London Lyrics

ted till it looked spontaneous--as it was in thought if not altogether in development. His critical sense seems to have grown keener with his interest in the making of verses: "he was a great student of verse," Mr Birrell says, and a student especially of that kind of verse of which he was himself one of the masters. In 1867 he published the well-known collection "Lyra Elegantiarum," assisted by Mr Kernahan: the preface, written by Locker, contains some excellent rules for "light verse," from which the selections are made. This anthology ranges over the whole field of English poetry, and, like everything else of Locker's, it shows the man. "Its charm," writes the editor's collaborator, "is entirely of the editor's individuality"--at least, from his favourites in literature, one may make a very fair guess at some part of his character. So, too, "Patchwork"--a kind of scrap-book, a collection of miscellaneous anecdotes, mostly humorous, but not as a rule broadly or farcically funny--illustrates his del