"
So ends this ripe and mellow work, leaving the reader like one who
listens still for pleasant music i' the air which sounds no more. Those
who will may compare it with the rippling strangeness of "Hiawatha," the
mournfully rolling cadence of "Evangeline," the mediaeval romance of "The
Golden Legend." For ourselves, its beauty does not clash with theirs.
The simple old form of the group of guests telling stories, the thread
of so many precious rosaries, has a new charm from this poem. The Tabard
inn is gone; but who, henceforth, will ride through Sudbury town without
seeing the purple light shining around the Red Horse tavern?
The volume closes with a few poems, classed as "Birds of Passage." It is
the "second flight,"--the first being those at the end of the "Miles
Standish" volume. Some of these have a pathos and interest which all
will perceive, but the depth and tenderness of which not all can know.
"The Children's Hour" is a strain of parental love, which haunts the
memory with its melody, its sportive, affectionate, and yearning lay.
"They almost devour me with kisses,
Their arms about me entwine,
Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen
In his mouse-tower on the Rhine.
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