Liverpool Daily Post, 4 August 1909, p. 8

Canon Rawnsley has the faculty of placing vivid impressions in vivid verse. He is a true and a worthy disciple of Wordsworth. In our own and other columns he has dealt with events of the moment in verse which always displays a wonderful faculty for grasping the inner meaning of these events. This, too, is Wordsworthian in influence. "Poems at Home and Abroad" shows Canon Rawnsley in every phase of his art. The “Poems of Italy” are quite characteristic. There is the appreciation of colour, the tender optimism of the philosophy, the wide comprehension of sympathy. The “Memorial Sonnets” appeal most to us. Here is a collection of sonnets dealing in Canon Rawnsley’s own way events of the time. It would be absurd to say that the sonnets are perfect in form; after all, that is an achievement which is given to very few. But they have their own dignity and richness of thought. If we place the tribute to Swinburne as the best, it is largely because it shows in every line Canon Rawnsley’s widely sympathetic temper. It is not every ecclesiastic who can see so deeply into Swinburne’s yearning heart.

Citizen (Letchworth), 6 November 1909, p. 8

Canon Rawnsley has long been known to us as a lover of nature and the author of some of the most charming books in our library. We have followed him on many a jaunt around his favourite Lakeland, but he has now taken us further afield and given us a volume of “Poems at Home and Abroad.” The talented parson is a sweet singer, and although we like his Nature poems best of all, he has written much that is worth reading of Italy and other foreign lands. We should like to quote many stanzas by this pleasant songster, but a reasonable quotation from the poem “Fieldfares” must suffice. These birds, if not already here, will soon be heard uttering their “chank, chank” upon our breezy Common, and judging by the wild fruits which now abound, these winter visitors from the far North will find food in plenty to tide them over the winter.

With ‘tsik-tsak’ high and ‘tsik-tsak’ low—
    While perched far off their pickets stand—
    These wandering birds possess the land
Our Norseman fathers used to know.
    In voice, half quarrel, half command,
    They wrangle on, the robber band—
    Swift-wingéd Vikings from the strand
Of ice and winter snow.