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A REVIEW 
 
 OF MR. LONGFELLOW S 
 
 EYANGELIIE. 
 
 FROM 
 
 THE AMERICAN REVIEW 
 
 FOR FEBRUARY, 1848. 
 
3Sl7 £98 
 
PS 2263 
 .P4 
 Copy 1 
 
 EVANGELINE.* 
 
 Poetry, or rather the poetic, is a theme 
 which must be forever re-discussed and 
 rc-defined, since it is a matter upon which 
 the uneducated and unreflecting must 
 ever refer to their own individual impres- 
 sions. Like the di\ine institution of Chris- 
 tianity, it adapts itself to all hearts and 
 all capacities. There is none so stockish, 
 hard, and full of rage, but poetry may 
 for the time change his nature : the wild- 
 est savage has his chants and dances, and 
 though when they are translated to us 
 there is nothing poetic perceptible in them, 
 yet they shall, to him, be poetry. The 
 Chinese have their poems, as well as we 
 ours ; but, with the perverseness apper- 
 taining to most traits of character in our 
 celestial antipodes, what they consider el- 
 egant poetic writing, we should class with 
 the maxims of poor Richard. " Keaou 
 Seen Sang," says the Rev. Mr. Smith, a 
 late traveller, " seemed to revel in a para- 
 dise of self-complacency, as we sat to hs- 
 ten to his magniloquent intonations of the 
 classics. The impassioned gesture and lit- 
 erary enthusiasm of Keaou, would have 
 led us to believe that his mental enjoy- 
 ment was very great, and the ideas con- 
 veyed by the composition very sublime. 
 But, on translating the immortal fragment, 
 it was frequently found to consist of some 
 such sentiment as these : ' He who makes 
 just agreements, can fulfill his promises ; 
 he who behaves with reverence and pro- 
 priety, puts shame and disgrace to a dis- 
 tance ; he who loses not the friendship of 
 those Avhom he ought to treat with kind- 
 ness and respect, may be a master.' " 
 These are very sensible worldly maxims, 
 but they are certainly not much more po- 
 etic to us than " Time is money," " An hon- 
 est man's the noblest work of God," or 
 any of the points and antitheses Avhich may 
 occur in poetry, and belong to it, but can 
 exist without it — the pure products of the 
 raised intellect. So, if we are content to 
 
 seek nearer than China for an illustration, 
 we may discern that what is poetry to one 
 is not so to another ; for who has not 
 seen eyes suffused by the recitation of bal- 
 lads of the most silly character possible ? 
 Political elections often engender serious 
 poems of this sort. The Miller doctrine 
 was a myth that gave birth to hymns at 
 once lofty and laughable. The temple of 
 the Mormons, no doubt, echoed to the 
 songs of bards. 
 
 In the multitude of tastes between these 
 extreme productions and those of Shak- 
 speare and Milton, there can never be a 
 consensus omnium as to the true definition 
 of Poetry, any more than there can be 
 among artists as to what are the requisites 
 of HIGH ART. There is, however, a con- 
 stant tendency towards such an unanimous 
 agreement, as generations rise up from 
 youth to age, through the experience of 
 passion and the growth of reason. It is 
 very well settled that the names we have 
 just mentioned stand at the head of our 
 poetic literature. Some college students 
 prefer Byron — others Tennyson ; Milton 
 they almost universally consider very pe- 
 dantic and dry ; and although they cannot 
 but admit there are some humorous char- 
 actei's in Shakspeare, they would rather see 
 him on the stage than read him. As they 
 grow up into life, however, if they 
 continue (as, alas ! but few of them do 
 in our spreading countiy,) to love lit- 
 erary studies, they see more and more of 
 the greatness of these wonderful men, and 
 acquiesce more and more in the general 
 verdict of the world. Thus the process 
 forever goes on, the pure art of poetry 
 standing before the race like a pillar of 
 fire, seen by all, but seen best by those 
 who are in the van, or now and then seen 
 best of all by the far-reaching eye of 
 genius. 
 
 There was one not many years ago that 
 saw it, as it would seem, in its very purity ; 
 
 * Evangeline, a Tale of Acadie: 
 Willimo D. Ticknor & Co. 1848. 
 
 By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Second Edition. Boston: 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 who had approached, whh his self-con- 
 sciousness all awake, into its empyreal 
 circle, and could define its form and fix its 
 qualities and limits — Coleridge, the most 
 poetic of philosophers, and the most pro- 
 found and candid of critics. His mind 
 seemed peculiarly formed to be at once 
 the exhibiter and expounder of the highest 
 forms of poetry ; he could assume the 
 lyric frenzy, and could analyze it also ; he 
 not only wooed the pure muse successfully, 
 but without losing his own heart ; he 
 united, in short, in one person, the rarest 
 quahties of artist and critic, actor and 
 reflector, doer and observer. The defini- 
 tion of poetry he has given in his Bio- 
 graphia Literaria, and especially in the 
 volume containing the immortal criticism 
 of Wordsworth's Lyrical Ballads, is one 
 whose excellence appeals to a man's indi- 
 vidual growth in the same manner with 
 that of all the great models of art, ^Az. : it 
 grov/s better by time, and is more under- 
 stood the more it is studied. Few persons 
 in active life have leisure to read Cole- 
 ridge ; indeed, it is questionable whether 
 his pecuhar, minutely guarded, yet elo- 
 quent, philosophical style should be recom- 
 mended to young persons engaged in ac- 
 tive literary or professional pursuits ; he 
 is a writer who were perhaps better left to 
 those who cannot avoid him. Any such 
 one who may have fancied that he fully 
 comprehended the distinctions in the defini- 
 tion we are speaking of several years ago, 
 will probably find on re-reading the pas- 
 sage, ample argument for modesty in the 
 retrospection. And this will arise, not 
 from a certain theoiy's wedding itself to 
 his mind and confining it to a particular 
 track, but simply from his own personal 
 experience of life ; he will understand them 
 better, as he does his Milton and Shak- 
 speare, not from their having educated 
 him, but from his havinff ffrown older and 
 thought and suffered more. It is our 
 purpose to recur briefly to these distinc- 
 tions and principles, culling out and ex- 
 plaining some of the most important of 
 them, and then to apply them to the 
 work under review. * 
 
 In the first chapter of the second vol- 
 ume of the Biographia, a new edition of 
 which has just been issued by the Messrs. 
 Wiley & Putnam, after a short account 
 of the origin of th© Lyrical Ballads, the 
 
 author proceeds to explain his ideas, first, 
 of a Poem, secondly, of Poetry itself, in 
 kind and in essence. Of a poem he ob- 
 serves : First. That it must be in metre 
 or rhyme, or both ; it must have the su- 
 perficial form. Secondly. Its immediate 
 purpose must be the communication of 
 pleasure. But, thirdly. " The communica- 
 tion of pleasure may be the object of a work 
 not metrically composed, as in novels and 
 romances. Would, then, the mere super- 
 addition of metre, with or without rhyme, 
 entitle these to the name of poems ? The 
 answer is, (and this distinction we italicize, 
 that the reader may observe it carefully,) 
 that nothing can permanently please which 
 does not contain in itself the reason why it i& 
 so, and not othenvise. If metre be super- 
 added, all other parts must be made con- 
 sonant with it. They must be such as to 
 justify the perpetual and distinct attention 
 to each part, which an exact correspondent 
 recurrence of accent and sound are calcu- 
 lated to excite. The final definition, then. 
 so deduced, may be thus worded : A po- 
 em is that species of composition, which ia 
 opposed to works of science, by proposing 
 for its immediate object pleasure, not 
 truth ; and from all other species (having 
 this object in common v/ith it) it is dis- 
 criminated by proposing to itself such de- 
 light from the whole, as is compatible with 
 a distinct gratification from each compo- 
 nent part.'' ^ 
 
