CURRENT LITERAT URE.
Evenings in Arcadia. Edited by John Dennis. (E. Moron and Co.)— Conversations on the English rural poets by three friends, who must, we suppose, be taken to have a real existence. From internal evidence we should hardly have arrived at that conclusion, and the form at least of the remarks of Hartley and Stanley must be due to Talbot or the editor. Their criticism is just and sensible, and very few will be the readers who will not recognize a much profounder acquaintance with our minor poets in the friends than he possesses himself. From the -conversational form into which it is thrown two good regatta have followed —the maintenance of a common-sense tone, and a freedom from that necessity of saying something distinct about each poet which often tempts the writer of set essays to see more in poets like Shenstone or Akenside than is really to be found in them. On the other hand, a volume of critical talk is rather discursive, and must be read piecemeal. Evenings is Arcadia is worth reading.
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