The diamond drill., 1889-01-05

Is an educated taste n curse or bless
ingg Which is most TO be envied, the
epicure over his terapin and Amontila-
do. or the boy in the rapture OF his first
bonbony AS we grow older we learn TO
distinguish more certainly and more
precisely the shades OF difference be-
tween great writer's and poor, to appre-
hend the deeper meaning Of sage and poet; /;
we grow wiser,-perhaps,- for even this
may be doubted), but nre we any the
happier for it2 lie pioisfr du crifiQue
ofe ic pidisir Il eafeldre les bellies chooses,
says Fenelon. We call this or that
great genius magician, we speak OF
the enchanted wand by which he waves
us into faery-land. Ah, WELT there is N
real faery- Land; and we have alb known
il (for we too were born in Arcadia),
where life is strange and new and full Of
delirious transport, where all the
earth shouts for Joy, where the morning
stars, singing together, are not SO sweet
as the voices OF the men and women
whom we know, where every youth To
every maid, and every maid to- every
youth, is that divine possibility which in
some one of them shall soon be realized,
that object towards whom all tu-
multuous passions shall trend, in whom
love and awe and reverence shall find an
abiding place, SO that all fieshy cere-
ments shall fade away, and Soul stand
naked before naked Soul, glorious and
unabashed and the Infinite be revealed.
What no. without there, Seneschal. n
stoup of wine.--for the Reviewer is old
and wan and his heart Is chill, and only
the generous vintage OF Oporto and
Bordeaux may warm him to some dim
remembrance OF the splendors of his
prime. when, reeling with his passions
and his immaginations. he first came up-
on the theatre OF action. But all around
him and about him there are still beings
such as erstwhile he was, living in that
raery-land which is now only remem-
brance and a regret, youths in the first
flush OF that glorious intoxication, who
reck not OF the choice bouquet of the
preciousest wines, who know not Bor-
deaux nor Port, to whose virgin palates
the meanest rim ordinaire is as some di-
vinest nectar.
Does the reader see the parable? Does
| he recognize that the Reviewer is COM
pairing the great writer's TO Bordeaux
and Port, which only the educated pal
ate can fully appreciate, and the lesser
writer's 10 rin ordindire, which the edu-
Gated would reject, yet which titillates
all the nerves and glands of the unedu-
Gated with n Joy that the former would
give Golconda TO reconquers The young
reader has real intellectual advantage
over his elders. He cares little for the
subtler beauties OF style, for great
| thought, for vivid insight, for any
novelty in incident or situation, for any
real approach of mind to mind. Enough
| il hero and heroine dance and flirt, love,
quarrel, kiss, aud make IL up, IL there
be laughter and tears, sunshine and
moonlight. open compliment and whis-
pered adulation, the sheen of pretty
dresses and OF golden hair, the ring and
the ripple of slnall-talk, with due al
lowancc OF Incidents, accidents, and
startling transitions. The alert imagi-
nation OF youth catches fire at word.
Reader and novelist meet each other
halfway: the novelist provides plot and
characters. the reader dowers them with
life and likelihood.