10, AUGUST, 1858***


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THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY.

A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS.

VOL. II.--AUGUST, 1858.--NO. X.







DAPHNAIDES:

OR THE ENGLISH LAUREL, FROM CHAUCER TO TENNYSON.


  They in thir time did many a noble dede,
  And for their worthines full oft have bore
  The crown of laurer leaves on the hede,
  As ye may in your olde bookes rede:
  And how that he that was a conquerour
  Had by laurer alway his most honour.
                DAN CHAUCER: _The Flowre and the Leaf_.


It is to be lamented that antiquarian zeal is so often diverted from
subjects of real to those of merely fanciful interest. The mercurial
young gentlemen who addict themselves to that exciting department of
letters are open to censure as being too fitful, too prone to flit,
bee-like, from flower to flower, now lighting momentarily upon an
indecipherable tombstone, now perching upon a rusty morion, h