PREFATORY NOTE. The following essays, originally prepared as lectures, are not offered as exhaustive treatises upon the writers dealt with. They are intended to be, within the strict meaning of the title chosen for them, studies in interpretation; and detailed criticisms of a technical nature, as well as the reproduction of more or less familiar personal matters, have therefore been purposely avoided. Such value as the essays may possess will, the author believes, be found to depend upon the point of view maintained throughout -a point of view not thus far commonly adopted by students of modern poetry. STANFORD UNIVERSITY, CALIFORNIA |