That Bailey's genius is all that need be desired in the "coming poet," will be contested by few who have read and wondered at "Festus"—at its fire of speech, its force of sentiment, its music of sound, its Californian wealth of golden imagery; the infinite variety of its scenes, speeches, and songs; the spirit of reverence which underlies all its liberties, errors, and extravagances; and the originality which, like the air of a mountain summit, renders its perusal at first difficult, and almost deadly, but at last excites and elevates to absolute intoxication. It has, however, been objected to it, that it seems an exhaustion of the author's mind—that its purposeless, planless shape betrays a lack of constructive power—that it becomes almost polemical in its religious aspect, and gives up to party what was meant for mankind—that it betrays a tendency toward obscure, mystical raptures and allegorizings, scarcely consistent with healthy manhood of mind, and which seems growing, as is testified by the "Angel World"—that there is a great gulf between the powers it indicates, and the task of leading the age—and that, on the whole, it is rather a prodigious comet in the poetical heavens, than either a still, calm luminary, or even the curdling of a future fair creation.
Admitting the force of much of this criticism, and that Bailey's art and aptitude to teach are unequal to his native power and richness of mind, we are still willing to wait for a production more matured than "Festus," and less fragmentary and dim than the "Angel World;" and till then, must waive our judgment as to whether on his head the laurel crown is transcendently to flourish.
But meanwhile a young voice has suddenly been uplifted from a provincial town in England, crying, "Hear me—I also am a poet; I aspire, too, to prove myself worthy of being a teacher I aim at no middle flight, but commit myself at once to high, difficult, and daring song, and that, too, of varied kinds." Nor has the voice been despised or disregarded. Some of the most fastidious of critical journals have already waxed enthusiastic in his praise. Many fine spirits, both young and old, have welcomed him with acclamation, as his own hero was admitted, for the sake of one song, into the society of a band of experienced bards. Even the few who deny—unjustly and captiously, as it appears to us—the artistic, admit the poetical merit of his work And we have now before us, not the miserable drudgery of weighing a would-be poet, but the nobler duty of inquiring how far a man of undoubted genius, and great artistic skill, is likely to fulfill the high-raised expectations of the period. The scene of the "Roman" is in Italy. The hero is a patriot, filled and devoured by a love for the liberation of Italy, and for the re-establishment of the ancient Roman Republic—"One, entire, and indivisible." To promote this purpose, he assumes the disguise of a monk; and the history of his progress—addressing now little groups, now single individuals, and now large multitudes of men—at one time captivating, unwittingly, a young and enthusiastic lady, by the fervor of his eloquence, who delivers him from death by suicide—and at another, shaking the walls of his dungeon, through the power and grandeur of his predictions and dreams—till at last, as, after the mockery of a trial, he is led forth to death, he hears the shout of his country, rising en masse—is the whole story of the piece. But around this slender thread, the author has strung some of the largest, richest, and most resplendent gems of poetry we have seen for years.
Let us present our readers with a few passages, selected almost at random. Take the "Song of the Dancers" for its music:
"Dancers. Sing lowly, foot slowly, oh, why should we chase
The hour that gives heaven to this earthly embrace?
To-morrow, to-morrow, is dreary and lonely;
Then love as they love who would live to love only!
Closer yet, eyes of jet—breasts fair and sweet!
No eyes flash like those eyes that flash as they meet!
Weave brightly, wear lightly, the warm-woven chain,
Love on for to-night if we ne'er love again.
Fond youths! happy maidens! we are not alone!
Bright steps and sweet voices keep pace with our own,
Love-lorn Lusignuolo, the soft-sighing breeze,
The rose with the zephyr, the wind with the trees.
While heaven blushing pleasure, is full of love notes,
Soft down the sweet measure the fairy world floats."
P. I, 2.
Take the Monk's Appeal to his "Mother, Italy," for its eloquence:
"By thine eternal youth,
And coeternal utterless dishonor—
Past, present, future, life and death, all oaths
Which may bind earth and heaven, mother, I swear it
We know we have dishonored thee. We know
All thou canst tell the angels. At thy feet,
The feet where kings have trembled, we confess,
And weep; and only bid thee live, my mother,
To see how we can die. Thou shalt be free!
By all our sins, and all thy wrongs, we swear it
We swear it, mother, by the thousand omens
That heave this pregnant time. Tempests for whom
The Alps lack wombs—quick earthquakes—hurricanes
That moan and chafe, and thunder for the light,
And must be native here. Hark, hark, the angel!
I see the birthday in the imminent skies!
Clouds break in fire. Earth yawns. The exulting thunder
Shouts havoc to the whirlwinds. And men hear
Amid the terrors of consenting storms,
Floods, rocking worlds, mad seas, and rending mountains,
Above the infinite clash, one long great cry,
Thou shalt be free!"
P. 14, 15.
Take the few lines about "Truth," for their depth: