Mr. Beckett closes some very singular stanzas, entitled an Introduction, with the following lines:—
"Give it praise, or blame,
Or pass it without comment, as may seem
To you most meet; with me 'tis all the same.
I hymn because I must, and not for greed of fame."
These lines incline us at first to let Mr. Beckett "pass without comment," considering, that, as he says, he cannot help writing; but we are finally decided to observe him more closely, inasmuch as he says it makes no difference to him, thus relieving us of the dreadful fear of wantonly crushing some delicate John Keats (always supposing we had him) by our severe censure.
Instead of entering into a philosophical examination of "Hester," we shall present some specimen pearls, making our first extract from the 21st page:—
"The very desert would have smiled
In such a presence! yet despite
Her dimpled cheek, her soft blue eye,
Her voice so fraught with music's thrill,
The shrewd observer might espy
The traces therein of a will
That scorned restraint, the soul of fire
That slumbered in her tacit sire."
"The traces therein." Wherein? Not in the cheek, eye, or voice, clearly; for it was "despite" all these that he would make the discovery,—they are obstacles, entirely outside of the success. It is necessarily, then, in the "presence," in which the unthinking desert would have smiled unsuspecting, but in which "the shrewd observer might espy" a good deal that was ominous of trouble. Now it is obvious that the writer intended to refer "therein" to the cheek, eye, and voice, a reference from which he barred himself by the word "despite." As it happens, luckily for him, there is a word to refer to, so that his grammatical salvation is secured; but the result is sad nonsense.
Page 23,—
"Indeed, it was their chief delight,
When combed the far seas feather-white,
To steer out on the roughening bay
With leaning prow and flying spray,
And gunnel ready to submerge
Itself beneath the flaming surge!"
Page 28,—
"nor gave
He heed to aught on land or wave;
As if some kyanized regret
Were in his heart," etc., etc.