"There sits a lovely maiden The ocean murmuring nigh; She throws the hook and watches The fishes pass it by. A ring with a ring jewel, Is sparkling on her hand; Upon the hook she binds it, And flings it from the land. Uprises from the water A hand like ivory fair. What gleams upon its finger? The golden ring is there. Uprises from the bottom A young and handsome knight; In golden scales he rises, That glitter in the light. The maid is pale with terror-- 'Nay, knight of ocean, nay, It was not thee I wanted; Let go the ring, I pray.' 'Ah, maiden, not to fishes The bait of gold is thrown; The ring shall never leave me, And thou must be my own.'" It cannot be complained of _Mr Whittier's_ poems that they are not sufficiently national; but they are national in a very disagreeable point of view--they introduce us into the controversies of the day. Mr Whittier appears to be one of those who write verses, hymns, or odes, instead of, or perhaps in addition to, sundry speeches at popular assemblies in favour of some popular cause. His rhymes have the same relation to poetry that the harangues delivered at such meetings bear to eloquence. We were at a loss to understand on what wings (certainly not those of his poetic genius) he had flown hither, till we discovered that his intemperate zeal against slavery, as it exists in the southern States of America, had procured for him a welcome amongst a certain class of readers in England. If we insert his name here, it is simply to protest against the adoption by any party, but especially by any English party, of such blind, absurd, ungovernable zeal, upon a question as difficult and intricate as it is momentous. Both Mr Longfellow and Mr Bryant write upon slavery; and both have produced some very touching poems on the subject; but they treat the topic as poets. Mr Whittier treats the subject with the rabid fury of a fierce partisan. No story so preposterous or ridiculous but he can bend it to his purpose. He throws contumely upon the ministers of the gospel in the Southern States, because instead of attempting, every moment of their lives, to overthrow the unfortunate organisation of society that is there established, they endeavour to make the slave contented with his lot, and the master lenient in the exercise of his authority. Sentence of death was passed, it seems, on a man of the name of Brown, for assisting a slave to escape. The sentence was commuted, but this does not prevent Mr Whittier from hanging the man in his own imagination, and then, _à propos_ of this imaginary execution, thus addressing the clergy of South Carolina:--