“Autumn." William Watson.

“Still'd is the virgin rapture that was June,

And cold is August's panting heart of fire;
And in the storm-dismantled forest choir
For thine own elegy thy winds attune
Their wild and wizard lyre:
And poignant grows the charm of thy decay,
The pathos of thy beauty, and the sting,
Thou parable of greatness vanishing!
For me, thy woods of gold, and skies of grey,
With speech fantastic ring.

“For me to dreams resign'd, there come and go,

Twixt mountains drap'd and hooded night and morn,
Elusive notes in wandering wafture borne,
From undiscoverable lips that blow
An immaterial horn;
And spectral seem thy winter-boding trees,
Thy ruinous bowers, and drifted foliage wet,
O Past and Future in sad bridal met,
O voice of everything that perishes,
And soul of all regret!”

Very fine also is Andrew Lang's song of harvesting time. The flowing classic metre has a very soothing effect, and its rhythm is admirably adapted to produce the feeling of rest that is desired, and very gently are our thoughts led on to the time when “our little life is rounded with a sleep.”

“Mowers weary and brown and blythe,
What is the word methinks ye know,

"Scythe Song."

Endless over word that the Scythe
Sings to the blades of the grass below?
Scythes that swing in the grass and clover,
Something still they say as they pass;
What is the word that, over and over,
Sings the Scythe to the flowers and grass ?

“Hush, ah hush, the scythes are saying,
Hush and heed not and fall asleep;
Hush, they say to the grasses swaying,
Hush, they sing to the clover deep!
Hush, 'tis the lullaby time is singing,
Hush and heed not, for all things pass,
Hush, ah hush! And the Scythes are swinging
Over the clover, over the grass."

“Job.”

And the dramatist of old says: “There is hope for a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease. Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof die in the ground; yet through the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant. But man dieth and wasteth away and where is he? · As the waters fail from the sea, and the flood decayeth and drieth up, so man lieth down and riseth not; till the heavens be no more they shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep.”

Shelley epitomises thus the whole matter, and explains the use the poet makes of the materials supplied by Nature:

“He will watch from dawn to gloom

The lake-reflected sun illume
The yellow bees in the ivy-bloom,
Nor heed nor see what things they be;
But from these create he can
Forms more real than living man,
Nurslings of immortality!”

“The Poet's Dream."

This is what poet and painter alike should try to do, and expel forever the idea that art is the imitation of nature, and so create a new world of art, like yet very unlike, the world they see.

It is important to consider this subjective view of nature in the poets; for the painter in words and the painter in colours work toward the same end, both seeking to inspire the thoughts and move the feelings of the people they appeal to in their different ways. The poets have the advantage of being able to relate a story, and are not limited to one action, or one period of time. The painters have the powerful attraction of colour and form. But both must strive to give the spirit if they would

attain the rank of masters. So we find in painting, as in poetry, the greatest power will always be with those artists who have this sympathetic imagination, who are able to discern the poetical in the actual, the ideal in the real, the universal in the particular.

They alone can produce those glorious “speaking” pictures, which continually reveal the ideas and feelings that possessed the artist, when his brush was touched by a power that he knew not of.

CHAPTER V

MODERN DUTCH ART

THE seven Dutch artists we have already spoken of form a unique group, inasmuch as their paintings have this strong subjective “Art seeks phase, this revealing of nature, and of their the artist

alone. own feelings unconsciously inspired by nature, When he

dies she and because, in addition to this, they each see sadly takes the subjects they paint in an absolutely dif- her flight,

though ferent way from anyone who has preceded loitering yet them. They have shown us new phases of in the land

from fond art, they have expressed the ideas that possessed association.

And so we them in new and varied forms, and they have have the transferred their thoughts to canvas with ephemeral

influence of masterly execution in a large and noble man- the master's ner and dignified style, giving the impression meme

the afterof power in reserve. As usually happens

which are with strong and original characters, they have warmed for inspired others, who see more or less through a while

the worker their eyes; but they themselves are creators. and disci

ple.” “Ten They have caught a spark of the divine fire

O'Clock.” of genius, and stand splendidly alone. Whistler.

men

ner