But that his critical acumen and judgment were not altogether destroyed by the enthusiasm of his friendship, is, I think, shown by the following little poem by Theodosia Trollope, written a few years after the birth of her child.

I don't think I need apologise for printing it.
The original MS.

of it before me gives no title; nor do I remember that the authoress ever assigned one to the verses.
I.
"In the noon-day's golden pleasance, Little Bice, baby fair, With a fresh and flowery presence, Dances round her nurse's chair, In the old grey loggia dances, haloed by her shining hair.
II.
"Pretty pearl in sober setting, Where the arches garner shade! Cones of maize like golden netting, Fringe the sturdy colonnade, And the lizards pertly pausing glance across the balustrade.
III.
"Brown cicala drily proses, Creaking the hot air to sleep, Bounteous orange flowers and roses, Yield the wealth of love they keep, To the sun's imperious ardour in a dream of fragrance deep.
IV.
"And a cypress, mystic hearted, Cleaves the quiet dome of light With its black green masses parted But by gaps of blacker night, Which the giddy moth and beetle circle round in dubious flight.
V.
"Here the well chain's pleasant clanging, Sings of coolness deep below; There the vine leaves breathless hanging, Shine transfigured in the glow, And the pillars stare in silence at the shadows which they throw.
VI.
"Portly nurse, black-browed, red-vested, Knits and dozes, drowsed with heat; Bice, like a wren gold-crested, Chirps and teases round her seat, Hides the needles, plucks the stocking, rolls the cotton o'er her feet.
VII.
"Nurse must fetch a draught of water, In the glass with painted wings,[1] Nurse must show her little daughter All her tale of silver rings, Dear sweet nurse must sing a couplet--solemn nurse, who _never_ sings! VIII.
"Blest Madonna! what a clamour! Now the little torment tries, Perched on tiptoe, all the glamour Of her coaxing hands and eyes! May she hold the glass she drinks from--just one moment, Bice cries.
IX.
"Nurse lifts high the Venice beaker, Bossed with masks, and flecked with gold, Scarce in time to 'scape the quicker Little fingers over-bold, Craving tendril-like to grasp it, with the will of four years old.
X.
"Pretty wood bird, pecking, flitting, Round the cherries on the tree.
Ware the scarecrow, grimly sitting, Crouched for silly things, like thee! Nurse hath plenty such in ambush.

'Touch not, for it burns,'[2] quoth she.
XI.
"And thine eyes' blue mirror widens With an awestroke of belief; Meekly following that blind guidance, On thy finger's rosy sheaf, Blow'st thou softly, fancy wounded, soothing down a painless grief.
XII.
"Nurse and nursling, learner, teacher, Thus foreshadow things to come, When the girl shall grow the creature Of false terrors vain and dumb, And entrust their baleful fetish with her being's scope and sum.
XIII.
"Then her heart shall shrink and wither, Custom-straitened like her waist, All her thought to cower together, Huddling sheep-like with the rest, With the flock of soulless bodies on a pattern schooled and laced.
XIV.
"Till the stream of years encrust her With a numbing mail of stone, Till her laugh lose half its lustre, And her truth forswear its tone, And she see God's might and mercy darkly through a glass alone! XV.
"While our childhood fair and sacred.
Sapless doctrines doth rehearse, And the milk of falsehoods acrid, Burns our babe-lips like a curse, Cling we must to godless prophets, as the suckling to the nurse.
XVI.
"As the seed time, so the reaping, Shame on us who overreach, While our eyes yet smart with weeping, Hearts so all our own to teach, Better they and we lay sleeping where the darkness hath no speech!" [Footnote 1: Those unacquainted with the forms of the old decorated Venetian glass will hardly understand the phrase in the text.

Those who know them will feel the accuracy of the picture.] [Footnote 2: "_Non toccare che brucia_," Tuscan proverb.] It is impossible for any but those who know--not Florence, but--rural Tuscany well, to appreciate the really wonderful accuracy and picturesque perfection of the above scene from a Tuscan afternoon.