from its proper line of work, too much has been sacrificed or at least subordinated to the study of stage surprises conveyed in a constant succession of galvanic shocks, as though to atone for neglect or violation of dramatic duty and the inner law of artistic growth and poetic propriety by excess of outward and theatrical observance of effect; whether or not these and such-like deductions may be made from the fame of this great poet as dramatist or as novelist, in such a book as that now before us this quality is glorious only and dangerous no more. The partisanship which is the imperfection of a play is the perfection of a war-song or other national lyric, be it of lamentation, of exhortation, or of triumph. This book of song takes its place beyond question beside the greatest on that lyric list which reaches from the "Odes et Ballades" to the "Chansons des Rues et des Bois;" such a list of labours and triumphs as what other lyrist can show? First come the clear boyish notes of prelude, songs of earliest faith and fancy, royalist and romantic; then the brilliant vivid ballads, full already of supple harmonies and potent masteries of music, of passion and sentiment, force and grace; then the auroral resonance and radiance of the luminous "Orientales," the high and tender cadences of the "Feuilles d'Automne," the floating and changing melodies of the "Chants du Crépuscule," the fervent and intimate echoes of the "Voix Intérieures," the ardent and subtle refractions of "Les Rayons et les Ombres;" each in especial of these two latter books of song crowned by one of the most perfect lyrics in all the world of art for sweetness and sublimity—the former by those stanzas on the sound of the unseen sea by night, which have in them