The Dalles times-mountaineer. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1882-1904, 1893-05-20
JOHN RUsKIN AS LAUREATE.

The Chicago Inter Ocean says: Mr.
Gladstone has furnished genuine,
though very pleasant, surprise in the
offer of the laureatship to John Rus
kin. Among all the possible or pros
pective candidates for the laureateship
perhaps no one besides Mr.. Gladstone
ever thought of Mr.. Ruskin in COM
nection with that high honor. John
Ruskin has no place, as a poet, in the
literature of his time, and even among
the best posted students of literature
the one that could, previous to this
surprising literary announcement
quote stanza of Ruskin's poetry
must have been an exception.
And yet, notwithstanding the sur
prise Of the announcement, the first
feeling of every loYer of literature and
true poetry must be one of consratu-
lation that Tennyson is to have as a
successor, if not one who is generally
known as poet, at least the foremost
living man of letters in England to-
day, the last of the great quartet,
Carlyle, Browning, Tennyson and Rus
kin, that have given the Victorian age
its high place in the literature of the
world. Nothing of violence is done
to the memory of Tennyson in bestow-
ing the laureateship upon Ruskin, and
while it is not possible for even Rus
kin's fame to add distinction to that
high office in the realm of letters there
is no man living to-day who stands in
closer relation to those who acknowl-
edged the kinship of Tennyson in poe
try and letters than John Ruskin.
Mr.. Gladstone's selection, therefore,
though wholly unexpected, will be
generally applauded, and both Eng
land and America will feel, in case
Ruskin shall accept the honor, that
no worthier sovereign in letters could
have been selected. For this is what
the appointment means, and in the
dearth of great poets, Mr.. Gladstone
has been fortunate in selecting, instead
of second or third-rate singer, the
one living man of letters in England
to-day whose life and life.work are
most poetical and most inspiring.
OF Ruskin, the art critic, the word
painters whose gorgeous pictures are
forever associated with clouds and
mountains and rivers, the beauty of
mornings in Florence and Venice, or
of Ruskin, the writer of the "Fors"
papers, who has flashed the lightning
of his scorn upon all that is base or
material only in our civilization, 1t is
unnecessary to speak. But of Ruskin,
the successor of Tennyson in the lau-
reateship, there will be much spoken
and written on both sides of the At
lantic.
And vet John Ruskin must be num-
bered among the poets also, if even so
good ajudge as Wordsworth may de-
eide, who in his Excursion" tells us:
90, many are the poets that are sown
By Nature Men endowed with high est gifts,
The vision and the faculty divine,
Yet wanting the accomplishment of verse"
To most persons, it must be ad-
mltted, poet wanting the accomplish
ment of verse is something Of an
anomaly, though every one is aware of
the much-disputed question as to just
what it is that distinguishes prose from
poetry. And in Ruskin's case at least
we must admit with Stedmen that
'.6ne prose is a higher form of express
sion than wretched verse;" or, we will
add, than even second-rate verse. In
his "elements Of drawing" he gives the
advice: "Never read bad or common
poetry, never write any poetry your
self; there is, perhaps, rather too much
than too little in the world already"
Ruskin has religiously followed his
own teachings as respects writing
pee.ry, though he is not altogether
lacking the Accomplishment of verse. J"
He gained the Newdigate prize at Ok
ford in English poetry, and volume
of his poems has been published. The
smallness of his contributions to Eng
lish poetry, however, is not to be taken
as Indicative that he is not poet any
more than the refusal of moderately
good musician to play in the presence
of Paderewskl should be taken as evi-
dence that the person refusing is not a
musician. Ruskin's own words offer
the best explanation. "Those who
sincerely love poetry know too well
the touch of the masters hands on the
chords to tumble among them after
him." he says in "Modern Painters"
and these words offer the best expla-
nation of the fact that Ruskin the poet
is kno sn chiefly to the world as a
writer of exquisite and inspiring
prose.
Suicide at Wamlc.
From Saturdays Daily.
Yesterday evening about o'clock Mr.. H. |
Staley was found dead in his room at the