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But if our poet is grossly unoriginal in his subject, and in the events which evolve it, may he not be original in his handling or tone? We really grieve to say that he is not, unless, indeed, we grant him the need of originality for the peculiar manner in which he has jumbled together the quaint and stilted tone of the old English dramatists with the degagee air of Cervantes. But this is a point upon which, through want of space, we must necessarily permit the reader to judge altogether for himself. We quote, however, a passage from the second scene of the first act, by way of showing how very easy a matter it is to make a man discourse Sancho Panza:

Chispa. Abernuncio Satanas! and a plague upon all lovers who ramble about at night, drinking the elements, instead of sleeping quietly in their beds. Every dead man to his cemetery, say I; and every friar to his monastery. Now, here’s my master Victorian, yesterday a cow-keeper and to-day a gentleman; yesterday a student and to-day a lover; and I must be up later than the nightingale, for as the abbot sings so must the sacristan respond. God grant he may soon be married, for then shall all this serenading cease. Ay, marry, marry, marry! Mother, what does marry mean? It means to spin, to bear children, and to weep, my daughter! and, of a truth, there is something more in matrimony than the wedding-ring. And now, gentlemen, Pax vobiscum! as the ass said to the cabbages!

And we might add, as an ass only should say.

In fact, throughout “The Spanish Student,” as well as throughout other compositions of its author, there runs a very obvious vein of imitation. We are perpetually reminded of something we have seen before — some old acquaintance in manner or matter, and even where the similarity cannot be said to amount to plagiarism, it is still injurious to the poet in the good opinion of him who reads.

Among the minor defects of the play, we may mention the frequent allusion to book incidents not generally known, and requiring each a Note by way of explanation. The drama demands that everything be so instantaneously evident that he who runs may read; and the only impression effected by these Notes to a play is, that the author is desirous of showing his reading.

We may mention, also, occasional tautologies, such as:

Never did I behold thee so attired

And garmented in beauty as to-night!

Or —

What we need

Is the celestial fire to change the fruit

Into transparent crystal, bright and clear!

We may speak, too, of more than occasional errors of grammar. For example, p. 23:

Did no one see thee? None, my love, but thou.

Here “but” is not a conjunction, but a preposition, and governs thee in the objective. “None but thee” would be right; meaning none except thee, saving thee. Earlier, “mayest” is somewhat incorrectly written “may’st.” And we have:-

I have no other saint than thou to pray to. ­

Here authority and analogy are both against Mr. Longfellow. “Than” also is here a preposition governing the objective, and meaning save or except. “I have none other God than thee, etc” See Horne Tooke. The Latin “quam te” is exactly equivalent. At page 80 we read:

Like thee I am a captive, and, like thee,

I have a gentle gaoler.

Here “like thee” (although grammatical of course) does not convey the idea. Mr. L. does not mean that the speaker is like the bird itself, but that his condition resembles it. The true reading would thus be:

As thou I am a captive, and, as thou,

I have a gentle poler.

That is to say, as thou art and as thou hast.

Upon the whole, we regret that Professor Longfellow has written this work, and feel especially vexed that he has committed himself by its republication. Only when regarded as a mere poem can it be said to have merit of any kind. For in fact it is only when we separate the poem from the drama that the passages we have commended as beautiful can be understood to have beauty. We are not too sure, indeed, that a “dramatic poem” is not a flat contradiction in terms. At all events