larger vision may confirm. In contrast to this is the feeling expressed in Stevenson's Requiem, that the world is a place for joyous work and play, from the manful exertion of which one turns at last with a sense of gratitude to his well-deserved rest. In Browning's Prospice enters the note, not found in the foregoing poems, of positive anticipation of a hereafter: death itself a struggle, to be approached not only with the confident courage that every strong man knows, but with the sustaining conviction that beyond it is the love that he began to know in his married life on earth. Finally comes Christina Rossetti's Up-hill, in which we feel that the confidence expressed is not so much courage as serenity, the rest and refreshment of the inn being the goal for which the arduous journey of life is but the preparation.

Whether or not the moods of these several poems are fairly interpreted in this brief survey, it clarifies our conception of " imagery" in poetry to observe how the different attitudes of the poems are expressed in each case figuratively. With the exception of the Requiem, which brings to the mind two pictures, a sailor and a hunter arriving home, each poem conceives of the relation of death to life under the form of a single figure, dwelt upon sufficiently to make the idea tangible, yet not so as to cloud the subtler meaning underneath.

Study. In the poems grouped under Poems on Bereavement and Death, note that some, like Highland Mary, express personal grief; others, like Glen

Almain, the Narrow Glen, impersonal loss, with a wide range of feeling between. Toward which extreme would O Captain! My Captain! be placed? Both Landor and Browning have poems expressing bereavement: do they reflect the same differences of personality noted in the poems regarding the end of their own lives? Do the poems here grouped seem to express the first poignant sense of loss, or the calmer feeling of later reflection? Does the answer point to a reason for their lasting beauty? Is the metrical quality of these poems, taken as a whole, especially appropriate?

INDIVIDUAL POETS

The results of the following studies can be at best only fragmentary, for they are based on but a small portion of the author's work; yet if allowance be made for this, and the conclusions be held tentatively, it is always possible to correct them as increasing knowledge and experience suggest. Everything that follows, then, is to be accepted only as suggestion, subject to the possibility of later revision.

I. BROWNING. It is noteworthy, first of all, that some of Browning's poems are narrative, some lyrical, -that there is a large range of interest in them. A glance at the narrative poems reveals the fact that all those in this volume relate incidents of war or siege. Was Browning primarily a singer of military exploits? Apart from the fact that the coincidence

is accidental in this case, closer observation shows that the military scene is not of chief concern to Browning, but merely the setting of his action; that the attention is on the individual man-how he conducts himself at a time that tests the quality of a man's soul. We think of Hervé Riel and Pheidippides not so much as the heroes of exciting incidents as the single-hearted men that they are, larger than their actions, great enough to do great deeds simply. In point of style it is first to be noted that the action itself, the story, is graphically portrayed, always vivid to the eye and ear. Furthermore, it is often dramatic, for the poet does more than tell the facts of his talehe imagines himself as an actor in it, and interprets the situation through that actor's personality. The reader thus becomes for the time being himself another character, and so discovers new capacities in himself to feel and will. This broadening of the imaginative life is perhaps the chief service that literature renders the sympathetic reader.

The lyrics, it will be seen at once, have much in common with the narrative poems. They too imply, if not a story, yet a situation, in which a human being speaks his thought. The poet's imagination carries him into the heart of each new scene: now he is a Cavalier, singing death and destruction to the insolent foes of the king; now a modern patriot, lamenting the desertion of a trusted leader in freedom's cause; now an Italian person of quality, meditating on the pleasures of city life.

As is natural, the style in which these poems are expressed is one of abounding vigor. Browning writes from a rich vocabulary, and he uses it freely, not hesitating to employ an expressive word because it might be thought too homely for the polite usage of poetry. There is a corresponding fulness of allusion, the outpouring of an active mind and a well-stocked memory. And so compelling is the force of the thought that it is impatient, sometimes, of the restraint of careful grammatical structure, and expresses itself in broken, chaotic sentence forms. Similarly, it is vigor and strength, sometimes rude strength, that characterizes the meter of Browning's verse, rather than smoothness and delicacy of lyric flow. But though this is perhaps the characteristic effect, it does not blind the discerning to the fact that some lyrics, like Evelyn Hope and The Lost Leader, are notable for the delicate perfection of their musical quality.

Study. Which of the poems included in this volume seem so typical of Browning that one would not imagine them written by another? Are there any that do not bear so obvious a stamp of personality? Are the poems of more broken sentence form the ones that contain the more frequent allusions? Is there any natural explanation? Is there any poet whose work seems especially different from Browning's in spirit and form? Illustrate. In the Complete Works of Browning will be found a group of poems called Dramatic Lyrics: do these poems con

firm the definition of dramatic" given above? Does Browning seem to confine himself to a small number of meters, or does he use a great variety? The poems in this volume indicate the answer, which may be confirmed by looking over a few more poems in his complete works.

II. WORDSWORTH.-The name of Wordsworth is

always connected with the idea of nature in poetry. It is not surprising, therefore, that we find that Wordsworth contributes a large share to the "Poems on the World of Nature," and that throughout practically all the other poems here included nature is felt to be a pervading interest. Yet it is not in nature for its own sake, its intrinsic charm and beauty alone, that Wordsworth is interested. Poems like the Ode to Duty and the sonnet beginning Milton! Thou shouldst be living at this hour show the poet's strong interest in human character, in high moral and spiritual standards of life. It is the relation of the two-man and nature that is the subject of the greater part of Wordsworth's poetry.

Briefly stated, it was Wordsworth's belief that sympathy with nature, and a wise understanding of her teachings, should be a leading influence in the development of man's highest nature. This understanding sympathy comes gradually: first the youthful sense of glad joy in physical contact with nature -walking, skating, climbing; then the maturer pleasure of remembered beauty, such as is expressed in The Daffodils; finally the contemplation of the deeper