with great success, but the shadows are a little too deep. You do not catch gleams of light through the cloud-rifts. Again, the slave characters are too numerous, and have no very marked identity. This is the weakest part of the play. Where Mrs. Stowe does admirably well, our author is not successful. Read the drama, and you will hardly remember the negroes, save two or three; while the members of the planter's household you remember distinctly. It is hard to enter completely into sympathy with negro-life. It is a common fault in negro novels; and all we mean to say is, that the same fault stands out here. Had there been fewer of this race, and had they been more sharply drawn, the play would have been more popular, more successful. But no work is perfect; and we must not blame a writer for not doing what is perhaps impossible. It is pleasanter to turn to what she has done exceedingly well.

In dramatic power, we think our author excels. That peculiar intensity of expression which tragedy requires, she is master of. That she should fail in the delineation of negro character is not to be wondered at. But the fine conception of the white characters, and finer clothing of that conception as the persona stand out upon the stage, make you feel her peculiar power. The imagination is strong, but controlled. The touches of her pen are delicate; study alone will appreciate them. This drama is for the closet; and these fine pointings of thought give charm and grace, whenever the burstings of intense tragic feeling allow of them.

This brings us to another merit in this play the style. It is among the best dramatic writing we know of, outside the old dramatists. It is simple, sweet, passionate poetry, as clear and sparkling as the beautiful river that glides and murmurs by our parsonage. The rhythm is easy and flowing. The words are nimble, well selected, and put precisely where they were needed most. The poetry has the ease of the best conversation, and yet is true poetry. Take a specimen. Hermann describes Helen's genius:

That ruder senses miss. She feels the accord
Between the genius of a race, its language,
Its history: thus each reveals the other.
Through some mysterious power of sympathy,
The acts, the thoughts of distant times and lands,

To her are as the present and the near.

All that is human is akin to her."

What grace and charm in the flow of the verse, while the

thought is exquisite!

How free from high-sounding words!

How could this be better expressed?

"You cannot tell what grief it is to hold

Your fondest thoughts imprisoned in your heart

And never give them voice."

And then the old Greek chorus is imitated by the "swallow flights of song" which the minstrels sing at intervals. They have a sweet plaintive air, the echo of earlier, happier days. Here are a few verses taken from an intercalary song:

"O Christ! O King of Glory! thus homeless didst Thou go!
Thou wast not too high for sorrow, as we are not too low!

But Thou wast born of woman! Didst Thou bear Thy bitter part,
And never know the failing of Thy mother's feeble heart?
Oh, look on those who follow the path that once was Thine,
Their earthly hearts imploring as then did the divine!

Thou, faultless and reproachless, couldst seek the Father's face;
We, full of sin and doubting, have no refuge but Thy grace."

Nor must we omit to quote the verses which preface the second part of the tragedy. Their delicate, pathetic allusion to one who is now no more is as true to a mother's heart as it is beautiful.

"Still hold them in thy tender fostering while

The cool air of a wider world they brave,

These household growths that rose beneath thy smile

To be the earliest offering at thy grave.

"Nor fail me when upon the steepening slope,
Viewing my future lonely road, I stand,

With earnest purpose, though with humble hope:

Be my strength still, true heart and faithful hand!"

As true poetry as ever breathed from poet's lips! Many such tender strains can you pick out of the work; but we will leave

the reader to find them.

Only let us quote one passage more. It is charming, both for the thought, and its nervous, yet simple expression.

"What after God is most divine is man.
That faculty which is the evidence
Of things unseen has not been given us
For solitary, seldom flights to heaven,
But to inform and elevate our lives.
Guard not a shrine

Be truer to yourself.

