m. It is surely one of the loveliest spots in the world.
It is one of my lions, and if you will make me a visit this spring, I
will take you up to hear it roar, and I will show you 'the oaks'--the
largest, I fancy, left in the country."

21. Undine: In mythology and romance, Undine is a water-spirit who
is endowed with a soul by her marriage with a mortal. The _race_ is
the watercourse conducted, from the dam in an open trough or
"penstock" to the wheel.

45. In that new childhood of the Earth: This poem was written a few
weeks after the _Vision of Sir Launfal_ was published, and it
therefore naturally partakes of its idealism.

_THE PRESENT CRISIS_

This poem was written in 1844. The discussion over the annexation of
Texas was absorbing public attention. The anti-slavery party opposed
annexation, believing that it would strengthen the slave-holding
interests, and for the same reason the South was urging the scheme.
Lowell wrote several very strong anti-slavery poems at this time, _To
W.L. Garrison_, _Wendell Phillips_, _On the Death of C.T. Torrey_, and
others, which attracted attention to him as a new and powerful ally of
the reform party. "These poems," says George William Curtis,
"especially that on _The Present Crisis,_ have a Tyrtaean resonance, a
stately rhetorical rhythm, that make their dignity of thought, their
intense feeling, and picturesque imagery, superbly effective in
recitation. They sang themselves on every anti-slavery platform."

While the poem was inspired by the political struggle of the time,
which Lowell regarded as a crisis in the history of our national honor
and progress, its chief strength is due to the fact that its lofty
sentiment is universal in its appeal, and not applicable merely to
temporal and local conditions.

17. Round the earth's electric circle, etc.: This prophetic figure was
doubtless suggested by the first telegraph line, which Samuel F.B.
Morse had just erected between Baltimore and Washington.

37. The Word: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with
God, and the Word was God." (_John_ i, 1.)

44. Delphic cave: The oracle at Delphi was the most famous and
authoritative among the Greeks. The priestess who voiced the answers
of the god was seated in a natural fissure in the rocks.

46. Cyclops: The Cyclopes were brutish giants with one eye who lived
in caverns and fed on human flesh, if the opportunity offered. Lowell
is recalling in these lines t