OUR LITERARY CORNER.

Press, Volume L, Issue 14916, 14 March 1914, Page 9

OUR LITERARY CORNER.

A NOTABLE POET.

(Br thx Hoy. Sir Robe&t Srotrr, K.C31.G.)

The pleasure of my visit to Europe did not arise mainly from a visit to places famed in song and story. It 3id not como from tho sight of great Cities, of hives of industry, of noble buildings, of beautiful pictures, of noted gardens, nor from the landscape of England that has taken two thousand years to create in all its loveliness. Was it not Emerson who was 60 much impressed with old England that he wrote as follows:—"Under an ashjoloured 6ky the fields havo been combed and rolled till they appear to havo beon finished with a pencil instead of a plough?" Not even tho sight of nature in her grandeur in the Swiss Alps and the glory of the Rhineland, were .the source of my pleasure. I had seen our New Zealand mountains, and our Aorangi, though about 300 feet lower than the Jungfrau, need not hide its head in abasement to the worshipper of the virgin snow of any Bernese mountain.. And tho Rhine! What of this great European river? I had seen the glories of tho Wanganui gorges and though this New Zealand river lacks the historic associations and tho human interest of the Rhine, it excels the German river in natural beauty. It wns not Nature in her various moods that impressed mc iv my trip through Europe; it was humanity. Tho meeting and often conversing with tho men that had made and were making history in the United Kingdom, in France, in Germany, in Switzerland, etc., etc.,. gave tho most pleasure on • my visit. I thought of this when I recently read the able, nay noble, utterance of Viscount Haldane of Cloan to the American Bar Association at Montreal last September. Never before had a Lord Chancellor of England addressed that Association, and certainly v no English judicial officer had ever in America dealt with a greater theme. It "Higher Nationality." What gripped me,in,the speech was, however, the illustration he used from one of tho late Sir Alfred C. LyalTs poems: The speech was an appeal to our kin beyond the sea in America to help forward tho higher life and to promote peace, and from . a poem . read by few, called '•Theology in Extremis".and from a poot not known to many, came a very f powerful and most apt quotation. Sir Alfred Lyall was one of our great . Imperialists that I met in England. Before I met him 1 had read this poem. It appears in Henley's collection of "Lyra. Heroica," but I* was not then acquainted with his other poems I speat a few hours in his company I was charmed with his modesty, his t strong common senie, but until you struck some of his . chords.of idealism you would never have imagined him to have written - "Theology' in Extreme." We talked of the outlook •of India ; I riomd. judge, by what he said that though he was hopeful of progress, to felt that his country- * men did not realise the enormous task _ , England had undertaken in trying' to govern India and to. lead her vast millions to a higher life. The difficulty are appalling. We talked of its of Buddhism, and one topic was, was there any evidence in Buddhistic '-enptures of humour in Buddha? To •this query of mine one of the great Buddhatstic scholars of England who was present afterwards sent mc a fandV letter .pointi-g out a passage •whKh answered my enquiry That evening, when Lyall and many other eminent men, were present, I shall »ever forget. It was worth going to ;/ • to .be present at, such a *. - meeting. I.was fortunate, in having many more such meetings. One that * also impressed mc 'was that of the society of "Social Experiences" in Parts. I was : the only British subject . present. '- There were all nationalities represented French, German, Austrian, Russian, Greek, Swiss, Roumanian, etc., and the, hours our symposium las Usd wore all too short for the discussiott of the many social subjects thtt wero touched upon, Those were earnest men and women, all enthusiastic workers to raise the level of human i We not in one nation,.or amongst ono Mcc, but to raise it everywhere. W*o island dwellers need to have our out- „ look enlarged, and to ever remember '.that tho problems of the present ard future are not forgotten amongst the „ thinking citizens of other countries » Let mc, however, refer to Lyall as * poet. Lord Chancellor Haldane, in dealing with the higher,, nationality referred ,to what Germans call ''Sittlichkeit;" which he explained meant.that habit of life by which a itttion inspires and compels its citizens to act morally. It is the ethical habit ▼hfch a nation has evolved which dominates its citizens. If this habit » weakened or at a low level, then the community degenerates. If you find it high tho nation is high, and to illustrate what it does he refers to Iffall'si poem "Theology in Extremis." 1 It is a tale in verse of an incident of" th» Indian Mutiny. The poem is Beaded hj tho following extract from _ *n Indian newspaper of date June, , J 1857 » and takes the form of a soliliquy * an English prisoner captured by '*; Mohammedan rebels. Tho paragraph , £ Ittads ■—"They would have spared life any of their English prisoners who , should consent to profess Mohammedanism by repeating the usual short formula; but only one half-caste cared save himself in that way." « '^ ta '> English prisoner was an agnostic. 'What harm for him to say: 'Great is f Allah and Mahomet is his prophet." A bullock's death and at thirty years! Just one phrase, and a man gets off it; J*ok at that mongrel clerk in hia tears t Warning aloud the name- of the prophet; Only a formula easy to patter, Ana God Almighty, what can it matter?' He thus argues with himself, but :here is tho -English name, there is, * the compelling "Sittlichkeit" ; shall he , *ast disgrace on the English name, on tte Christian nation? No! In Beayon's name, no; as Carlyle would lave said. He has many strings pull- ] »ng him down; does he not say :-— v lofe ia pleasant, and fr;«nda may be -nigh, Fats' would I speak' one • word and be, spared; ; Yet [ could be silent and cheerfully-die. If I were "only sure God cared: !g If I had faith and -were only certain |r ytbal ia behind, that terrible curtain/

