REVIEW,

Auckland Examiner, Volume 1, Issue 33, 30 July 1857, Page 3

REVIEW,

“ Wa 7 denses, or the Fall of Bsoa; a Lyrical Sketch." With other poems. By Aubrey de Fere. London, 1852. This scarcely known book, though entitled a Lyrical Sketch, is lyrical in part only-; the groundwork of the piece being laid in dramatic collcquy and blank verse. It is in three acts, and has not unaptly been described by an eminent critic as a Romanesque modification of the old Greek tragedy. Its plot or story is founded upon the persecution and Massacre of the Waldenses, which took place in the year 1655. One cf Milton’s most admirable sonnets was in reference to the same subject, and, no doubt, it offers ample material for a purely dramatic representation Mr. De Vere's claims to be considered a first-class poet are admitted by few ; but it seems to us that he is entitled to a place amongst sublime mediocrities. The following passages, taken at random from his book, fairly indicate the character of his mind if not the extent ef his genius:— Tyrants say That men were shaped but to obey ; Dead spokes alone, to roll and reel, Within their car's revolving wheel ! Let them take heed, for they have driven In frenzy o’er the rocky plain, Till earth's deep groans are heard in heaven, And fire bursts from those wheels amain. Not soon the stormy flames expire —.. When hearts, contagious in their ire, Burst forth like forests catching fire. This is part of a chorus in the 3rd act. Some few other lines from a beautiful hymn to the meek arc all we can find room for The “ single eye” alone can see All Truths around us thrown In their e'ernal unity : The humble ear alone. Has room to held, and time to prize The sweetness of life’s harmonies. Notions, to thought made visible, Are but the smallest part Of those immortal truths which dwell Self-radiant in man’s heart; With outward beams are others bright, But God has made you “ full of light.”

There are no scribblers more self-sufficient or less useful, than those who, upon the stwngth of making ryhmes, would pass themselves upon us for poets. Specimens cf that ridiculous class are to bo found in every considerable town or city in every known part of the world. These are the people to whom Newton made allusion when he said poets and bellmen were only fit to be yoked together. The difference between that poetic faculty “by grey-beards called Divine,” and that rhyming faculty with which so many “Centaurs not fabulous ” are cu’-sed, is indeed, immense:— From the East to Western In i’, No jewel is like Rosalind ; Her worth being mounted on the wind, Through all tho world bears Rosalind ; AU the pictures fairest lin'd Are but black to Rosalind ; Let no face be kept in mind, But the fair of Rosalind. When Rosalind reads this jingling stuff, Touchstone says —"I’ll rhyme you so for eight years together,”—and a clown with a thousandth part his wit quite easily might. Aubrey de Vere, though not to be compared with great poets, is something quite different to your mere rhymer, to criticise whom would be what Hook called Ass-ass-ination.