25 MAY 1918, Page 11

THE ENGLISH SONNET.

(To THE Enrroa or TER • " SPECTATOR."3 SIR,—Your interesting and sympathetic review on May 4th of Mr. Crosland's The English Sonnet recalls to memory a criticism —of no mean value—by T. E. Brown. It occurs on p. 81, Vol. II., of the Letters: "A. shapely sonnet ought, I fancy, to pile up the octave as a stem, avoiding rhythmic changes; then the sestet should blossom out iu rhyme like a rich corolla." Pictured in this way we have a strong plea for liberty of rhyme in the sestet, forbidding only a final couplet. I should like to press on Mr. Crosland the beauty of the "a-b-c-o-b-a " form. The last line, throwing back its rhyme to the first line, gives a rounded com- pleteness very suggestive of the perfect bloom of a flower.—I am,