 The -discrimination here made seems to 
 cover too much ; for the gratification re- 
 ceived from each part in a true poem must 
 be such as is also compatible with the de- 
 light to be inspired by the whole ; each 
 must help each and all. But the philoso- 
 pher does not overlook this in his next 
 paragraph : " If a man chooses to call 
 every composition a poem, which is rhyme, 
 or measure, or both, I must leave his opin- 
 ion uncontroverted. The distinction is at 
 least competent to characterize the writer's 
 intention. If it were subjoined, that the 
 whole is likewise entertaining or affecting, 
 as a tale, or a series of interestiug reflec- 
 tions, I of course admit that this is another 
 fit ingredient of a poem, and an additional 
 merit. But if the definition sought for be 
 that of a lecjitimate poem, I answer, it must 
 be one, the parts of which mutually sup- 
 port and explain each other ; all in their 
 proportion harmonizing vidth, and support- 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 ing, the purpose and knoAvn influences of 
 metrical arrangement. The philosophic 
 critics of all ages coincide "with the ulti- 
 mate judgment of all countries, in equally 
 denying the praises of a just poem, on the 
 one hand, to a series of striking lines or 
 distichs, each of Avhich, absorbing the 
 Avhole attention of the reader to itself, dis- 
 joins it from its context, and makes it a 
 separate whole, instead of an harmonizing 
 part ; and on the other hand, to an unsus- 
 tained composition, from which the reader 
 collects rapidly the general result, unat- 
 tracted by the component parts. The 
 reader should be carried forward, not 
 merely, or chiefly, by the mechanical im- 
 pidse of curiosity, or by a restless desire 
 to arrive at the final solution ; but by the 
 pleasurable activity of mind, excited by 
 the attractions of the journey itself. Like 
 the motion of a serpent, which the Eg3^p- 
 tians made the emblem of intellectual 
 power ; or like the path of sound through 
 the air ; at every step he pauses, and half 
 recedes, and, from the retrogressive move- 
 ment, collects the force which again car- 
 ries him onward. Precipitandus est liber 
 spiritus, saj's Petronius Arbiter, most hap- 
 pily. The epithet liber, here balances the 
 preceding verb ; and it is not easy to con- 
 ceive more meaning, condensed in fewer 
 words." 
 
 We have quoted largely this character- 
 istic passage for its beautiful clearness and 
 breadth and condensation of thought. 
 But the definition, it must be remembered' 
 is after all only of a poem, and is intended 
 to distinguish that species of writing from 
 prose. Evangeline, and many works far 
 inferior to it, come indisputably Avithin the 
 definition. If Ave Avish to examine Avhat 
 are the elements of a great poem, Ave shall 
 find them in the succeeding and concluding- 
 paragraphs of the chapter, under the defi- 
 nition of poetry. Of course the excel- 
 lence of a poem as a work of art must be 
 determined by the manner in Avhich it de- 
 velops those elements. After the form, 
 the question is, hoAV far is the piece poe/ic? 
 Or the examination might be reversely 
 thus : after considering hoAv far the piece 
 is poetic, the only other question must be, 
 how far is the form born of and consonant 
 with the quality of the piece as poetry ? 
 For in poetry the form and the spirit are 
 in reality inseparable, and the task of con- 
 
 sidering them apart, to which our minds 
 are compelled by the infirmity of their con- 
 stitution, while it is the only Avay by which 
 Ave arrive at a clear understanding of the 
 Avhole subject, leads necessarily through a 
 labyrinth of distinctions in Avhich it is 
 hardly possible to thread one's Avay with- 
 out errors. 
 
 We might noAV consider the form of 
 Evangeline, and its general keeping, and 
 its intellectual ability and merit as a Avork 
 of taste ; the definitions already giA'cn 
 being, as we consider, for such an exami- 
 nation, the best standard. But as all these 
 qualities should be subordinate to, and 
 created by, poetry, Ave must go still fur- 
 ther into the matter abstractly before de- 
 scending into particulars. Poetry is to all 
 the other qualities Avhat charity is to \\\\- 
 man abilities ; Avithout it all is " sounding 
 brass." It is the father of all metres ; all 
 varieties of rhyme are but its outAvard 
 limbs and flourishes. Let us abandon oui*- 
 selves once more to the guidance of the 
 adventurous explorer, whose soul lived in 
 the tropics of passion, Avhile at the same 
 time his mind wandered clear and unchilled 
 in the darkest and coldest zones of thought. 
 
 " What is poetry ? is so nearly the same 
 question with, what is a poet ? that the answer 
 to the one is involved in the solution of the 
 other. For it is a distinction resuUing from the 
 poetic genius itself, which sustains and modi- 
 fies the images, thoughts and emotions of tha 
 poet's own mind. The poet, described in ideal 
 perfection, brings the Avhole soul of man into 
 activity, Avith the subordination of its faculties 
 to each other, according to their relative worth 
 and dignity He diffuses a tone and spirit of 
 unity, that blends, and (as it were )/Mses, each 
 into each, by thai xynlhctic and magical pou-er, 
 lo uhich we have exclusively appropriated the 
 name of imaginatiun. This power, tirst put in 
 action by the will and understanding, and re- 
 tained under their irrnmissive, though gentle 
 and unnoticed, control, {laxis eff'ertiir liabenis.) 
 reveals itself in the balance or reconciliation of 
 opposite or discordant qualities ; of sameness, 
 with difference ; of the general, with the con- 
 crete ; the idea, with the image ; the individ- 
 ual, with the representative ; the sense of nov- 
 elty and freshness, with old and familiar ob- 
 jects : a more than usual state of emotion, 
 with more t!ian usual order ; judgment ever 
 awake, and steady sclf-po'jsession, with enthu- 
 siasm and feeling profound or vehement ; and 
 while it blends and harmonizes the natural and 
 the artificial, still subordinates art to nature ; 
 the manner to the matter ; and our admira- 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 tion of the poet to our sympathy with the 
 poetry." 
 
 " Finally, good sense is the body of poetic 
 genius, fancy its drapery, motion its life, 
 and IMAGINATION the soul, that is everywhere, 
 and in each ; and forms all into one graceful 
 and intelligent v/hole." 
 
 To make this perfectly clear, it would 
 be necessary to read, or rather studj^ the 
 chapters in the preceding volume of the 
 Biographia, leading to the discussion of 
 the esemplastic power, up to the point 
 where the author wisely writes himself a 
 letter, advising him to proceed no further — 
 a task we would recommend to none 
 who are not already somewhat versed in 
 metaphysical reading, and have not smat- 
 tered away the original confidence in their 
 ignorance, which is the surest guide to 
 knowledge. Let us reverently endeavor 
 to explain what he means by the Imagina- 
 tion which is the soul of poetic genius, 
 and the Fancy which is its drapery. In 
 common parlance these words are used in- 
 terchangeably : here their meanings are 
 widely different. If the important words 
 in this final sentence are fully understood, 
 we are under no apprehension of being 
 unintelligible, when we speak of the genius 
 of Mr. Longfellow. 
 
 What is meant by " good sense" is clear ; 
 we understand a vigilant presiding reason, 
 having the common knowledge of the 
 world in greater or less degree under its 
 control : in some of our modern small poets 
 animal feeling seems to take its place, and 
 we then have poems very well sustained, 
 very well clothed, moving very grace- 
 fully, but for all that extremely weak 
 and nonsensical. What is - meant by 
 motion is also perfectly plain ; but the 
 other two words are less easily dis- 
 tinguished, and no man can understand 
 them fully, unless he possesses them in a 
 conscious degree himself, which very 
 many do not. Let us go back to the 
 concluding definitions in the first volume, 
 already referred to: — "The imagina- 
 tion, then, I consider either as primaiy 
 or secondary. The primary imagination, 
 I hold to be the living power and 
 prime Agent of all human Perception, 
 and as a repetition in the finite mind of the 
 eternal act of creation in the infinite I am." 
 That is to say, as we understand it, it is that 
 first principle in the mind of man, which 
 
 enables him to say, "I exist;" over this 
 the will has no control. " The secondary 
 I consider as an echo of the former, co-ex- 
 isting with conscious will, yet still as iden- 
 tical with tiie primary in the kind of its 
 agency, and differing only in degree, and in 
 the inode of its operation. It dissolves, 
 diffuses, dissipates, in order to re-create ; 
 or, where this process is rendered impossi- 
 ble, yet still, at all ^events, it struggles to 
 idealize and to imify. It is essentially 
 vital," etc. " Fancy, on the contrary, has 
 no other counters to play with, but fixities 
 and definities. The fancy is, indeed, no 
 other than a mode of memory emancipated 
 from the order of time and space, and 
 blended with, and modified by, that empir- 
 ical phenomenon of the will, which we ex- 
 press by the word choice. But, equally 
 with the ordinary memory, it must receive 
 all its materials ready-made from the law of 
 association." 
 
