The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1903-08-04

all English morality. conjugal infidelity
established a a rule. amorous fidelity
raised 10 a duty" This remember was
after 1915. II - a bad, wicked poem, saw
age and merciless in exposure, rich in
beauty, aggressive and toTturing. Read
what Taine says OF Don JUAN and OF
its author. 1t Is the ablest and most i'm
pressive OF critical papers upon the great
poet. He thinks there Is "a arrangement
OF mind and heart in the style OF Don
Juan as in Swift. When a man tests
amidst his tears, il IS because he has a
poisoned Imagination Byron's excess
shortened his days. At thirty-six he closed
his career at Missolongki, Greece. and a
great intellect was forever quenched IN
the night of the grave. His country has
produced less than a half dozen men OF
genius his equal.
would not commend Don Juan to read
ers unless in an eXpurgatcd edition. There
is probably a third of the great poem that
is very desirable reading because OF its
fine genius and superb poetry, much OF it
among the best productions of has prolific
pen. Obsenity. ribaldry, debauchery pros
titutes and mars perhaps two-thirds Of
the long poem. 1t was never completed.
and contains over $4,000 lines. He died
Ol 1JLl EApiI IL < 4IIo CCdS hGE IdhtH
to England, but sepulture in Westminster
Abbey was refused. and in July he was
buried in the village of Hucknall, near
Newstead Abbey. His last words spoken
were IN Greek-tr2nslated, 4 must 20 to
sleep now" From it he never aWoke. In
January 22nd. 1924, was his last anniver-
sary-hiS 36th. He wrote on that occa-
sion a very pathetic poem. He had gone
to Greece to help in the liberation Of the
oppressed Greeks. The last two stanzas-
so we'll knoWn-read
If thou regrett'st thy youth, why live?
The land of honorable death.
Is here:-up to the field, and give
Away the BREATH
Seek o~ut-less often sought than found
A soldiers grave for thee the best;
Then look around, and choose thy ground,
And take thy rest
Whatever the defects Of Byron morally,
artistically, he has produced much that
will live because it richly deserves to live.
You may not admire the man, and you
may condemn and regret much that he
has left as unworthy, but there Is at least
a good duodecimo of 500 pages that is
rich in thought, splendid in expression,
magnificent and descriptive, and not
immoral, and these pages have upon them
the untadlng stamp OF perpetulty. Prot.
G.. E.. Woodberry, of Columbia College,
New York city, who IS one Of the ablest
and safest of living American critics, in
his fine volume he calls the Makers of
Literature" devotes some fourteen
pages to .|Byron's Centenary The ar
ticle as a whole is decidedly depreciatory,
but at it's close he says his poems are not
"in a true sense classic, as a whole" but
lie IS pleased to concede, that there are
qualities that nah Childe Harold and
Don Juan great, and preserve here and
there passages III other poems that
confer Immortality" Three years ago
two splendid editions of Byrof's works APP
peared in England, and many critics wrote
in laudation of him. There was something
of a Byronic revival, and it should con-
tinue. Even that great writer. Walter
Savage Landor, who hated Byron, was
compelled to concede hat he had power.
He wrote: Say what you will. once
whispered a friend of mine, there are
things in him strong as poison and origin
al as sin"
THEODORE BRYANT KINGSBURY.
Wilmington, N. c., Aug. 1, 1903.