His present volume shows a greater ripeness than any of its
predecessors. We find a mellowness of early autumn in it. There is the
old sweetness native to the man, with greater variety of character and
experience. The personages are all drawn from the life, and sketched
with the light firmness of a practised art. They have no more
individuality than is necessary to the purpose of the poem, which
consists of a series of narratives told by a party of travellers
gathered in Sudbury Inn, and each suited, either by its scene or its
sentiment, to the speaker who recites it. In this also there is a
natural reminiscence of Chaucer; and if we miss the rich minuteness of
his Van Eyck painting, or the depth of his thoughtful humor, we find the
same airy grace, tenderness, simple strength, and exquisite felicities
of description. Nor are twinkles of sly humor wanting. The Interludes,
and above all the Prelude, are masterly examples of that perfect ease of
style which is, of all things, the hardest to attain. The verse flows
clear and sweet as honey, and with a faint fragrance that tells, but not
too plainly, of flowers that grew in many fields. We are made to feel
that, however tedious the processes of culture may be, the ripe result
in facile power and scope of fancy is purely delightful. We confess that
we are so heartily weary of those cataclysms of passion and sentiment
with which literature has been convulsed of late,--as if the main object
were, not to move the reader, but to shake the house about his
ears,--that the homelike quiet and beauty of such poems as these is like
an escape from noise to nature.
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