The milk-white lilies

Do dress their tresses, and the daffodillies.

If living eyes Elysian fields could see,
This little Arden might Elysium be.

An opal hue

Bepaints heaven's crystal, to the longing view
Earth's late-hid colours glance, light doth adorn
The world, and, weeping joy, forth comes the morn.

So a small seed that in the earth lies hid
And dies, reviving bursts her cloddy side,
Adorn'd with yellow locks, of new is born,
And doth become a mother great with corn,
Of grains brings hundreds with it, which when old
Enrich the furrows with a sea of gold.

These, I say, are fair specimens, which could easily be augmented by a glance over his longer secular and religious

verses.

The sonnets of Drummond are the high mark of his distinction. They stand at the very top of poetical achievement, whether is regarded their structure, their full harmony, or their sentimental completeness. Their general excellence is fatal to the anthologist; and a comparison I have made of various selections has only confirmed my first impression of the difficulty of declaring which unquestionably are the best. The most popular are "To a Nightingale" and "Sleep." Of the latter I give the octave:

Sleep, Silence', child, sweet father of soft rest,
Prince, whose approach peace to all mortals brings,
Indifferent host to shepherds and to kings,
Sole comforter of minds with grief opprest;
Lo, by thy charming rod all breathing things
Lie slumb'ring, with forgetfulness possest,
And yet o'er me to spread thy drowsy wings
Thou spares, alas! who cannot be thy guest.

I give in full “The Praise of the Solitary Life."

Thrice happy he, who by some shady grove,

Far from the clamorous world, doth live his own;
Though solitary, who is not alone,

But doth converse with that eternal love.

O how more sweet is birds' harmonious moan,
Or the hoarse sobbings of the widow'd dove,
Than those smooth whisperings near a prince's throne,
Which good make doubtful, do the evil approve!
O how more sweet is zephyr's wholesome breath,
And sighs embalm'd, which new-born flow'rs unfold,
Than that applause vain honour doth bequeath!
How sweet are streams to poison drunk in gold!
The world is full of horrors, troubles, slights,
Woods' harmless shades have only true delights.

But that which has most appealed to me is one of his first to Miss Cunningham.

I know that all beneath the moon decays,

And what by mortals in this world is brought,
In Time's great periods shall return to nought;
That fairest states have fatal nights and days;
I know how all the Muse's heavenly lays,
With toil of spright which are so dearly bought,
Ás idle sounds, of few or none are sought,
And that nought lighter is than airy praise;
I know frail beauty like the purple flower,
To which one morn oft birth and death affords;
That love a jarring is of mind's accords,
Where sense and will invassal reason's power:
Know what I list, this all can not me move,

But that, O me! I both must write and love.

If I speak of the distinction of Drummond's sonnets, I would note also their distinctness. Read a score of them together, each will remain disparate, independent, vivid: this, because it is a sonnet; it is the perfect versical expression of a compact poetical fancy.

The criticism of Mr. Whibley may be true, that “in taste, sympathy, and style Drummond was a true Eliza

bethan, who, by an accident of survival, had strayed into the reign of Charles;" but I think I have quoted and written sufficiently to show the deceptive judgement of his further remark that Drummond "always wrote English with the pedantic accuracy of an accomplished foreigner." Mr. W. J. Courthope says: "Drummond stands preeminent, among contemporary poets using the English language, for the easy harmony of his numbers." And, turning particularly to the sonnets, he adds, "None of the Euphuistic sonneteers had produced anything comparable with the sonnet- The sun is fair'-which will be at once recognised as the inspiring source of Eve's amorous address to Adam in Paradise Lost (iv., 641-56)." Let me contend, before I close, that what Drummond owed to his forerunners he amply repaid to posterity. Some of the greatest would seem to have drawn upon him; or he had, in the great sympathy of genius, as great a mind as they.

Finally, the bustle of life passed him by; he brooded like an eremite in its serenities and over its profound abyss; he touched where the clouds gather at night; and he caught the song of the morning stars-he had the sun also. I see him fondling his treasures in that study at Hawthornden; I look upon him in his years of mournful solitude by murmuring Esk-the best was then, and that, with other, has come to us. We have only to handle, for love of the man, and to taste, for our own delight.

ONE

By ARTHUR DOGGETT.

NE of our passengers going steerage was a man going to Burmah looking for a job. He did not appear to be enthusiastic about it, however, and called it "a fool's game." From all I could gather he appears to have had too much of it to enjoy the novelty of fresh scenery and the feeling of freedom of nothing to do, that is so delicious to a busy man when turned out to grass. He had expended Rs. 720/- in railway and steamer fares during the last (I forget whether he said six or twelve months, say) nine months. He must have therefore saved at least this sum and could hardly be called a spendthrift. He was hardy and honest looking and apparently a fearless man. I could not help feeling proud of him as a fellow countryman and contrasting his simple trust in his common manhood with my own fears and anxieties about the ills of life. He was a railway engine driver and when we became confidential, informed me that he had recognised me when I came on board as a mail driver which being apparently the top of the driver's tree, I accepted as a compliment. But he had not always stuck to engine driving, and when in Bombay took charge of a wealthy native gentleman who had become temporarily insane. It was a case of pluck versus madness then, and

by all accounts he had a gay time of it while there, but they paid me well" (five rupees a day), and so he stuck to his man as long as he was required, sometimes riding out with him, sometimes driving a four-in-hand drag, on the box of which they had a sharp tussle on one occasion "because the gentleman would get to his larks," and at all times tending him, even to the extent of giving him his bath, putting him to bed, etc., all of which was varied by an occasional "set-to fight when the gentleman got up to his larks," and because they couldn't get one of the natives to go near him. Yes, it is a fact, ruminated I, European labour is getting cheap! Fancy all this for five dibs, including a few annas, say, for the nerve, not wound up for the occasion, but always there to meet emergencies when the natives were flying from a tall, well-made, English trained, native madman "up to his larks," and whose favourite toast was "Bismillah, five hundred heads, God save the Queen."

We reached Rangoon about 10 a.m. on Saturday and, retaining the carriage, I deposited my baggage at the hotel and went straight on to the big pagoda. All pagodas are built on hills, and advantage is taken of this to build steps up to them with occasional terraces, the balustrades being ornamented with imposing dragons of fantastic design. The effect is very fine but in this case the steps were covered with a colonnade all the way to the top, the pillars of which were formed of one piece of wood, the ceilings panelled and decorated with arabesques and fine carvings, beautifully painted, the archways made of magnificently carved wood, sometimes painted and at other times plain. The foliated designs in these are rich and never twice the same, in fact, the richness of the details impresses one with the unlimited wealth of artistic resource of the designs, which is explained by the fact that this pagoda is, I am told, authentically known to be two thousand four hundred years old, and is a national glory, so that the observer here sees presented to him,