that four hundred knights had pledged their arms to the support of Luther. But here the matter ended.

Other stirring events are at hand, destined to lead to like disappointment and failure. Sickingen, who had just been unsuccessful as a general of the imperial forces, became, in the year 1522, involved in a feud with the Bishop of Treves, and, being worsted, retired to his castle, which was forthwith besieged by the enemy. Hutten, whose waning health began. to alarm his friends, was persuaded to leave the castle which he was too weak to help defend, and, in company with his friends Bucer and Ecolampadius, went towards Switzerland. It is remarkable that he should have received just then an offer from the Emperor of a place at court, with a liberal salary ; the only explanation is, that it was probably made with the intent of purchasing his silence. He was very poor, and this notwithstanding his father had recently died, who had the credit of owning a large estate. But probably the old knight left little or nothing to his heirs. Living on serf labor in the sixteenth century was fast becoming (like living on slave labor in the nineteenth century) less profitable than it had been in the good old times. But whatever the reason, Hutten's fortunes were now at the lowest ebb. Broken in body and estate, though not in mind, he had to meet still another affliction, the death of Sickingen, who had been mortally wounded and taken prisoner, ending thus his attempt, as he himself expressed it," to bring the people out from the harsh, unchristian yoke of the priesthood to Christian light and freedom." Hutten, accompanied by his friends, travelled on to Basel, and was received in so flattering a manner by the magistracy that he concluded to take up his residence there.

But Erasmus was there also, and, to Ulrich's great surprise and wrath, refused to receive a visit from him. This gave rise to an angry controversy, afterwards published. Portions of it show that the now prosperous man, who loved quiet, and hated fanatical, to say nothing of unpopular people, was simply averse to intercourse with one with whom he had little in common, and therefore did not wish to see him. His efforts, which were successful, to persuade the magistracy to banish Ulrich as a dangerous man from the city, can only be

traced to fear of compromising himself with powerful men in Germany. It is to be hoped that he did not know how forlorn and pitiable was the state of the poor fugitive.

From Basel, hardly able to walk, but still able to write bitter complaints of Erasmus, and to answer the attacks made upon him by the other in his "Spongia," quick to resent injury even to the last, Ulrich went to Zürich. Here he was the guest of Zwingli, and the object of his unremitting and tender care during the few remaining weeks of his life. By his advice and at his expense the invalid went to Pfeffer's baths, but without benefit; and when the Zürich magistrates forbade him to remain in their city, the same kind hand procured him a safe asylum in a monastery on the island of Ufenau, in the Lake of Zürich. Here, receiving every attention from the abbot of the small fraternity of monks, he lived only a few weeks, closing, in the beginning of the autumn of 1523, his stormy and checkered life, at the age of thirty-six. The monks, though friendly, have not preserved the record of the closing scenes of the life of the heretic. For a year no stone marked the place of his burial. A French knight, in the following year, set up a stone bearing this inscription:

"Hic eques auratus jacet oratorque disertus

Huttenus vates carmine et ense potens."

In the course of a few years this memorial disappeared, and now the place where he lies, in the pleasant and quiet island of Ufenau, has been long forgotten.

ART. III. — HENRY TAYLOR.

1. Philip van Artevelde. A Dramatic Romance. In Two Parts. By HENRY TAYLOR. Boston: Ticknor and Fields.. 1863.

2. Edwin the Fair; an Historical Drama. And Isaac Comnenus; a Play. By HENRY TAYLOR. Second Edition. London: Edward Moxon.

1845.

3. The Eve of the Conquest, and other Poems. By HENRY TAYLOR.

4. The Statesman. By HENRY TAYLOR, ESQ. London: Longmans.

1836.

5. Notes from Life, in Seven Essays. By HENRY TAYLOR. Boston: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields. 1853.

6. Notes from Books, in Four Essays. By HENRY TAYLOR. London. Edward Moxon. 1849.

7. The Virgin Widow. By HENRY TAYLOR. London: Edward Moxon. 1850.

8. St. Clement's Eve: a Play. By HENRY TAYLOR. London: Chapman and Hall. 1862.

THERE are few names in English literature less known to general readers, or more fondly cherished by a select few, than that of Henry Taylor. His reputation is not wide; even professed scholars are often ignorant of his writings, and you search for them in vain at the bookstore; but they occupy a niche in many carefully selected libraries, and among college students and thoughtful readers they bid fair to outlive the reputation of many modern writers.

