A Handful of Honeysuckle. By A. Mary F. Robinson. (C.
Kegan Paul and Co.)—The "Rime of True Lovers," with which this volume opens, and which is said to be " after Boccacio," is a little poem of such sterling value, that we need not go further to be assured of Miss Robinson's poetical capacities. Martuccio and Constance are parted for awhile ; tidings come to the lady of her lover's death (sent, it would seem, after the somewhat cruel fashion of chivalrous times, to try her constancy). She goes,- " Musing,—this heart I dare not strike ;
He loved it. Neither lips he found So sweet, must poison touch. Belike, I should remember underground How all the land and all the sea
Lies cold between my love and me.
Would God I were with him, where he lies drowned :"
How she goes out to sea in an open boat, without rudder or oars, and how the winds, ever kind in those days to faithful lovers, wafted her to the very place where Martuccio was looking out across the sea, is very prettily told :—
"She opened wide her happy eyes.
That shone so strangely, sweet and bright And said, • We are in Paradise : too, was lost at sea last night.
What? did you think when you were drowned I could stay happy on dry ground? No, no, I came to you, my heart's delight :' '
The simplicity and grace of the whole, the genuine pathos which makes itself felt under a somewhat conventional form, and the skill with which a somewhat difficult metro is handled, are worthy of high praise. The occasional poems have their sweet pathos, and sometimes a certain weird power, but it is by longer efforts that reputations are made. The best of tho shorter pieces, perhaps, is " To a Dragon-fly."
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