The blood still rosy in their tapering nails.
A line of pearl ran through her parted lips,
And in her nostrils, spiritually thin,

The breathing curve was mockingly like life:
And round beneath the faintly tinted skin,
Ran the light branches of the azure veins,
And on her cheek the jet lash o'erlay,
Matching the arches pencilled on her brow,-
Her hair had been unbound, and falling loose
Upon her pillow, hid her small round ears
In curls of glossy blackness, and about

Her polished neck, scarce touching it, they hung,
Like airy shadows floating as they slept.

"T was heavenly beautiful.”

With this crowning climax we close this attempt to diminish into mere prettiness the sublime simplicity of this gospel narrative.

We need hardly point out, to the most casual reader, the singular taste which has dictated the selection of the images and epithets of this piece of sacred verse.

As a curious specimen of scriptural vocabulary we may quote the following:

"Spice lamps;" "alabaster urns;" "white and fragrant smoke;" "curled indolently;" "silken curtains slumbered in their folds;" "silken curtains,"

repeated in a few lines further down the page.

The description of the dead maiden, in the next quotation, is

rather an anatomical auctioneer Robins cataloguing her limbs, than a fine picture of death, sketched by the hand of a poet.

Our readers must pardon our placing in juxtaposition to this elegant elaboration, a passage from Byron. However well known these lines may be, their reiteration now will do more to show the difference between false and true poetry than a volume of critical analysis.

"He who hath bent him o'er the dead,
Ere the first day of death is fled,

The first dark day of nothingness,

The last of danger and distress;

Before decay's effacing fingers

Have swept the lines where beauty lingers,
And marked the mild, angelic air,

The rapture of repose that's there,

The fixed yet tender traits that streak

The languor of that pallid cheek ;—

And but for that sad, shrouded eye,

That fires not, wins not, weeps not now,
And but for that chill, changeless brow,
Where 'cold obstruction's' apathy
Appals the gazing mourner's heart,
As if to him it would impart

The doom he dreads yet dwells upon,—
Some moments, aye, a treacherous hour,
He still might doubt the tyrant's power,
So fair, so calm, so softly sealed,

The first, last look by death revealed."

Although these vices of style pervade to a great extent

the poems of Mr. Willis, there are many occasions when he writes with force and plainness. The following opening to his poem entitled "Rizpah with her Sons," is not open to our former objections. We dare say, however, that many will consider our former quotations the best poetry; and we fear that the poet has himself been frequently led to consult the taste of his admirers, rather than his own.

"Bread for my mother!' said the voice of one
Darkening the door of Rizpah. She looked up-
And lo! the princely countenance and mien
Of dark-browed Armeni. The eye of Saul,
The very voice and presence of the king,
Limb, port, and majesty, were present there,
Mocked like an apparition in her Son.
Yet as he stooped his forehead to her hand
With a kind smile, a something of his mother
Unbent the haughty arching of his lip,

And through the darkness of the widow's heart
Trembled a nerve of tenderness, that shook

Her thought of pride all suddenly to tears."

It is a conclusive proof of the bad taste of over ornament that it always fails of effect when so unsparingly laid on. The mind readily welcomes the poetical and intensed lines:

"And through the darkness of the widow's heart
Trembled a nerve of tenderness, that shook

Her thought of pride all suddenly to tears."

We here feel that the metaphor is justified by the passion

of the scene; but the besetting sin is too strong, and after a few more lines we come to these:

"Was this the fairest of the sons of Saul?

The violet's cup was harsh to his blue eye,

Less agile was the fierce barb's fiery step;
His voice drew hearts to him: his smile was like
The incarnation of some blessed dream,

Its joyousness so sunned the gazer's eye!
Fair were his locks: his snowy teeth divided
A bow of love, drawn with a scarlet thread.
His cheek was like the moist heart of the rose,
And but for nostrils of that breathing fire
That turns the lion back, and limbs as lithe
As is the velvet muscle of the pard,
Mephibosheth had been too fair for man."

It really seems, on reading these lines, that the author had deliberately resolved to rack his fancy for the most outrageous conceits and hyperboles that he could invent.

It is pleasant to leave this strained metaphorical style, and come to such verses as these.

Hope promised but to bring us here,
And reason takes the guidance now.
One backward look-the last-the last,

One silent year-for youth is past!"

These are natural, manly verses, and show how much Mr. Willis has lost by not cultivating this simpler style. The whole poem is so good that we shall quote it.

of this

"Who goes with hope and passion back?
Who comes with me and memory on?
Oh! lonely looks that downward track—
Joy's music hushed-Hope's roses gone.
To pleasure and her giddy troop

Farewell, without a sigh or tear!
But heart gives way, and spirits droop,

To think that love may leave us here."

There is a pathos in the last line which had Mr. Willis more frequently displayed, would have rendered him one of the most charming of modern American Poets.

"Have we no charm when youth has flown,

Midway to death left sad and lone”

"Yet stay, as 'twere a twilight star

That sends its thread across the wave,

I see a brightening light from far,

That shows a path beyond the grave,
And now-bless God !--its golden line

Comes o'er, and lights my shadowy way,