If Mr. Gosse were right, it would practically put on a par with a mere advertising scheme many poems which have now become household favorites. Take, for example, "Hervé Riel." Think of the blue-eyed Breton hero whom all the world has learned to love through Browning, tolerated simply as an index finger to "The Pied Piper of Hamelin." Take, too, such poems, as "Donald." This man's dastardly sportsmanship is so vividly portrayed that it has the power to arouse strong emotion in strong men, who have been known literally to break down in the middle of it through excess of feeling; "Ivan Ivanovitch," in which is embodied such fear and horror that weak hearts cannot stand the strain of hearing it read; the story of the dog Tray, who rescued a drowning doll with the same promptitude as he did a drowning child--at the relation of whose noble deeds the eyes of little children grow eager with excitement and sympathy. And where is there in any poet's work a more vivid bit of tragedy than "A Forgiveness?"
And would not an unfillable gap be left in the ranks of our friends of the imaginative world if Balaustion were blotted out?--the exquisite lyric girl, brave, tender and with a mind in which wisdom and wit are fair play fellows.
As Carlyle might say, "Verily, verily, Mr. Gosse, thou hast out-Homered Homer, and thy nod hath taken upon itself very much the semblance of a snore."
These and many others which might be mentioned since the date when Mr. Gosse autocratically put up the bars to the poet's genius are now universally accepted. There are others, however, such as "The Red Cotton Night-cap Country," "The Inn Album," "Aristophanes' Apology," "Fifine at the Fair," which are liable at any time to attacks from atrophied critics, and among these are the groups of poems which are to form the center of our present discussion.
Without particularizing either critics or criticism it may be said that criticism of these poems divides itself into the usual three branches--one which objects to their philosophy, one which objects to their art, one which finds them difficult of comprehension at all. This last criticism may easily be disposed of by admitting it is in part true. The mind whose highest reaches of poetic inspiration are ministered unto by such simple and easily understandable lyrics as "Twinkle, twinkle, little star," might not at once grasp the significance of the Parleying with George Bubb Dodington. Indeed, it may be surmised that some minds might sing upon the starry heights with Hegel and fathom the equivalence of being and non-being, and yet be led into a slough of despond by this same cantankerous George.