(O Mother, Mary Mother,
Lost, lost, all lost, between Hell and Heaven!)
This, and other poems by Rossetti, such as Eden Bower, and Troy Town, only revived a very old fashion—the ballad with a refrain or burden.
But when once it was revived so many indifferent poets attempted to utter their little insipidities in the ballad style, that the parodists soon caught the infection. One gentleman furbished up a tremendous ballad which resembled nothing so much as the cry of a costermonger, for its burden, oft repeated, was—
“Apple, and orange, and nectarine,”
whilst one of the evening papers published the following satire on Rossetti’s style:—
After Dilettante Concetti.
“Why do you wear your hair like a man,
Sister Helen?
This week is the third since you began.”