of metaphor and antithesis, but that which results from thinking clearly and feeling warmly, and which consists in the energetic and unaffected statement of the most important and interesting sentiments. We consider the style of these sermons as furnishing an excellent model for pulpit composition. The discourses cannot but be regarded as extremely seasonable, and we have unmingled satisfaction in recommending them to the attention of our readers. Art. VII. The Grave of the last Saxon; or the Legend of the Curfew. A Poem. By the Rev. W. L. Bowles, Author of Letters to Lord Byron, Poems, &c. 8vo. pp. 112. 8vo. Price 6s. London. 1822. WE have already slightly adverted to the critical controversy which Mr. Bowles appears in his titlepage anxious to commemorate. It was a quarrel, we believe, about the poetical claims of Pope, and the eternal principles' of poetry, which Mr. Bowles seems to understand better in theory than in practice, and his noble opponent better in practice than in theory. The former is very orthodox in his poetical creed, and had he but the requisite placidity and calmness of temper, might even do for a Reviewer; while Lord Byron, it is evident, is fit only to be a poet. Those finer, unwritten rules which genius works by, he understands, or instinctively observes without understanding; but he makes sad work with criticism. Indeed, we cannot avoid taking this opportunity of remarking, how much worse off poets and authors would find themselves in each other's hands, than in those of the licentiates of criticism. There is as much difference between the temper of an angry rival or petulant satirist, and that of a professional critie, as between the temper of a lancet and that of a tomahawk. To be sure, Jeffray and Gifford, the former especially when he falls foul of a Laker, the latter when he clutches a radical or a woman, are rather merciless. But then, Mr. Gifford is a poet, and began his career as a satirist. Think of the Dunciad; think of English Bards and Scotch Reviewers; think of the quarrels of authors from time immemorial; read Mr. Bowles's letter to Mr. Gilchrist, &c.; and you will acknowledge, gentle author, that ours is a clement tribunal, and that it were better to fall into the hands of the sourest critic, than to lie at the mercy of a rival poet or angry satirist. Mr. Bowles is chiefly known, and will longest be remembered, by his sonnets. We are indebted to him for some elegant specimens of that delicate kind of poem, which well suits the miniature painting of sentimental and descriptive writers. In blank verse, they are apt to run riot in epithets, or to wind their readers with the length of their periods. For instance, in the introductory canto to the present poem, we have (at p. 4) a sentence of eighteen lines, followed by one of eleven, and another of nine; three periods in near forty lines. The simple idea thus enlarged upon, is, that the Poet will not sing either of Italy or of South America, for this very good reason, that he is going to sing of green England; which idea, there can be no doubt that Mr. Bowles would have expressed twice as neatly and as pointedly within the compass of a sonnet, and there would have been a saving of twenty-four lines to the reader. The story in the Arabian Nights, of the giant whose immensely expansive bulk was, by means of a certain talisman, comprised within a small casket, was, no doubt, intended to shew the literati of Bagdad, what may be done by compression: at least, it will serve us for an illustra tion. We have that respect for Mr. Bowles as an old acquaintance, that would lead us to speak as favourably as we can of his present production; but the truth is, that he has attempted something above his reach. This, in a young writer, would bespeak a commendable ambition: in a veteran, it indicates a mistaken estimate of his powers. In "The Grave of the last "Saxon," we have, brought together, agreeably to the most authorized recipes, all the fitting materials of poetry; warriors, monks, weird sisters, pages, spirits, and distressed damsels; moreover, for scenery, abbeys, caves, forests, castles; for the dramatis personæ, names of historic grandeur and euphony; and for the subject, an interesting period of English history. But, bubble, bubble, toil and trouble,' the charm is wanting to make all good. The materials will not mix, and the cauldron will not boil, though the imps sing to it in such strains as the following: Around, around, around, Troop and dance we to the sound, Whilst mocking imps cry, Ho! ho! ho! And again, ministering spirits sing: • I. 