[In the following review, the author laments the death of Smith and praises her posthumous poems as some of her best work, particularly noting the composition and tone.]

Most sincerely do we lament the death of Mrs. Charlotte Smith. We acknowledged in her a genuine child of genius, a most vivid fancy, refined taste, and extraordinary sensibility. We could not, indeed, always accord with her in sentiment. With respect to some subjects beyond her line of experience, reading, and indeed talent, she was unfortunately wayward and preposterous; but her poetic feeling and ability have rarely been surpassed by any individual of her sex. Her sonnets in particular will remain models of that species of composition; and, as Johnson remarked of Gray's Elegy in a Country Church-yard, had she always written thus, it were vain to blame and useless to praise her. It remains to take notice of these posthumous poems. The first is on “Beachy Head,” and in blank verse. Blank verse is of late becoming a favourite style of composition. We are inclined to suspect that this proceeds either from idleness, or from a conscious want of powers. But a vast deal more is required in blank verse than youthful poets may at first imagine. We are by no means satisfied with the regular and correct structure of the verse, we require both classical taste, strong poetical fancy, a judicious arrangement, and melodious rythm.

Mrs. Smith has demonstrated in this her first poem, that she could adorn any branch of poetry upon which she chose to exercise her powers. This poem is distinguished by great vigour, and, by what was the characteristic of the author's mind, a sweet and impressive tenderness of melancholy. It is a very charming composition. We would not disgrace our page by any hypercritical cavil on little oversights and inaccuracies, but confidently appeal to the subjoined specimen in vindication of the praise which we have given to this poem.

“Ah who is happy? Happiness! a word
That like false fire, from marsh effluvia born
Misleads the wanderer, destin'd to contend
In the world's wilderness, with want or woe—
Yet they are happy, who have never asked
What good or evil means. The boy
That on the river's margin gaily plays,
Has heard that Death is there.—He knows not Death,
And therefore fears it not; and venturing in
He gains a bullrush, or a minnow—then,
At certain peril, for a worthless prize
A crow's, or raven's nest, he climbs the boll
Of some tall pine; and of his prowess proud
Is for a moment happy. Are your cares
Ye who despise him, never worse applied?
The village girl is happy, who sets forth
To distant fair, gay in her Sunday suit,
With cherry-colour'd knots, and flourish'd shawl
And bonnet newly purchas'd. So is he
Her little brother, who his mimic drum
Beats till he drowns her rural lovers' oaths
Of constant faith and still increasing love;
Ah yet awhile, and half those oaths believ'd,
Her happiness is vanished; and the boy
While yet a stripling, finds the sound he lov'd
Has led him on, till he has given up
His freedom and his happiness together.
I once was happy, when while yet a child
I learn'd to love these upland solitudes,
And, when elastic as the mountain air,
To my light spirit, care was yet unknown,
And evil unforeseen:—Early it came
And childhood scarcely passed I was condemned
A guiltless exile silently to sigh,
While Memory, with faithful pencil, drew
The contrast; and regretting, I compar'd
With the polluted smoky atmosphere
And dark and stifling streets, the southern hills
That to the setting sun, their graceful heads
Rearing o'erlook the Frith, where Vecta breaks
With her white rocks, the strong impetuous tide,
When western winds the vast Atlantic urge
To thunder on the coast—Haunts of my youth
Scenes of fond day dreams, I behold ye yet
Where 'twas so pleasant by thy northern slopes
To climb the winding sheep-path, aided oft
By scatter'd thorns, whose spiny branches bore
Small woolly tufts, spoils of the vagrant lamb,
There seeking shelter from the noon-day sun;
And pleasant, seated on the short soft turf
To look beneath upon the hollow way,
While heavily upward mov'd the labouring wain;
And stalking slowly by, the sturdy hind
To ease his panting team stopp'd with a stone
The grating wheel.”

The second poem in the volume is the Truant Dove, from Pilpay, very interesting and very elegant; but as it is not original, we say no more than that it will well repay the reader's attention. The third is the Lark's Nest, from Æsop, which is precisely in the same predicament, except that it indicates, what does not often appear in this writer's productions, much playfulness and genuine humour. The next is an original poem, named “The Swallow,” and this we give at length.

