The intervening years had been spent in educating her boys and writing some of her best lyrics. She had become very popular as a writer in America, and had received a handsome offer from a Boston publisher to edit a periodical there, which would have been of great pecuniary benefit to her. But of all writers of whom we have heard or read, Mrs. Hemans had the most home proclivities.

Retiring, dreamy, modest, and perchance saddened by her domestic history, she nestled in the shelter of her mother's or her own home, and had no desire to see the lands whose natural features her imagination so vividly reproduced at second hand. Meantime she had made many literary friends, one of the most enthusiastic being Miss Jewsbury, afterwards Mrs. Fletcher. She corresponded with Joanna Baillie, Miss Bowles, Mary Howitt, Miss Mitford, Dean Milman, and Dr. Channing.

In the year following her mother's death, Mrs. Hemans' connexion with Blackwood's Magazine began. That firm published also her "Records of Woman." Her "Hymns for Childhood" were published in America in 1827.

In the following year she removed with her family to Wavertree, near Liverpool, sending her two elder sons at the same time to Rome to the care of their father, who had always been consulted in all matters relating to their training and education. During her residence at Wavertree (which proved very uncongenial to her), she studied music under Zeugheer Hermann, and composed airs for some of her own lyrics. She had played on the harp and piano from her youth, and had great facility in sketching from nature; in fact, few women have ever possessed the varied gifts of Felicia Hemans—beauty, talent of all kinds, and a fine moral nature.

In 1829 she visited Scotland, and became acquainted with Sir Walter Scott, between whom and herself a sincere liking and friendship began, which continued to the end. In 1830 she visited Wordsworth at Mount Rydal, who also yielded to the spell of her gentleness and genius, and when the grave had closed over her, paid a poetical tribute to her memory. Here (at Ambleside) she remained in a cottage called "Dove's Nest" with her boys for the summer. She revisited Scotland, and then returned to Wales for the last time.

Wavertree had proved, as we have said, uncongenial to her; the family in Wales had been broken up by the death of her mother, and Mrs. Hemans now thought of making a new home in Ireland, Major Browne, her brother, having been appointed Commissioner of Police in Dublin, and being desirous of having his gifted sister near him; so, in the spring of 1831, she embarked for the Irish capital. Here her health improved, and she formed some valuable friendships, notably with the family of Archbishop Whately.

Her "Lyrics and Songs for Music," were first published in Dublin. The "Scenes and Hymns of Life," a volume of religious poems, was the last published during her lifetime—dedicated to Wordsworth, and still copyright. Mrs. Hemans resided while in Dublin, in Upper Pembroke Street, St. Stephen's Green, and Dawson Street; and now the end of hershort and brilliant existence was drawing near. Her health failed, and she was nearly always condemned to keep on her sofa. Still she continued writing. Her illness was cheered by the presence of her brother and his wife, and her sister, Mrs. Hughes; while Charles and Henry, her two younger sons, rewarded her maternal love by their filial devotion. It was about this time that a stranger sought an interview with her, and gave her the delight of hearing that her poem "The Sceptic" had been the means of converting him to a belief in Christianity. As her mind was at this time deeply imbued with religious feeling, she probably rightly estimated this fact as the best part of her renown, the fullest reward of her efforts for good.

In the summer of 1834 Mrs. Hemans was attacked by scarlet fever, which left her extremely weak. A cold supervened, caught from having sat too long reading in the gardens of the Dublin Society. The cold was followed by ague and hectic fever attended by symptoms of dropsy. During an interval of convalescence she paid a visit to her friends the Whatelys at Redesdale, a country seat of the Archbishop's, but she returned from it much worse, having nearly lost the use of her limbs.

On the 16th of May, 1835, at the age of forty-one, she passed quietly away to the "Better Land," of which she had so touchingly written. She was interred in a vault beneath the church of St. Anne's, Dublin. She died, as she had once wished, in the spring.

"With the bright sunshine laughing around, it (death) seems more sad to think of," she says in one of her letters. "Yet, if I could choose when I would wish to die, it should be in the spring—the influence of that season is so strangely depressing to my heart and frame." ("Memoir," pp. 66 and 68.)

