This again, however, is worth only qualified commendation. The first six lines preserve the personification (that of a ship) sufficiently well; but, in the seventh and eighth, the author suffers the image to slide into that of a warrior unsheathing his sword. Still there is _force_ in these concluding verses, and we begin to fancy that this is saying a very great deal for the author of “Puffer Hopkins.” The best stanza in the poem (there are thirty-four in all) is the thirty-third. No cloud was on the moon, yet on His brow A deepening shadow fell, and on his knees _That shook like tempest-stricken mountain trees_ _His heavy head descended sad and low_ _Like a high city smitten by the blow_ _Which secret earthquakes strike and topling falls_ _With all its arches, towers, and cathedrals_ _In swift and unconjectured overthrow._ This is, positively, not bad. The first line italicized is bold and vigorous, both in thought and expression; and the four last (although by no means original) convey a striking picture. But then the whole idea, in its general want of keeping, is preposterous. What is more absurd than the conception of a man’s head descending _to his knees_, as here described—the thing could not be done by an Indian juggler or a man of gum-caoutchouc—and what is more inappropriate than the resemblance attempted to be drawn between a _single_ head descending, and the _innumerable_ pinnacles of a falling city? It is difficult to understand, _en passant_, why Mr. Mathews has thought proper to give “cathedrals” a quantity which does not belong to it, or to write “unconjectured” when the rhythm might have been fulfilled by “unexpected” and when “unexpected” would have fully conveyed the meaning which “unconjectured” does not. By dint of farther microscopic survey, we are enabled to point out one, and alas, _only_ one more good line in the poem. Green dells that into silence stretch away contains a richly poetical thought, melodiously embodied. We only refrain, however, from declaring, flatly, that the line is not the property of Mr. Mathews, because we have not at hand the volume from which we believe it to be stolen. We quote the sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth stanzas in full. They will serve to convey some faint idea of the general poem. The Italics are our own. VI. _The spirit lowers and speaks: “Tremble ye wild Woods!_ Ye Cataracts! your _organ-voices_ sound! Deep Crags, in earth by massy tenures bound, Oh, Earthquake, _level flat_! The peace that broods Above this world, and steadfastly eludes Your power, howl Winds and break; the peace that mocks Dismay ’mid silent streams and voiceless rocks— Through wildernesses, cliffs, and solitudes. VII.