AN ENIGMA

"Seldom we find," says Solomon Don Dunce, "Half an idea in the profoundest sonnet. Through all the flimsy things we see at once As easily as through a Naples bonnet - Trash of all trash! - how can a lady don it? Yet heavier far than your Petrarchan stuff- Owl-downy nonsense that the faintest puff Twirls into trunk-paper the while you con it." And, veritably, Sol is right enough. The general tuckermanities are arrant Bubbles - ephemeral and so transparent - But this is, now, - you may depend upon it - Stable, opaque, immortal - all by dint Of the dear names that lie concealed within 't.

1847.