'I have syllables of dread; They can wake the dreamless dead. · 11. I, a dark sepulchral song, That can lead Hell's phantom throng. • III. • Like a nightmare I will rest This night upon King William's breast! ་་ Spirits and Night÷hags. * Around, around, around, Dance we to the dismal sound Of dying shrieks and mortal woe, Whilst antic imps shout, Ho! Ho! Ho!' It is well they do not shout Ha! ha! ha! But, leaving the imps to their pranks, the spirits of the earthquake, of the storm, of the battle, and of the fire-they are certainly spirits much below proof-the other persons of the tale or drama, whichever we are to call it, are quite as shadowy and undefined as they are. They swear in character, by St. Anne, and by a name more sacred, which holy name is used much more freely than we think quite befitting a clergyman; but in little else do they act in character. Edgar Atheling prettily enough thus talks to the daughter of Harold. مية Oh, no! I will keep watch with you till dawn- On e "Atheling," (Adela answer'd) "early piety Hath disciplin'd my heart to every change."' All the Saxons in the poem are persons of astonishing piety, warriors and all. But the above dialogue will be thought strange discourse for the supposed time, and place, and personages. Edgar Atheling has been riding hard to bring tidings of the fall of York and the approach of the victorious Saxon army. Adela has been sitting up all night; unattended, by the by, by a single female, and only a grey monk with her; which we should not have recommended to any young lady to do, were the grey monk Mr. Bowles himself. She has been all agitation and anxiety; and when she heard Edgar on the stairs, thought it was the Normans, poor girl, that had somehow got into the castle, and were coming to murder her. Under these circumstances, we think her early piety by no means accounts for her calmness, much less for her keeping Atheling, as she does, from his supper, to hear a long story. 'Listen-I will be (So to beguile the creeping hours of time) If she could a tale unfold,' Mr. Bowles, it is plain, cannot. The story wants consistency, and it wants a catastrophe; at least, a close. That which the Author designed to bea ⚫ centre,' round which the passions brought into action' might revolve, to wit, the grave of Harold, answers neither this purpose of a pivot or hinge for the poem to turn upon, nor that of a point of sufficient interest for its conclusion. Mr. Bowles conducts us to Waltham Abbey, where he has assembled the greater part of the personages of the tale, to look at Harold's grave; and when we are all expectation of some tragic or heroic circumstance to wind up the scene, he coolly opens the portal of the abbey, and turns us adrift, Adela and all, at twelve o'clock at night, into the open air; the Poet vanishing at the same moment, like a mischievous will o' the wisp, just as we thought we had come up to the place which the light shone from. Tis dangerous lingering here: the fire-eyed lynx Before them lay their path through the wide world. We know not which to consider as the worst behaviour, for the monks of Waltham to treat Harold's children thus inhospitably, or for Mr. Bowles to act the same part by his readers. Nevertheless, to shew that we bear him no malice, we will exhibit his talents to much better advantage in the following descriptive passage. Here he is more at home. Tranquil and clear the autumnal day declined. A δι That rear'd their dark brows beetling o'er the bay, ̈ A voice amidst the hush'd and listening world, Once more their summer feelings, as a light In the brief sunshine of the turret top.' This is a very pleasing picture. We regret to detract from it by a single remark, but can scarcely help suspecting that Panope is introduced in downright waggery. Milton has, On the level brine, Sleek Panope with all her sisters play'd. The propriety and elegance of which, it needed not Milton's name to sanction. But was ever such a travestie of all that is classical, as in the incongruous expressions, Panope rolled in the offing? We must just add, that where a red-breast could be seen, we should imagine that it might, not only ́ al'most,' but quite be heard. There are several songs scattered through the poem. The worst is entitled, "Song of the Battle of Hastings,' which opens thus: The Norman armament, beneath thy rocks, St. Valerie, Is moor'd; and, streaming to the morn, three hundred banners fly.” Does Mr. Bowles mistake this for rhyme, or for metre?We must try to find something better. The following is so little in harmony with the context, that it will gain, rather than lose, by being detached from it. Oh! when 'tis Summer weather, In some remote retreat, |