 In brief, it is to the imagination that we 
 owe the sustaining pov:er in poetry, and to 
 the fancy its imagery. The imagination 
 is the wing — the fancy, the plumage ; 
 that is, considering them as distinct qual- 
 ities, like the " organs " of the phrenolo- 
 gist. But they unite in all proportions, and 
 in all degrees of submission to the primary 
 consciousness. Where the poet, in the 
 open day, with the disappointments of the 
 past, the distraction of the present, and 
 the hopelessness of the future around him ; 
 with his judgment all awake, his memory 
 stored with learning and his fancy teeming 
 with images ; can resolutely cast himself 
 loose and abandon himself to a rapture 
 that is feigned and yet real — that despises 
 reason, yet never goes beyond it — that in 
 short sets the whole of the faculties of his 
 nature into intense activity — it is by the 
 strength of his imagination that he is ena- 
 bled to do it ; and it is according as this 
 facult)^ of his mind is put forth, that we 
 feel his power. In some, it is exerted 
 with less of tire will than in others. 
 Shakspeare's imagination carried him 
 quite beyond consciousness, so that he 
 utters the divinest songs without knowing- 
 it ; Milton's had more of the dull clay to 
 contend with, but then, with an Atlas-like 
 strength, he bears the burden to the very 
 sky. Coleridge himself is another splen- 
 did example of the power of the faculty 
 he has analyzed. He must have Jiad an 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 almost infinitely greater tenacity of con- 
 scioxis reason to overcome than ordinary 
 men, yet when he does rise, how strong is 
 his flight ! He reminds one, though the 
 reader will smile at the application, of 
 what the French Lord says of Parolles, in 
 All's Well that Ends Well : " Is it pos- 
 sible he should know what he is, and be 
 that he is ?" Like his own Albatross, he 
 is an unwieldy bird ; but when he is once 
 on the wing, " thorough the fog," or on 
 the good south wind, he wins his Avay with 
 an unconquerable ^^g•or. 
 
 Wherever this strength is put forth, 
 and under whatever variety of obstacles, 
 it never fails to be felt. It is indeed " the 
 faculty divine." Whether exerted with 
 more or less of learning, in poetry or 
 prose, in writing or in any other art, or in 
 actual life, it is at once perceived and its 
 force measured according to its degree. 
 It is the contact of soul with soul. In life, 
 it is the essence of character. Men do 
 not atfect each other through dry intel- 
 lect ; it is not by argument alone that 
 they sway each other ; it is by the 
 strength of the imagination. Some men 
 have weak intellects combined with great 
 force of character : it is almost miraculous 
 what a power they will exert over those 
 around them. In some this power de- 
 velops itself, through a rough nature, in 
 violence and impetuosity ; in others it 
 works smoothly. It makes the tunes, with 
 which, in this jangled and discordant 
 world, the spirits of men play upon each 
 other. Some are sweet and tender, some 
 rapid and harsh, some melting, others 
 inspiring. In what but the imagination 
 consists the subtle powers of great rulers ? 
 Mere force of will is not sufficient to ac- 
 count for it. We must estimate the souls 
 even of such men as Napoleon by our 
 own, and certainly all the power of will 
 in the whole human family would never 
 suffice to account for such phenomena, 
 without the presence of that " synthetic 
 and magical power " which ever " struggles 
 to ideahze and unify " — a power which, in 
 such extreme cases, seems almost to de- 
 prive the soul of its free agency, and make 
 the man a " child of destiny," while in 
 reality it is the excess of liberty. 
 
 But the most lovelj^ development of 
 this Imagination, which is the soul's life, 
 is in Poetry and the fine arts. Here it 
 
 acts not to gain, or primarily to overcome, 
 but to please. Here it speaks through 
 beautiful forms, and the delightful play of 
 thoughts. It moves us, but at the same 
 time enchains us. If it awes us it does 
 not make us afraid, but merelj^ quickens in 
 us, for the moment, a kindred thrill. 
 Only here, through poetry and art, is it that 
 man to man is lovely and excellent ; only 
 here that his soul expands above the gross 
 things of earth, and aspires to reach the 
 original image of its Maker. The act of 
 adoration is its highest exercise. To pray 
 truly is not, though it should be one's duty 
 to strive to make it so, an act for all times 
 and places, nor is it to be accomplished 
 easily, though to endeavor is all that is 
 required of us. Hence the dim aisles of 
 venerable churches, lofty music, and 
 solemn ceremonies, are assistants to devo- 
 tion, because they call off the Fancy from 
 its ordinary scenes, and, by turning it to 
 loftier ones, teach it to lead its elder sister 
 the Imagination to retire into its secret 
 closet and there worship the infinite Ma- 
 jesty of Heaven. Next to this exercise of 
 the soul, there is no art in which it de- 
 velops itself against more difficulty or 
 with more irresisiblc power than in music. 
 This art requires infinite learning and in- 
 finite physical education. It tasks both 
 body and mind, at the very moment of 
 imaginative rapture. The poet here must 
 soar with his mind crowded to the utmost 
 with mathematical symmetries, and his 
 fingers literally, as well as figuratively, on 
 the strings of his lyre. Hence it is an art 
 in which the imagination is more won- 
 drously near and present than in any 
 other ; and also, one in which the great 
 masters are fewer than in an}^ other, and 
 the interval between them and their infe- 
 riors, wider. Were it not for this, that 
 the composer can educate himself into 
 such a habit that he can create a whole 
 work in his mind alone, or pass and repass 
 it at will across his fancy, as one may a 
 movement that he has often heard, the 
 productions of the great musical geniuses 
 would be absolute miracles ; as it is, the 
 spiritual vigor stands before us more naked 
 in this art than even in poetry. The 
 power of Handel is felt moi'e imivereally 
 and at once, than that of Milton ; many 
 have admired the ever-active and graceful 
 invention of Haydn, to whom Chaucer, 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 would be a mere antique ; tlie qualities of 
 Mozart are more instantly moving than 
 those of Shakspeare ; and it is easier to 
 understand Beethoven than Coleridge. 
 For the learning of the science supplies in 
 music the place of "' good sense " in po- 
 etry ; and symmetry becomes more readily 
 the habit of the mind than sense. 
 
 But poetry, if it is below music in inten- 
 sity and rapidity, is above it, and above 
 painting and sculpture, in universality. If 
 in it the imaginative power is not so sud- 
 den, it is not, on the other hand, confined 
 to so narrow a range. If it does not draw 
 the spirit so near, it enables us to see more 
 of it at a time. If it does not magnify so 
 miich, its field of vision is greater. For it 
 is not limited to symmetries of ear-forms, 
 or groups, figures, or views for the eye ; 
 it includes all forms and all thoughts. It 
 •' brings the whole soul of man into activity, 
 with the subordination of its faculties to 
 each other, according to their relative 
 worth and dignity." God be thanked for 
 all these lovely arts, but most of all for 
 this — the divinest of all ! 
 
