to turn from the critics' indiscriminate abuse to their equally indiscriminate praise, and to read the glowing tributes heaped upon authors whose mediocrity has barely saved them from oblivion. Compare the universal rapture which greeted "the majestick numbers of Mr. Cowley" to the indifference which gave scant welcome to the Hesperides. Mr. Gosse tells us that for half a century Katherine Philips, the matchless Orinda, was an unquestioned light in English song. "Her name was mentioned with those of Sappho and Corinna, and language was used without reproach which would have seemed a little fulsome if addressed to the Muse herself."
"For, as in angels, we
Do in thy verses see
Both improved sexes eminently meet;
They are than Man more strong, and more than Woman sweet."
So sang Cowley to this much admired lady; and the Earl of Roscommon, in some more extravagant and amusing stanzas, asserted it to be his unique experience that, on meeting a pack of angry wolves in Scythia,
"The magic of Orinda's name
Not only can their fierceness tame,
