The general character of the poem will, we
think, be sufficiently understood by any one who may have taken the
trouble to read our foregoing compendium of the narrative. It will
be there seen that what is so frequently termed the imaginative
power of this story, lies especially- we should have rather said is
thought to lie- in the passages we have quoted, or in others of a
precisely similar nature. These passages embody, principally, mere
specifications of qualities, of habiliments, of punishments, of
occupations, of circumstances, &c., which the poet has believed in
unison with the size, firstly, and secondly with the nature of his
Fairies. To all which may be added specifications of other animal
existences (such as the toad, the beetle, the lance-fly, the
fire-fly and the like) supposed also to be in accordance. An example
will best illustrate our meaning upon this point-
He put his acorn helmet on;
It was plumed of the silk of the thistle down:
The corslet plate that guarded his breast
Was once the wild bee's golden vest;
His cloak of a thousand mingled dyes,
Was formed of the wings of butterflies;
His shield was the shell of a lady-bug queen,
Studs of gold on a ground of green;*
And the quivering lance which he brandished bright
Was the sting of a wasp he had slain in fight.
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