THIS WEEK'S BOOKS
Miss Nainaiaa CRANE, the baby laureate of New York, who is now thirteen years old, has rightly found a place in Messrs. Cape's revised and enlarged edition of Modern American Poetry, edited by Mr. Unterineyer (15s.). Here is a specimen of this prodigy's use of odd images :
" The angels grow quite wistful over worldly things below, They hear the hurdy-gurdies in the Candle Makers' Row ; They listen for the laughter from the attics of the earth, They lower pails from heaven's wall to catch the milkmaids' mirth."
The volume ranges from 1830 to the present day and Mr. Unterrneyer's prefatory criticisms, are clear, cogent, apt —in short, models of their kind. What could be said better of Mr. Vachel Lindsay than that he will not live, as a prophet or politician but that " the vitality which impels the best of his galloping metres will persist?" What do our English poets make Of his " Congo," or of Mr. Sandburg's " Hog-butcher of the World ? . They might read and reflect on some of this modern American poetry.
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