It is not, however, a very remarkable production.
The Smouse, by Fannin, has the modern merit of incomprehensibility. It reads like something out of The Hunting of the Snark:
I’m a Smouse, I’m a Smouse in the wilderness wide,
The veld is my home, and the wagon’s my pride:
The crack of my ‘voerslag’ shall sound o’er the lea,
I’m a Smouse, I’m a Smouse, and the trader is free!
I heed not the Governor, I fear not his law,
I care not for civilisation one straw,
And ne’er to ‘Ompanda’—‘Umgazis’ I’ll throw
While my arm carries fist, or my foot bears a toe!
‘Trek,’ ‘trek,’ ply the whip—touch the fore oxen’s skin,
I’ll warrant we’ll ‘go it’ through thick and through thin—
Loop! loop ye oud skellums! ot Vikmaan trek jy;
I’m a Smouse, I’m a Smouse, and the trader is free!
The South African poets, as a class, are rather behind the age. They seem to think that ‘Aurora’ is a very novel and delightful epithet for the dawn. On the whole they depress us.
Chess, by Mr. Louis Tylor, is a sort of Christmas masque in which the dramatis personæ consist of some unmusical carollers, a priggish young man called Eric, and the chessmen off the board. The White Queen’s Knight begins a ballad and the Black King’s Bishop completes it. The Pawns sing in chorus and the Castles converse with each other. The silliness of the form makes it an absolutely unreadable book.
Mr. Williamson’s Poems of Nature and Life are as orthodox in spirit as they are commonplace in form. A few harmless heresies of art and thought would do this poet no harm. Nearly everything that he says has been said before and said better. The only original thing in the volume is the description of Mr. Robert Buchanan’s ‘grandeur of mind.’ This is decidedly new.
Dr. Cockle tells us that Müllner’s Guilt and The Ancestress of Grillparzer are the masterpieces of German fate-tragedy. His translation of the first of these two masterpieces does not make us long for any further acquaintance with the school. Here is a specimen from the fourth act of the fate-tragedy.
SCENE VIII.
ELVIRA. HUGO.
ELVIRA (after long silence, leaving the harp, steps to Hugo, and seeks his gaze).
HUGO (softly). Though I made sacrifice of thy sweet life. The Father has forgiven. Can the wife—Forgive?
ELVIRA (on his breast). She can!
HUGO (with all the warmth of love). Dear wife!
ELVIRA (after a pause, in deep sorrow). Must it be so, beloved one?
HUGO (sorry to have betrayed himself). What?
In his preface to The Circle of Seasons, a series of hymns and verses for the seasons of the Church, the Rev. T. B. Dover expresses a hope that this well-meaning if somewhat tedious book ‘may be of value to those many earnest people to whom the subjective aspect of truth is helpful.’ The poem beginning
Lord, in the inn of my poor worthless heart
Guests come and go; but there is room for Thee,