hink I must have hurriedly mis-expressed
myself in writing to him, as he seems to think I wished to
dissuade him from following narrative poetry. Not in the
least--I only wished him to try his hand at clearer dramatic
life. The dreamy romantic really hardly needs more than one
vast Morris in a literature--at any rate in a century. Not
that I think him derivable from Morris--he goes straight
back to Keats with a little modification. The narrative,
whether condensed or developed, is at any rate a far better
impersonal form to work in than declamatory harangue,
whether calling on the stars or the Styx. I don't know in
the least how Watson is faring with the critics. He must not
be discouraged, in any case, with his real and high gifts.

The young poet, in whom Rossetti saw so much to applaud, can scarcely be
said to have fared at all at the hands of the critics.

Here is a pleasant piece of literary portraiture, as valuable from the
peep it affords into Rossetti's own character as from the description it
gives of the rustic poet:

The other evening I had the pleasant experience of meeting
one to whom I have for about two years looked with interest
as a poet of the native rustic kind, but often of quite a
superior order. I don't know if you noticed, somewhere about
the date referred to, in _The Athenaeum_, a review of poems
by Joseph Skipsey. Skip-sey has exquisite--though, as in all
such cases (except of course Burns's) not equal--powers in
several directions, but his pictures of humble life are the
best. He is a working miner, and describes rustic loves and
sports, and the perils and pathos of pit-life with great
charm, having a quiet humour too when needed. His more
ambitious pieces have solid merit of feeling, but are much
less artistic. The other night, as I say, he came here, and
I found him a stalwart son of toil, and every inch a
gentleman. In cast of face he recalls Tennyson somewhat,
though more bronzed and brawned. He is as sweet and gentle
as a woman in manner, and recited some beautiful things of
his own with a special freshness to which one is quite
unaccustomed.

Mr. Skipsey was a miner of North Shields, and in the review referred to
much was made, in a delicate way, of his stern environments. His volume
of lyrics is marked by the quiet humour. Rosset