It takes but a short while to read this thin volume; nor will any one with a taste for true poetry find the perusal a task. The author undoubtedly possesses [pg 720] “the vision and the faculty divine,” and belongs to the subjective school of which Tennyson is king—a school peculiarly capable of teaching a subjective age. The more the pity, then, say we, that Mr. Ellis should have made his chief poem, “The Two Ysondes,” hang on the idea that love is fate. His “Two Ysondes” are the two “Isolts” of Tennyson; but Tennyson does not attempt to excuse the passion of Mark's wife for Tristrem. Our author makes it originate in Tristrem and Ysonde having “drunk,” “by an evil chance,” a philtre which had been placed “in Tristrem's charge” as “a wedding-gift for Ysonde and King Mark” (p. 7). Now, it may be said that this does away with the guilty aspect of the romance, and throws over the whole a veil of faëry. Yes; but we insist that it is, therefore, the more mischievous, as teaching the doctrine of fatality.
Neither is this the only, or even the most, objectionable feature of the poem; for, together with descriptions of emotions and caresses which would be chaste if the theme were lawful love, all idea of sin is kept away, and especially as regards its eternal consequences. There is not a word about remorse during life, or of repentance at death. But Tristrem dies in despair of beholding the object of his passion; and Ysonde, in turn, expires on the breast of her dead lover, declaring that she will “go with him beyond the bars of fate.”
Now, we should not have troubled ourselves to make these strictures but that Mr. Ellis shows powers for the misuse of which he will be very responsible. Moreover, as is clear from some of his shorter lyrics, particularly “At a Shrine,” his mind has a religious bent, with (of course) Catholic sympathies.
With regard to his verse, it is less Tennysonic than his thought. Better if, while originating metres (with which we have no quarrel whatever), he modelled both his lines and his diction on the peerless accuracy of England's laureate.
Books And Pamphlets Received.
From Kelly, Piet & Co., Baltimore: The Money God. By M. A. Quinton.
From Lynch, Cole & Meehan, New York: English Misrule in Ireland: A Course of Lectures. By V. Rev. T. N. Burke, O.P. 12mo. pp. 299.
From J. A. McGee, New York: “Thumping English Lies”: Froude's Slanders on Ireland and Irishmen. With Preface and Notes by Col. J. E. McGee, and Wendell Phillips' Views of the Situation. 12mo. pp. 224.—Half Hours with Irish Authors: Selections from Griffin, Lover, Carleton, and Lever. 12mo. pp. 330.
From A. D. F. Randolph, New York: Christ at the Door. By Susan H. Ward. 12mo, pp. 232.
From J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia: Expiation. By Mrs. Julia C. R. Dorr.