Page:A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields.djvu/378

Rh myself; and as they had a tendency to float up to heaven for want of sympathy on earth, God gave them wings, and they mounted, mounted up to Him." "Yes, it is that," I exclaimed, as if he had explained to me the simplest thing in the world, "and I understand all now. True poets become thus what they are. How many men there are of talent who only want a great misfortune to become men of genius. You have told me in a single word the secret of your life. I know it now as well as you yourself."'

These flattering notices and the beauty of some of Reboul's small poems, such as the verses addressed, 'A une Chouette,' 'La Bergère et le Papillon,' and 'La Confidence,' attracted public attention to him, and gained him influence and position.

At the same time, it must be noted that Reboul was neither a man of great genius nor of a high education. He resembles some of the peasant poets of England and Scotland, Clare or Thom,—not Burns, for that was a Master Spirit. In his more ambitious efforts Reboul utterly fails. It was only in his occasional inspired moods that he succeeded in dashing off the little pieces which charm us, and will always charm, by their simplicity, modesty, melancholy, and even pathos.

The piece we give here has often been translated into English. The reader will find one version of it in Longfellow, and another in the Dutt 'Family Album.'

The Last Day of the Year. There is not much merit in this commonplace piece, but Madame Tastu's poems seldom rise above the barren level of mediocrity. She wants strength and stamina, and her best efforts are only pretty pieces of embroidery. She has written several educational works for the young, which are deservedly popular.

Sur la Terrasse des Aygalades. Joseph Méry, a Provençal poet, born about the end of the last century, has written a very large number of works jointly with M. Barthélemy, and the two names Barthélemy and Méry are always joined together in France, like those of Beaumont and Fletcher in England. Among their works may be mentioned 'Napoléon en Egypte' and 'Waterloo.' In connection with Gérard De Nerval, whose Sanscrit attainments have already been mentioned in another note, Méry published a translation of the Sanscrit drama 'Mritsakati' or 'Le Chariot d'Enfant,' which thus, after two thousand years, transplanted from its native soil, had a new lease of vitality in the centre of civilisation—Paris. Méry's greatest merits are fecundity and diversity. All languages and lands seem familiar to him, and he flies from one to another without ever appearing to be out of his native region. His pictures of past times are generally very vivid, and his historical figures are not always mere automatons, but very often living and breathing men and women.