Many of our readers will understand and sympathize with this feeling and recall Keble's exquisite lines:—

Mrs. Hemans had her greatest popularity, perhaps, in her own day. Critics—with the exception of her first foe and the theatrical public—lauded her efforts uniformly; the people loved her sweet strains, and musical young ladies rejoiced in the songs set to charming melodies by her sister. It is said that Sir Walter Scott never tired of listening to her "Captive Knight," sung to the music composed by that sister, Mrs. Hughes, who wrote the "Memoir" above cited.

Time has somewhat diminished this popularity. The spirit of the present day undoubtedly does not harmonize with the purity and softness of this poetess of the early part of the century. Nevertheless, amongst a large class of readers Mrs. Hemans is still a great favourite. Her intenselove of nature, her strong family affection, the thousand tender glimpses of home-life to be found in her poems, will have a lasting attraction for the young of her own sex; while many of her best shorter poems, as "The Treasures of the Deep," "The Dying Soldier," "The Voice of Spring," &c. &c., will live as long as the language; and perchance, when the vexed pulse of this feverish age shall have subsided into a wiser calm, and an intellectual repose, her poems will be as much loved as they were when Heber, Scott, Wordsworth, and Whately united in commending and admiring them. Lord Jeffrey bore strong testimony to her powers in an admirable critique on her poems in the Edinburgh Review after the publication of the "Records of Women."

"We think," he says, "the poetry of Mrs. Hemans a fine exemplification of female poetry, and we think it has much of the perfection which we have ventured to ascribe to the happier productions of female genius.

"It may not be the best imaginable poetry, and may not indicate the highest and most commanding genius, but it embraces a great deal of that which gives the very best poetry its chief power of pleasing, and would strike us, perhaps, as more impassioned and exalted if it were not regulated and harmonized by the most beautiful taste. It is infinitely sweet, elegant, and tender—touching, perhaps, and contemplative rather than vehement and overpowering; and not only finished throughout with an exquisite delicacy and even severity of execution, but informed with a purity and loftiness of feeling, and a certain sober and humble tone of indulgence and piety, which must satisfy all judgments and allay the apprehensions of those who are most afraid of the passionate exaggeration of poetry.

"The diction is always beautifully harmonious and free, and the themes, though of infinite variety, uniformly treated with a grace, originality, and judgment which mark the same master hand...... Though occasionally expatiating somewhat fondly and at large amongst the sweets of her own planting, there is, on the whole, a great condensation and brevity in most of her pieces, and, almost without exception, a most judicious and vigorous conclusion. The great merit, however, of her poetry is its tenderness and its beautiful imagery..... Almost all her poems are rich with fine descriptions, and studded over with images of visible beauty. But these are never idle ornaments. All her pomps have a meaning, and her flowers and her gems are arranged, as they are said to be among Eastern lovers, so as to speak the language of truth and passion. This is peculiarly remarkable in some little pieces which seem at first sight to be purely descriptive, but are soon found to tell upon the heart with a deep moral and pathetic impression. But it is a truth nearly as conspicuous in the greater part of her productions, where we scarcely meet with any striking sentiment that is not ushered in by some such symphony of external nature, and scarcely a lovely picture that does not serve as a foreground to some deep and lofty emotion." (Edinburgh Review, No. 99.)

Such is a very brief portion of the long and masterly article in which the great reviewer discussed the works of the favourite poetess of her day.We recommend our lady readers to peruse it in its entirety, as it commences with an estimate of womanly powers which appears to us to answer many of the vexed questions of the present day.

We have heard that Mrs. Hemans regretted that circumstances and the friendly importunities of her admirers had induced her to write so fast; but we think that, from the period which followed the publication of "Modern Greece," we could ill spare any of her productions.

A great many specimens of her juvenile poems are given in this edition—all, in fact, of any importance. They are remarkable for great smoothness of metre and some taste and fancy, but of course cannot compare with the productions of her more mature years. We believe that all her best poems will be found in the present volume, which contains some few not to be met with in any other edition.

The domestic fireside can, we believe, have no pleasanter companion than her Poems will prove; while mothers may safely place them in the hands of their children, certain that nothing but moral good can be obtained from them, and that noble sentiments and the acquirement of a fine and correct taste are a natural consequence of the study of Mrs. Hemans' poems.

We add, in conclusion, a portion of the exquisite lines in which Wordsworth lamented her death in conjunction with those of his earlier brethren in art:—

The Editor has to thank Charles Hemans, Esq.—son of the poetess—for a very kind and courteous revision of this memoir and poems, since the original publication of the work.