A striking characteristic of Miss Barrett’s prose, is its prevailing seriousness, approaching to solemnity—a garb borrowed from the “sceptred pale” of her favorite Greek drama of fate. She loses much with the general reader by a dim mysticism; but many of her later poems are free from any such defect. The great writers whom she loves will teach her the plain, simple, universal language of poetry. Her dreams and abstractions, though “caviare to the generale,” have their admirers, who will ever find in pure and elevated philosophy expressed in the words of enthusiasm the living presence of poetry. On Parnassus there are many groves: far from the dust of the highway, embosomed in twilight woods that seem to symbol Reverence and Faith trusting on the unseen, we may hear in the whispering of the trees, the wavering breath of insect life, the accompaniment of our poet’s strain. Despise not dreams and reveries. With Cowley, Miss Barrett vindicates herself. “The father of poets tells us, even dreams, too, are from God.” We cannot here do justice to Miss Barrett’s volume of the Seraphim, or to her other poems. We cannot here illustrate as we would the lofty tone of her conceptions, which in grandeur and human interest belong to the highest and most enduring of lyrical strains. She has thrown aside sentimentality, the fluency without thought, the cheap eloquence that marks a certain school of lady poets, for the genuine language of emotion, the fire-new currency of speech forged in the secret chambers of the heart. From two volumes of her poetry before us, (unfamiliar as yet to American readers—they cannot be so long,) we quote one poem, perhaps not the most brilliant of all, but inferior to none of the rest in the pathos, the tenderness, the deep Christian sympathy with human life, which dwell in the soul of this rare poetess. THE SLEEP. “He giveth His beloved sleep.”—_Psalm cxxvii. 2._ Of all the thoughts of God that are Borne inward unto souls afar, Along the Psalmist’s music deep— Now tell me if that any is, For gift or grace surpassing this— “He giveth his beloved sleep?” What would we give to our beloved? The hero’s heart, to be unmoved— The poet’s star-tuned harp, to sweep— The senate’s shout to patriot vows— The monarch’s crown, to light the brows?— “He giveth _His_ beloved sleep.” What do we give to our beloved? A little faith, all undisproved— A little dust, to overweep— And bitter memories, to make The whole earth blasted for our sake! “He giveth His beloved sleep.” “Sleep soft, beloved!” we sometimes say, But have no tune to charm away Sad dreams that through the eyelids creep: But never doleful dream again Shall break the happy slumber, when “He giveth His beloved sleep.”