Past the pane, the mountain spreading, Somewhat low for ai's and oi's." In 1833 she produced a spirited version of the great Greek tragedy of schylus, "Prometheus Bound." She afterwards issued an improved version of it. Mr. Home mentions that he received a letter from a friend enclosing a poem from Miss Barrett, with the request that she might be frankly told whether it was poetry or merely verse. He had no doubt of its poetry, and sent it to Colburn's New Monthly Magazine, then edited by Bulwer, where it was published. Miss Barrett then started on her career as an original poetess, and became the greatest woman poet of all time. Shortly after this an event happened which laid her prostrate, and confined her to a dark chamber for years. Her brother and two friends were suddenly drowned at Torquay by the capsizing of a boat. The shock to her was great and disastrous. During her affliction she read and studied Plato and the Hebrew Bible from beginning to end, and many other works. She wrote one of her ablest poems on her brother's death, but it was never published till after her own decease. She became acquainted with Mr. Robert Browning's poems, and in one of her own, called "Lady Geraldine's Courtship," she referred to him thus "Or from Browning some pomegranate, which, if cut deep down the middle, Shows a heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity." Mr. Browning was so much pleased that he called upon her, not aware of her invalid state, and by a blundering servant was shown up to her room. A friendship was thus begun. which led to their marriage on her recovery in 1846, and to their joint lives till her death. In 1844 her first two volumes of poetry appeared. She issued "Sonnets from the Portuguese," most enchanting love poems, in one of which she described the wooing of her lover. During her married life she resided at Florence, and sent forth successive volumes of her poetic genius. She entered warmly into the spirit of revolution in Italy, and in gratitude to her the city of Florence erected a marble tablet to her memory in front of the Casa Guidi, where she had lived. "Her verse," says one, "throbs with all the human hopes and fears. All hearts may come here to find their personal story told. All aspirations, all struggles, all defeats, all victories have their fit memoirs in these books. This poet keeps the Sybil's record, to whom men may come to learn of life and death." A GOOD prose style is not early acquired, as a general rule. The "heaven-born inspiration" may make a poet, but it was the opinion of Dr. Samuel Johnson that a man required to give his days and nights to the study of Addison in order to acquire a good style in English prose. Lord Macaulay denied that any work of imagination of the highest class was ever in any country produced by a man under thirty-five. The great historian affirmed that whatever powers a man may have received from nature, it was impossible for his taste and judgment to be ripe, or his mind sufficiently stored with images, or that he could have observed sufficiently the vicissitudes of life or the nicer shades of character in the years of youth. Of all the great books extant in the world, he computed that nineteen-twentieths of them were published after the writers had attained the age of forty. Dr. Smiles, however, says that "though great things may be done after forty-new inventions made, new books written, new thoughts elaborated — it is doubtful whether the mind really widens and enlarges after that age.” There have been some noble achievements of youth in prose literature, especially in works of the imagination and in the Belles-Lettres. The writings of Sir PHILIP SIDNEY (1554-1586) rank among the most illustrious of these. As pioneer of the new era of English literature, he gave a noble embodiment to the literary character, and may well head the list as an example of what a young man should be. He was the true gentleman of the great age of Queen Elizabeth. He died at thirty-two, yet gained a high place in the esteem of his contemporaries, and a lasting renown. He was born at Penshurst in Kent. His father, Sir Henry Sidney, was Deputy of the Realm of Ireland, and President of the Council in Wales. His mother was Lady Mary Dudley. Philip was therefore connected with the noblest blood in England. The Duke of Northumberland was his grandfather, and his uncle was the celebrated Earl of Leicester. As a boy Sidney was grave. Lord Brooke, his early friend, said :- "Of his youth I will report no other wonder but this, that though I lived with him, and knew him from a child, yet I never knew him other than a man, with such staidness of mind, lovely and familiar gravity, as carried grace and reverence above greater years his talk ever of knowledge, and his very play tending to enrich his mind, so as even his teachers found something to observe and learn above that which they usually read or taught. Which eminence by nature and industry made his worthy father style Sir Philip in my hearing (though I unseen) Lumen familiæ suæ." The Dean of Christchurch at Oxford felt such honour in having had him for three years under his tuition, that he had it engraved afterwards upon his tomb that he had been the preceptor of "Philip Sidney, that noble knight." Lord Brooke wished no other inscription over his grave than this: "Here lies the friend of Sir Philip Sidney." Sidney went to Oxford in his fourteenth year, and left in his seventeenth without having taken his degree; but that was not because he had been an indifferent student, for he was far otherwise. It was the custom of persons of quality at the time. He then travelled for three years on the continent of Europe, and enriched his mind. He was in Paris on the day of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, August 24th, 1572, and probably owed his life to having taken refuge at the English embassy. He was made by that horrible outrage a more decided Protestant than ever, and more anxious to maintain a Christian character. On his tour through Europe he avoided the allurements of pleasure, and only cultivated his mind and manners. Roger Ascham, in his Schoolmaster,” says that he knew many who "returned out of Italy worse transformed than ever was any in Circe's court;" but he was also acquainted with "divers noble personages and many worthy gentlemen of England whom all the siren songs of Italy could never untwine from the mast of God's Word, nor no enchantment of vanity overturn them from the fear of God and love of honesty." Of the latter, we learn, was Sir Philip Sidney. "Like the bee which sucks honey from poisonous flowers, he gained only good from the travels which were so pernicious to his fellowcountrymen at large.” 66 When he returned to England at the age of twenty-one, he was introduced to court by the Earl of Leicester, whose presumptive heir he was then supposed to be. He was present at Kenilworth during the memorable visit of Queen Elizabeth to the earl's castle, and shared in the great festivities. In 1577 he was sent on a mission to congratulate the new Emperor of Germany, and to condole with the princes of the Palatinate, whose father, the elector, had just died. He had an interview with William the Silent in Holland, on his return journey to England. Sir Philip acquitted himself to the satisfaction of all, and left so marked an impression or |