273 241. Where swart Paynims pray. "Clasped like a missal in a land of Pagans: that is to say, where Christian prayer-books must not be seen, and are, therefore, doubly cherished for the danger.” LEIGH HUNT.

274 250. Noiseless as fear in a wide wilderness. To me this is one of the numerous great lines in the poem. Without being able clearly to define how or why, the reader feels himself seized by the throat, as it were, with a sense of being alone in a wide, breathless desert, where nothing of evil is visible, but where some awful and almost supernatural stillness is thrillingly informed with a fear too supreme for expression or comprehension. The suggestiveness of the line is all but worthy of Shakespeare.

274 262. "It is, apparently, as a poetical contrast to the fasting which was generally accepted as the due method by which a maiden was to prepare herself for the Vision, that the gorgeous supper-picture of st. xxx was introduced. Keats, who was Leigh Hunt's guest at the time this volume appeared, read aloud the passage to Hunt, with manifest pleasure in his work: the sole instance I can recall where the poet — modest in proportion to his greatness — yielded even to so innocent an impulse of vanity." — Palgrave.

274 266. Soother. Smoother to the palate.

275 289–297. It was a pretty fancy thus to connect his own poem, La Belle Dame sans Merci, with a forgotten Provençal air.

278 360. Carpets. Of course an error, as carpets were not in use at the time indicated by the rest of the poem. in The King's Tragedy Dante Gabriel Rossetti anachronism:

"The night-wind wailed round the empty room

And the rushes shook on the floor."

The point is, however, one of no great importance.

Forman notes that avoids such an

Leigh Hunt's closing words upon this poem may not inaptly close these notes: "Here endeth the young and divine poet, but not the delight and gratitude of his readers; for, as he sings elsewhere, —

A thing of beauty is a joy forever."

INDEX OF FIRST LINES.

As from the darkening gloom a silver dove
Asleep! O sleep a little while, white pearl
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever

Bards of Passion and of Mirth

Bright star! would I were steadfast as thou art

Fair Isabel, poor simple Isabel

Glory and loveliness have passed away
Great spirits now on earth are sojourning

Here all the summer could I stay.
How many bards gild the lapses of time
Hush, hush! tread softly! hush, hush, my dear

In a drear-nighted December

I stood tip-toe upon a little hill

242

56

59

48

57

52

46

18

It keeps eternal whisperings around

61

Keen, fitful gusts are whisp'ring here and there .

57

O Goddess! hear these tuneless numbers, wrung
One morn before me were three figures seen

O solitude! if I must with thee dwell
O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness

St. Agnes' Eve - Ah, bitter chill it was
Standing aloof in giant ignorance

265

Souls of Poets dead and gone

The poetry of earth is never dead

This pleasant tale is like a little copse

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness

Time's sea hath been five years at its slow ebb

Upon a Sabbath day it fell

261

Upon a time, before the fairy broods

219

What is more gentle than a wind in summer
What though, for showing truth to flatter'd state
When I have fears that I may cease to be
Woman! when I behold thee flippant, vain

Young Calidore is paddling o'er the lake

ATHENÆUM PRESS SERIES.

ISSUED UNDER THE GENERAL EDITORSHIP OF

PROFESSOR GEOrge Lyman KiTTREDGE, of Harvard University,

AND

PROFESSOR C. T. WINCHESTER, of Wesleyan University.

IT is proposed to issue a series of carefully edited works in English Literature, under the above title. This series is intended primarily for use in colleges and higher schools; but it will furnish also to the general reader a library of the best things in English letters in editions at once popular and scholarly. The works selected will represent, with some degree of completeness, the course of English Literature from Chaucer to our own times.

The volumes will be moderate in price, yet attractive in appearance, and as nearly as possible uniform in size and style. Each volume will contain, in addition to an unabridged and critically accurate text, an Introduction and a body of Notes. The amount and nature of the annotation will, of course, vary with the age and character of the work edited. The notes will be full enough to explain every difficulty of language, allusion, or interpretation Full glossaries will be furnished when necessary.

The introductions are meant to be a distinctive feature of the series. Each introduction will give a brief biographical sketch of the author edited, and a somewhat extended study of his genius, his relation to his age, and his position in English literary history. The introductory matter will usually include a bibliography of the author or the work in hand, as well as a select list of critical and biographical books and articles. See also Announcements.

Sidney's Defense of Poesy.

Edited with an Introduction and Notes by ALBERT S. Cook, Professor of English in Yale University. 12mo. Cloth. xlv + 103 pages. By mail, 90 cents; for introduction, 80 cents.

William Minto, Late Prof. of Lit- | erature, University of Aberdeen: It seems to me to be a very thorough and instructive piece of work. The interests of the student are consulted

in every sentence of the Introduction and Notes, and the paper of questions is admirable as a guide to the thorough study of the substance of the essay.