land and boasted that they "had never slept beneath a raftered roof, or drained the bowl at a sheltered hearth." Their wild mythology charmed him with its gloomy grandeur; in its superstitions his imagination found ample materials for display, and its rough gems his genius polished until they sparkle with surpassing lustre. His war-songs "breathe and burn with the lust of fight;" they throb like the hearts of their own heroes, with the strong energy of a spirit whose only delight is in the battle field, or in the fierce contention of the elements.

This high, untamable courage is characteristic of all the war-songs, but is most conspicuous in the magnificent Sword Chant. To his proud brand alone Thorstein Raudi owes his possessions; in that is his only title to the lands he holds, and he boastfully exclaims:

I point with my sword

East, west, north and south,

Shouting, "There am I Lord."

In the "Wooing Song" we find the rough Sea-king putting on the impetuosity of the Lover-yet he cannot sue in the soft accents of parlor courtesy; but, as the wild winds of his own northern land bend the stately pines before them, so his boisterous love sweeps before it all hesitation and maidenly reserve in the part of Torf Einar's proud daughter. There is no sentimentality in this song; no languishing sighs of pretended devotion, disgust and repel us: but it is full of frank and manly feeling, bursting its way through every obstacle.

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We have said that Motherwell had a heart full of strong sensibility; full of sympathy and tenderness. No one, destitute of such a heart, could ever have written "Jeannie Morrison," or the song commencing My heid is like to rend, Willie." In the latter, a young maiden, betrayed, heart-broken and dying, sobs out her remorseful agony to him who has brought this ruin upon her, in words so full of pathos that they are "utterly mournful." Yet, in the midst of her own deep suffering, there comes no reproach against him-no hatred or revenge rises; on the contrary, she shows a pitying, forgiving love that is very touching, and, forgetful of herself, strives to soothe her lover's anguish.

It was during his school-boy days that Motherwell's acquaintance with Jeannie Morrison commenced; and the poet, although he never saw her from the time he left school, always cherished a warm attachment for her. The poem, inscribed with her name, was written during this brief acquaintance, but was not published until many years afterwards. It is not so mournful, so despondingly sad, as the piece we have just spoken of, but we seem to feel while reading it that the ghost of long-past hap

piness is haunting the poet's mind and pointing in sorrow to "Auld lang syne." We will quote the last stanza, as showing the spirit of the piece, and also that the cares of life never obliterated this early attachment.

Motherwell's hearty sympathy with nature often led him to desert the noisy, bustling town, in order that he might hold nearer communion with her. In the fields or forest he is entirely at home; and with the singing birds, the murmuring brooks, and the blooming flowers, his heart offers up its incense of prayer and thanksgiving to the God of nature. might expect, from the fierce spirit of some of his poetry, that he would take a wild delight in watching the ocean when lashed by the tempest's fury; that rugged mountains, among whose crags the thunder rolls in long reverberations, would be most congenial to his muse; but it is not So. Wherever this feeling does appear, it can easily be seen that it is affected, and that he loves to sing of calm, solemn night, when the silvery moonshine is scattered

of holy Sabbath noontide, of lively May and of the merry summer

months.

These simple descriptions of nature contain more of Motherwell's own character than any of the others. For the noble war songs of the north we are indebted, as has been remarked, to the ardent zeal with which he studied Norse poetry and literature. Thus these odes are like the fruit of a grafted bough, owing their present form and a great part of their beauty to the poet's own mind, but wrought from materials lying ready to his hand. Many of the pathetic pieces do not express their author's true character for another reason; there runs through them a vein of morbid melancholy which is forced and untrue. This we consider the poet's greatest fault. He is not content with pouring out his sorrow in the touching strains of Jeannie Morrison, or the lines addressed to a friend just before his own death, but sometimes writes songs which are sickly with sentimentality and nonsense. In the Joys of the Wilderness, for instance, he becomes very misanthropic and evinces a desire to turn

anchorite; but inasmuch as Motherwell's cheerful spirit lived to mingle in the social circle, we opine that he would have made a very restless, dissatisfied hermit, and would never have earned a saintship by spending his days on the top of a pillar.

Versatility is a marked feature of these Poems; there is a continual transition from one subject to another, from one metre to another. We have in a volume of less than three hundred pages Norse war-songs, Turkish battle-chants, and cavalier ditties. Love forms the subject of other pieces, and interspersed here and there, are imitations of the old Scotch and English ballad poetry. The Demon Lady, Lady Margaret, the Witches' Joys, etc., are of the supernatural order, and abound in frightful imagery. In direct contrast to these stand several sober ballads, which exhibit a strong shade of religious feeling-such are the Covenanter's Battle-chant, Change Sweepeth our All, The Solemn Song of a Righteouse Hearte, etc.

