Here, again, are lines in which the rhythm demands an accent on impossible syllables. But ah winged _with_ what agonies and pangs. Swiftly before me _nor_ care I how vast. I see _visions_ denied to mortal eyes. Uplifted longer _in_ heaven’s western glow. But these are trifles. Mr. Mathews is young and we take it for granted that he will improve. In the meantime what does he mean by spelling lose, _loose_, and its (the possessive pronoun) _it’s_—re-iterated instances of which fashions are to be found _passim_ in “Wakondah”? What does he mean by writing _dare_, the present, for _dared_ the perfect?—see stanza the twelfth. And, as we are now in the catachetical vein, we may as well conclude our dissertation at once with a few other similar queries. What do you mean, then, Mr. Mathews, by A sudden silence _like a tempest_ fell? What do you mean by “a quivered stream;” “a shapeless gloom;” a “habitable wish;” “natural blood;” “oak-shadowed air;” “customary peers” and “thunderous noises?” What do you mean by A sorrow mightier than the midnight skies? What do you mean by A bulk that swallows up the sea-blue sky? Are you not aware that calling the sky as blue as the sea, is like saying of the snow that it is as white as a sheet of paper? What do you mean, in short, by Its feathers darker than a thousand fears? Is not this something like “blacker than a dozen and a half of chimney-sweeps and a stack of black cats,” and are not the whole of these illustrative observations of yours somewhat upon the plan of that of the witness who described a certain article stolen as being of the size and shape of a bit of chalk? What do you _mean_ by them we say? And here notwithstanding our earnest wish to satisfy the author of Wakondah, it is indispensable that we bring our notice of the poem to a close. We feel grieved that our observations have been so much at random:—but at random, after all, is it alone possible to convey either the letter or the spirit of that, which, a mere jumble of incongruous nonsense, has neither beginning, middle, nor end. We should be delighted to proceed—but how? to applaud—but what? Surely not this trumpery declamation, this maudlin sentiment, this metaphor run-mad, this twaddling verbiage, this halting and doggerel rhythm, this unintelligible rant and cant! “Slid, if these be your passados and montantes, we’ll have none of them.” Mr. Mathews, you have clearly mistaken your vocation, and your effusion as little deserves the title of _poem_, (oh sacred name!) as did the rocks of the royal forest of Fontainebleau that of “_mes déserts_” bestowed upon them by Francis the First. In bidding you adieu we commend to your careful consideration the remark of M. Timon “_que le Ministre de l’Instruction Publique doit lui-même savoir parler Français_.” * * * * * [Illustration: SPRING FASHIONS. 1842 IN ADVANCE.]