roon." In our account of all this matter we have had reference to the book--and to the book alone. It will be difficult to prove us guilty in any degree of distortion or exaggeration. Yet such are the puerilities we daily find ourselves called upon to admire, as among the loftiest efforts of the human mind, and which not to assign a rank with the proud trophies of the matured and vigorous genius of England, is to prove ourselves at once a fool, a maligner, and no patriot.[7] [Footnote 7: A review of Drake's poems, emanating from one of our proudest Universities, does not scruple to make use of the following language in relation to the _Culprit Fay_. "_It is, to say the least, an elegant production, the purest specimen of Ideality {332} we have ever met with, sustaining in each incident a most bewitching interest. Its very title is enough_," &c. &c. We quote these expressions as a fair specimen of the general unphilosophical and adulatory tenor of our criticism.] As an instance of what may be termed the sublimely ridiculous we quote the following lines from page 17. With sweeping tail and quivering fin, Through the wave the sturgeon flew, And like the heaven-shot javelin, He sprung above the waters blue. Instant as the star-fall light, He plunged into the deep again, But left an arch of silver bright The rainbow of the moony main. _It was a strange and lovely sight To see the puny goblin there; He seemed an angel form of light With azure wing and sunny hair, Throned on a cloud of purple fair Circled with blue and edged with white And sitting at the fall of even Beneath the bow of summer heaven._ The verses here italicized, if considered without their context, have a certain air of dignity, elegance, and chastity of thought. If however we apply the context, we are immediately overwhelmed with the grotesque. It is impossible to read without laughing, such expressions as "It was a strange and lovely sight"--"He seemed an angel form of light"--"And sitting at the fall of even, beneath the bow of summer heaven" to a Fairy--a goblin--an Ouphe--half an inch high, dressed in an acorn helmet and butterfly-cloak, and sitting on the water in a muscle-shell, with a "brown-backed sturgeon" turning somersets over his head.