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Show CRITICISM OF MILTON. A mining-camp editor at Bodie recently received from a San Francisco bookseller a copy of Milton's "Paradise Lost." "More new books to review!" he sighed, taking out his tobacco knife and cutting the leaves. "Milton must be a new man," he added, "a New-Yorker, I suppose. Well, here goes." Thereupon he wrote the following paragraph. "We received yesterday a copy of John Milton's poems from the enterprising publishing house of X. X., San Francisco. The book opens with a long yarn, ‘Paradise Lost.' He very improperly commences with a description of hell, a topic that is never mentioned in the polite circles of this camp, and gives a most thoroughly absurd pen portrait of the devil. This person he pictures as many rods in length, while the best authorities on the subject have likened him to a goat. He goes on then to tell of a fight with a batch of angels, wherein the devil, as a matter of course, gets the worst of it, being from the very start the under dog in the fight. This is quite enough for us. John Milton would do better to return to his legitimate newspaper sphere. He may be able to describe a masquerade ball, or a street row, but, in our opinion, he is a very poor poet." "This will do for Milton," said the editor, as he passed the copy in to the foreman. |
