other of his early poems burned with a steady glow in after years, and illumined poems of which we shall speak presently. After a year and a half spent in travel, Lowell was ap pointed in 1855 to the Belles Lettres professorship at Harvard, previously held by Longfellow. When the Atlantic Monthly was established in 1857 he became its editor, and soon after relinquishing that post he assumed part editorship of the North American Review. In these two magazines, as also in Putnam's Monthly, he published poems, essays, and critical papers, which have been gathered into volumes. His prose writings, besides the volumes already mentioned, include two series of Among my Books, historical and critical studies, chiefly in English literature; and My Study Windows, including, with similar subjects, observations of nature and contemporary life. During the war for the Union he published a second series of the Biglow Papers, in which, with the wit and fun of the earlier series, there was mingled a deeper strain of feeling and a larger tone of patriotism. The limitations of his style in these satires forbade the fullest expression of his thought and emotion; but afterward in a succession of poems, occasioned by the honors paid to student-soldiers in Cambridge, the death of Agassiz, and the celebration of national anniversaries during the years 1875 and 1876, he sang in loftier, more ardent strains. The interest which readers have in Lowell is still divided between his rich, abundant prose, and his thoughtful, often passionate verse. The sentiment of his early poetry, always humane, was greatly enriched by larger experience; so that the themes which he chose for his later work demanded and received a broad treatment, full of sympathy with the most generous instincts of their time, and built upon historic foundations. In 1877 he went to Spain as Minister Plenipotentiary. In 1880 he was transferred to England as Minister Plenipotentiary near the Court of St. James. His duties as American Minister did not prevent him from producing occasional writings, chiefly in connection with public events. Notable among these are his address at the unveiling of a statue of Fielding, and his address on Democracy. Mr. Lowell returned to the United States in 1885, and was not afterward engaged in public affairs, but passed the rest of his life quietly in his Cambridge home, prevented by failing health from doing much literary work. He made a collection of his later poems in 1888, under the title Heartsease and Rue, and carefully revised his complete works, published in ten volumes in 1890. THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL. [AUTHOR'S NOTE. According to the mythology of the Romancers, the San Greal, or Holy Grail, was the cup out of which Jesus Christ partook of the last supper with his disciples. It was brought into England by Joseph of Arimathea, and remained there, an object of pilgrimage and adoration, for many years, in the keeping of his lineal descendants. It was incumbent upon those who had charge of it to be chaste in thought, word, and deed; but one of the keepers having broken this condition, the Holy Grail disappeared. From that time it was a favorite enterprise of the Knights of Arthur's court to go in search of it. Sir Galahad was at last successful in finding it, as may be read in the seventeenth book of the Romance of King Arthur. Tennyson has made Sir Galahad the subject of one of the most exquisite of his poems. The plot (if I may give that name to anything so slight) of the following poem is my own, and, to serve its purposes, I have enlarged the circle of competition in search of the miraculous cup in such a manner as to include not only other persons than the heroes of the Round Table, but also a period of time subsequent to the supposed date of King Arthur's reign.] PRELUDE TO PART FIRST. OVER his keys the musing organist, First lets his fingers wander as they list, And builds a bridge from Dreamland for his lay: Then, as the touch of his loved instrument Gives hope and fervor, nearer draws his theme, 5 |