AT THE SIGN OF THE LYRE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1194, 18 January 1895, Page 11

AT THE SIGN OF THE LYRE.

SIR EDWIN ARNOLD’S LATEST. From Oar Special Correspondent. London, December 3. I am cynical enough to believe that if Sir Edwin Arnold were not the editor of the Telegraph the majority of his poetic effusions would go the waste paper-basket way of most rubbishy verses. Fancy, for example, any sane magazine printing the Japanese drivel awarded the honours of large type in Friday’s!). 17.I 7 . : “ Shirakami Genjiro (Okayama man) Left his ripening rice to go Fighting for Japan-” Certainly it was : " “ Sad for grey-haired husbandman Fatherly in years, Sad for pretty Yoshi San, Proudly checking tears.” But Sir Edwin also, no doubt, “proudly checking tears," explains that it was “no go/' Duty bids! the fact is, Genjiro must go. And go he does, and so does Sir E.lvvin, on on, on, for Heaven alone knows how many versicle. A P.M.G. man, enthused by a perusal of this phenomenal effort, applies the same poetic method to the lamentable case of Miss Janet Cakebread, fined for the 147th time for drunkeness : Little Jenny Cakebread ' (Servant of no. home) Was discharged from Holloway In Stamford Hill to roam. Then further : Sad for Mr Latham, Magistrate on beak, • Sad for the policeman, Forced ’gainst Jane to speak. But alas 1 Law is stern ! . the end is. Cakebrea i gets a month. MR DAVIDSON S POETRY. Tho coming man amongst poets is Mr Jno Davidson, whose slim volume of “ Ballads aud Songs ” just issued by Mr Lane entitles him to a seat alongside W. E. Henley and William Watson. Mr Davidson’s style is indeed more like the former’s than the latter’s. An abundant vigour and an intense, lusty vitality mark all he does. He doesn’t seem to versify for the sake of versi fying, but because his intensity of feeling seeks an outlet in the most vehement and and concentrated form of expression. “Ballads and Songs” contains many fine pieces, but its chef d’oeuvre is “The Ballad of the Nun," which formed the most striking feature of the October Yellow Booh. Of this Mr Swinburne writes: —Further study has only confirmed our opinion that it must take its place at once among (ho irally living utterances of our time. Listen to the following stanzas : High on the hill the convent hung, Across the duchy looking down, Where everlasting mountains flung There shadows over tower and town. Their jewels of their lofty snows In constellations flashed at night; Above their crests the moon arose ; The deep earth shuddered with delight. Long ere she left her cloudy bed, Still dreaming in the orient land, On many a mountain’s happy head Dawn lightly laid her rosy hand. The adventurous sun took Heaven by storm; Clouds scattered largesses of rain ; The sounding cities, rich and warm, Smouldered and glittered in the plain. Is there anything in English literature much more nobly pictorial than this last stanza ? It is a Turner in four lines. The beauty of the quatrain before it is slightly marred, to our thinking, by the recurrence of dissyllabic epithets in “ y,” “cloudy bed,” “happy head,” “rosy hand.” But the verse which must inevitably engrave itself on the memory of all who know the meaning of poetry is the second of these two :

He healed her bosom with a kiss ; She gave him all her passion’s hoard ; And sobbed and murmured ever, “ This Is life’s great meaning, dear my lord.

“ I eare not for my broken vow ; Though God shall come in thunder soon, I am sister to the mountains now, And sister to the sun and modn.” The longest poem in the book is “ A Ballad in Blank Verse of the Making of & Poet.” Why thus cumbrously entitled we cannot gues*. It is a vigorous and memorable pibce of work, describing the rebellion of a pagan-hearted boy against the narrow Calvinism of his parents : His father, woman-hearted, great of soul, Wilful and proud, save for one little shrine That held a pinchbeck cross, had closed and barred The many mansions of his intellect.

His father’s pleading done, his mother cried, With 1 twitching forehead, scalding tears that broke The seal of wrinkled eyelids, mortised hands Where knuckles jutted white : “ Almighty God!— Almighty God ! —Oh, save my foolish boy.” The vision of Aphrodite and Adonis which floats into his mind in the midst of his parents’ entreaties is very beautifuily written, and indeed the whole poem is full of masterly lines and passages, till it ends thus: — And lo ! to give me courage comes the dawn, Crimsoning the smoky east ; and still the sun With fire-shod feet, shall step from hill to hill Downward before the night; winter shall . ply His ancient craft, soldering the years with ice ; And spring appear, caught in a leafless brake. Breathless with wonder and the tears half dried Upon her rosy cheek : summer shall come And waste his passion like the prodigal Eight royally ; and autumn spend her gold Free-handed as a harlot ; men to know, Women to love are waiting everywhere.