 Let us now descend from these abstract 
 principles, and endeavor to apply them to 
 Evangeline. But we must first inform the 
 reader more particularly what the book is, 
 than he could learn from the title-page, 
 copied at the beginning of our article. 
 That only informs him that it is a " tale of 
 Acadie," which was the old French name 
 for the peninsula that is now a part of 
 Nova Scotia. The particular place where 
 the story begins, is Grand Pre, a village of 
 French settlers containing about a hundred 
 families. The time is soon after the ex- 
 pedition against Louisburg. The interest 
 chiefly depends on the misfoi'times of the 
 hero and heroine, Gabriel Lajeunesse and 
 Evangeline Bellefontaine — either of whom, 
 by the way, would have had shorter names 
 had we been present at the christenmg. 
 These two are betrothed and are soon to 
 be married ; but before they are so, some 
 English ships come into the harbor with 
 orders to break up the settlement and 
 carry off the inhabitants, which is accord- 
 ingly done. The wretched people are land- 
 ed, some at one place, some at another, and 
 are thus scattered throughout this country. 
 Evangehne loses Gabriel, and the whole of 
 the remainder of the tale is an account of 
 her feehngs and efforts to find him. At 
 
 one time she is going down the Mississippi 
 on a cumbrous boat, Avhile he is going up 
 on a swift boat : she feels in her spirit 
 that he is near, but does not know that he 
 has passed, till her boat reaches the new 
 home of his father the next day, and she 
 hears that he has gone to the far West, on 
 a trapping expedition. Not disheartened, 
 she sets off after him the succeeding day, 
 and follows him, always too late to overtake 
 him, even to the base of the Ozark moun- 
 tains. So passes her whole life, in a 
 fruitless search for her lost lover. She 
 goes everywhere : to the shores of Lake 
 Huron, down the St. Lawrence, to the 
 Moravian Mission — " in cities, in fields, in 
 the noisy camps and battle fields of the 
 army !" At length in her old age she 
 lands, from the troubled sea, at Philadel- 
 phia. " Pleased with the Thee and the Thou 
 of the Quakers," she remains there, and 
 joins the Sisters of Mercy, whose duty it 
 is to visit the sick. Finally, in the time of 
 the yellow fever, she sees among the dying 
 at the hospital an old man with thin locks ; 
 she utters such a cry of anguish that " the 
 dying start iip from their pillows :" it is 
 Gabriel ! He just recognizes her, and then 
 the light of his eyes suddenly sinks into 
 darkness, " as when a lamp is blown out 
 by a gust of wind at a casement." She 
 bows her head ; the long agony is over 
 now, and the story ends with her saying, 
 "Father, I thank thee !"-^an ejaculation 
 in which, for reasons perfectly clear to 
 ourself, and which we hope to make so to 
 the reader, we could not refrain from 
 heartily joining. 
 
 In the first place, the author has chosen 
 to write this tale, not in any usual or 
 natural form of English verse, but in Latin , 
 hexameter, or a form intended to resemble 
 it, and without rhyme. The English muse 
 is boldly invoked to permit him to sing 
 (page 90 ; he has the grace not to request 
 her aid) in lines which are the counter- 
 parts of 
 
 " Quadrupedante putrem sonitu quatit ungula 
 campum." 
 
 The consequence is, that each line is by 
 itself, and rushes down with a doleful deca- 
 dence that in a short time carries the reader's 
 courage along with it. Knowing, as Mr. 
 Longfellow of course does, the. fate of all 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 similar attempts, it is strange that he 
 should liave had the hardihood to have 
 made another. But it is still stranger that 
 one who has so exquisite an ear for the 
 melody of verse, considered by itself, 
 should be so little able to distinguish its 
 propriety considered in connection with a 
 subject, and as aiding to imbody and carry 
 out harmoniously a particular imaginative 
 hue. " Nothing can permanently please 
 which does not contain in itself the reason 
 why it is so, and not otherwise :" — the 
 reader will remember that we italicized 
 this sentence in the definition of a poem ; 
 it was that we might Use it here. We 
 cannot see why this tale should have been 
 written in this measure ; there is no con- 
 sonance between the form and the sub- 
 stance of the narrative. But to show this, 
 let us quote a passage as a specimen. We 
 will take the description of the heroine : — 
 
 " Somewhat apart from the village, and nearer 
 the Basin of Muias, 
 
 Benedict Bellefontaine, the wealthiest farmer of 
 Grand-Pre, 
 
 Dwelt on his goodly acres ; and with him, direct- 
 ing his household, 
 
 Gentle Evangeline lived, his child, and the pride 
 of the village. 
 
 Stalworth and stately in form was the man of 
 seventy winters ; 
 
 Hearty and hale was he, as an oak that is cov- 
 ered with snow-flakes ; 
 
 White as the snow were his locks, and his cheeks 
 as brown as the oak-leaves. 
 
 Fair was she to behold, that maiden of seven- 
 teen summers. 
 
 Black were her eyes as the berry that grows on 
 the thorn by the way-side. 
 
 Black, yet how softly they gleamed beneath the 
 browE shade of her tresses ! 
 
 Sweet was her breath as the breath of kine that 
 feed in the meadows. 
 
 When in the harvest heat she bore to the reap- 
 ers at noontide 
 
 Flagons of home-brewed ale, ah I fair ia sooth 
 was the maiden. 
 
 Fairer was she wlien, on Sunday morn, while 
 the bell from its turret 
 
 Sprinkled with holy sounds the air, as the priest 
 ■ with his hyssop 
 
 Sprinkles the congregation, and scatters bless 
 ings upon them, 
 
 Down the long street she passed, with her chap- 
 let of beads and her missal, 
 
 Wearing her Norman^ap, and her kirtle of blue, 
 and the ear-rings. 
 
 Brought in the olden time from France, and 
 since, as an heirloom, 
 
 Handed down from mother to child, through 
 
 long generations. 
 But a celestial brightness — a more ethereal 
 
 beauty — 
 Shone on her face and encircled her form, 
 
 when, after confession, 
 Homeward serenely she walked with God's 
 
 benediction upon her. 
 When she had passed, it seemed like the ceasing 
 
 of exquisite music." 
 
 Is this natural poetry ? Does the nar- 
 rative require these "dying falls?" We 
 answer, no ; the measure jars upon us ; it 
 is as though we were reading intense prose 
 before a slowly nodding China mandarin. 
 The face falls at the end of every line. 
 Where was the necessity for choosing such 
 a form ? It cannot be that the idea of its 
 appropriateness rose up spontaneously in 
 the author's mind on his first conceivinar 
 the piece, and that he used it because he 
 fell it lo be the best ; at least it is to be 
 hoped it did not. That motion which 
 Coleridge calls the life of poetry, is here a 
 very melancholy life indeed. It is a " body 
 of this death." Was it because it was a 
 new form, and the author wished to show 
 that -"some things could be done as well as 
 others ?" Then he should not have at- 
 tempted it for three reasons : first, the mo- 
 tive is unworthy of a poet; secondly, the 
 same thing or others very like had been 
 tried before a hundred times, and it is evi- 
 dent to any student that it has never suc- 
 ceeded, because it does not accord with the 
 structure of our language ; and, thirdly, no 
 one has a right to try such novelties with- 
 out being, Hke Collins in his Ode to Even- 
 ing, successful. Was it because the old 
 forms were exhausted ? How much richer 
 would be an imitation, were it necessary to 
 make such, of the melody of Comus, than 
 such a monotonous tune as this ! We have 
 tried all ways of reading it, now minding 
 accents and pauses, now reading it as prose; 
 but it is neither one thing nor the other, 
 and whet-her as prose or verse is equally 
 cold, affected and unnatural. The whole 
 book did not accustom us to it ; and from 
 its growing more and more tedious till the 
 end, we do not believe another would, 
 twice as bulky. 
 
 But it may be urged, Evangeline is in a 
 walk of art to which strictness of criticism 
 should not be applied. It is not attempted 
 to make the characters natiu'al, but only 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 to make them in harmony with each other. 
 It is raised very high into the poetic region ; 
 and the mind which approaches it must 
 for the nonce lay aside common sense and 
 put on spectacles which turn all things to 
 gold. To appreciate such constancy as 
 Evangeline's, one must be very refined in- 
 deed. The whole work, in short, is so fine 
 that it required these awkward inchned 
 planes of lines, that perpetually carry the 
 reader down — and down — ^and down-a — 
 in order to make it sufficiently remote and 
 strange. It is a painting on glass, and has 
 laws of its own. The attempt is not to 
 ideahze, but to create. 
 
 So far as such opinions recognize the 
 propriety of works of art in which the 
 fancy shall give the whole a delicate and 
 peculiar hue, their justice must be admit- 
 ted, of course. We suffer ourselves to be 
 pleased with transparencies around lamps; 
 we see landscapes in the frost pictures on 
 windows ; there are innumerable golden re- 
 gions above the sunset, and miniatures of 
 them in -the glowmg coals ; nay, faces of 
 angels and devils peep out upon us even 
 from the papered walls. Whatever the 
 fancy permits will come into poetry. There 
 may be g-ood poems as literal as the Tales 
 of the Hall, and others equally good, as fan- 
 ciful as the Faery Queen. But in one, as 
 much as in the other, the form and motion 
 should be, because it must be, created by, 
 and conform with, and belong to, and 
 be a part of the essence of, the whole. For 
 example, take the Ancient Mariner : noth- 
 ing is more common than the ballad form ; 
 but that form was never so written before. 
 The poetry of the piece takes that old mea- 
 sure and moulds it anew into an eloquent 
 motion peculiar to itself, harmonizing with 
 and heightening its general effect. The 
 verse of the poem is as original as any ele- 
 ment of it ; but how clearly did it grow to 
 be what it is, under the guidance of the 
 poet of course, yet still as of necessity. 
 
