections, with their poetic characterization of the supreme moments of history, show the author's work at its best, for they afford him the most opportunities for the fine philosophical generalizations towards which he is led by his natural bent. As an illustration of this, as well as of the complex structure of the whole poem, we quote the stanza which sums up the part of India in the history of ancient culture:
"Under the fervid skies, and mid the growth
Of tangled forests where the mountains vast
Circle the shaded glens, a gloomy past
Enwraps a nobler people; ever loth
To grasp the present firmly, seeing both
The worlds of earth and heaven in mist of dreams
Enrobed and mingled, they seemed bound by oath
Of high allegiance to the One who gleams
Recedingly on the gaze
Turned Himwards; by what ways
Of severence from the body, down what streams
Of anguish did they seek Him; the land teems
With monstrous shapes and visions that enthrall;
And chiefly thee, O Buddh, the foiled ones call
Savior and friend, thee clothed in contemplation's rest,
And finding loss of all and nothingness the best."
Felicitous passages abound in the poem.
"People grown strong with very sight of God,"
gives admirable expression to the ethical mission of the Hebrew.
"Freedom awoke with Greece,
And violet-crowned peace;
The soul was born and thought's first victory won,"
is both exquisite and adequate. The following fine tribute is paid to England:
"O stern-browed Heroine far across the sea,
Your daughter knows your blood within her veins,
And hearkens to the ever-ringing strains
Your voice has poured to honor liberty."
Indeed, the whole poem is a song of the conquests of liberty, and closes in a vein that seems inspired by Shelley's outburst:
"Oh, happy earth, reality of heaven!"
"One vision more!" sings the author,
"One vision more! the spiritual city lies
Beneath the sun; the all-subduing love
Inhabits there as in the realms above;
As lordly as the blue unclouded skies
Life passes, and the mighty dawn's surmise
Reaches completion, and the deeps on deeps
Of spirit which are seen alone of eyes
Whose watch is kin to power that never sleeps
Are more and more revealed;
The inmost heavens unsealed
Comfort the heart where no more anguish weeps,
And open fields which faith forever reaps."
The dramatic element, rather than the lyrical, is the characteristic component of Mr. Fawcett's "Songs of Doubt and Dream." The best of the poems are those either dramatic in form, as "Two Scenes in the Life of Beau Brummell," or in spirit, as the fine narrative of "Queen Christina and De Liar." Hence we question the propriety of specifically styling the volume a collection of songs. The spontaneous grace and melody of the true lyric are qualities rarely exhibited in Mr. Fawcett's verse, but we have instead abundant energy devoted to a wide range of themes. We are inclined to think that the author has weighted his verse with more philosophy than it will bear, or rather, perhaps, that his philosophy has not been sublimed in the proper alembic; it is often crude and merely prosaic in expression. The memorial verses to Courtlandt Palmer are excellent in thought and sympathy, yet we can hardly call poetry such lines as these:
"Ye men that bow to science as your god
Learn self-control and patience from her laws.
Remember Newton and Copernicus
Killed superstition with the sword of truth;
They did not scare it dead with rhetoric;
Hysteria never framed a syllogism,
And logic murders like a gentleman."
The "dream" of Mr. Fawcett's title, as well as the "doubt," is justified by many pieces, from which we select, as among the more successful, "A Retrospect."
"Wandering where mortals have no power to gauge
The enormity of night that space outrolls,
Floated or paused, in shadowy pilgrimage,
Two disembodied souls.
"One towered a shape with dark wild-trailing shroud,
With face by sorrow and anger seamed and drawn;
One loomed a holy glory, as when some cloud
Swims deep in baths of dawn.
"World after world they gazed on, till beguiled
They flew toward earth, and hovering where she swept,
One with a saturnine dejection smiled,
And one with slow tears wept.
"'On that star,' said the spirit of sombre mien,
'As Dante I passed through pain's most blinding heats. . . .
'On that star,' said the spirit of look serene,
'I suffered, and was Keats.'"
There are in these lines echoes of Tennyson and Aldrich, at least, and the felicity of several words (guage, enormity, loomed, dejection) may be questioned, but the poem has merits, and is not unimpressive. We have found nothing prettier or more nearly faultless in the volume than this "Aquarelle":
"Far away westward the cattle go,
Dotting the land's dim edges;
Isled in the roseate afterglow,
Darken the long cloud-ledges.
"Burning each moment with warmer beams,
Moon, by your sweet chaste power
Lull the world into lotus-dreams,
While you hang like a lotus-flower."
On the whole, Mr. Fawcett's volume comprises the best work in verse that he has yet given us, and fairly entitles him to a place among our American poets of the second rank.
