law very keenly.

_To_ FREDERICK STANLEY SMITH, ESQ.




SWINBLAKE: A PROPHETIC BOOK, WITH HOME ZARATHRUSTS.


Every student of Blake has read, or must read, Mr. Swinburne's
extraordinary essay, _William Blake: a critical study_, of which a new
edition was recently published. It would be idle at this time of day to
criticise. Much has been discovered, and more is likely to be
discovered, about Blake since 1866. The interest of the book, for us, is
chiefly reflex. _And does not the great mouth laugh at a gift_, if
scheduled in an examination paper with the irritating question, 'From
what author does this quotation come?' would probably elicit the reply,
'Swinburne.' Yet it occurs in one of Blake's prophetic books.

How fascinated Blake would have been with Mr. Swinburne if by some
exquisite accident he had lived _after_ him. We should have had, I
fancy, another Prophetic Book; something of this kind:

Swinburne roars and shakes the world's literature--
The English Press, and a good many contemporaries--
Tennyson palls, Browning is found--
Only a brownie--
The mountains divide, the Press is unanimous--
Aylwin is born--