 But in Evangeline there is no s-uch con- 
 cinnity. The verse stands out like an 
 awkward declaimer, or a bashful school- 
 boy rehearsing young Norval, or Hohen 
 Linden. It has no connection with the 
 poetry ; the two are in the condition of a 
 couple divorced a mensn et thoro, but not 
 a vinculo matrimonii \ they are mingled 
 but not combined ; in mixtion, not in solu- 
 tion. We are not called upon to be first 
 
 affected with the tale as we pi'oceed, and 
 left to admire at its elegance, but are asked 
 to admire first, and to be affected seconda- 
 rily. The difference is just this, that the 
 author is affected and not we. He is de- 
 termined to be fine, and consequently 
 determinately so. " O wad some power 
 the giftie gie xis !" — and most especially in 
 writing poetry, for there it is impossible to 
 hide the secret purpose. When the spirit 
 of the Muse is upon us, and we must 
 prophecy ; when the whole soul is com- 
 pelled by an angel with a fiery sword ; 
 when, as Milton saith, the poet is " soaring 
 in the high region of his fancy, with his 
 garland and singing robes about him ;" then 
 these over-niceties do not appear, or if they 
 do, they are at once pardoned and passed 
 by. When the hot simoom of the Imagi- 
 nation sweeps across the burning wastes 
 of the soul, the birds and beasts which 
 people it fly before the blast, and the silly 
 young estriches of our vanity run till they 
 fall and die ; but when the strong north 
 wind of the Will sweeps along with only a 
 great cloud of dust, the silly creatures 
 stick their heads in the sand and abide its 
 utmost fierceness ! 
 
 The idea, also, that this tale is so very- 
 fine as not to be appreciated by common 
 minds, and is therefore exempt from com- 
 mon criticism ; that it is in what Mr. 
 Willis would perhaps style a " Japonica" 
 region of the poetic art, and only to be read 
 after a purification, this idea which we have 
 admitted as a supposed excuse for the un- 
 couthness of the measm-e, is only admissible 
 as such a supposition. For the characters 
 and theii" motives are old and universal. The 
 popularity of Madame Cottin's tale of the 
 Exile of Siberia, shows how well the world 
 understands the wealth and the depth of 
 woman's affection. But it may be said, 
 that though old and universal this affection 
 is here in a highly refined form. Con- 
 stancy, it may be urged, it is true, is only 
 constancy whether clad in hoddin gray or 
 pink satin, but that here it is clad in ex- 
 tremely choice raiment. 
 
 Now to this Ave must answer, and this 
 conducts us to the general style of the 
 piece, the clothing is not to our taste. It is 
 not really fine, but tawdry ; not neat, but 
 gaudy. It pains the eye for want of har- 
 mony, and for ostentatious showiness in the 
 coloring. To read the whole book cloys 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 9 
 
 the fancy. The figures and comparisons 
 seldom come in naturally, but are the off- 
 spring of conscious choice. The poet has 
 always left him a " conceit, a miserable 
 conceit." There is not a simile in the 
 piece resembling in its essence either of the 
 three that Burns throws in Avith a single 
 dash in Tarn O'Shanter ; not one that 
 makes the picture burst upon the eye, and 
 thrills the heart with its imaginative sym- 
 pathy. But the similes in Milton, it may 
 be said, which he strews in "thick as the 
 leaves in Vallombrosa," are consciously 
 chosen. Not so ; though there arc minds 
 to whom they must always so appear, not 
 being able to lift themselves up to the 
 height of his g-reatness. 
 
 The comparison in the extract quoted — 
 " Sweet was her breath as the breath of 
 kine that feed in the meadows," is neither 
 suggested nor suggestive, neither natiiral 
 nor well chosen, but forced, unapt and not 
 new. To one who never had any agricul- 
 tural experience, it may seem elegant ; 
 possibly to such an one it Avould come 
 naturally ; but to our apprehension it is a 
 simile which is not only strained, but 
 degrades rather than exalts. The last line 
 in the extract is another forced simile : 
 " When she had passed, it seemed like the 
 ceasing of exquisite music." But this is 
 so pretty, that one cannot choose but par- 
 don it. The author is not always so 
 successful. Thus : — 
 
 " Silently one by one, in the infinite meadows of heaven, 
 Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the 
 angels." 
 
 This is altogether too fine. It is sick- 
 ening. We cannot away with it. A writer 
 who feeds American boarding-school misses 
 with such bon-bons, is fair subject for mirth. 
 He ought to be laughed out of the folly. 
 Next thing his bust will appear in some 
 barber's window in Broadway — if indeed 
 the ideal is not there already. One would 
 think this should suffice for the stars in one 
 poem ; but no : — 
 
 " Over her head the stars, the thovg'his of God in 
 the heavens .'" 
 
 This is naughty : we fear we shall never 
 meet Mr. Longfellow in the place he 
 mentions, if he allows himself to use such 
 expressions. 
 
 Sometimes he is very ingenious, so much 
 
 so, that it becomes a pleasure to anato- 
 mize his good things. Indeed, in this sense, 
 the poem would not be so tedious, were 
 we not called upon to feel at the same time 
 for the grief of the unfortunate lovers. 
 But there is just the difficulty. How one 
 could elaborate so affecting a plot, in so 
 minutely cool and trifling a manner, exer- 
 cising his ingenuity on an unusual metre, 
 and in discovering all sorts of pretty com- 
 parisons and expressions, passes compre- 
 hension. When, for examjjle, his heroine 
 grows old, he says : — 
 
 " Then there appeared and spread faint streaks 
 
 of gray on her forehead, 
 Dawn of another life, that broke o'er her earthly 
 
 horizon, 
 As in the. eastern sky the first faint streaks of 
 
 tiie morning." 
 
 The comparison of the turning gray of 
 the hair to the dawn of the morning, has 
 a pleasing fancifulness, but is certainly as 
 remote from real pathos, as likening a 
 boiled lobster to the same phenomenon.* 
 The poet does not paint by such similes ; 
 they distract from his picture and attract 
 to his ingenuity. The cool idt (using the 
 word in its old acceptation) so predomi- 
 nates over the imagination, as to cause that 
 faculty to dwindle into affectation. If the 
 reader is moved by such writing, it is of 
 his own accord, and out of the disposition 
 of his nature to supply emotion where it 
 is so evidently Avanting. We can fancy 
 that one shoidd feel in reading many pas- 
 sages like this, and, indeed, the whole 
 piece, that the writer is giving out in a 
 calm and unnatural monotonous chant, 
 feelings too deep to be allowed egress in 
 spontaneous eloquence ; just as many must 
 remember to have felt, when it was com- 
 mon for college students to imitate the 
 impressive oddity of Mr. Emerson's man- 
 ner, at hearing some imfortunate, meek- 
 eyed, muddy-brained young gentlemen 
 " commune ;" or as they would, perhaps, 
 have phrased it, " let the within flow out 
 into the universal." There is a perfect 
 analogy between this poem and its style, 
 and between their thinking and conversa- 
 tion ; and it might be added, that the 
 
 * How much nearer the language of emotion is 
 "the milky head of reverend Priam," in the 
 rhetorical passage the first player recites in Hamlet. 
 
10 
 
 Evangeline. 
 
 poetry and the thinking are both equidistant 
 from the high and the true. For what 
 degree of vital heat can be felt to exist in 
 a style which gives birth to such flowers 
 of rhetoric, as those we are quoting ? — 
 
 " Life had long been astir in the village, and 
 
 clamorous labor 
 Knocked with its hundred hands at the golden 
 
 gates of the morning." 
 
 This is not lavender, mint, or marjoram, 
 " flowers of middle summer ;" but is more 
 like rosemary and rue, that keep " seem- 
 ing and savor" all winter ; rather it is a 
 lichen, that might grow on an iceberg. 
 
