Poems. By Edward Rowland Sill. (Houghton, Mifflin, and Co.)—These poems
are noticeable for the deep feeling which they show, and for a quiet beauty of expression. In the first of the volume, " The Venus of Milo," Mr. Sill has skilfully drawn a comparison between the masterpiece of Praxiteles and the Medicean Venus, as respectively the types of spiritual and earthly love. Both in idea and form, the poem is finely conceived and worked out. Here are some lines describing the great statue :- " Thy garments' fallen folds
Leave beautiful the fair round breast In sacred loveliness ; the bosom deep
Where happy babe might sloop; The ample waist no narrowing girdle holds,
Where daughters slim might come to cling and rest, Like tendriled vines against the plane-tree pressed."
The poems throughout show a keen appreciation of the beauties of Nature, and a great power of describing them. Perhaps this power is beat illustrated in the poem of " Christmas in California." The following lines will afford a specimen of delicate word- painting :—
" Before me on the wide, warm hay, A million azure ripples run ;
Round me the sprouting palm-shoots lay Their shining lances to the sun.
With glossy leaves that poise or swing,
The cause their white cups unfold, And faintest chimes of odour ring
From silver bel:s with tongues of gold."
For the sake of completeness, we would add another stanza, describing the scene with which this is contrasted :—
" Pencilled against the cold white sky Above the curling eaves of snow, The thin blue smoke lifts lingeringly, As loth to leave the mirth below."
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