COLONEL HAY ON LITERATURE.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 10968, 16 July 1898, Page 6

COLONEL HAY ON LITERATURE.

i A recent London dinner wbb that of the Royal Literary Fund, and Colonel Hay was present to respond to tbe toast of "Literature" Amordlog to the report of bis remarks ia the London Times : — 11 He dliohl'ned the title wbloh had been oonferred upou him of a representative of literature, aud the oonneotlon of bia name with tbe tonad reminded him of the story of a four-la hand olub whloh coniitted of two daises— those who oonld drive four- In- hand and thoie who would like to dv so If they could, He belonged to tho latter o ttegory, An Egyptian poet of Immemorial ant'tjilty had said thtio to all profesilons buj one there was BOma objjotlon— that one waa the. icrlbe. Cer. talaly the great writera of the world bad an immorta'loy whloh was denied to the greatest monarobs, The literary association waa more faaoinatlog than tbe hlatorloil, and a vUit to Slally was more ilkely to recall a verae of Theomitas than the aiiulßg history of the Island, and Cleopatra's place In onr memory waa due more to Shakespeare than to the actual records of the p&Bb. A preaober btfore Louis &IV. In an nnluaky moment bad said, ' Brethren, we mmt all die,' and he at onoe oorrooted himself—' at least moat of ns.' Bat there waß an immortal element in literature, and tbe greatest writers had bsen indifferent to material considerations. Of hi* own countrymen, Edgar Pjb had been content to receive a few dollars (or the myatlo inspirations whloh had haunted later generational Qiall'.y waa beyond the power of god, and literature oonld never perish from the earth, and Biitiih literature, like the British Empire, oould never ba swallowed np in darknees."