 " She saw serenelj^ the moon pass 
 Forth from the folds of a cloud, and one star 
 
 follow her footsteps, 
 As out of Abraham's tent young Ishmael wan- 
 dered with Hagar !" 
 
 The exclamation point is not ours ; it is so 
 in the original, and ends a chapter. The 
 reader can attach to it no other legitimate 
 significance, than as indicating the poet's 
 astonishment at his own conception. 
 
 But he is very fond of comparisons from 
 Scripture : — 
 
 " The trumpet flower and the grape-vine 
 Hung their ladder of ropes aloft like the ladder 
 
 of Jacob, 
 On whose pendulous stairs the angels ascend- 
 ing, descending, 
 Were swift humming birds that flitted from 
 blossom to blossom." 
 
 Have the old painters, did Rembrandt, 
 represent Jacob's Dream with a rope lad- 
 der ? The image, to our fancy, is as 
 strange as the likeness of humming birds 
 to angels. Jacob's ladder on Mount 
 Washington, must surely be more like the 
 original. 
 
 " Wild with the winds of September 
 Wrestled the trees of the forest, as Jacob of old 
 with the angel." 
 
 The trees collectively could not have 
 wrestled like Jacob, though any one of 
 them might have been said to do so with 
 perfect propriety. We observe the same 
 slight maccuracy in another place : — 
 
 " Their ssouls with devotion translated, 
 Rose on the ardor of prayer, like Elijah ascend- 
 ing to heaven." 
 
 But here is a Scripture simile from the 
 part of the poem where the reader is 
 asked to be most moved. Evangeline has 
 at last discovered her long-lost Gabriel 
 among the sick in the hospital : — 
 
 " Hot and red on his lips still burned the flush 
 of the fever, 
 
 As if Hfe, like the Hebrew, with blood had be- 
 sprinkled its portals, 
 
 That the Angel of Death might see the sign 
 and pass over." 
 
 Tliis is a temperance in passion, not ac- 
 quired or begotten, but innate and "from 
 the purpose." One wotdd suppose that 
 the redness of the lips were rather an in- 
 vitation for Death to enter; or an indica- 
 tion like an auctioneer's flag in the window 
 of a dwelling house, that the inhabitants 
 were moving out. 
 
 Frequently we meet Avitli a good thing 
 spoiled by the same coldness that permits 
 these unpleasing extravagancies. 
 
 " On the river 
 Fell here and there through the branches a 
 
 tremulous gleam of the moonlight, 
 Like the sweet thoughts of love on a darkened 
 
 and devious spirit." 
 
 This is very pretty indeed. The tremu- 
 lousness sufficiently divides the one gleam 
 into many, to make it resemble " sweet 
 thoughts." But see what follows : — 
 
 " Nearer and round about her, the manifold 
 
 flowers of the garden 
 Poured out their souls in odors, that'were their 
 
 prayers and confessions 
 Unto the night, as it went its way, like a silent 
 
 Carthusian." 
 
 If this had stopped with " odors," it would 
 have been well ; had it ended with 
 "night," it Avould have been perhaps half 
 as good ; as it is, the whole is bad. The 
 little kitten of a thought is pinched and 
 pinched till it mews horribly. Let us 
 leave it and pass to another : — 
 
 " Circles and sails aloft, on pinions majestic, the 
 vulture. 
 
 Like the implacable soul of a chieftain slaugh- 
 tered in battle." 
 
 So far would have been well, but — 
 
 " By invisible stairs ascending and scaling the 
 heavens." 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 11 
 
 , Now the motion of a high soaring vulture, 
 though it be Hke going up circuhir stairs 
 in respect that it goes round and round, 
 yet in respect that it is a smooth equable 
 motion, it is very unlike going up stairs. 
 Why an implacable soul should go to 
 heaven at any rate, we find no sufficient 
 reason, unless it be to fill out the metre of a 
 very rough line ; but perchance Mr. School- 
 craft's Algic Researches might furnish 
 one : we observe so many instances of 
 minute memory of little particulars gleaned 
 out of books of travel and thrust in for 
 their own sake, that we are in constant 
 danger of exposing our ignorance. Possi- 
 bly there may be some superstition among 
 the Indians — whom the author calls, but 
 without giving any note for the authority, 
 "the scattered tribes of Ishmael's chil- 
 dren" — to the effect that implacable souls 
 go to heaven, and up circular stairs. 
 
 Where a simile occurs which is really 
 expressive, it looks as if it had been laid 
 away in a note-book and copied out for the 
 occasion ; thus : — Evangeline beheld the 
 priest's face 
 
 " without eitlier thought or emotion, 
 E'en as the face of a clock from which the 
 htinds have been taken." 
 
 This would not be out of place in pleas- 
 ant prose description : it occurs in what is 
 intended to be a very serious passage. A 
 little on the priest attempted to speak ; 
 
 " but his heart was full, and 
 his accents 
 Faltered and paused on his lips, as the feet of a 
 
 child on a threshold, 
 Hushed by the scene he beholds, and the awful 
 presence of sorrow." 
 
 But how shall such a comparison as the 
 following be classified ? — The Notary has 
 told Evangeline's father a story, which 
 does not convince him, any more than it 
 will the reader, but it puzzles him, so that 
 he stood like a man who fain would speak 
 but findeth no lano-uaore ; 
 
 " And all his thoughts congealed into lines on 
 
 his face, as the vapors 
 Freeze in fantastic shapes on the window 
 panes in the winter." 
 
 It is sufficient to add to a list of such 
 things, which might be extended to more 
 
 than equal in number the pages of the 
 poem, a few which are better : — 
 
 " In the dead of the night she heard the icliis- 
 
 fering rain fall 
 Loud on the withered leaves of the sycamore 
 
 tree by the window." 
 
 " The tire of the cart-wheel 
 Lay like a fiery snake coiled round in a circle 
 of cinders." 
 
 " Oft on sledges in winter, as swift as ili". swoop 
 
 of the eagle, 
 Down the hill-side bounding they glided away 
 
 o'er the meadows." 
 
 " Blown by the blast of fate like a dead leaf over 
 the desert." 
 
 These have as much naturalness and 
 truth as any of their kind in the piece. But 
 they are not very remarkable. Indeed, it 
 may be observed of all this sort of writing, 
 that where it is not strained it is common. 
 Like singers who force their voices, the au- 
 thors become incapable of sustaining a full, 
 vigorous tone. 
 
 The description of the heroine already 
 given to show the effect of the verse, the 
 doleful hexameters, will serve to show also 
 the general tone of the style and the level 
 of the thought and sentiment. So far as it 
 is melodious and flowing it is pleasing, but 
 with all its labored similes and studied 
 common-place epithets, it fails to flash the 
 picture upon the mind's eye with that im- 
 aginative power which is the soul of high 
 descriptive poetry. We are told that 
 Evangeline's father was " stalworth and 
 stately," and " hearty and hale as an oak 
 that is covered with snow flakes :" 
 
 '• White as the snow were his locks, and his 
 cheeks as brown as the oak leaves." 
 
 Does this comparison bring into the 
 vision at once and irresistibly a clear image ? 
 On the contrary, the reader must first fancy 
 an oak tree in winter, and consider wherein 
 it resembles a stout old farmer, and then 
 fall back upon the epithets, which are cer- 
 tainly not the most novel in the world. 
 Stalworth, stately, and the like, have been 
 used before — several times ; perhaps they 
 might be found in Mr. James's novels. 
 
