about them, and his grief at this affected him greatly. He had always been consumptive, and now he rapidly grew worse. A friend took him to Italy; and there, under the blue Italian skies, he died, when only twenty-five years old. In a grave at Rome almost smothered in violets he lies buried, beneath the words he himself chose to be placed there-"Here lies one whose name is writ in water." Keats's poetry is full of his passionate love for beauty. To him beauty meant truth.

"Beauty is truth, truth beauty-that is all

Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

And the first line of his longest poem, Endymion, is this

"A thing of beauty is a joy for ever."

4. We must not linger over the names of many other nineteenth century poets:-LEIGH HUNT, the friend of Byron, Shelley, and Keats, whose prison room, with birds and books and flowers, became a little paradise to him; THOMAS CAMP

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BELL, the author of The Pleasures of Hope and Ye Mariners of England; MRS. HEMANS, who wrote so many beautiful poems for children; THOMAS HOOD, who sang The Song of the Shirt; THOMAS MOORE, the singer of Irish Melodies; JOHN KEBLE, the author of The Christian Year; HARTLEY COLERIDGE, the son of Wordsworth's friend, laureate of many baby boys and sweet "wee ladies;" MACAULAY, with his stirring Lays of Ancient Rome, so dear to school-boys' hearts; the Scottish poet AYTOUN, with his Lays of the Cavaliers; CHARLES KINGSLEY, the novelist, who also wrote many sweet songs, and a book beloved by children, The Water Babies; ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH, who gives us in the Bothie a picture of the Long Vacation merry-makings of a party of Oxford friends, with fine descriptions of the wild Highland scenery among which they rambled ; WILLIAM ALLINGHAM, who has written many songs, verses for children, and ballads in a patriotic vein; and MATTHEW ARNOLD, whose simplicity and fine natural feeling are seen in all his poetic labours. But among the rest three stand boldly out as landmarks in the history of the poetry of the nineteenth century. Two are still alive—our poet-laureate, Alfred Tennyson, and Robert Browning.

5. The third, the greatest of our English poetesses, was ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING, the wife of the poet. She was a great scholar as well as a poetess, and during the long days of her invalid life, when she had to spend much of her time on a sofa, she got to know and love the old Greek and Latin poets, and made translations of some of their works. Her longest poem, Aurora Leigh, is a beautiful picture of the life of a poetess. Her writings include sonnets, and a large number of short pieces which boys and girls can quite well understand. When she was nearly forty years of age, Miss Barrett met the poet whom she afterwards married. They lived for many years in Italy, and most of Mrs. Browning's poems were written in Florence.

6. ROBERT BROWNING published his last poems a day or two before he died. His poetry is read a great deal, but much of it is difficult to comprehend. Perhaps he is the poet of the future, and we are not quite ready to understand him yet. He has, how

ever, written one poem specially for young folks, The Pied Piper of Hamelin, which any boy or girl can read and enjoy.

7. LORD TENNYSON succeeded Wordsworth as Poet Laureate, and forty years afterwards he continued to write verses; but his fame was long ago made by his two great poems, In Memoriam and the Idylls of the King. In the Idylls our old friend, King Arthur, is brought back to us with his queen, his knights of the Round Table, and all his court. In Memoriam was written in memory of a college friend of Tennyson, Arthur Hallam, the son of Henry Hallam the historian, who died at Vienna. In this poem the poet not only laments the death of his friend, but sings of his hope of a future life for Arthur and himself. In one part of the poem he describes winter bringing Christmas in its train, and sings this song of the dying year :

8. One of Tennyson's works, written before his In Memoriam, is called The Princess. It tells how a prince and princess are betrothed by their parents without having seen each other. The lady refuses to carry out the agreement, and founds a college for women, of which she herself becomes the head. The prince and two friends, Cyril and Florian, eager to see the princess and her students, go to the college disguised as girls, and are admitted. They are not discovered until one day Cyril, having drunk too much wine, begins to sing a foolish drinking song, and thus betrays his secret. Ida, in anger turning to leave him, slips, and falls into the river. The prince, plunging in, saves her, and then attempts to flee, but is seized by the college proctors and brought before the haughty lady. She is just going to pronounce sentence, when a hubbub arises in the hall. The father of the prince has come to release his son, and has seized the Princess Ida's father as hostage. The princess is obliged to give the prince his liberty, and, quivering with rage at the way in which she has been deceived, dismisses him. The prince, who has grown to love her, wonders how he can soften the proud heart. Accident does it for him. It is decided that fifty men of the army of King Gama, Ida's father, shall fight with fifty of the army of the prince's father. The prince, who is among them, is wounded; and when Ida sees him lie bleeding on the sand her heart melts, and to her, sitting by the bedside of the prince, whom she thinks to be dying, pity comes, bringing with it love, and love as conqueror.

9. Other poems of Tennyson's are Maud, Locksley Hall, Enoch Arden, The Lotos Eaters, and Dora. He has written some of the prettiest songs in the English language, many of which are set to music. There is one called Claribel, which I think you will like. The very words seem to give us the hum of the drowsy bee and the rustle of rose-leaves. Tennyson has written several dramas-Harold, Queen Mary, The Cup, and others, all

of them better suited for reading than for acting. From time to time as laureate he has written verses about public events. Perhaps the best of such of his poems are the verses on the Death of the Duke of Wellington.

10. And now we must close the record of sweet singers. Before the present century has come to an end some who are now singing will have passed away from the living, to join the "choir invisible" of those who sung on earth in life and act, as well as in words. We must leave to others the task of writing of them, for while a man still lives and writes it is difficult to give him his true place in literature. Such names as ALGERNON SWINBURNE and LEWIS MORRIS may then be added to the list of song-writers; and GEORGE MACDONALD, ANDREW LANG, and many others now beginning or in the midst of a busy career, will be added in their places to the great roll of England's prose-writers.

11. As we were writing the last words of our record of great English writers, a voice seemed to come to us across the Atlantic from that great American nation which speaks our language and calls our country its motherland. "Why are we left out?" it seemed to ask in a plaintive tone. Why, indeed? for many a sweet singer has arisen in the New World. LONGFellow, who died a few years ago, had his great heart full of love and music for young and old. To many of you his shorter poems must be familiar; and as you grow older you will doubtless learn to love Hiawatha, with its pictures of strange wild Indian life, and Evangeline, with its quiet, sad beauty. He wrote many of his songs for the little folks who gathered around him, for he never forgot the children's hour. BRET HARTE, too, has written poems full of mirth and sadness mingled, like sunshine through summer rain. WALT WHITMAN writes much that is hard to understand. He is almost more a prophet than a poet. One might call him the Browning of America. But no one can fail to admire the combined shrewdness and tenderness of OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, or the delicate sentiment and rich humour of JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL'S polished verse.

12. In the works of some American poets-for example