ence beyond the capacity of meditative boyhood. The Tiger is a magnificent expression of boyish wonder and admiring terror. The Crystal Cabinet is a fairy dream of early youth; The Golden Net is a fine dream of adolescence. Perhaps in only three more of his briefer poems do we find Blake mature (it must be borne in mind that his second maturity unfolded itself in pictures rather than songs); Broken Love, Auguries of Innocence, and the Letter in verse, dated from Felpham, to his friend, Mr. Butts. These are mature as to their conception, as to the amount and quality of experience and thought involved in them, but occasionally very immature in execution. There is, indeed, one piece of twenty lines mature in every respect, although written so late as 1807: I mean the verses to Queen Charlotte with his illustrations of Blair's Grave:—
The door of death is made of gold,
That mortal eyes cannot behold;
But when the mortal eyes are closed,
And cold and pale the limbs reposed,
The soul awakes, and wondering sees
In her mild hand the golden keys.
The grave is Heaven's golden gate,
And rich and poor around it wait:
O Shepherdess of England's Fold,
Behold this gate of pearl and gold!
To dedicate to England's Queen
The visions that my soul hath seen,
And by her kind permission bring
What I have borne on solemn wing
From the vast regions of the grave,
Before her throne my wings I wave,
Bowing before my sovereign's feet;
The Grave produced these blossoms sweet,
In mild repose from earthly strife,
The blossoms of eternal life!
