mily." The story I cannot at this stage
anticipate. Some looseness of diction I have taken liberty to advert to.
It wants a little more severity of style. There are too many
prettinesses, but parts of the Poem are better than pretty, and I thank
you for the perusal.

Your humble Servt.

C. LAMB.

Perhaps you will favour me with a call while you stay.

Line 42. "The old abbaye" (if abbey _was_ so spelt) I do not object to,
because it does not seem your own language, but humoursomely adapted to
the "how folks called it in those times."

82. "Flares"! Think of the vulgarism "flare up;" let it be "burns."

112. [In her pale countenance is blent
The majesty of high intent
With meekness by devotion lent,
And when she bends in prayer
Before the Virgin's awful shrine,--
The rapt enthusiast might deem
The seraph of his brightest dream,
Were meekly kneeling there.]

"Was" decidedly, not "were." The deeming or supposition, is of a
reality, not a contingency. The enthusiast does not deem that a thing
may be, but that it _is_.

118. [When first young Vernon's flight she knew,
The lady deemed the tale untrue.]

"Deemed"! This word is just repeated above; say "thought" or "held."
"Deem" is half-cousin to "ween" and "wot."

143. [By pure intent and soul sincere
Sustained and nerved, I will not fear
Reproach, shame, scorn, the taunting jeer,
And worse than all, a father's sneer.]

A father's "sneer"? Would a high-born man in those days _sneer_ at a
daughter's disgrace--would he _only_ sneer?

Reproach, and biting shame, and--worse
Than all--the estranged father's curse.

I only throw this hint out in a hurry.

177. "Stern and _sear_"? I see a meaning in it, but no word is good that
startles one at first, and then you have to make it out: "drear,"
perhaps. Then why "to minstrel's glance"? "To fancy's eye," you would
say, not "to fiddler's eye."

422. A knight thinks, he don't "trow."

424. "Mayhap" is vulgarish. Perchance.

464. "Sensation" is a philosophic prose word. Feeling.

27. [The hill, where ne'er rang woodman's stroke,
Was clothed with elm and spreading oak,
Through whose black boughs the moon's mild ray
As hardly strove to win a way,
As pity to a miser's heart.]

Na