The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-04-07

of Greek antiquity, and he frames it in his
sonnets. There lives again the soul of
Theocritus and Meleager. With garlands
of epigrams he crowns the heroes of N.Y.
thology and the neck Of the Centaurs. He
has written much about the Centaurs and
in one sonnet he shows the last of the race
All his brothers are dead, and the lone
Centaur is ashamed of his solitude-his
singularity. AT sunset only he gallops on
the beach, because there he sees his shadow
beside him, and can imagine there are
two. In 'Trophees" there are some SON.
is which prove NJ. de Heredia to be a
loving pupil of Dante and Petrarch.
Again we find sonnets written in honor
of certain De Heredia who in 1882 founded
the town of Carthagena, in the Indies.
Among the ancestors illustrious in the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries this is
the one most reyered.
The Cubans regret that their poet chooses
the French language for the expression of
his thought. They believe he should write
in Spanish and to him they apply the
name afrancesado. The Cubans say that
his talent comes from an ancestor, another
Jose Maria de Heredia, known in every
South American country by his eloquent
verses on Niagara.
But if M. de Heredia is no longer Cuban
at heart, he is faithful to the mother coun-
try Spain, and has translated De Castro's
nellie.
M. de Heredia is also collectionneur,
placing in his Trophies the enamels of his
gallery, and a savant who has written
long study on the "Chroniques" of Ber-
nard Diaz.
One of NJ de Heredias most exquisite
sonnets is "BI;se Marine; in this we see
the exotic poet standing on the coast, near
est his own country, inhaling the natal air
and listening to the poetry OF the conquis-
tadores.
NJ de Heredia and Leconte de Lisle are
the two tropical poets of France. They
are often compared and both may feel hon
ored by the resemblance. l think it was
heconte de Lisle who gave the best def
milton of this resem blance. To NJ. de He
redia he said. "Vous etes I'm coloriste; je
suis un luministe."
The French critics find this definition
absolutely true. The author of "Poemes
Barbares" is dazzling in style, while one
feels that the Cuban poet comes from
country where the rain sometimes gives
shadow and where the earth is not con-
tinually parched by brilliant sun. M. de
Heredia always calls himself "the loving
pupil of Leconte de Lisle, and perhaps if
the latter had never existed we should not
have possessed the Trophies"
But M. de Heredia is a distinct person
atty. He is endowed with qualities for
which we seek vainly in the works of
Leconte de Lisle. In the slightest move
ment, he betrays his Spanish origin. A
broad style of painting and vivid coloring
are his ideas of poetic brilliancy. And as
the past lends itself best to his dream there
is nothing modern in his work-nothing
which might trouble the soul and alter the
majestic style of his verse. To him emotion
in poetry means lack of nobility. In this
M. de Heredia belongs to the group of
L. - l. l. L
priest. He has all the instincts of Par
nassian, and it seems strange that "Tro-
phees" was not published between 1868 and
$780, when the Parnassians reigned alone
But when I'm 1881 the work was published
all felt that a poet of the first rank was
born to France.
There is SO much beauty in M. de
Heredia's poems that in spite of their
heroic Alexandrines, in spite of their
solemnity, the mind of the reader is re-
posed and refreshed. He has been accused
of repetition; words, such as etincelant,
rutilant, blanc, immortel, are continually
repeated, but that is the fault of the French
language, which is very poor in synonyms.
With M. de Heredia, the word precedes
and gives birth to the thought. Northern
poets write only under the pressure of
South, and above all those of Spanish
birth, need the influence of word and
image In NJ de Heredia's writings, we
see that he makes no exception to the rule
His sonnets evidently have fallen one by
one from the divine pen OF the poet, and
from a lyric river, a mejestic sonorous
Rhone. The Rhone, here, IS not the river
which passes by Lyons and Provence; it
crosses CASTLE and Leon. But here lies
it's originality M. de Heredia occupies an
unique position in the French poetical
world, because he is as little French as
possible and in his veins flows only the
hot blood of Castilian.
BARONESS ALTHEA SALVADOR.