 The maiden was "fair;" she had "black 
 eyes " that gleamed softly beneath the 
 brown shade of her tresses ; she was par- 
 ticularly fair when at noontide she carried 
 
12 
 
 Evangeline. 
 
 ale to the reapers ; (at that time of day she 
 would have seemed fairer to the reapers 
 had she, if we may write a hexameter, 
 
 Stood in the door of the kitchen and blown a 
 tin horn for the dinner ;) 
 
 fairer still was she when she went to 
 church, where the bell sprinkled the air 
 with holy sounds as the priest sprinkled 
 the congregation with hyssop ; fairest of all, 
 celestially so, when she walked homeward 
 serenely with God's benediction upon 
 her. All this does not make us see her. 
 "Serenely," it is true, is a good phrase; 
 it brings an indistinct impression of a sweet 
 young lady walking home from church, 
 and thus affects the ear poetically. But 
 taking the whole together as it stands, and 
 how must Evangeline impress any fancy 
 which is peopled with the beautiful forms 
 of our elder English poets, and our best 
 novelists, with the Shakspeare's ladies and 
 Walter Scott's ? Is she a worthy person to 
 be introduced into suxh company ? They 
 would be ashamed of so insipid a creature ; 
 Perdita would never endure such a coun- 
 try maid. For with all her graces and dif- 
 ferent degrees of fairness, there is nothing 
 of her but a name, and a faint impression, 
 not of feminine characterlessness, but of 
 softness. There is no soul in her. For 
 seventeen she is so childish as to be silly. 
 What is told about her is told in such a way, 
 that while we forget the particulars there 
 is nothing left that is general. 
 
 This is perhaps because she is so very 
 fine and delicate a creature that critics 
 cannot understand or lift themselves up to 
 the exaltation of her refinement. But 
 critics can bear the desci'iption of Belphebe. 
 It is not the lusciousness of the imagery 
 that offends in Evangeline. It is simply 
 the absence -of the " unifying poAver," that 
 fuses all into one image, 'that illumines the 
 creations of the fancy with a steady intense 
 gleam. How delightful is the first intro- 
 duction of Una : — 
 
 " A lovely lady rode him fair beside, 
 Upon a lov/ly ass more white than snow ; 
 Yet she much whiter, but the same did hide 
 Under a veil that wimpled was full low, 
 And over all a black stole she did throw. 
 As one that inly mourri'd : so was slie sad, 
 And heavy sat upon her palfrey slow ; 
 Seemed in her heart some hidden care she had, 
 And by her in a line a milk-white lamb she led." 
 
 In truth a most lovely lady ! " As one 
 thai inly mourned " — who can read it with- 
 out pitying her? Here is no oak tree, 
 kine breath, or hyssop sprinkling compari- 
 son ; the poet is working in the glow of 
 thought and emotion ; he is lost in the gen- 
 tle music of his song ; he is not endeavor- 
 ing to excite admiration, but to communi- 
 cate the vision and the dream which his 
 rapt eyes behold. Observe how incon- 
 gruously, like the couplet in Goldsmith's 
 Elegy, the last line follows its predeces- 
 sor. Yet in reading the Faery Queen, one 
 never notices such things as blemishes ; 
 the level of the song admits them, and the 
 fancy is kept too busy to mind them. 
 
 " Rapt with the rage of mine own ravished 
 
 thoughts, 
 Through contemplation of those goodly sights 
 And glorious images in heaven wrought, 
 Whose wondrous beauty, breathing sweet de- 
 lights, 
 Do kindle love in high conceited sprites, 
 I fain to tell the things that I behold, 
 But feel my wish to fail, and tongue to fold." 
 Spenser's Hymn of Heavenly Beauty. 
 
 But in Evangeline one is obliged to no- 
 tice every line. He is not permitted to 
 lose his attention in the story, in the pic- 
 tures, in the character, the thought, or 
 emotion. The writer, with his sweet 
 sentences, his pile-driving hexameters, his 
 strained similes and over-nice conceits, is 
 ever directly before him, and whatever of 
 warmth and beauty the kind reader is 
 willing to behold, he must perceive 
 through a cold distorting fog of artificial- 
 ity. There is no character-drawing in the 
 piece ; the hero and heroine are not alive. 
 We shudder at the possible mournfulness 
 of the story, but not at its actual. 
 
 " Fairest of all the maids was Evangeline, 
 
 Benedict's daughter ! 
 Noblest of all youths was Gabriel, son of the 
 
 blacksmith !" 
 
 Upon what pitch or poetic ground-color 
 was it supposed possible to work in such a 
 consciously affected style, such " make be- 
 lieve good children " kind of thought and 
 sentiment as appears in the passage which 
 this Miltonic echo concludes ? Or what 
 class of readers were supposed capable of 
 relishing a work which should abound in 
 passages like the following — baby-talk 
 forced into a canter : — 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 13 
 
 " Bent like a laboring oar, that toils in the surf 
 
 of the ocean, 
 Bent, but not broken, by age was the form of 
 
 the notary public ; 
 Shocks of yellow hair like the silken floss of 
 
 the maize hung 
 Over liis shoulders ; his forehead was high ; 
 
 and glasses with horn bows 
 Sat astride on his nose with a look of wisdom 
 
 supernal. 
 Father of twenty children was he, and more 
 
 than a hundred 
 Children's children rode on his knee, and hoard 
 
 his great watch tick." 
 
 This was intended probably to be a lit- 
 tle pleasant touch of simple nature ; but 
 it is not. It is mere puerility. The pain- 
 ful obviousness of the intent is as fatal to 
 humor as to pathos. Both need the ars 
 celare artem, which is here entirely Avant- 
 ing. The last line is so plainly the work 
 of a cold design, that it renders w^hat 
 might otherwise assist in bringing out a 
 domestic picture seem purely goody ish. 
 It w^ould be a pretty thought for Dickens, 
 in some passage where it would fii"st strike 
 the fancy as funny ; but here, especially 
 at the beginning of a chapter, all the 
 pleasure that should be derived from the 
 nicety or novelty of the observation is ut- 
 terly lost. It is belittling one's self to 
 Avrite or read such stuff : — 
 
 '• There from his station aloft, at the head of the 
 
 table, the herdsman 
 Poured forth his heart and his wine together in 
 
 endles^profusion. 
 Lighting his pipe, that was filled with sweet 
 
 Natchitoches tobacco." 
 
 Whoever has obsen-ed a Tilly Slowboy 
 with a wondering baby on her knee, Avhich 
 she is seesawing to and fro, and amusing 
 with some great story all about nothing, 
 must have experienced the feeling which 
 this sort of writing cannot but excite. 
 Suppose Tilly is entertaining her charge 
 with a history of the Avar ; she chants 
 hexameters without knoAving it, merely to 
 chime with the motion of her knees : — 
 
 " President Polk is the crossest old man that 
 ever was heard of, 
 
 Fighting and killing is just what he likes and 
 he cuts people's heads off 
 
 When they don't mind him, like aunty for tea- 
 table slicing the brciid ; and 
 
 General Scott he went away off to conquer the 
 Mex'cans, 
 
 And he had a great sword, O ! ever so long, 
 
 and he rode a stout war-horse — 
 Rode a horse that probably cost him I don't 
 
 know how many dollars ; 
 And his epaulettes, my ! dear nic ! they shined 
 
 like — anything shiny, 
 And in his cap were feathers enough to stuff 
 
 out a bolster — 
 But when he come to the city, says he, ' I must 
 
 put in a noAV one,' 
 And he did it — " 
 
 But no parody could be made colder 
 and more remote from true poetic elo- 
 quence than the style of Evangehne. Nor 
 would it be very 'easy to write so long a 
 piece, intended to be so affecting, Avith so 
 little manly thinking. 
 
 What shall be said of such an incident 
 as this, and the advice which follows it : 
 When Evangeline and Father Felician are 
 going down the Mississippi in a cumbrous 
 boat, they are one night moored under the 
 boughs of Wachita Avillows. That very 
 night, under the other bank of the river, a 
 SAvift boat Avith Gabriel on board passes 
 upAvard. The ha' er being there somethmg 
 less than a mile wide, EA'angeline feels by 
 some mesmeric attraction that her lover is 
 near, and tells the father so, at the same 
 time adding that it is only her fancy, and 
 that he Avill not probably understand her : 
 
 " But made answer the reverend man, and he 
 smiled as he answered," — 
 
 (But should smile why the reverend man, 
 we confess we do not perceive here.) 
 
 " Daughter, thy Avords are not idle ; nor are they 
 
 to me without meaning. 
 FeeUng is deep and still ; and the word that floats 
 
 on the surface 
 Is as the tossing buoy, that betrays Avhere the 
 
 anchor is hidden. 
 Therefore trust to thy heart, and to what the 
 
 Avorld calls illusions." 
 
