'the splendid
imperfection of an AEschylus,' or that we had lately 'one dramatist
living in England, and only one, who could be compared to Hugo, and that
was Richard Hengist Horne,' and that 'to find an English dramatist of the
same order before him we must go back to Sheridan if not to Otway.' Mr.
Noel, again, has a curious habit of classing together the most
incongruous names and comparing the most incongruous works of art. What
is gained by telling us that 'Sardanapalus' is perhaps hardly equal to
'Sheridan,' that Lord Tennyson's ballad of The Revenge and his Ode on the
Death of the Duke of Wellington are worthy of a place beside Thomson's
Rule Britannia, that Edgar Allan Poe, Disraeli and Mr. Alfred Austin are
artists of note whom we may affiliate on Byron, and that if Sappho and
Milton 'had not high genius, they would be justly reproached as
sensational'? And surely it is a crude judgment that classes Baudelaire,
of all poets, with Marini and mediaeval troubadours, and a crude style
that writes of 'Goethe, Shelley, Scott, and Wilson,' for a mortal should
not thus intrude upon the immortals, even though he be guilty of holding
with them that Cain is 'one of the finest poems in the English language.'
It is only fair, however, to add that Mr. Noel subsequently makes more
than ample amends for having opened Parnassus to the public in this
reckless manner, by calling Wilson an 'offal-feeder,' on the ground that
he once wrote a severe criticism of some of Lord Tennyson's early poems.
For Mr. Noel does not mince his words. On the contrary, he speaks with
much scorn of all euphuism and delicacy of expression and, preferring the
affectation of nature to the affectation of art, he thinks nothing of
calling other people 'Laura Bridgmans,' 'Jackasses' and the like. This,
we think, is to be regretted, especially in a writer so cultured as Mr.
Noel. For, though indignation may make a great poet, bad temper always
makes a poor critic.

On the whole, Mr. Noel's book has an emotional rather than an
intellectual interest. It is simply a record of the moods of a man of
letters, and its criticisms merely reveal the critic without illuminating
what he would criticise for us. The best that we can say of it is that
it is a Sentimental Journey through Literature, the worst that any one
could say of it is that it has all the merits of such an expedition.

Essays on Poetry and Poets. By the Hon. Roden Noel. (Kegan Paul.)