the case of "Peter's Letters," so successfully that he had to write the book itself as a "second edition" to answer the demand for it). This review was so cleverly done that "most of the newspaper critics took the part of the poet against the reviewer, never suspecting the identity of both, and maintained the poetry to be fine poetry and the critic a dunce." The sarcasm of 'Firmilian' is so delicate that only those familiar with the school it is intended to satirize can fairly appreciate its qualities. The drama opens showing Firmilian in his study, planning the composition of Cain: a Tragedy'; and being infused with the spirit of the hero, he starts on a career of crime. Among his deeds is the destruction of the cathedral of Badajoz, which first appears in his mental vision thus:

"Methought I saw the solid vaults give way,

And the entire cathedral rise in air,

As if it leaped from Pandemonium's jaws."

To effect this he employs

"Some twenty barrels of the dusky grain
The secret of whose framing in an hour
Of diabolic jollity and mirth

Old Roger Bacon wormed from Beelzebub.»

When the horror is accomplished, at a moment when the inhabitants of Badajoz are at prayer, Firmilian rather enjoys the scene:"Pillars and altar, organ loft and screen,

With a singed swarm of mortals intermixed,
Whirling in anguish to the shuddering stars.»

« 'Firmilian,' " to quote from Aytoun's biographer again, "deserves to keep its place in literature, if only as showing how easy it is for a man of real poetic power to throw off, in sport, pages of sonorous and sparkling verse, simply by ignoring the fetters of nature and common-sense and dashing headlong on Pegasus through the wilderness of fancy." Its extravagances of rhetoric can be imagined from the following brief extract, somewhat reminiscent of Marlowe :

"And shall I then take Celsus for my guide,
Confound my brain with dull Justinian tomes,
Or stir the dust that lies o'er Augustine?
Not I, in faith! I've leaped into the air,
And clove my way through ether like a bird
That flits beneath the glimpses of the moon,
Right eastward, till I lighted at the foot
Of holy Helicon, and drank my fill
At the clear spout of Aganippe's stream:

I've rolled my limbs in ecstasy along

The selfsame turf on which old Homer lay
That night he dreamed of Helen and of Troy:
And I have heard, at midnight, the sweet strains

Come quiring from the hilltop, where, enshrined
In the rich foldings of a silver cloud,

The Muses sang Apollo into sleep."

In 1856 was printed 'Bothwell,' a poetic monologue on Mary Stuart's lover. Of Aytoun's humorous sketches, the most humorous are 'My First Spec in the Biggleswades,' and 'How We Got Up the Glen Mutchkin Railway'; tales written during the railway mania of 1845, which treat of the folly and dishonesty of its promoters, and show many typical Scottish characters. His Ballads of Scotland' was issued in 1858; it is an edition of the best ancient minstrelsy, with preface and notes. In 1861 appeared Norman Sinclair,' a novel published first in Blackwood's, and giving interesting pictures of society in Scotland and personal experiences.

After Professor Wilson's death, Aytoun was considered the leading man of letters in Scotland; a rank which he modestly accepted by writing in 1838 to a friend: "I am getting a kind of fame as the literary man of Scotland. Thirty years ago, in the North countries, a fellow achieved an immense reputation as The Tollman,' being the solitary individual entitled by law to levy blackmail at a ferry." In 1860 he was made Honorary President of the Associated Societies of the University of Edinburgh, his competitor being Thackeray. This was the place held afterward by Lord Lytton, Sir David Brewster, Carlyle, and Gladstone. Aytoun wrote the The Life and Times of Richard the First' (London, 1840), and in 1863 a 'Nuptial Ode on the Marriage of the Prince of Wales.'

Aytoun was a man of great charm and geniality in society; even to Americans, though he detested America with the energy of fearthe fear of all who see its prosperity sapping the foundations of their class society. He died in 1865; and in 1867 his biography was published by Sir Theodore Martin, his collaborator. Martin's definition of Aytoun's place in literature is felicitous:

"Fashions in poetry may alter, but so long as the themes with which they deal have an interest for his countrymen, his 'Lays' will find, as they do now, a wide circle of admirers. His powers as a humorist were perhaps greater than as a poet. They have certainly been more widely appreciated. His immediate contemporaries owe him much, for he has contributed largely to that kindly mirth without which the strain and struggle of modern life would be intolerable. Much that is excellent in his humorous writings may very possibly cease to retain a place in literature from the circumstance that he deals with characters and peculiarities which are in some measure local,

and phases of life and feeling and literature which are more or less ephemeral. But much will certainly continue to be read and enjoyed by the sons and grandsons of those for whom it was originally written; and his name will be coupled with those of Wilson, Lockhart, Sydney Smith, Peacock, Jerrold, Mahony, and Hood, as that of a man gifted with humor as genuine and original as theirs, however opinions may vary as to the order of their relative merits.»

