The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1909-07-06

cal PAPER on a very gifted and famOuS
Brit sh female author. Christina RIOS
Setti, by a. DISTINGUISHED literary critic.
Edmund Gosse, in which he said that
no woman has eve taken a very
prominent position in the h story Of
poetry" He points tothe fact that
Shakespeare has had no female wal.
Has he in fact ever had any male
rival? If SO whom shall be named
for the foremost place-shall 1t be
Aeschylus or EuriDides, or SoHhocles,
or any other poet OF antiquity? l be
lieve not. No french poet-no Mo
leire or Racine can possibly be called
his rival. No one of the more famOus
and richly endowed of the E~lizabethan
dramatists a be named as a rival,
clever as several !were-Ben JOnSOn,
Chapman, Marston. and Decker, pos
Sibly. and Webster and Middleton,
full Of excellence but not equal to the
four named. None Of these approach
the greatest Of all-Shakespeare. SO
if there has been no female rival of
the greatest of all poets 1t IS no rea-
son for their deprivation. But it is a
fact, nom the less. that but few
women have really ranked high as
poets. They have written even IN
times of dearth as in times of liter
airy rival. Mr.. Gosse, a most compe-
tent critic, mentions that many times
will Sulp. cia remain to testify as to
her genius in the very time when
Juvenal and Persius fiourished, and
so glitterly satiriZed their times, He
also mentions that among the Greek
women but two had so asserted their
genius as to be included by Meleager
in that delicious garland of the poets
which was woven" by him ito be hung
outside the gate of the Gardens of the
Hesperides.' They were Sapphe and
Erinna. The poetic remains of these
two most gifted of all Greek ONE
of genius are Very scant, and would
scarcely fill two columns of the News
and Observer. if so much. OF Sappho
there is at least enough remaining to
insure the Derpetuity of her name and
thus to hand down her fame among
the lnlnOrtals as the q poet
among 81 ONE of al nations, u
tries and ages. She lives, as Mr.. GOSse
says, she lives mot by reason of the
variety or volume of her work, but
by virtue of it's intensity, its individ-
uality, its artistic p~erfecliOn.' Erinna
was praised by the Greeks, and five
hundred years after, the critic speaks
of still hearing the SWannOle of EIrinna
clear above the jangling chatter of the
joys. and of still thinking hose three
hundred heXameter verses sung by a
girl of nineteen as lovely as the love-
Hest of Homer's." Possibly something
strained is this praise Of three hun
dred lines of SO young of so gifted a
poet. OF the waits and trays of
Sappho scholars ard critics are agreed
as to their beauty and very rare
charm. They bewail the loss of the
greater part of her productions, and
think hat if all had been preserved
they would have constituted a great
glory among Greek masterpieces. SO
the world is a great loser. Mr.. j. A.
r-@1l 80. --.4.
of fine gifts, says I'VE must be thank
full for any two words of Sappho
that are Of authentic juXtaposition."
so precious is the porcelain of her eX-
quisite verse. Mr.. SymOnS was emf
nently a learned, discriminating ana
eloquent critic in Greek poetry. He
holds that 1.-The world has suffered
no greater literary loss than the loss
Of Sappho's poems. SO perfect are
the smallest fragments preserved in
Bergh's collection. that we must be in
sad rapture of establishment to think
what the complete poems must have
been" h ranked immensely high,
evidently with the greatest of her
cOuntrymen. Mr.. SymOnS says she
was spoken Of as "The Poetess," just
as Homer was called 1.-The Poet" He
says Aristotle placed her in 1.-The same
rank with Homer and Archiloohns.'
and Plato mentioned her "as the
tenth Muse" Take other evidences
Of estimate: "Solon, hearing one of
her poems, prayed that he might not
see death till he had learned it,
StratO speaks of her genius with re-
HgiOus 1--WE Longinus cites her love
ode as a specimen of pOetical sublim-
ity.' Others praised her in exalted
strains. No where is a hint whisper
ed that her poetry was but per-
feet" In her art she was unerring,
holds Symonds, who says also that
beside her Alcaens pales." Those
who were the most competent were
her greatest admirers, and spoke in
most marked emphasis of her glories,
her beauties, her marvellous art.
Among her thief lovers was the wond-
erful Roman Horace. Her style
must AVE been wonderful To have