Welsh Journals

ting melodies, the warmth and colour of the har- monies, the exquisite tenor solo Onaway, awake beloved," the masterly orchestration and the uncon- ventional treatment of the whole, announced without fear of contradiction that a master had arrived, and we were tempted with Jaeger of the Musical Times to repeat Schumann's saying Hats off, gentlemen, a genius." Again at the Albert Hall in March, 1900, when the "Trilogy" was first performed, the impression made upon us was such as to make us leap for joy. We felt that here at last was a British composer not too tespectable to be emotional. Later Coleridge-Taylor became the most popular of English adjudicators in the Principality, and his keen criticisms-always couched in gentlemanly terms-were highly appreciated by competitors. Mr. Sayers has bestowed much loving care on this book, and on the whole it is admirably written. The composer's career is traced minutely from its earliest days at Croydon to the tragic end thirty-seven years later, and it provides most interesting reading. The struggles of the early days, the kindness of his benefactor Colonel Walters, his later triumphs and occasional disappointments are sympathetically re- lated. The author writes from the fullness of knowledge, and with that sympathy which helps us to understand the artists' point of view. We owe him a debt of gratitude for the able way in which he has performed his task. "Oxford Poetry, 1915." B. H. Blackwell. Oxford. Pp. 72. It would be a curious and interesting study to collect the poems of young men in England year by year from the time of Elizabeth. No surer guide to literary fashion could possibly be imagined. Youth is at once imitative and desirous of originality, and in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred it allows the one free play and gives itself the illusion of the other, either by following the very latest fashion. In a rather charmingly naive way, Mr. T. W. Earp's little poem Departure" expresses this desire. I have been reading books for about twenty years I have laughed with other men's laughter, wept with their tears Life has been a cliche all these years. I would find a gesture of my own. D.E. Of course, the gesture of your own is not to be found, by starting a line with a small letter or any- thing quite so simple as that. What is wanted is a thought or emotion of your own, and the gesture will come of itself. But it is true, as every young man who has ever tried to write poetry knows, that the great natural longing is to find that gesture, and the great apparent drawback, is the amount of books one has read and continues to read. If such a collection as I suggest were made, there would be discovered one difference between our age and all others, except one that is really noteworthy. You would find that in the age of Dr. Donne, for instance, most of the young men were young Donnes in the age of Dryden, Dry- dens in the age of Pope, Popes in that of Dr. Johnson, Johnsons then follows the other great exception; in the age of Tennyson, Tennyson and Swinburne, Swinburnes. Now, as in the age between Dr. Johnson and Tennyson, the influences are far more diverse. In this volume, for instance, the influence of Belloc, Rupert Brooke, the Vorticists, Fletcher, Mallarmé, many older poets may be seen. The similarity between this age and the other of like significance is, to say the least of it, hopeful. Technically, much of the work in these poems is first rate, especially in the use of accent. It is about time that some learned man wrote a book on the use of accent in modern poetry, for on the technical side it is long since such significant advances have been made in English verse. And the book contains at least one fine poem by H. C. Harwood (Balliol), The Prayer of the Virgin Mary," of which this is the first verse Give me the strength for one more day — To do the ordinary things To scrub and cook and watch and pray, -And tranquilly at night to sing A lullaby to Jim and John And memories to the boy who's gone. For the rest, Dorothy L. Sayers (Somerville) shows at least an extraordinary virtuosity in her management of the Lay." And Esther Lilian Duff, Godfrey Elton, Naomi M. Haldane, Robert Nichols, Rd. Huxley, and Steward Vines, are clever and honest craftsmen. Tales by Polish Authors." Translated by Else C. M. Benecke. Published by B. H. Blackwell, Oxford. 3s. 6d. net. This little book gives translations of short tales by four different Polish authors, only one of whom- Sienkiewicz represented by Bartek the Con- queror "-is at all well known in England; the