'The Modern Endymion,' from which an extract is given, is a parody on Disraeli's earlier manner.

THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE

From the Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers >

I

OUND the fife and cry the slogan;

SOUND

Let the pibroch shake the air
With its wild, triumphant music,

Worthy of the freight we bear.
Let the ancient hills of Scotland

Hear once more the battle-song
Swell within their glens and valleys
As the clansmen march along!
Never from the field of combat,
Never from the deadly fray,

Was a nobler trophy carried

Than we bring with us to-day;
Never since the valiant Douglas
On his dauntless bosom bore
Good King Robert's heart-the priceless-
To our dear Redeemer's shore!

Lo! we bring with us the hero

Lo! we bring the conquering Græme,

Crowned as best beseems a victor
From the altar of his fame;
Fresh and bleeding from the battle
Whence his spirit took its flight,
'Midst the crashing charge of squadrons,
And the thunder of the fight!
Strike, I say, the notes of triumph,
As we march o'er moor and lea!

Is there any here will venture
To bewail our dead Dundee ?

Let the widows of the traitors

Weep until their eyes are dim! Wail ye may full well for Scotland Let none dare to mourn for him! See! above his glorious body

Lies the royal banner's foldSee! his valiant blood is mingled

With its crimson and its gold.
See how calm he looks and stately,
Like a warrior on his shield,
Waiting till the flush of morning
Breaks along the battle-field!

See oh, never more, my comrades,
Shall we see that falcon eye
Redden with its inward lightning,
As the hour of fight drew nigh!
Never shall we hear the voice that,
Clearer than the trumpet's call,
Bade us strike for king and country,
Bade us win the field, or fall!

II

On the heights of Killiecrankie
Yester-morn our army lay:

Slowly rose the mist in columns
From the river's broken way;

Hoarsely roared the swollen torrent,
And the Pass was wrapped in gloom,
When the clansmen rose together

From their lair amidst the broom.

Then we belted on our tartans,

And our bonnets down we drew,

As we felt our broadswords' edges, And we proved them to be true; And we prayed the prayer of soldiers, And we cried the gathering-cry, And we clasped the hands of kinsmen, And we swore to do or die!

Then our leader rode before us,

On his war-horse black as night

Well the Cameronian rebels

Knew that charger in the fight!

And a cry of exultation

From the bearded warrior rose;

For we loved the house of Claver'se,

And we thought of good Montrose.
But he raised his hand for silence-

"Soldiers! I have sworn a vow;
Ere the evening star shall glisten
On Schehallion's lofty brow,
Either we shall rest in triumph,
Or another of the Græmes
Shall have died in battle-harness

For his country and King James!
Think upon the royal martyr—

Think of what his race endure-
Think on him whom butchers murdered
On the field of Magus Muir:*
By his sacred blood I charge ye,

By the ruined hearth and shrine-
By the blighted hopes of Scotland,
By your injuries and mine-
Strike this day as if the anvil

Lay beneath your blows the while,

Be they Covenanting traitors,

Or the blood of false Argyle!
Strike! and drive the trembling rebels
Backwards o'er the stormy Forth;
Let them tell their pale Convention
How they fared within the North.
Let them tell that Highland honor
Is not to be bought nor sold;
That we scorn their prince's anger,
As we loathe his foreign gold.
Strike! and when the fight is over,
If you look in vain for me,
Where the dead are lying thickest
Search for him that was Dundee!"

1115

III

Loudly then the hills re-echoed

With our answer to his call,

But a deeper echo sounded

In the bosoms of us all.

For the lands of wide Breadalbane.
Not a man who heard him speak

*Archbishop Sharp, Lord Primate of Scotland.