The poem is by John Lucas Tupper, whose verse WMR admired greatly—far more than his critical prose. This work's attention to an unmoralized natural detail marks its Pre-Raphaelite character.
WMR edited a collection on Tupper's poems after his death (
First printed in The
Germ
A Pre-Raphaelite Friendship: The Correspondence of
William Holman Hunt and John Lucas Tupper