 Most profound Father ! so profound that 
 a question arises as to his meaning. If it 
 would please the poor girl to think that 
 her Gabriel was near because she felt so, 
 that was very AA^ell ; but one does not see 
 how her feeling could have any influence 
 on the actual fact. She might have felt 
 so had he not been passing, and the 
 father's advice Avould have been just as 
 pertinent ; indeed, for aught he kneAV, he 
 might be a thousand miles away. If the 
 
14 
 
 Evangeline. 
 
 father really meant to say that her feeling- 
 was to the actual fact what the buoy is to 
 the anchor, he is talking nonsense ; if he 
 meant, as he says, that her words were to 
 her feelings what the buoy is to the anchor, 
 and that therefore she should trust to illu- 
 sions, he is talking worse nonsense. There 
 is no sequitur. We can understand Defoe's 
 feeling that he was urged by an overruling 
 impulse to do a particular tiling, and his 
 advice in such cases to follow the super- 
 natural guidance ; Dr. Johnson's leaping 
 over posts in London streets because he 
 felt that if he could or did, something- 
 would turn out well, is no absurdity to 
 those who are particular to see the new 
 moon over the right shoulder ; the sudden 
 shooting forward of the memory by which 
 for an instant the present and new seems 
 old and familiar, all the occult dreams of 
 poets and musicians, are easy to under- 
 stand ; but this passage is not. It does 
 not mean anything. Fortunately, the 
 poem being almost wholly narrative, those 
 whose duty it is to criticise it are spared 
 the necessity of remarking upon much of 
 such thinking — thinking which it would 
 never be necessary to notice with severity, 
 did it not appear undet- a form of much 
 pretension. 
 
 If we take the sceneral thouo-ht of the 
 piece aside from what is wasted in such 
 nonsense as this, and in dressing what 
 should hav^ been an affecting storj^ in such 
 a masquerading costume that it is, ridicu- 
 lous ; that is to say, if we consider the 
 bare plot and the naked thread of the 
 description, there is nothing in them to be 
 condemned. This is but negative praise, 
 yet it is all they deserve. The story, in 
 decent garb, might have told very well in 
 the monthly magazines. Indeed, it is of a 
 kind which would have borne quite a 
 flowery style, and is perhaps sufficiently 
 poetic for verse — reasonable verse, we 
 mean, for no bard on earth could drag it 
 or any other story safely over the quaking 
 boggy syrtis of these hexameters. The 
 characters, though faintly and unartisti- 
 cally drawn, are yet not wholly unnatural. 
 The hero and the heroine love and wish to 
 be together, as all true lovers should and 
 miist — Madame Sand's to the contrary 
 notwithstanding. They have no particular 
 life, being merely impossible combinations 
 of universal qualities ; but all the best side 
 
 of what they are, they are in a very 
 proper and sensible way. Gabriel is 
 simply a manly man, Evangeline a woman- 
 ly woman, and each is thus not by a supe- 
 rior development but by a common one. 
 They are so, we mean, because the poet 
 tells us that they are so, and ascribes* to 
 them common traits which are universal, 
 and nothing else. There is a wide diff'er- 
 ence between the great universal and the 
 every day. If Evangeline were really the 
 great " historical-pastoral, tragical-histori- 
 cal, tragical-comical," which it is sufficiently 
 apparent from internal evidence it wasrin- 
 tended to be, the hero and heroine would 
 have been something- more than a stout 
 fellow and a handsome girl ; they would 
 have been all that they are and more 
 beside, without being any the less types of 
 humanity. The great names of epic story 
 are by no means such fanciful good 
 creatures. They are not so soft, but are 
 more delicate. Their thoughts and emo- 
 tions are no less un-individual, but are 
 larger and deeper. They open to lis more of 
 the experience of life. Their joy is an ex- 
 ceeding- great joy ; in their sorrow the 
 " waters come in unto their souls." 
 
 Or not to rank the piece with those 
 with which its style and design provoke a 
 comparison — if it be looked upon (that is) 
 not as an artificial attempt to accomplish 
 what it has not accomplished, and what, ' 
 if it had, would not have been worth ac- 
 complishing, but simply as -, a pastoral 
 ppem of such a length — it is not of merit 
 to deserve a place among the best compo- 
 sitions of that kind in the English language. 
 How infinitely more poetic is any one of 
 Crabbe's Tales '? or that most exquisite- 
 one of Wordsworth, " Michael," the brok- 
 en-hearted father, whose unfinished sheep- 
 fold still remains 
 
 " Beside the boisterous brook of Green-head 
 Ghyll." 
 
 For these are something. They are in a 
 legitimate walk of art. They idealize the 
 actual without departing from it. Evan- 
 geline mingles the possible with the impos- 
 sible, till it ends in the incredible. The 
 heroine is a farmer's daughter, and has a 
 heifer of her own, and is not ashamed to 
 " do the milking ;" she has woven an 
 " ample and high " clothes-press, with 
 
Evangeline. 
 
 15 
 
 " spacious shelves" full of linen and wool- 
 len stuffs, -which are the precious duwer 
 she is to bi'inrj to her husband in niarriaffe, 
 
 " Better tlian flocks and l.erds, being proofs of 
 her skill as a housewife." 
 
 Can the reader suppose for a moment, 
 that a sonsie lass like this ca er "saw serene- 
 ly the moon pass," etc. ? Is she a young 
 lady likely to have been troubled with 
 such a mesmeric fancy as that Avhich leads 
 the good Father Felician to philosophize 
 so profoundly ? Of course not. She would 
 have talked and thought differently. 
 She might have had just as deep an affec- 
 tion, just as much constancy, delicacy and 
 sensitiveness as are attempted to be 
 ascribed to her, but she would have ex- 
 pressed Jierself quite otherwise. Rich 
 people have the same hearts as poor peo- 
 ple, but they do not talk in the same way ; 
 and it takes a much larger experience 
 than a young lady seventeen j^ears old, 
 betrothed to the son of a blacksmith; can 
 be supposed to have had, to enable one in 
 the low plains of poverty to assume the 
 tone of his fellows who walk on the gilded 
 summits of affluence. Characters should 
 be consistent with themselves. If cottage 
 damsels are to be depicted with the senti- 
 ments of ladies, we should see nothing of 
 rural life but jessamines and honey-suc- 
 kles. The whole should be invested with 
 « harmonizimj imaginative atmosphere. 
 When we have " happy peasantry" scenes 
 upon the stage, Mr. Barry has the Alpin» 
 mountains put into the slides, and over 
 these places such a sky as was never seen 
 elsewhere since the second day of Crea- 
 tion. We cannot be, at the same time, 
 awake and dreaming, in spite of Bunyan's 
 promise. 
 
 This great fault of Evangeline, its want 
 nf keeping, more even than all its faults of 
 style, forces us to deny it merit as a work 
 of the IMAGINATION. It is radically defec- 
 tive as a great poem, in that it lacks a 
 pervading tone. It blends extremes of 
 hue as wide apart as those of the pasto- 
 rals of Phillips and Wordsworth's Michael. 
 It is too unreal to be real, and too real to 
 be unreal. Like a familiar landscape, 
 done in water colors by a young lady, we 
 lecognize just enough to be most intensely 
 aware of the unlikeness. The characters 
 remind one of Punch's designs of Bandits 
 and Scotch Highlanders, worked by board- 
 ing-school misses in Berlin wool. The 
 whole piece ought to rank as a work of 
 art with those curious specimens of carv- 
 ing exhibited in museums. It is a series 
 of cubes and spheres and cones in open 
 spaces, cut out of a single piece of sqft 
 wood, not for the purpose of producing 
 an effect by its symmetry or beauty of 
 proportion, but to make us admire at the 
 ingenuity of the carver. Or it is like a 
 Avonderful piece of inlaid work, which 
 must have cost immense toil, but which, 
 being irregular and formless, expresses 
 nothing but its maker's patient skill. In 
 brief, it is a most labored piece of fine 
 writing. The words are melodiouslj'- ar- 
 ranged ; the incidents are pathetic ; there 
 is much pleasing luxurious description ; 
 the natural feelings of the lovers are, in 
 general, correctly, though incongruously 
 drawn ; but with all this, the vital spark 
 is wanting. The piece does not display 
 the depth of emotion, nor the height of 
 rapture, necessary to a great poem. It 
 does not burn or glow with heat, but only 
 congeals and coldly glitters. G. W. P. 
 
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