ORIGINAL AND SELECTED MATTER.

NOTES ON BOOKS AND . AUTHORS^:

And again— Now do I feel that my heart must break All for one glimpse of a-woman's face.* But not even leaving his beloved can move him. There he stands In this plain all bare eavo the shadow of

death; Leaving my life in its hill noonday, And no one to know why I flung it away. *

And then a few lines further on comes tho quotation. Lord Haldane made. It is as follows:— Yet for tho honour of the English race. May I not live or endure disgrace. Ay, but the word if I could have said it,

I by no terrors of hell pcrplcxt; Hard to be silent and have no credit From man in this world or reward in the next; None to bear witness and reckon the cost Of the name that is saved by the life that is lost. I must be gone to the crowd untold, Of men by the cause which they served unknown, Who moulder in myriad groves of old; Never a etory and never a stone Tells of the martyrs who died like mc, Just for tue pride of the old countree. "ies, the agnostic will not pronounce what is to him a meaningless shibboleth, to save hi.s life, because to do 60 would bring disgrace on the English name. Could thero bo a finer -illustration of "Sittlichkeit"? Can there be a higher national life till there is this national consciousness felt by every citizen? Everyone must feel that the nation's good name is in his keeping. If we could see that amongst us then the higher life would have arrived. And if it does not come the higher life is still far distant from us. We must have a passion for tho attainment of this compelling inspiration. Were it only present with us most, if not all, of our social evils would vanish like the morning mists. It is significant that the other illustration given by Lord Haldane was that of Socrates, who was condemned by a majority vote as a blasphemer, and who would not escape from prison at the solicitation of Crito, for that would havo been .to destroy justice. He must act as a good citizen would act. And so the Lord Chancellor takes as his exemplars of tho performance of the highest duty as citizens, two agnostics. Had we all had a true ideal of citizen's life there would have been no "striko disorders. Leaving, however, the forceful speech of tho Lord Chancellor we may make some further reference to Lyall s poems. Tho first edition was pubJished in 1890, and was modestly named "Verses Written in India." The last edition, the sixth, was published in 1905, and can be got for a shilling. Students of Horace will delight in the free translations of some of the odes. There have been many translations of Ode XfV. of Book the Second, "Eheu, Fugaces, Posthume, Posthume! Alas, the .fleeting years slide by Posthumus, O Posthumus 1" But Lyall's cannot be despised. Let mc quote just two or threo of the verses: — Alas, old friend, that each year Of our life » Tapidly flying! No -charity softens the sentence drear Of wrinkles, and age, and dying. ' You may fill with gold the chuTch plat* Each Sabbath day morn in tho portal, You can never appease iate, Who laughs at the tears of a mortal. Monarch* and warriors, stout, She holds them all in her tether, So whether you now be a lord or a lout, Wo must travel that road together. The heir will inherit your keye! And deep from the bins he'll fish no The Madeira, you thought to drink at your