at
may shelter itself under the royal mantle of Shakespeare. The poet has
here achieved what he too often fails in, the triple union of
simplicity, pathos, and (in the best sense) elegance. The dangerous
repetitions of "roses, roses," "tired, tired," &c., come all right;
and above all he has the flexibility and quiver of metre that he too
often lacks. His trisyllabic interspersions--the leap in the vein that
makes iambic verse alive and passionate--are as happy as they can be,
and the relapse into the uniform dissyllabic gives just the right
contrast. He must be [Greek: e therion e theos]--and whichever he
be, he is not to be envied--who can read _Requiescat_ for the
first or the fiftieth time without mist in the eyes and without a
catch in the voice.

But the greatest of these--the greatest by far--is
_The Scholar-Gipsy_. I have read--and that not once only, nor
only in the works of unlettered and negligible persons--expressions of
irritation at the local Oxonian colour. This is surely amazing. One
may not be an Athenian, and never have been at Athens, yet be able to
enjoy the local colour of the _Phaedrus_. One may not be an
Italian, and never have been in Italy, yet find the _Divina
Commedia_ made not teasing but infinitely vivid and agreeable by
Dante's innumerable references to his country, Florentine and general.
That some keener thrill, some nobler gust, may arise in the reading of
the poem to those who have actually watched

"The line of festal light in Christ Church Hall"

from above Hinksey, who know the Fyfield elm in May, and have "trailed
their fingers in the stripling Thames" at Bablockhithe,--may be
granted. But in the name of Bandusia and of Gargarus, what offence can
these things give to any worthy wight who by his ill luck has not seen
them with eyes? The objection is so apt to suggest a suspicion, as
illiberal almost as itself, that one had better not dwell on it.

Let us hope that there are after all few to whom it has presented
itself--that most, even if they be not sons by actual matriculation of
Oxford, feel that, as of other "Cities of God," they are citizens of
her by spiritual adoption, and by the welcome accorded in all such
cities to God's children. But if the scholar had been an alumnus of
Timbuctoo, and for Cumnor and Godstow had been substituted strange
places in _-wa_ and _-ja_, I cannot think that, even to
those who are of Oxford, the intrinsic greatness of this noble poem
would