The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 54, April, 1862

'T wuz the time for diffusin' correc' views abroad
Of our union an' strength an' relyin' on God;
An', fact, when I'd gut thru my fust big surprise,
I much ez half b'lieved in my own tallest lies,
An' conveyed the idee thet the whole Southun popperlace
Wuz Spartans all on the keen jump for Thermopperlies,
Thet set on the Lincolnites' bombs till they bust,
An' fight for the priv'lege o' dyin' the fust;
But Roanoke, Bufort, Millspring, an' the rest
Of our recent starn-foremost successes out West,
Hain't left us a foot for our swellin' to stand on,—

We've showed too much o' wut Buregard calls abandon,
For all our Thermopperlies (an' it's a marcy
We hain't hed no more) hev ben clean vicy-varsy,
An' wut Spartans wuz lef' when the battle wuz done
Wuz them thet wuz too unambitious to run.

Oh, ef we hed on'y jes' gut Reecognition,
Things now would ha' ben in a different position!
You'd ha' hed all you wanted: the paper blockade
Smashed up into toothpicks,—unlimited trade
In the one thing thet's needfle, till niggers, I swow,
Hed ben thicker 'n provisional shinplasters now,—
Quinine by the ton 'ginst the shakes when they seize ye,—
Nice paper to coin into C.S.A. specie;
The voice of the driver'd be heerd in our land,
An' the univarse scringe, ef we lifted our hand:
Wouldn't thet be some like a fulfillin' the prophecies,
With all the fus' fem'lies in all the best offices?
'T wuz a beautiful dream, an' all sorrer is idle,—
But ef Lincoln would ha' hanged Mason an' Slidell!
They ain't o' no good in European pellices,
But think wut a help they'd ha' ben on their gallowses!
They'd ha' felt they wuz truly fulfillin' their mission,
An', oh, how dog-cheap we'd ha' gut Reecognition!

But somehow another, wutever we've tried,
Though the the'ry's fust-rate, the facs wun't coincide:
Facs are contrary 'z mules, an' ez hard in the mouth,
An' they allus hev showed a mean spite to the South.
Sech bein' the case, we hed best look about
For some kin' o' way to slip our necks out:
Le''s vote our las' dollar, ef one can be found,
(An', at any rate, votin' it hez a good sound,)—
Le''s swear thet to arms all our people is flyin',
(The critters can't read, an' wun't know how we're lyin',)—
Thet Toombs is advancin' to sack Cincinnater,
With a rovin' commission to pillage an' slarter,—
Thet we've throwed to the winds all regard for wut's lawfle,
An' gone in for sunthin' promiscu'sly awfle.
Ye see, hitherto, it's our own knaves an' fools
Thet we've used,—those for whetstones, an't' others ez tools,—
An' now our las' chance is in puttin' to test
The same kin' o' cattle up North an' out West.
I–But, Gennlemen, here's a despatch jes' come in
Which shows thet the tide's begun turnin' agin,—
Gret Cornfedrit success! C'lumbus eevacooated!
I mus' run down an' hev the thing properly stated,
An' show wut a triumph it is, an' how lucky
To fin'lly git red o' thet cussed Kentucky,—
An' how, sence Fort Donelson, winnin' the day
Consists in triumphantly gittin' away.

REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES

The Sisters, Inisfail, and other Poems. By AUBREY DE VERE. London.

Whatever Mr. De Vere writes is welcomed by a select audience. Not taking rank among the great masters of English poetry, he yet possesses a genuine poetic faculty which distinguishes him from "the small harpers with their glees" who counterfeit the true gift of Nature. In refined and delicate sensibility, in purity of feeling, in elevation of tone, there is no English writer of verse at the present day who surpasses him. The fine instinct of a poet is united in him with the cultivated taste of a scholar. There is nothing forced or spasmodic in his verse; it is the true expression of character disciplined by thought and study, of fancy quickened by ready sympathies, of feeling deepened and calmed by faith. As is the case with most English poets since Wordsworth, he invests the impressions received from the various aspects of Nature with moral associations, and with fine spiritual insight he seeks out the inner meaning of the external life of the earth. No one describes more truthfully than he those transient beauties of Nature which in their briefness and their exquisite variety of change elude the coarse grasp of the common observer, and too frequently pass half unnoticed and unfelt even by those whose temperament is susceptive of their inspiring influences, but whose thoughts are occupied with the cares and business of living. But it is especially as the poet of Ireland, and of the Roman Church, that Mr. De Vere presents himself to us in this last volume; and while, consequently, the subject and treatment of many of the poems contained in it give to them a special rather than a universal interest, the patriotic spirit and the fervor of faith manifest in them appeal powerfully to the sympathies of readers in other countries and of other creeds. "'Inisfail' may be regarded as a sort of National Chronicle, cast in a form partly lyrical, partly narrative…. Its aim is to record the past alone, and that chiefly as its chances might have been sung by those old bards, who, consciously or unconsciously, uttered the voice which comes from a people's heart." In this attempt Mr. De Vere has had an uncommon measure of success. The strings of the Irish harp sound with the cadences of fitting harmonies under his hand, as he sings of the sorrows and the joys of Ireland, of the wild storms and the rare sunshine of her pathetic history,—as he denounces vengeance on her oppressors, or blesses the saints and the heroes who have made the land dear and beautiful to its children. The key-note of the series of poems which form this poetic chronicle is struck in the fine verses with which it begins, entitled "History," and of which our space allows us to quote but the opening stanza:—

"At my casement I sat by night, while the wind far off in dark valleys
Voluminous gathered and grew, and waxing swelled to a gale;
An hour I heard it, or more, ere yet it sobbed on my lattice:
Far off, 't was a People's moan; hard by, but a widow's wail.
Atoms we are, we men: of the myriad sorrow around us
Our littleness little grasps; and the selfish in that have no part:
Yet time with the measureless chain of a world-wide mourning hath
wound us;
History but counts the drops as they fall from a Nation's heart."

One of the most vigorous poems in the volume is that called "The Bard Ethell," and which represents this bard of the thirteenth century telling in his old age of himself and his country, of his memories, and of the wrongs that he and his land had alike suffered:—

"I am Ethell, the son of Conn;
Here I live at the foot of the hill;
I am clansman to Brian, and servant to none;
Whom I hated, I hate; whom I loved, love still."

Here is a passage from near the end of this poem:—

"Ah me, that man who is made of dust
Should have pride toward God! 'T is an angel's sin!
I have often feared lest God, the All-Just,
Should bend from heaven and sweep earth clean,
Should sweep us all into corners and holes,
Like dust of the house-floor, both bodies and
souls;
I have often feared He would send some
wind
In wrath, and the nation wake up stone-blind!
In age or youth we have all wrought ill."