PART THE FIFTH. GRACE. I. AMONG the guests who often staid II. He was a mighty poet-and A subtle-souled psychologist; All things he seemed to understand, Of old or new-of sea or land But his own mind-which was a mist. III. This was a man who might have turned Trusted, and damned himself to madness. IV. He spoke of poetry, and how "Divine it was a light-a loveA spirit which like wind doth blow As it listeth, to and fro; A dew rained down from God above. .V. "A power which comes and goes like dream, And which none can ever trace Heaven's light on earth-Truth's brightest beam." And when he ceased there lay the gleam Of those words upon his face. VI. Now Peter, when he heard such talk, VII. At night he oft would start and wake In a wild measure songs to make And on the heart of man- 1 VIII. And on the universal sky And the wide earth's bosom green, And the sweet, strange mystery Of what beyond these things may lie, And yet remain unseen. IX. For in his thought he visited The spots in which, ere dead and damned, He his wayward life had led; Yet knew not whence the thoughts were fed, 1 In Mrs. Shelley's editions there is a full-stop here. X. And these obscure remembrances XI. For though it was without a sense He knew something of heath, and fell. XII. He had also dim recollections Of pedlars tramping on their rounds; XIII. But Peter's verse was clear, and came It augured to the Earth. XIV. Like gentle rains, on the dry plains, Making that green which late was grey, This stanza was printed by Mrs. Vol. III of Lodore (1835). XV. For language was in Peter's hand, XVI. And Mr. 2 the bookseller, Gave twenty pounds for some;-then scorning Peter, too proud of heart, I fear, Instantly gave the Devil warning. XVII. Whereat the Devil took offence, And swore in his soul a great oath then, 1 Mr. Rossetti has suggested the substitution of for for to, so as to bring for mountain Cotter "in apposition with "for all the land; but the signification seems to me to be that Peter made songs, not that were sweet to all the land, but that were simply sweet, sweet to the heart and understanding, sweet as late pipkins to a mountain Cotter, and that these songs were for all the land. It is of course conceivable that Shelley meant to write for, and to imply that, as Peter had of late made pipkins for mountain Cotters, so he now made songs for all the land. 2 Wordsworth's publishers at that time were the Longman firm,—then Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. I think with Mr. Rossetti that the missing name if any was a monosyllable; and it may have been one of the monosyllabic names of that firm. It is, however, possible that we were intended to read "Mr. Dash, the bookseller." PART THE SIXTH. DAMNATION. I. “O THAT mine enemy had written A book!"-cried Job:- -a fearful curse; If to the Arab, as the Briton, 'Twas galling to be critic-bitten:— The Devil to Peter wished no worse. II. When Peter's next new book found vent, The Devil to all the first Reviews A copy of it slily sent, With five-pound note as compliment, III. Then seriatim, month and quarter, IV. Another "Let him shave his head!1 1 Mr. Rossetti says there is "no rhyme" to head, and suggests top or crop as an emendation. I protest against such a change. It is rather an VOL. III. agreeable vaniation that head rhymes with bed in the last line of the preceding stanza. Similarly I should strongly object to the introduction of |