But besides their general and obvious beauty, Motherwell's productions are full of little graces of thought, imagery, and expression. He is graphic and forcible; fond of striking off his thoughts in bold, clear language, and this renders his word-painting vivid and impressive. Harald's ships "sweep like a tempest-cloud" over the ocean, and as they approach the land devoted to slaughter, it is said that they "like wild steeds are careering." In battle the enemy's "spear-points crash like crisping ice;" the sword of Jarl Egill "scatters pale light," as it cuts through bones and armor. The dew, falling noiselessly from the midnight sky, is called "Heaven's own vintage;" and in speaking of the calm, quiet beauty of a summer night, the poet says:

"And the wee stars were dreaming,
Their way through the sky."

In the lines, already alluded to, which our poet wrote to a friend while his life was ebbing fast, the conviction that death is coming upon him is joined with uncomplaining resignation and acquiescence in the Divine will, most touchingly.

But there is one fault which often mars the beauty of Motherwell's verse: it is the habit of using words which, being obsolete or very uncommon, have no distinct meaning "tweering stars," "gurly billows," "swirling smoke," are examples. The same objection lies against his imitations of old English, and the frequent use of words derived from that source. Those conversant with Chaucer and Spenser can under

stand and appreciate "Elfinland Wand" and "Lord Archibald," but to the generality of readers they are unintelligible. This fault may, however, find excuse in the fact that a little study will give a meaning to that which was before meaningless, but we can find none for such barbarisms as that which occurs in the piece entitled "Midnight and Moonshine," where the stars are spoken of as "rushing out with joyous face" to welcome the rising moon, and are called “Godkins (!) of the skies."

Another, but less noticeable defect, is that the meters are often rough and unpolished. Such faults as throwing the accent upon the final syllable -"ly," in words like "marvelously," and making it rhyme with "there,” "be," etc.; and squeezing words like "quiet," which properly occupy two feet, into the compass of one, occur altogether too frequently.

Motherwell's early death is much to be regretted; he had purposed translating and publishing a large collection of Scandinavian poetry; and the ability which he possessed in this department admirably fitted him for the task. Very seldom has it been attempted by any of the English poets, but scattered here and there we find a few odes like "Zernebock,” or the "Descent of Odin," which are based upon Norse legends, and exhibit some of their peculiarities.

"We part with William Motherwell and his wild Northmen. The swift barques, hung with glittering shields; and the fierce landing, the despairing flight, and the battle-horn of 'thunder;' the magic raven ensign, and the shout of onslaught, and the shriek of defeat; all vanish slowly into empty space, die off into their own irrecoverable past, and leave us to soberer, though it may be safer, truth."

8. A.

Editor's Table.

You have, doubtless, Dear Reader, recovered from your Thanksgiving surfeit, and are already beginning to count the days which must elapse ere you taste again the pleasures of vacation, and watch another old year to its grave. Little, probably, did our good old Fathers think as they ate their first Thanksgiving hominy (Turkeys are a later idea) "on a stern and rock bound coast"-little did they think, we say, of the vast importance of that November feast. The most sanguine Puritan of them all, could hardly have presumed to say, with Shakspeare,

"The yearly course that brings this day about,
Shall never see it but a holiday."

But Thanksgiving, nevertheless, has come to be almost a National Institution, and where then sat the hominy bowl, the innovating hand of time has established flesh, fish, and fowl, while alps of pastry stand like sentinels on every side, making escape impossible, until they are annihilated-dished.

We might say something just here about Progress, and paint an American Eagle in black and white, surrounded by stars and stripes, et cetera, but then we fear that anything so new and startling might not "take." Wait patiently, Dear Reader, until Commencement day, and you shall see an Eagle perched on each shoulder of every speaker, and an imaginary flag waved wildly over every patriotic sentence. We except, of course, our brother members of the "Board," who have appointments elsewhere on that occasion.

Thanksgiving is gone but Christmas is coming on apace. The holiday temporal will soon be forgotten in the soberer joys of the holiday spiritual. Thanksgiving days may be appointed or they may not. Christmas, on the contrary, comes of itself, and is a bright, well defined spot on the wheel of the revolving year. We love to summon to our presence the memories of Christmas days gone by how, when we were young, (we mean, very young,) we used to make it the "punctum stans," as Charles Lamb would say, for all our time counting; how, when at boarding school, whose presiding Deities were hard lessons and bad hash, we used to say to ourselves-"it 's only eight weeks to Christmas" how we got up before daylight and stole anxiously to our pendant stocking, to see if the old German Deity, Chriskringle, had left us his annual legacy; and lastly, how we went to bed at night feeling as though we had been metamorphosed into a candy shop, and how we stuck to the bed in the morning!

But more important, perhaps, than either Christmas or Thanksgiving, is New Year day. It is a sort of tribunal, and each of us for himself, the judge upon it. Unlike other tribunals, however, it not only tries and punishes, but associates with these prerogatives, an improving and reforming mission. Conscience is a jury of one, and we can always rely upon a verdict, and that a true one. The Devil is always "counsel for the defense," but seldom wins his case. Everybody expects to see a reform in somebody after New Year day is passed. Your humble servants, the Editors, for instance, expect you, Dear Reader, to