32 EDINBURGH PAST AND PRESENT.
when compared with his age; and in it you find combined much of the
elegance of Pope and something of the fire of Schiller or Byron, although
the lyric energy and compression of his Mariners of EngZand and HohmZinden,
and the exquisite pathos of Gertrulze of Wyomhgand of 0’ Connor’s ChiZ4 were
yet to come. We are often half ashamed and half angry when we think that
AL1SON.S SQUARE M D POTTERRUW.
some of our poetic mystagogues have prevailed to dim the glory and to
lessen the popularity of such pure, clear, refined, and classical writers as
Campbell, and are sorry too that Campbell’s most congenial critic, Lord
Jeffrey, is suffering a temporary eclipse through similar causes. Temporary
it can only be, for while we readily admit the great genius of the writers just
referred to, we believe that their grievous and gloried-in fauIts and mannerisms
will prevent their permanence in the poetic sky, and that as they recede and
darken, the better and more English of our authors, alike poets and prosewriters,
will come again to the foreground.
Almost opposite Clarinda’s house, in Cordiners’ Court, Potterrow, there is
a little dark house of two apartments, where James Smith, a living and true
Scottish poet, wrote some of his best pieces, such as WeeJoukydaziiZes, The
Wee Pair d Siroon, B u d AiZie, Lily hm, and others, all breathing the real
