Volume 1 - Electric Scotland

MR aird's poem. 311
and that a twenty-page poem, if showing power and genius,
would be better in the Magazine than many a prose paper
even of average ability or interest. That is to say, now and
then.
To get long poems faultless, or free from great and many
faults, is not easy. " The Jewess of the Cave " is not of the
number. Still Mr Aird's poem may have in your eyes, looking
at it with a view to all I have said, greater faults than in
mine, and such faults as may make you decide, however reluctantly,
against its admission. And if so, then I think you
will be justified in not inserting it, notwithstanding my vote
on the other side. Probably you may be of the opinion that
long poems would not benefit the Magazine, however talented,
unless such as would on the whole defy criticism, and be uni-
versally or very generally popular. To me it appears that such
long poems would be seldom if ever got, and that, therefore,
the idea of inserting long poems in the Magazine (as a new
feature—now and then) will have to be relinquished, unless
such are inserted whose merits overbalance their defects, how-
ever numerous and strong these may be.
This is a long story ; but I have troubled you with it, that
you may exactly understand my views in general. Consider
these, and then judge from a careful perusal for yourself
whether or not Mr Aird's poem fulfils the provisions of the
new Act.
F.S.—This letter reminds me of De Quincey.
The letter does very much resemble De Quincey :
much more than it resembles Wilson, in its elabor-
ate balance of arguments and complete inconclusive-
ness. It is a curious question, and v^^e can imagine
Blackwood, who never had written any poetry, to
have been somewhat confused by it, though prob-
ably he settled such matters summarily on the simpler
issue, whether he liked a poem or not.
The negotiation about the publication of Wilson's