selves and one another, match and
hang together somehow.

All things are either a fore-
shadowing of an echo, which may
be the principal secret of, and a key
to, the great mysterious art of
novel-writing, at present in a
slump.

When Elizabeth Roberts dead,
twenty years later, and someone in-
formed me of what her fatal ill-
ness had been: a kind of infe-
tious eczema sometimes as destructive
as leprosy, I suddenly recalled that
phantom wedding ring, sentimental
Equivalent of Christ-inspired wows,
physical damage brought about by
the extreme virtues and the bad-

# A Personal Note about Miss Roberts

BY GLENWAY WESCOTT

MY PLEASURE in her work has never gone stale, and I am still taken by surprise by passages that I remember, almost word for word. None of the slight edges of enthusiasm have worn away. Indeed rereading is more mysteriously exciting than the original spell when it was cast. It may be that the reasons for admiration are never very clear until it has grown systematic, until it begins to cool; it may be merely that I do not know how to urge others to love what I love, not having been altruistic enough to learn. In any case, more than once, wishing to praise Miss Roberts, I have just disappointed myself badly. She has done me the honor to be my friend; and fumbling tiresomely with the pompous or the abstract or the precious words which are all one has to describe writing itself, I imagine that the mystery lies no less in the writer and might thus be touched upon, indirectly.

It is hard with modern reasonableness to characterize a poet, as such! Needless to say I use the word "poet" in the sense which may include a writer of prose and excludes most versifiers. It is hard to find an image which will sufficiently stand for the more glorious extremes of that profession, as during centuries without much sense of humor it was conceived, as indeed—amid the mere fiction-manufacturers, masters of pastimes and pastiches, worldly observers, hacks, academicians, engendering books out of books alone—it still sparsely goes on being practised. I often think of the oracle, mystery's mouthpiece or human megaphone in Greece, the gaunt stark person on a tripod, drunken: its intellect not quite self-possessed, being possessed of and by something superior to itself; its message

ning, unregretted⁵, unenacted, un-
enactable passions, even false
passions; and it made me shiver.

All things are either a fore-
shadowing of an echo, which may
be the principal secret of, and a key
to, the great mysterious art of
novel-writing, at present in a
stump.

When Elizabeth Roberts died,
twenty years later, and someone in-
formed me of what her fatal ill-
ness had been: a kind of infe-
tions eczema sometimes as destructive
as leprosy, I suddenly recalled that
phantom wedding ring, sentimental
Equivalent of Christ-inspired wounds,
physical damage brought about by
the extreme virtues and the bur-

BY GLENWAY WESCOTT

It is hard with modern reasonableness to characterize a poet, as such! Needless to say I use the word “poet” in the sense which may include a writer of prose and excludes most versifiers. It is hard to find an image which will sufficiently stand for the more glorious extremes of that profession, as during centuries without much sense of humor it was conceived, as indeed—amid the mere fiction-manufacturers, masters of pastimes and pastiches, worldly observers, hacks, academicians, engendering books out of books alone—it still sparsely goes on being practised. I often think of the oracle, mystery’s mouthpiece or human megaphone in Greece, the gaunt stark person on a tripod, drunken: its intellect not quite self-possessed, being possessed of and by something superior to itself; its message

Ving, unregretted, unenacted, un-
enactable passions, even false
passions; and it made me shiver.