No emotion is more truly, or more often pictured in her song, than that craving for affection which answers not unto the call. The very power that she possesses, and which, in early youth, she perhaps deemed would both attract and keep, is, in reality, a drawback. Nothing can stand its test. The love which the spirit hath painted has too much of its native heaven for earth. In how many and exquisite shapes is this vain longing introduced on her page. Some slight incident gives the framework, but she casts her own colour upon the picture. In this consists the difference between painting and poetry: the painter reproduces others,—the poet reproduces himself. We would draw attention especially to one or two poems in which the sentiment is too true for Mrs. Hemans not to have been her own inspiration. Is it not the heart's long-suppressed bitterness that exclaims—
"Tell me no more—no more
Of my soul's lofty gifts! are they not vain
To quench its panting thirst for happiness?
Have I not tried, and striven, and failed to bind
One true heart unto me, whereon my own
Might find a resting-place—a home for all
Its burden of affections? I depart
Unknown, though fame goes with me; I must leave
The earth unknown. Yet it may be that death
Shall give my name a power to win such tears
As might have made life precious."
How exquisitely is the doom of a woman, in whose being pride, genius, and tenderness contend for mastery, shadowed in the lines that succeed! The pride bows to the very dust; for genius is like an astrologer whose power fails when the mighty spell is tried for himself; and the tenderness turns away with a crushed heart to perish in neglect. We proceed to mark what appears to bear the deep impress of individual suffering:—
"One dream of passion and of beauty more:
And in its bright fulfilment let me pour
My soul away! Let earth retain a trace
Of that which lit my being, though its race
Might have been loftier far.....
......For thee alone, for thee!
May this last work, this farewell triumph be—
Thou loved so vainly! I would leave enshrined
Something immortal of my heart and mind.
That yet may speak to thee when I am gone,
Shaking thine inmost bosom with a tone
Of best affection—something that may prove
What she hath been, whose melancholy love
On thee was lavished; silent love and tear,
And fervent song that gushed when none were near,
And dream by night, and weary thought by day,
Stealing the brightness from her life away."
"And thou, oh! thou on whom my spirit cast
Unvalued wealth—who knew not what was given
In that devotedness, the sad and deep
And unrepaid farewell! If I could weep
Once, only once, beloved one! on thy breast,
Pouring my heart forth ere I sink to rest!
But that were happiness, and unto me
Earth's gift is fame."