“THE SWALLOW.”

“The gorfe is yellow on the heath,
                    The banks with speedwell flowers are gay,
The oaks are budding; and beneath,
The hawthorn soon will bear the wreath,
                    The silver wreath of May.
“The welcome guest of settled spring,
                    The Swallow too is come at last;
Just at sun-set when thrushes sing,
I saw her dash with rapid wing,
                    And hail'd her as she pass'd.
“Come, summer visitant, attach
                    To my reed roof your nest of clay,
And let my ear your music catch
Low twittering underneath the thatch
                    At the gray dawn of day.
“As fables tell, an Indian Sage,
                    The Hindostani woods among,
Could in his desert hermitage,
As if t'were mark'd in written page,
                    Translate the wild birds song.
“I wish I did his power possess
                    That I might learn, fleet bird, from thee,
What our vain systems only guess,
And know from what wide wilderness
                    You came across the sea.
“I would a little while restrain
                    Your rapid wing that I might hear
Whether on clouds that bring the rain
You fail'd above the western main,
                    The wind your charioteer.
“In Afric does the sultry gale
                    Thro' spicy bower, and palmy grove
Bear the repeated cuckoo's tale?
Dwells there a time, the wandering quail,
                    Or the itinerant dove.
“Were you in Asia? O relate
                    If there your fabled sisters woes
She seem'd in sorrow to narrate;
Or sings she but to celebrate
                    Her nuptials with the rose.
“I would enquire how journeying long
                    The vast and pathless ocean o'er,
You ply again those pinions strong,
And come to build anew among
                    The scenes you left before;
“But if, as colder breezes blow
                    Prophetic of the waning year,
You hide, tho' none know when or how,
In the cliff's excavated brow,
                    And linger torpid here;
“Thus lost to life, what favouring dream
                    Bids you to happier hours awake,
And tells, that dancing in the beam,
The light gnat hovers o'er the stream,
                    The May fly on the lake.
“Or if, by instinct taught to know
                    Approaching dearth of insect food,
To isles and willowy airs you go.
And crouding on the pliant bough
                    Sink in the dimpling flood.
“How learn ye, while the cold waves boom
                    Your deep and ouzy couch above,
The time when flowers of promise bloom,
And call you from your transient tomb,
                    To light, and life, and love?
“Alas! how little can be known
                    Her sacred veil where Nature draws;
Let baffled Science humbly own,
Her mysteries understood alone
                    By Him who gives her laws.”

“Flora,” which succeeds, has been printed before, in Conversations for the Use of Children and Young Persons; so has the next poem, called “Studies by the Sea.” This is followed by the “Horologe of the Fields, addressed to a Young Lady, on seeing at the house of an acquaintance a magnificent French Time-piece.” This is a very elegant and well-timed composition, intimating that many of the simple productions of nature will, to those who well observe them, mark the periods as they pass, as well as these costly and splendid toys. Such, for example, as the Nymphæa, the Hieracium's various tribe, the Star of Bethlem, the Arenaria, Silene, and others, which contract or expand their flowers at different hours of the day. The next poem is entitled “Saint Monica,” which is followed by a Walk in the Shrubbery, Hope, Evening, Love and Folly, from Fontune, and a trifling Jeu d'Esprit, on the Aphorism, “L'Amitie est l'Amour sans ailes.”—Notes are added to all the poems, but of no material value.

We take our leave of this author with unseigned regret and sympathy. Her life was embittered by sorrow and misfortune, this gave an unavoidable tinge to her sentiments, which, from the gay and the vain, and the unfeeling, may excite a sneer of scorn and contempt; but in the bosoms of those who, like Charlotte Smith, with refined feelings, improved by thought and study, and reflection, have been compelled, like her, to tread the thorny paths of adversity, will prompt the generous wish, that fortune had favoured her with more complacency; and will induce the disposition to extenuate such portions of her productions, as sterner judgment is unable to approve.