The lines in "Faithful for Ever," particularly alluded to as having been condemned by the "Critic," were those here italicized in the following passage:
"For your sake I am glad to hear,
You sail so soon. I send you, Dear,
A trifling present, and will supply
Your Salisbury costs. You have to buy
Almost an outfit for this cruise!
But many are good enough to use
Again, among the things you send
To give away. My maid shall mend
And let you have them back. Adieu!
Tell me of all you see and do.
I know, thank God, whate'er it be,
'Twill need no veil 'twixt you and me."
("Faithful for Ever," p. 17, II. "Mrs. Graham to Frederick," her sailor son.)
[156] See "Sesame and Lilies" (Ruskin's Works, vol. i.), p. 89, note. "Coventry Patmore. You cannot read him too often or too carefully; as far as I know he is the only living poet who always strengthens and purifies; the others sometimes darken, and nearly always depress and discourage, the imagination they deeply seize."
[From "The Asiatic," May 23, 1871.]
"THE QUEEN OF THE AIR."
To the Editor of "The Asiatic."
Sir: I am obliged and flattered by the tone of your article on my "Queen of the Air" in your last number, but not at all by the substance of it; and it so much misinterprets my attempt in that book that I will ask your leave to correct it in main points.[157] The "Queen of the Air" was written to show, not what could be fancied, but what was felt and meant, in the myth of Athena. Every British sailor knows, that Neptune is the god of the sea. He does not know that Athena is the goddess of the air; I doubt if many of our school-boys know it—I doubt even if many of our school-masters know it; and I believe the evidence of it given in the "Queen of the Air" to be the first clear and connected approximate proof of it which has yet been rendered by scientific mythology, properly so called.
You say, "I have not attempted to explain all mythology."