Page:The Dream of Pythagoras and Other Poems.djvu/5

 Mai aJ

A BRIEF

MEMOIR OF EMMA TATHAM,

OF MARGATE.

IN the early autumn of 1854 a volume was published, bearing title " The Dream of Pythagoras, and other Poems," from the pen of this child of song. Her muse at once attracted general admiration, and opinions of the press were given in a manner unusually flattering. In influential quarters Miss Tatham was commended for " great imagination, depth of thought and feeling, exquisite tenderness, great power of expression, combined with a harmony of metre rarely surpassed." One of her critics, selecting for example a passage from her " Tempest Songs," does " not fear the comparison with Shelly and Mrs. Hemans which it provokes." "Our promising young poetess," says another, "is still in the flower of her youth ; and, from the sample she has given us of her powers, we prophecy that in process of time she will achieve a lasting reputation. In the poem, 'Jordan's Lament,' the subject is treated in a manner worthy of its grandeur." And (not to multiply these eulogies) even the " Catholic Standard " ascribes to her pieces " a very high order of merit ; " adding a sinister observation, wliich, as it is characteristic of the reviewer's school, may be quoted : " There is a devout and reverential tone about Miss Tatham's writings which we wish we could detect more frequently in Protestant authors."

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