No, I will not forget thee. Hearts may break Around us, as old lifeless trees are snapt By the swift breath of whirlwinds as they wake Their path amid the forest. Lightning-wrapt, (For love is fire from Heaven,) we calmly stand-- Heart pressed to answering heart--hand linked with hand.
_Endymion. By Henry B. Hirst. Boston: Wm. D. Ticknor & Co. 1 vol. 12mo._
It was Goethe, we believe, who objected to some poet, that he put too much water in his ink. This objection would apply to the uncounted host of our amateur versifiers, and poets by the grace of verbiage. If an idea, or part of an idea, chances to stray into the brain of an American gentleman, he quickly apparels it in an old coat from his wardrobe of worn phrases, and rushes off in mad haste to the first magazine or newspaper, in order that the public may enjoy its delectable beauty at once. We have on hand enough MSS. of this kind, which we never intend to print, to freight the navy of Great Britain. But mediocrity and stupidity are not the only sinners in respect to this habit of writing carelessly. Hasty composition is an epidemic among many of our writers, whose powers, if disciplined by study, and directed to a definite object, would enable them to produce beautiful and permanent works. So general is the mental malady to which we have alluded, that it affects the judgments of criticism, and if a collection of lines, going under the name of a poem, contains fine passages, or felicitous flashes of thought, it commonly passes muster as satisfying the requirements of the critical code. Careless writers, therefore, are sustained by indulgent critics, and between both good literature is apt to be strangled in its birth.
Now it is due to Mr. Hirst to say that his poem belongs not to the class we have described. It is no transcript of chance conceptions, expressed in loose language, and recklessly huddled together, without coherence and without artistic form, but a true and consistent creation, with a central principle of vitality and a definite shape. He has, in short, produced an original poem on a classic subject, written in a style of classic grace, sweetness and simplicity, rejecting all superfluous ornament and sentimental prettinesses, and conveying one clear and strong impression throughout all its variety of incident, character and description. It is no conglomeration of parts, but an organic whole. This merit alone should give him a high rank among the leading poets of the country, for it evidences that he has a clear notion of what the word poem means.