The first volume of HOME LYRICS was published during the life of the authoress, in 1876, receiving, amongst others, comments from the press as follows:
From the Morning Post, Jan. 4th, 1877.
The mantle of Mrs. Hemans may be said to have descended on Mrs. H. S. Battersby. She infuses into her poems the ardour of home affection; her faith is pure, and her hope unswerving. Many of her verses have inspiration from the clear, bracing air of Canadian skies. She loves the grandeur of nature; lofty rocks and waterfalls; forests whitened with snows, and vast frozen lakes, smooth as polished marble, and solid as granite. He who delights in the fauna and flora of nature has in every clime
"Which the eye of Heaven visits."
a library fruitful of study and a pursuit which is innocent and healthful. Mrs. Battersby deduces a moral lesson in her spirited lines "To the Chaudière Falls, Canada"—
"Oh, wild rolling waters; oh, white-crested foam,
I, too, would press onward, right on to my home;
Like thee, with stern purpose, let nothing impede,
Or cause me to falter in courage or speed.
"My mission, like thine, is right onward to go,
Though tempests be raging and dark waters flow,
Oh, might I, like these, with firm, resolute voice,
Through dangers, and even through tempests, rejoice!"
But the author reserves her warmest welcome and her loudest notes of praise for the charming scenery of her native land. "Beautiful Malvern" is dearer to her heart than the most romantic regions in Europe. More beloved than the snow-capped grandeur of the Alps, than the castle crowned Rhine, enshrined in the stanzas of a hundred poets, Helvetia's dark gorges, and the silvery cascade of Giessbach, calm Chamounix, and the gloomy dungeons and stake of the Castle of Chilon.
"All these wonders of nature and wonders of mind,
With their thousand attractions of beauty combined,
Have served but to strengthen my fond love for thee,
And make thee, dear Malvern, still dearer to me."
This supports the quaint remark of a tourist that one of the great delights of travelling is the thought and anticipated pleasure of coming home again. From the subjects chosen for many of her poems the author has evidently made appeal rather to the narrow circle of her own near relations and friends than to that ever-increasing one which is expressed by the phrase of the "reading public." She writes thus in her preface, the brevity of which is much to be commended:—"They are published chiefly for the author's dear children, relations, and valued friends, to whose hearths and hearts it is hoped that they will, as HOME LYRICS, readily find their way."
In "A Painful History," Mrs. Battersby speaks boldly out against one of our social inequalities, which she sensibly and very justly denounces. All men of true honour must accept and endorse her verdict. Hood treats the same theme with all the tenderness of his fine sensitive nature, and with all that exquisite harmony which his refined muse had at ready command. HOME LYRICS is a charming little volume of poems, full of sincerity, grace, and devotional feeling.