hibits the
merits and defects of the poet in almost the clearest possible light,
and it may be safely said that no English poet, not the very greatest,
need have been ashamed of such a stanza as this, where there is no
affectation worth speaking of, where the eternal and immortal
commonplaces of poetry are touched to newness as only a master touches,
and where the turn of the phrase and verse is impeccable and supreme:--

And lo! on the ground Rose-Mary lay,
With a cold brow like the snows ere May,
With a cold breast like the earth till Spring--
With such a smile as the June days bring
When the year grows warm for harvesting.

Here, as elsewhere, it has seemed better to postpone most of the
necessary general criticism of schools and groups till the concluding
chapter, but in this particular respect the paucity of individuals which
our scheme leaves (though Miss Rossetti and Mr. O'Shaughnessy will give
valuable assistance presently), may make a few words desirable, even if
they be partly repetition and partly anticipation. We find in Rossetti a
strong influence of pictorial on poetic art; an overpowering tendency to
revert to the forms and figures, the sense and sentiment of the past,
especially the mediaeval past; and a further tendency to a mysticism
which is very often, if not always, poetic in character, as indeed
mysticism generally if not always is. We find in point of form a
distinct preference for lyric over other kinds, a fancy for archaic
language and schemes of verse, a further fancy for elaborate and ornate
language (which does not, however, exclude perfect simplicity when the
poet chooses), and above all, a predilection for attempting and a
faculty for achieving effects of verbal music by cunning adjustment of
vowel and consonant sound which, though it had been anticipated
partially, and as it were accidentally in the seventeenth century, and
had been after the Romantic revival displayed admirably by Coleridge and
Keats, and brought to a high pitch by Tennyson, was even further
elaborated and polished by the present school. Indeed, they may be said
to have absolutely finished this poetical appeal as a distinct and
deliberate one. All poets have always attempted, and all poets always
will attempt, and when they are great, achieve these enchanting effects
of mere sound. But for some considerable time it will not be possible
(indeed it will be quite impossible until the structure, the into