Creeds are necessary, however, and an enlightened education teaches us not to value them above their true worth. In 1867 Doctor Holmes published a volume of poetry which was generally well received, but was criticised in the _Nation_ with needless and unmerciful severity. Rev. Edward Everett Hale and other friends of his had already been attacked in the same periodical, and the Doctor thought he knew the man who did it; but whether he was right in his conjecture cannot be affirmed. There can be no doubt that these diatribes were written by a Harvard professor who owned a large interest in the _Nation_, and who was obliged to go to Europe the following year in order to escape the odium of an imprudent speech at a public dinner. In this critique Holmes's poetry was summed up under the heading of "versified misfortunes"; and Holmes himself wrote to Mrs. Stowe that the object of the writer was evidently "to injure at any rate, and to wound if possible." It was certainly contemptible to treat a man like Doctor Holmes in this manner,--one so universally kind to others, and whose work was always, at least, above mediocrity. He behaved in a dignified manner in regard to it, and he made no attempt at self-justification, although the wound was evidently long in healing. What recourse has a man who places himself before the public against the envenomed shafts of an invisible adversary? Of this at least we may be satisfied, that whatever is extravagant and overwrought always brings its own reaction in due course; and Doctor Holmes's reputation does not appear to have suffered permanently from this attack. The general public, especially the republic of womankind, forms its own opinion, and pays slight attention to literary criticisms of that description. Holmes's poetry rarely rises to eloquence, but neither does it descend to sentimentality. It resembles the man's own life, in which there were no bold endeavors, great feats, or desperate struggles; but it was a life so judicious, healthful and highly intellectual that we cannot help admiring it. "Dorothy Q." is perhaps the best of his short poems, as it is the most widely known. The name itself is slightly humorous, but it is a perfect work of art, and the line, "Soft and low is a maiden's 'Yes,'" has the beautiful hush of a sanctuary in it. A finer verse could not be written. Also for a comic piece nothing equal to "The Wonderful One-hoss Shay" has appeared since Burns's "Tam O'Shanter." It is based on a logical illusion which brings it down to recent times, and the gravity with which the story is narrated makes its impossibility all the more amusing. The building of the chaise is described with a practical accuracy of detail, and yet with a poetical turn to every verse: "The hubs of logs from the 'Settler's ellum',-- Last of its timber,--they couldn't sell 'em; Never an axe had seen their chips, And the wedges flew from between their lips, Their blunt ends frizzled like celery-tips";