This is a sonnet of sincere feeling by Mr. Watts:

THE FIRST KISS.

IF only in dreams may Man be fully blest,

Is heav'n a dream? Is she I claspt a dream? Or stood she here even now where dewdrops gleam And miles of furze shine golden down the west? I seem to clasp her still, — still on my breast Her bosom beats, I see the blue eyes beam: I think she kiss'd these lips, for now they seem Scarce mine, so hallow'd of the lips they pressed!

Yon thicket's breath

Those birds

can that be eglantine?

can they be morning's choristers ? Can this be Earth? Can these be banks of furze? Like burning bushes fired of God they shine!

I seem to know them, though this body of mine
Pass'd into spirit at the touch of hers!

Andrew Lang is so well known in America, as a man who writes with enthusiasm and says things strongly and well, that one need hardly put his name under the following:

THE ODYSSEY.

As one that for a weary space has lain
Lulled by the song of Circe and her wine
In gardens near the pale of Proserpine,
Where that Egean isle forgets the main,
And only the low lutes of love complain,
And only shadows of wan lovers pine,
As such an one were glad to know the brine
Salt on his lips, and the large air again, ·

So, gladly, from the songs of modern speech

Men turn, and see the stars, and feel the free

Shrill wind beyond the close of heavy flowers, And, through the music of the languid hours, They hear, like ocean on a western beach, The surge and thunder of the Odyssey.

The playful satire, underlying point and deft poise in the following are also quite characteristic of Mr. Dobson:

DON QUIXOTE.

BEHIND thy pasteboard, on thy battered hack,
Thy lean cheek striped with plaster to and fro,
Thy long spear leveled at the unseen foe,
And doubtful Sancho trudging at thy back,
Thou wert a figure strange enough, good lack!
To make wiseacredom, both high and low,
Rub purblind eyes, and (having watched thee go)
Despatch its Dogsberrys upon thy track:

Alas, poor Knight! Alas, poor soul possest!
Yet would to-day, when Courtesy grows chill,
And life's fine loyalties are turned to jest,

Some fire of thine might burn within us still!
Ah! would but one might lay his lance in rest,
And charge in earnest were it but a mill!

There is great temptation to prolong this prelude of foreign sonnets, but we must close with Mr. Gosse's curious and musical sonnet, "Alcyone."

A SONNET IN DIALOGUE.

Phoebus. WHAT voice is this that wails above the deep? Alcyone. A wife's, that mourns her fate and loveless

days.

Phoebus. What love lies buried in these waterways?

Alcyone. A husband's, hurried to eternal sleep.

Phoebus. Cease, O beloved, cease to wail and weep!

Alcyone. Wherefore?

Phoebus.

The waters in a fiery blaze Proclaim the godhead of my healing rays. Alcyone. No god can sow where fate hath stood to reap. Phoebus. Hold, wringing hands! cease, piteous tears, to fall!

Alcyone. But grief must rain and glut the passionate

sea.

Phoebus. Thou shalt forget this ocean and thy wrong, And I will bless the dead, though past recall. Alcyone. What can'st thou give to me or him in me? Phoebus. A name in story and a light in song.

The literature of America is so young that the diffusion of the sonnet form through it need hardly be considered chronologically. The men who brought the sonnet to perfection and popularity in this country are either still living or have but recently passed away, so that the historical view of American sonnets is a brief one at best. It is a matter for pride that the earliest of our native writers of the sonnet, as he has long been reputed to be, was so admirable a figure as Colonel David Humphreys. He mingled both literary and patriotic ambitions, was a Yale graduate, a soldier and diplomat.

It is evident that people did not take the leisure to write many sonnets in the early days of the republic. Such things could be obtained from England, and meanwhile there was plenty of more onerous work to be done in making of laws, hewing of forests, and building of states. The sonnet being a product of leisurely culture, and generally preceded by simpler forms of verse, it is not sur

prising, then, that there were no prominent writers of the sonnet before the patriarchal group of poets who fathered the melodious period of our own time. In this group were the accomplished Percival, the gifted Dana, the painter Allston, the versatile Willis, the dignified Bryant. But even of these it must be noted that Dana was not a sonneteer. Many of the older poets wrote only the Shakespearean or some irregular form of sonnet, Bryant declaring that he failed to see the superior melody of the Italian form. Indeed, there are a number of prominent American poets who are not sonneteers. Emerson could not bind to so rigid and intricate a form a muse that must "aye climb for its rhyme." Poe's sonnets were few, and not noteworthy when compared with his other verse. The idea of Walt Whitman writing a sonnet is calculated to bring a smile; and this list might be extended. So it must not be expected that a sonnet anthology will wholly represent the poets of the time nor exactly measure the poetic capacity of those who are included. The men, then, who have really been pioneers in the revival of the sonnet in our literature, are poets like Longfellow, Boker, Lowell, Bayard Taylor, and Aldrich. It would only be fair to mention with them such poets among women as Mrs. Botta, Mrs. Dorr, Mrs. Preston, Mrs. Oakes Smith, etc. But closely following these is such an array of sonnet-writers the young and the middle-aged poets of to-day that one would have to mention scores of names to represent the group.

It must be admitted that the sonnet in America has grown of its own vitality. Until recent years there has been little written on the subject to stim

ulate production; while anthologies of poetry, generally compiled by poets out of sympathy with the sonnet, have given the little poem scant recognition indeed. The only anthology of American sonnets yet published in this country appeared in 1867, and its editor then lamented the poverty of good material to choose from. It notes the promising sonnets of Aldrich, a star that seemed to have just gleamed above the horizon as the book was sent to press. But the general longing on the part of the editor is like Rowland Robinson's in the old hymn

"Teach me some melodious sonnet."

The English collection of American sonnets made by William Sharp, and published recently (when the present compilation was about half finished), gave indication of the very respectable resources of our sonnet mines. In it the compiler stated that he believed a finer collection of sonnets could be made from the contemporary American poets than from living English ones. We acknowledge the charm of many current English sonnets, but we are tempted to adopt his generous opinion; for we believe that the living American poets are holding their own against our contemporary cousins in sonnets as well as in other forms of poetry. After perusing some of the English collections of sonnets, we fancy there is a certain generic difference between the typical contemporary English sonnet and the current American one. If one may hazard the opinion, English sonnets display most conspicuously a sedate, often deep, order of thought, occasional striking imagery, and a punctilious ob