Newark post., 1914-04-15
ART AND EXPRESSION ON A FARM :.

81 met the Dell with the cloven
hoof, the cloven hoof,
| met the Dell with the cloven
hoof,
On the Braes Of Killiecrankie, O."
When the later winter winds are
stilled and soft-breathing southern
airs come stealing through the tree
tops; when the little open spaces of
the wood are hot as in summer time
under the spring sun; when the
blue Of wings, the gold Of the rob-
in breast is seen through the will
lowy branches and earth is vibrant
with its millioned matings and
happy in bringing forth flowers
and hidden wealth Of leaves, then
human beings forget the rules of
church and custom, move forth
under the impulse of primal needs
and enter into joys such as the
bound slaves Of books and wheels do
not know. AS play to the school
boy, as music and dancing to a girl,
so to the tired soul Of man, over
worn by long days Of close atten-
tions, is the walk on the hills when
all is mysterious with new life;
when waters, cool and clear, slip
forward and around the turns of
brook-paths toward the rivers and
the seas, when the great heart of
Natures God is drawing all from
lesser things that they may see
with their eyes and hear with their
ears Of miracles ushered into view
with dawn.
And always, from the earliest
days, the moralists have, unless Of
a high order Of mind, feared the in
fuence Of spring. The Greeks made
a fable and then believed it, of crea-
lures that were half men, half goats
who roamed the woods, spirits in
carnate of the adventurous pas
sion. They put nymphs by every
fountain, gave every tree beauti-
full spirit of dwell in it, and fash
ioned in their poetry lesser gods
for each river. They did not warn
against these fancied beings very
much, but our civilization, if it ac-
cepted the stories as true, would
condemn them all indeed it has,
The old Greek Pan, the diety who
roamed the hills and wales of an
cient Already, leading the dances
of the nymphs, chasing the swift
footed deer and wild things Of the
wood, making music by the reedy
marshes or startling travellers into
panic fear, is now our Devil, pic
tured, alas, no more among the ten
drilled vines and bowling lilies and
sweet odors Of river banks that
bloom with violets, but as sitting
amid dust and ashes and amending
flame; consigned by a too Puritan
ical morality to the shores of unpro-
ductive seas, no longer worshipped
with reed-made lutes, but fouted by
the strictly good and reviled by
Billy Sunday.
Yet, after all, it is not the Devil,
an evil heather power, which walks
abroad these early spring days and
meets the robin coming back from
magnolia blooms, the bluebird in
its northern search for resting room
and the hermit thrush, shy and di-
vine amid her towering trees. It is
God, the living, breathing, loving
God, Almighty, infinite, pure and
holy, who has set the glow amid the
hazels, warmed with passion. the
heart OF weary men and longing
women, drawn the seven-wondered
mists from greening valleys when
the sun has come in April and
made mankind forget it's rules in
the universal passion for youth,
boyhood, girlhood, odors of grass
and earth, sweetness Of new resolve,
glory of the romance which mas
ters all the earth. l would rather be