The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1896-09-19

BY those free singers. when the world was
young.
For still the world is young. for still the
! spring
hours
Bring back the month of flowers.
SONGS OF THE CITY.
| But the songs of this volume are the
songs of two worlds. Hence not only OF
the world of Nature does our poet sing.
| but also of the world of Man, who
is greater than Nature, as the tenant Is
greater than the house in which he
dwells. 1t is impossible to study his
verse without discerning his deep SYM
pathy with humanity, alike in its more
piteous aspects as they confront us in
our great cities. or in the anxious ques-
tioning which burdens the mind of the
| thinker in his outlook on the myster-
| les of life.
The spectacle of human misery and
human fall is ever with him. 1.-The still
sad music offs humanity" haunts
| him with it's pathetic and sorrowful
refrain. Soiled human doves as they
fit by him bring pain upon their
wings. Weeds of the city on which
| Gods tender dews scarce seem to fall
\ sadden his steps. Lives which from
their poisoned fountains flow polluted
to the sea oppress him with their hope
| lcssness. Indeed, we are inclined to
think that it is in this deep moral SYM
pathy, this feeling of brotherhood, this
| tender outlook on the suffering world,
| that his truest claim to greatness
rests. In his poem entitled est. Christie
pher' he tells us. behind the veil of
his hero, how he moved amid the miry
ways of this sad world'' for ever bur-
dened with
| The great pain
Which everywhere cries heavenward ev-
| cry day
With unregarded suffrage: the foul
| wrongs
Which are done on earth for ever; the
| dark sins
sinned and yet unrequited the great sum
! And mystery of EVIL, worked on him
Not to allure, not to repel. but only
With that strange spell Of power which
| knows to take
| The strong soul captive.
In another poem of great beauty called
"The Food for Song" he asks to what
subject he shall strike his Tyre. Shall
he sing of Nature with her blue dome
flecled with pcarly cloudlets? Shall
he sing of knightly tournaments and the
awful joys of battle? Shall he attune
his voice to the low thunder of
| Thoughts unfathomed sea?
Nay
Rather amid the throng
OF toiling men
| He finds the food and sustenance of song,
Spread by hidden hands, again, and yet
again,
Where'er he goes by crowded city street.
He fares thro springing fancies sad and
sweet
Some innocent baby smile;
n close-wound waist:
Fathers and children; things of shame and
guile;
Dim eyes, and lips at parting kissed in
| haste;
The halt, the blind, the prosperous thing
The thief, the wanton. touch and vex him
| still.
EPIC OF HADEs."
| 1t was In the year 1876 that Sir Lewis
| Morris published the first instalment of
| the poem which constitutes his truest
title to enduring fame. In the classic
| legends of Greece he found q sphere
specially suited for the exercise of that
eXquisitet delicacy of touch. and that
pictorial grace which had already re-
vealed itself in his best work. In the
Epic of Hades" he has made those
fair and gracious fantasies" of Greek
mythology the theme of his verse.
Marsyas and Andromeda. Helen and
| Eurydic. Adonis and Medusa, Psyche
| and Eudymion, with others in their
train, come forth to enchant us with
| the strange witchery which for two
thousand years has led captive the
| hearts Of men. The poet represents
| himself as Hades in q dream; and
passing from place to place in that
realm Of shades, he sees the forms of
those whose names are enshrined in
the mythology of ancient Greece. and
from their lips he hears their story
| That is fine touch in which he pic
lures the souls in Hades as dim and
pale as the young faith which made
Them" His dream Is all the way
through half mixed with waking
| thoughts, and, as consequence of this,
lessons are drawn from these fantasies
of the ancient time full Of suggestive
ness for the modern day, and of
thoughtful application to the common
experience of life. The poet scorns the
thought that these stories of the dim
past have no present significance. On
the contrary, he holds that Greek
mythology abOunds with truths which
are unfading and eternal, and which
will ever find an echo in the deep heart
of man.
How should any hold
Those precious scriptures only oldworld
tales
OF strange impossible torments and false
| gods;
OF men and monsters in some brainless
| dream,
Coherent. yet unmeaning. linked together
BY some false skein of song?
| Nay! evermore
All things and thoughts, both new and
old, are writ
Upon the unchanging human heart and
soul.
The weary woman
Sunk deep in ease and sated with her life.
Much loved and yet unloving. pines today
AS Helen: still the poet strives and sings,
And hears Apollo's music and grows
dumb,
And suffers, yet is happy; still the young
Fond dreamer seeks his high ideal love,
And finds her name Is Death; still doth
| the fair
And innocent life, bound naked to the
| rock,
Redeem the race: still the gay tempter
goes
And leaves his victim. stone; still doth
| pain bind
Mems souls in closer links of lovingness,
Than Death itself can sever; still the sight
OF too great beauty blinds US, and we lose
The sense Of earthly splendours, gaining
| Heaven.
1t is after this fashion that these an
cient fables are spiritualized, while
from the first line to the last a high
| and 1a1ina "a nil