For secret worship. So dispose your life
That what is purest, noblest in your heart
May rise to heaven from the household altar."

single life,

Noble advice to those who are pining away in using finely trained affections to no purpose ! The work abounds in thoughts which we have never seen better expressed. And in those intense passages where language is hardly equal to passion, our author uses it with fine effect. It tingles with sensibility. It glows and sparkles like heated iron. You feel all that those speaking feel; and this is a very rare success for the dramatic writer. In few writings of this class, recently published, can you warm to more than cold admiration; but our author thrills you with the very spirit of passion. She does this without ever declaiming, without ever introducing what is unnecessary. It is singular that a work should be so free from those faults of hurry and carelessness which we find in all books, in these times. But we are glad to welcome such works as these. We are proud of a work showing such fine taste, such dramatic power, such a true vein of poetry, such a confidence in the strength of simple, homely language when used with good taste and literary skill. No American writer has, on the whole, achieved greater success in the drama. Works on slavery are apt to be ephemeral; it is an old and hackneyed subject; it is in everybody's mouth; but here is a writer who, for once, has writen a work upon slavery which may live when American slavery shall be a matter of history. All this has been done by an American lady, who, till now, was comparatively unknown.

But we had almost forgotten the little volume, at once the preface and introduction to the tragedy. It is after the fashion

of "Friends in Council." It is very gracefully written. It has a style as pure, as simple, as impressionable as the tragedy. And its contents are so unexpected, the story is told with such an air of reality, the home of Edward Colvil is set forth so charmingly, that you wish the book was longer. It is the minute finish which tells in works like this. Here you have plenty of touches which betray the artist no less than the poet. The main object of the narrative is to show that the black race are not the worthless beings we so often see in "Dixie," but men of mark and influence often in their own country, and endowed with the same high faculties as the Caucasian race. It delicately, gracefully pleads what the tragedy also aims to prove the superiority of those who have not been branded in soul and body with the stamp of slavery. Notice, in the "Record of an Obscure Man," the favorite tendency to make thoughtful, literary men consumptives—a convenient way of disposing of them. Notice, too, in all of these volumes, how many separate pictures are exceedingly well done. The parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, in the drama, the conversation between Stanley and Hermann about Helen, the description of a thunder-storm by Mrs. Stanley, the death-bed of Stanley, the interview between Woodford and Dorcas, Woodford's soliloquy, the picture of a New England home, the parting of Herbert and Helen, the womanly carriage of Alice, and the songs interspersed between the scenes, are each perfect in their way. The repose, the absence of effort, of all desire to be sententious, is admirable. It is less affected by the prevailing school in literature than any recent work we are acquainted with.

What this work may do toward putting down Slavery in this country, we leave to an abler pen. But it cannot fail to do much good in many circles where books of a different character would be repulsive. It will win its way on its own intrinsic merits; but the theme is not less exciting than the treatment is skilful. Hence it will make an impression precisely where this impression is most needed. It is a hopeful sign of the times, when a work of high ability and of the purest character aims to set forth the evils of a system which the largest army in the world is indirectly engaged in destroying. It shows, in its way, how, in the providence of God, many things are com

ing to an open issue at the present day. These volumes will do much in foreign literary circles also toward provoking jealousy of our high mental culture. It is a ripe, hearty production, and as such, must command attention from intelligent people everywhere.

ARTICLE V.

THE TWO CITIES.

On the dusky shores of evening, stretched in shining peace it lies, City built of clouds and sunshine wonder of the western skies!

While I watch, and long for pinions thitherward to take my flight, Slowly the aërial city fades and vanishes from sight.

Ruby dome, and silver temple, circling wall of amethyst,
Fall in silence, leaving only purple ruin hung with mist.

Darkness gathers eastward, westward; stronger waxeth my desire, Reaching through celestial spaces, glittering as with rain of fire,

To the City set with jasper, having twelve foundations fair,
Flashing from their jewelled splendor every color soft and rare.

--

Twelve in number are its gateways-numbered by the Seer of old Every gate a pearl most lustrous; and its streets are paved with gold.

In the midst, in dazzling whiteness, lightens the Eternal Throne; From it flows the Living Water - round it gleams an emerald zone.

Luscious fruits, and balmy odors, healing leaves, and cooling shade, Either side the Life-tree sheddeth, by sweet storms of music swayed.

O thou grand, untempled City, seen by John in visions bright,
Glory-flooded, needing neither sun by day nor moon by night,