ease, . And port'laid down for tho Bishop. • The two most powerful poems are,, perhaps, "A Sermon in Lower Bengal, by Hajee Mahomed Ghazee oorf Moo- ' jahid-ood-deen Wahabee. preacher from Arabia, and '-'The Old Pindaree." Both are too long for quotation. One verse may be quoted to show the swing and rhythm of tho first-named poem, if en of. the Indian cities who call on th* Prophet's name, By our brotherhood in Islam y« besought mc and I came, . From a country hard and barren to a softly watered land, • To a round sky lino oi harvest from a wilderness of. sand, From our bare and barren homesteads, from our feast of dates and milk. To your palaces, your flesh pots, and your raiment of the silk; Prom a land of fenced citadels, where blood is lightly ehed, Where a o'.an must hold its borders, and a man mutt keep' his head; Where the wayfarer benighted, as he nears a village Iste. Spie« the rea spark from tho matches of the guard about, the gate, Where the faithful watch in vain, except the Lord their city keepHere tho infidels protect you, end with open .. door ye sleep. Prayer is gfipd —but practice better. What is' it that ye can do ? . Will ye fight , for this fair heritage, this empire that ye lost? .Xcr-..70ur brains are dull with «ating, and your hearts are choked with lust, And your seat is loots in. saddle, and yonx scimitars aro rust. * A small poem, "Rajpoot Rebels," is in a! different metre: —* Whore the mighty cliffa are frowning Far o'er tho torrents fall, And the pine and oak stand crowning The ridges of high Nepaul, , Sat twenty Rajpoot rebels, Haggard and pale and thin, Lazily chucking the pebbles Into tho foaming lynn.' These Rajpoot rebels are the last of tho village, and they are hunted. Their villages have beon destroyed, and they think that when tho war is over they will be pardoned—will they accept such an offer ? When the army has slain its fill, When they bid tho hangman cease; They will beckon us down from the C-esert hill To go to our homes in peace. To plough with a heavy heart, • And, half our fields bereft, 'Gainst the usurer's oath and the lawyer's art To battJo that some be left. And this is the Chief's answer:— Toil like on ox or a mule To earn tho stranger his fee— Our sons may brook the -FcrinzhoeV rule, There is no moro lite for mc!" There are poems having other Indian subjects for their themes. Some are Jewish subjects, like "Joab Speaketh," and "Pilate's Wife's Dream." Others aro general:—"The Monk and the Bird." "Charles's Wain." Who knows but that Lord Haldane's quotation from Lyall's poems may lead some who love poetry to some hours of pleasure in reading the works of "one whom I dare call a notable poet? Sir Alfred Lyall was not only a notable poet, he was a man of affairs. He took a distinguished part in the Indian Mutiny, and afterwards was one of India's able civil administrators. For fifteen years he was a member of the Indian "Council in London, and later he was Ford Lecturer in History at Oxford. His Asiatic studies showed him to be an expert in comparative relieions, and in anthropology. In general literature he was author of two biographies, one of Tennyson and another of the Marquis of Dufferin and Ava. All thoso who had the honour of meeting him were, I am sure, charmed with his society, and impressed with his intellectual ahilitf.