New-York tribune., 1920-11-10

In music | heard
These found-but Herself
Slipped always past
Till day | saw her clear.
Captured at lastl
Rhythm of form. rhythm OF soul
Straightway l knew
/ need never seek again
Beauty was you!
JOHN V. A. wn4vzr.
In his Introductory Note to "The
Poets in the Nursery" by Charles
Powell, Mr. John Drinkwater discusses
Parody 1T will be Observed" pre-
diets Mr.. Drinkwater, "that while Mr..
Powell invariably catches his subjects
external manner with easy precision,
this is but the beginning of his art.
The underlying spiritual force never
evades him. and he measures himself
successfully against the poets impulse
as well as against it's formal express
sion" That may have been observed
" Mr.. Drinkwatcr, but no such thing
has been observed by this gazer. For
Powell, to our notion, does not be-
long in the first rank of parodists at
all, as he would if he accorded with
the Drinkwater blueprint. He is goodx
but he isn't first rate. What he does,
usually, is parody q particular poem
thing, if done we'll, which calls for
adroitncss, but calls no great critical
ability into play. Generally, Powell
parodies in the meter for which the
poet parodied is best known. In his
parody of Alfred Noyes a line reads
passed through lanes Of lilac bloom and
down arcades of emerald gloom.
Now, if there is one thing Noycs
can do it is to write lines whose ar
rangement of vowels and ccnsonants
makes them drip honey Cor, if you like,
oozc glucose); and this line of Powel's
is mouthful. The parodies Of
Kipling, Newbolt, Dobson, Yeats, Swim
burne-all of these are obvious paro-
dies with the slightest element Of real
criticism. They are good but not per-
feet. They are the sort Miss Carolyn
Wells has turned out blindfolded and
with one hand tied behind her.
For high humor ana cutting, reverent
criticism, the parodies Mother
Goose stuff-that Anthony c. Deane
wrote fifteen or twenty years ago put
Powell's to blush. Thus Deanc's no.
tion Of Sir Henry Newbolt's treatment
of II Saw Three Ships:
I saw three ships come sailing by,
And that was sight to see:
I saw three ships come sailing by,
Guarding the Land of the Free
And then uttered a stirring rhyme
nursery song pronounced sublime
For Colfngwoods all OF d future time
And Nelson's yet to be!
And his Kipling version Of "Jack
and Jill":
They have trodden.t the Way Of the Mire and
Clay, they have toied and travelled far,
They have climbed to the brow of the hilltop
now. where the bubblng fountains are.
They have taken the bucket and filled it up
yea, filled it up to the brim;
buI odVh lie SHecrcu AT MS sister Jill, and
Jill she jeered at him.
And the finest parody of Calvcrley
is QuillerCouch 1t was written in
his university days, and the book we
got it from ("Green Bays") was pub
lishcd in 1898. 1t is "Retrospection,' y
and Calvcrley never wrote his own
stuff any Calyerleyer. 1t begins:
When the hunter-star Orion
tOr, it may he, Charles his Vain
Tempts the tiny elves to try on
All their little tricks again;
When the earth Is calmly breathing
Draushts of slumbcr undcfled
And the sire, unused to teething,
Seeks for errant pins his child;
When the moon is on tho ocean,
And our little sons and heirs
From natural emotion
Wish that luminary theirs;
Then feeling hard to stihe,
Even harder to define
Makes me feel I'd give trihe
For tho days OF Aud Lang Svns.
Deceived again, and by q book store
salesman, Mr. Charles ". Wilcox