Page:Edgar Poe and his critics.djvu/39

 Harper’s “Easy Chair,” says, “Such curious and beautiful performances as Poe’s ‘Raven’ and ‘Sleigh-bells’ are not poems; they are, simply, ingenious experiments upon the sound of words.” Were this grand lyric of “The Bells” simply a lyric of “Sleigh-bells” as the “Easy Chair” pleasantly calls it, when were Sleigh-bells ever heard to ring so merrily before? Listen! How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle In the icy air of night! While the stars that oversprinkle All the heavens seem to twinkle With a crystalline delight; Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells From the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells— From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.”

It cannot indeed be denied that the mere artistic treatment of this poem is truly marvellous. The metallic 4