The life of Taylor is even less known than his books. He does not reveal himself in his writings; he has no trace of Byronism; the rightful freedom of self-comment in preface and note is used sparingly. He was born in England in the early part of this century; while yet a young man, he entered the Colonial Office, in which he now holds the second senior clerkship. In 1827, he published "Isaac Comnenus," a dramatic poem, according to his own confession, "sent into the world naked, to shift for itself, without name, preface, or dedication." It was republished in 1845, partly rewritten, compressed, and mended into a passable play. In 1834 he published "Philip van Artevelde," a dramatic romance in two parts. This is

his chief poetical work. It has passed through six editions in England; been translated into German by Professor Hermann, and is now passing through the second edition in this country. He next came before the public in "The Statesman," in 1836, a work in which he sought to give, in a delicate vein of satire, and in the results of a long experience, the rules for success in the practical administration of affairs. The book has a Baconian look, and abounds in shrewd, homely, and wise opinions. To this succeeded" Edwin the Fair," an historical drama, in 1842; it reached a second edition in 1845. "The Eve of the Conquest, and other Poems," appeared in 1847; and in the same year he published "Notes from Life," which has had three editions in England, and one here. In 1849 he reprinted four magazine articles, "Notes from Books"; in 1850 he came out with "The Virgin Widow," a dramatic play in five acts, which we have never seen. His last work, "St. Clement's Eve," was published in 1862. Here, then, is an authorship of nearly forty years, maintained, like Wordsworth's, amid unpopularity and neglect, but with a vigor and independence which we can hardly too highly value in these days. The author's clerkship has evidently been his support, and the writing of dramas his recreation. Like Charles Lamb, he has given his days to ledgers; his nights to the Muse. And few authors have ever more carefully improved their leisure. Every line he has written gives proof of leisurely carefulness. He rivals the Greeks in labore limæ. He is a student no less than a poet, and his prose works no less than his dramas show a wide and deep acquaintance with practical life. Hence there is a value in his writings which poetry does not always possess. They are all founded on a substantial basis of fact; experience or history enters into them all as an unvarying element.

There are those who will say, then, "he cannot be a poet who needs so much to lift his wings." Remember this: Shakespeare wrote historical plays, and no one of his dramas but had some legend or tradition on which his imagination rested; his brother dramatists drew largely from Italian romances for the substance of their plays; and we have yet to learn of the poet who has written enduring verses, without

being indebted largely to surrounding things,—either to observation of nature, or to history, or to romance, or to some of the countless circumstances which stir the imagination and captivate the fancy. We doubt if even Dante, picturing Beatrice in heaven, drew alone from the kindling ideal of his brain. Away, then, with this talk about denying a poet materials for his wit to work upon! He needs them as much as we need the common air, and if he dare do without them, we condemn him, as we do Shelley and Keats, for building with the cloudy fabrics of a vision. The very lyrics, which are a chief feature in modern poetry, throb with the keenest human emotions; and we prize them for this very human quality, which is nothing less than sticking close to a substantial basis of fact. Henry Taylor, then, is right, and the "Festus Baileys are wrong. The one will live into the next century, the other will grow mouldy on the shelves of the Athenæum.

Our author belongs to no school; he is simply himself, — Henry Taylor. He has created his own style and manner. But it would be unjust here not to show the reader how he has been helped in the formation of his own models. There are happily, despite the modesty of Taylor, the materials for this. He made the acquaintance of Southey in 1824,- the year of Byron's death, with which event, curiously enough, their correspondence opens. It was a life-long friendship. Southey loved men of letters as brothers. "Dear H. T." was always the heading of his letters, and the stray glimpses into Taylor's own letters, and the following verses, show how he valued the ever-active Southey.

"They contain," he says, "an acknowledgment of intellectual obligations which I am unwilling to omit, and a tribute of respect and admiration which I confess that it is a pleasure to me to pay in public; and which is not improperly so paid, because the person spoken of is one with whom it cannot be said that the public have no concern."

"Two friends

Lent me a further light, whose equal hate

On all unwholesome sentiment attends,

Nor whom may genius charm where heart infirm offends.

"In all things else contrarious were these two:

The one, a man upon whose laurelled brow