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THE HESPERIAN.
thus briefly, but lingers fondly on her grace unci dignity, her
beauty and her womanliness. The intimate companionship
between Bulwer and his mother was a potent factor in his
character and the cause of much in his later life. From her
he inherited his sympathetic nature, his tendency to philo
sophical reflection and the sombrous melancholy of character
which her later influence went to strengthen.
His early education was fragmentary. At the age of seven
he had learned a little Latin, when on .the death of his grand
father, a very erudite man, the great library was brought to
London. In his own words, "Behold the great event of my
infant life my Siege of Troy, my Persian Invasion, my Gall,
ic Revolution the arrival of my Grandfather's Books. The
learned deluge flowed into that calm, still world of Home;
it mounted the stairs; it rolled on, floor upon floor; the trim
face of the drawing rooms vanished before it; 110 attic, the
loftiest, escaped from the flood. But the grand reservoir, the
Lake. Mocris of the whole inundation, was the great drawing
room; and there, where the flood settled, I rested mine in
fant ark." But in time the great library was sold and Bulwer
was sent away to school. There his shrinking and timid na
ture was so imposed upon by his ruder fellows that he was ta
ken home. Two more changes in quick succession brought
him to the school of a Dr. Hooker. "Here," he says, "I
made a leap." In addition to his regular school work he be
came a poet-amateur and a pugilist. He was now fourteen
years old and fulfilled the precocious promise of his infancy.
Already he addressed his mother with the mature expression
of a man, but with the old affection. He writes gravely and
touchingly of love and already has a disappointed passion to
inspire his muse. Indeed, after making all allowance for the
effusive exaggeration oT a highly sentimental nature, it seems
plain that Bulwer was extremely suscepticle to female charms.
His early loves did not seriously affect either himself or their
objects, but at eighteen he became deeply enamored of a
young, and almost friendless maid, the daughter of a duke.
There is no need for details. A few brief weeks, and their
sweet intercourse was abruptly terminated by the marriage of
the inamorata to another and she soon after died. It was a
sad Mow to poor Bulwer. He lost flesh and spirits, became
gloomy and despondent, and the silly extravagance with
which he bewails his lot moves us equally to laughter, sneers
and pity. The passion of a man was combined with the cal
low judgment of youth, and, as ever, lost its manliness.
In this condition he entered Cambridge where he remained
nearly four years. College life, the debating club, associa
tions with men like Macaulay inspired the young writer and
his boyish uature was rapidly lopped off. But that much of
the rash romance of youth still remained is shown by an esca
pade among some gypsies while on a Scottish pedestrian
tour.
His college life ended with high honors. He had. made
a name for himself already and he made it constantly bright
er by his unceasing labor, till at his death in 1873 he was
reckoned second only to Carlyle as a leader in English liter
ature. At the age of twenty Bulwer married Rosina Wheel
er after an acquaintance of nearly two years. In this he vi
olated the wishes of his mother and caused an estrangement
which lasted two years. He seems to have been greatly
pained and there can be little doubt that at this time the
' foundation of much of his later moroscness was laid. Since
leaving college he had been steadily employed in writing and
henceforward supported himself by the labors of his own
hand and brain. , , , t t . ,
.From this time the details of his life lose interest and be
cone leu essential to a conception of his work and his sue-
CtM.
In recording a life, if any part is to be slighted, let it be
the latter part, for, having made acquaintance with the youth
we know the man; but we can never feel sure of the mature
until we have caught at least a glimpse of the immature
character. Having traced the history of this somewhat re
markable man thus far, we have gone over the most interest
ing part of his life. His development as a writer was hence
forth natural. His genius was diverse and his success sig
nal in many departments of litrature. He became a poli
tician, though never a partisan. In this he differed from
Disraeli, who became his intimate friend. With Lytton pol
itics was by-play in a literary life; Disraeli was a 'statesman,
literature his amusement. The former lacked too, the in
difference to criticism which marked the latter, but he was
the more indefatigable worker.
Since the early years of Bulwer appear so free from care
and so fraught with opportunity, he has been rudely criticiz
ed for the cynicism and morbid sentiment, almost Byronic,
which flavor his earlier works. But his boyhood training,
while apparently giving all blessings to be wished, was calcu
lated to intensify, rather than to counteract the morbid gloom
of his sensitive nature. He early breathed an atmosphere
of discontented unhappiness. He lived at a time when un
real sentiment and vain pedantry were rife and, calculated as
he was to look backward rather than forward, for inspiration,
it is not strange that his writings were tainted with unhealthy
thought. At least wc may find here some palliation of his
offence. He has power in depiction of character, in sjenic
description and in narration. He always interests and,while
his earlier attempts arc marred by his sickly sentiment or
visionary dreams, his later writings abound in a strong and
grave philosophy of life. While he inte ts heinstructs.His
life is an object lesson of industry, his success an inspiration
to persevering patience. Peace to his ashes: immortality to
his works. H.
A CRITICISM.
The poems of Thomas Gray may belong to the epochal
literature of the English people; a place has been claimed for
them in universal literature. A more or less careful study of
his poems has led me to offer the following critique.
The poems of Gray arc without exception short; nothing
less than a complete mastery over form, therefore, is accept
able in him if he would sustain his claim to the rank of po
et. The effort to attain to great perfection in technique, to a
finical nicety of expression, impresses itself upon the casual
reader, and grows intenscr as he reads more carefully. Indeed
the author asserts that such is his aim, and that nothing less
exacting would suit his peculiar poetic taste. But form rather
proves itself the master, and Gray is led to unusual expres
sions, to redundancy and ambiguity, to elisions and contrac
tions, simply to get a rhyme or for the sake of the metre, Of
goursc these small matters of technique should be attend
ed to by anyone pretending to write English and are serious
faults in poetry, especially In the ode or sonnet.
In the subject matter of his poems Gray is at once more for
unate and less happy. This apparent enigma resolves itself
at once into thisi Gray was learned; he was moreover of a
philosophical turn of mind, yet in his narrow way a man of
deep emotions. . He had poetical invention; he lacked in in
tensity, in earnest convictions the true inspiration of the po
et. Lacking also in the power of reproducing in his render
the feelings which he himself had, whether by direct convey
ance or by suggestion, Gray was here less a happy success
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