Volume I Part 22 (1/2)

'”J'aime le son du cor le soir, au fond des bois, Soit qu'il chante,” &c

And

'”Qu'il est doux, qu'il est doux d'ecouter les histoires Des histoires du temps passe Quand les branches des arbres sont noires, Quand la neige est essaisse, et charge un sol glace, Quand seul dans un ciel pale un peuplier s'elance, Quand sous le manteau blanc qui vient de le cacher L'iirouette au bout du long clocher”

'These poe as the leisure hours of an interesting ny writes in an excellent style; soft, fresh, deliberately graceful Such a style is like fine manners; you think of the words select, appropriate, rather than distinguished, or beautiful De Vigny is a perfect gentleentleman than that of the poets whom he is so full of In character, he looks naturally at those things which interest the man of honor and theabout the poets He should be the elegant and instructive companion of social, not the priest or the rasp with his reasoning powers, though of this, also, he is arace, often with dignity and pathos, what he sees, is his proper vocation Yet, where he fails, he has too h admire the absence of faults in a man whose ae and a country so full of false taste He is never seduced into sentimentality, paradox, violent contrast, and, above all, neverthe horrible with the sublime Above all, he never falls into the error, coigantesque_” His Richelieu and his Bonaparte are treated with great calnified ease, almost as beautiful as majestic superiority

'In this volume is contained all that is on record of the inner life of a man of forty years How many suns, how many rains and dews, to produce a few buds and flowers, so of the e tree, that busy plant” But, as Landor says, ”He who has any thoughts of any worth can, and probably will, afford to let the greater part lie fallow”

'I have not ation, which he repeats as often as Dr Channing the same watch-word of self-sacrifice It is that ment on the point'

BeRANGER

'_Sept_, 1839--I have lately been reading soer's _chansons_ The hour was not propitious I was in a er Bontemps, and beset with circumstances the most unsuited to aiete De ma philosophie;”

yet I ah sentirace A wit that sparkles all over the ocean of life, a sentiment that never puts the best foot forward, but prefers the tone of delicate hurace so aerial, that it nowhere requires the aid of a thought, for in the light refrains of these productions, theis felt as much as in the most pointed lines

Thus, in ”Les Mirmidons,” the refrain--

'”Mirmidons, race feconde, Mirmidons Enfin nous commandons, Jupiter livre le monde, Auxof the insects about the dead lion is expressed as forcibly as in the e of the chanson

In ”La Faridondaine” every sound is a witticisarrison people”

”Halte la! ou la systeh there the for, as in the cone,” ”Souvenirs du Peuple,” ”La Deesse de la Liberte,” ”La Convoi de David,” a melancholy pathos breathes, which touches the heart the”Ce n'est plus Lisette,” ”Mon Habit,”

”L'Independant,” ”Vous vieillirez, O raceful sadness wins us In ”Le Dieu des Bonnes Gens,”

”Les Etoiles qui filent,” ”Les Conseils de Lise,” ”Treize a Table,” a noble dignity is admired, while such as ”La Fortune”

and ”La Metempsycose” are inimitable in their childlike playfulness ”Ma Vocation” I have had and ad fairy changling of great mother Nature; the poet of the people, and, therefore, of all in the upper classes sufficiently intelligent and refined to appreciate the wit and sentiment of the people

But his wit is so truly French in its lightness and sparkling, feathering vivacity, that one like lish tonics, suicidal November melancholy, and Byronic wrath of satire, cannot appreciate hientler stimuli, we like them best, and we also would live awhile in the atmosphere of music and mirth, content if we have ”bread for to-day, and hope for to-morrow”

'There are fine lines in his ”Cinq Mai;” the sentih not sustained by the same majestic sweep of diction, as,--

'”Ce rocher repousse l'esperance, L'Aigle n'est plus dans le secret des dieux, Il fatiguait la victoire a le suivre, Elle etait lasse: il ne l'attendit pas”

'And from ”La Gerontocratie, ou les infiniment petits:”