'Violet! sweet violet! Thine eyes are full of tears; Are they wet Even yet With the thought of other years? Or with gladness are they full, For the night is beautiful, And longing for those far-off spheres? Thy little heart, that hath with love Grown colored, like the sky above On which thou lookest ever-- Can it know All the woe Of hope for what returneth never, All the sorrow and the longing To these hearts of ours belonging?' And there are touches of what we are wont to call dear, womanly feeling, as when the 'Forlorn,' out in the bitter cold, 'Hears a woman's voice within Singing sweet words her childhood knew, And years of misery and sin _Furl off and leave her heaven blue_.' The 'Changeling' alone would sustain a reputation. It seems always like the plaintive but sweet warble of some unknown bird rising from the midst of tall water-rushes in the day's dim dawning. A wonderful melody as of Mrs. Browning's best efforts pervades every verse, priceless and rare as some old intaglio. But when we come to his 'Odes to the Past and the Future,' the full power of poesy unfolds before us. Their images are not the impalpable spectres of a poet's dream, but symbols hardened into marble by his skill, and informed with the fire of life by his genius. 'Wondrous and awful are thy silent halls, O kingdom of the past! There lie the bygone ages in their palls, Guarded by shadows vast; There all is hushed and breathless, Save when some image of old error falls, Earth worshiped once as deathless.' Was ever picture of silence more effective and complete? We can see the desolate quiet of the vast arched halls, left undisturbed by centuries, and as the moldering statue totters forward from its niche, we feel a faith has fallen which was once the heaven of nations, and the awful tumult is audible as a voice from the drear kingdom of death. And the hymn to the Future, with all the joyful Titian hues of its opening strophes, the glowing fervor of its deep yearning, swelling through 'golden-winged dreams' of the 'Land of Promise':-- 'To thee the Earth lifts up her fettered hands And cries for vengeance; with a pitying smile Thou blessest her, and she forgets her bands, And her old woe-worn face a little while Grows young and noble: unto thee the Oppressor Looks and is dumb with awe; The eternal law Which makes the crime its own blindfold redresser, Shadows his heart with perilous foreboding, And he can see the grim-eyed Doom From out the trembling gloom Its silent-footed steeds toward his palace goading.'