For its still parted darkness--till it breaks
In heavy curls upon thy shoulders--speaks
Like the stern wave, how hard the storm hath been!

"So looked that hapless lady of the South,
Sweet Isabella! at that dreary part
Of all the passion'd hours of her youth;
When her green Basil pot by brother's art
Was stolen away; so look'd her pained mouth
In the mute patience of a breaking heart!"

There let us leave him, the gay rhymer of prize-fighters and eminent
persons--let us leave him in a serious hour, and with a memory of Keats.
{5}




ON VIRGIL


_To Lady Violet Lebas_.

Dear Lady Violet,--Who can admire too much your undefeated resolution to
admire only the right things? I wish I had this respect for authority!
But let me confess that I have always admired the things which nature
made me prefer, and that I have no power of accommodating my taste to the
verdict of the critical. If I do not like an author, I leave him alone,
however great his reputation. Thus I do not care for Mr. Gibbon, except
in his Autobiography, nor for the elegant plays of M. Racine, nor very